"My Lord," replied the Maid, "has a book in which no clerk ever read, were he ever so clerkly."[45] What next was for the Maid to do? Orleans was delivered, but France was still under English rule. John of Bedford, "brave soldier, prudent captain, skilful diplomatist, having experience of camps and courts," was startled, but not discouraged by the rescue of Orleans. He meant to rule France for his child-king, and to rule it well; as a matter of fact, he did rule it for thirteen years, striving always "in a degree superior to his century," to bring order out of chaos, to convert the bloodstained wilderness of the conquered country into a decent and well-ordered realm. Nor was John Talbot himself one whit disheartened. He had lost some of his best men on the bloody day of the Tourelles, but he had plenty more. He had lost Orleans, but the river towns on either side of it were still his, Meung, Beaugency, Jargeau; all strongly fortified, all guarding river and high road so that no man might pass without their leave. He had retreated in excellent order from that field where his offered battle had been--strangely, he may have thought--refused by the Maid and her victorious army; he now established himself at Meung, with strong outposts at Beaugency and Jargeau, and awaited the next move on the enemy's part. Bedford, meantime, assembled in all haste another army at Paris, prepared to go to Talbot's assistance whenever need should arise. Joan knew better than to follow the orderly retreat of the English. Her own men, with all their superb courage, even with the flame of victory in their hearts, had not the training necessary for a long campaign in the open; neither was there money for it, nor provisions. Besides, her Voices had but one message for her now; she was to go to the Dauphin; he was to be crowned king, as soon as might be; then--to Paris! Leaving Dunois in charge of Orleans, Joan, with several of her followers, rode out once more, this time to Tours, whither Charles came from Chinon to meet her. It was a strange meeting. The conquering Maid, she beside whom, as she and all her followers believed, the angels of God had fought for France, rode forward, bareheaded, her glorious banner drooping in her hand, and bent humbly to her saddle-bow in obeisance. Charles bade her sit erect;[46] an eyewitness thinks that in his joy he fain would have kissed her. He might better have alighted and held her stirrup, but this would naturally not occur to him; certainly not to the Maid, who had but one thought in her loyal heart. "Gentle Dauphin," she said, "let us make haste and be gone to Rheims, where you shall be crowned king!" Now, she pleaded, was the time, while their enemies still "fled, so to speak, from themselves."[46] She added some words which well had it been for Charles if he had heeded. "I shall hardly last more than a year!" she said. "We must think about working right well this year, for there is much to do."