DUNOIS [_pacing_] Blue bird, blue bird, since I am friend to thee, change thou the wind for me. No: it does not rhyme. He who has sinned for thee: that’s better. No sense in it, though. [_He finds himself close to the page_] You abominable boy! [_He turns away from him_] Mary in the blue snood, kingfisher color: will you grudge me a west wind? A SENTRY’S VOICE WESTWARD. Halt! Who goes there? JOAN’S VOICE. The Maid. DUNOIS. Let her pass. Hither, Maid! To me! _Joan, in splendid armor, rushes in in a blazing rage. The wind drops; and the pennon flaps idly down the lance; but Dunois is too much occupied with Joan to notice it._ JOAN [_bluntly_] Be you Bastard of Orleans? DUNOIS [_cool and stern, pointing to his shield_] You see the bend sinister. Are you Joan the Maid? JOAN. Sure. DUNOIS. Where are your troops? JOAN. Miles behind. They have cheated me. They have brought me to the wrong side of the river. DUNOIS. I told them to. JOAN. Why did you? The English are on the other side! DUNOIS. The English are on both sides. JOAN. But Orleans is on the other side. We must fight the English there. How can we cross the river? DUNOIS [_grimly_] There is a bridge. JOAN. In God’s name, then, let us cross the bridge, and fall on them. DUNOIS. It seems simple; but it cannot be done. JOAN. Who says so? DUNOIS. I say so; and older and wiser heads than mine are of the same opinion. JOAN [_roundly_] Then your older and wiser heads are fatheads: they have made a fool of you; and now they want to make a fool of me too, bringing me to the wrong side of the river. Do you not know that I bring you better help than ever came to any general or any town? DUNOIS [_smiling patiently_] Your own? JOAN. No: the help and counsel of the King of Heaven. Which is the way to the bridge? DUNOIS. You are impatient, Maid. JOAN. Is this a time for patience? Our enemy is at our gates; and here we stand doing nothing. Oh, why are you not fighting? Listen to me: I will deliver you from fear. I— DUNOIS [_laughing heartily, and waving her off_] No, no, my girl: if you delivered me from fear I should be a good knight for a story book, but a very bad commander for the army. Come! let me begin to make a soldier of you. [_He takes her to the water’s edge_]. Do you see those two forts at this end of the bridge? the big ones? JOAN. Yes. Are they ours or the goddams’? DUNOIS. Be quiet, and listen to me. If I were in either of those forts with only ten men I could hold it against an army. The English have more than ten times ten goddams in those forts to hold them against us. JOAN. They cannot hold them against God. God did not give them the land under those forts: they stole it from Him. He gave it to us. I will take those forts. DUNOIS. Single-handed? JOAN. Our men will take them. I will lead them. DUNOIS. Not a man will follow you. JOAN. I will not look back to see whether anyone is following me.