DEIRDRE. — _gathering her things together with an outburst of excitement._ — I will dress like Emer in Dundealgan, or Maeve in her house in Connaught. If Conchubor’ll make me a queen, I’ll have the right of a queen who is a master, taking her own choice and making a stir to the edges of the seas. . . . Lay out your mats and hangings where I can stand this night and look about me. Lay out the skins of the rams of Connaught and of the goats of the west. I will not be a child or plaything; I’ll put on my robes that are the richest, for I will not be brought down to Emain as Cuchulain brings his horse to the yoke, or Conall Cearneach puts his shield upon his arm; and maybe from this day I will turn the men of Ireland like a wind blowing on the heath. [_She goes into room. Lavarcham and Old Woman look at each other, then the Old Woman goes over, looks in at Deirdre through chink of the door, and then closes it carefully._ OLD WOMAN. — _in a frightened whisper._ — She’s thrown off the rags she had about her, and there she is in her skin; she’s putting her hair in shiny twists. Is she raving, Lavarcham, or has she a good right turning to a queen like Maeve? LAVARCHAM. — _putting up hanging very anxiously._ — It’s more than raving’s in her mind, or I’m the more astray; and yet she’s as good a right as another, maybe, having her pleasure, though she’d spoil the world. OLD WOMAN. — _helping her._ — Be quick before she’ll come back. . . . Who’d have thought we’d run before her, and she so quiet till tonight. Will the High King get the better of her, Lavarcham? If I was Conchubor, I wouldn’t marry with her like at all. LAVARCHAM. Hang that by the window. That should please her, surely. When all’s said, it’s her like will be the master till the end of time. OLD WOMAN. — _at the window._ — There’s a mountain of blackness in the sky, and the greatest rain falling has been these long years on the earth. The gods help Conchubor. He’ll be a sorry man this night, reaching his dun, and he with all his spirits, thinking to himself he’ll be putting his arms around her in two days or three. LAVARCHAM. It’s more than Conchubor’ll be sick and sorry, I’m thinking, before this story is told to the end. [_Loud knocking on door at the right._ LAVARCHAM. — _startled._ — Who is that? NAISI. — _outside._ — Naisi and his brothers. LAVARCHAM. We are lonely women. What is it you’re wanting in the blackness of the night? NAISI. We met a young girl in the woods who told us we might shelter this place if the rivers rose on the pathways and the floods gathered from the butt of the hills. [_Old Woman clasps her hands in horror._ LAVARCHAM. — _with great alarm._ — You cannot come in. . . . There is no one let in here, and no young girl with us. NAISI. Let us in from the great storm. Let us in and we will go further when the cloud will rise. LAVARCHAM. Go round east to the shed and you’ll have shelter. You cannot come in.