Trotaconventos: There, my brave lads, I told you! Caught in the act ... the new Don Juan Tenorio and his veiled concubine!
Don Manuel de Lara: Silence, you filthy, bawdy hag! (glares at her.) Here stand I, Don Manuel de Lara, and here stands a very noble lady of Spain and a bride of Christ, and here is my sword. Who will lay hands on us? You, Don Priest, pallid and gibbering? You, vile old woman, whose rotten bones need but a touch to crumble to dust and free your black soul for hell? You ... (his eyes rest on the alguaciles). Why! By the rood ... ’tis Sancho and Domingo and Pedro! Old comrades, you and I, beneath the rain of heaven and of Moorish arrows have buried our dead; we have sat by the camp-fire thrumming our lutes or capping riddles (laughs). How does it go? “I am both hot and cold, and fish swim in me without my being a river,” and the answer is a frying-pan ... and in the cold dawn of battle we have kneeled side by side and eaten God’s Body.
The alguaciles smile sheepishly and stand shuffling their feet.
Trotaconventos: At him! At him, good lads! What is his sword to your three knives and cudgels? Remember, you carry a warrant with Don Pedro’s seal.
Sancho (dubiously): ’Tis true, captain, we carry a royal warrant for your apprehension.
Trotaconventos: At him! At him!
Don Manuel de Lara: At me then! Air! Fire! Water! A million million banners of green leaves! A mighty army of all the lovers who have ever loved! Come, then, and fight them in me! You, too, were there that day when the whole army saw the awful ærial warrior before whom the Moors melted like snow ... what earthly arrows could pierce his star-forged mail? I, too, have been a journey to the stars. I wait! At me!
The alguaciles stand as if hypnotised.
Trotaconventos: Rouse yourselves, you fools! Oh, he’s a wonder with his stars and his leaves. Why, on his own showing, he is but a tumbler at a fair in a suit of motley covered with spangles, or a Jack-in-the-green at a village May-day. Come to your senses, good fellows; we can’t stay here all night.