At last, Livette speaks. She tells him everything; the gipsy's first appearance, her refusal to give her the oil she asked for insolently, with jeering remarks about extreme unction; then of the ominous spell she cast upon her, realized even now perhaps; the change in her Renaud's character, his coldness, his flight; and then, that very morning, the scene of the snakes; how she had been attracted--partly by curiosity, no doubt, but also by her conviction that she should hear something of Renaud. And how she gave her hand to the gipsy to have her fortune told! That, she had done against her inclination! She knew that it was wrong. Who would have dared say a moment before that she would commit such a sin? But she was afraid of seeming cowardly, not because of what the world would say, but because of _her_, the gitana, in whose presence she deemed it her duty to display pride and courage. She felt that she was very hostile to her. She was afraid of her, and yet, in her despite, she would defy her. She was the stronger of the two.--At last, she arrives at her most shocking avowal--she is jealous. A terrible thought has come into her mind; is it possible that Renaud could----? But no. Did he not, to save her from Rampal, risk his life by leaping down from a first-floor window the whole height of the house? To be sure, Rampal had stolen a horse from Renaud, and Renaud had been looking for him for a long time---- Livette is undone. She has glanced at Monsieur le curé, who, before replying, is listening to his own thoughts, in order not to be diverted from the matter in hand. He is still playing with his clasped fingers, making them revolve about one another. Around them the swans, the pelican, the red flamingo, the petrel, the ibis, look on with their eyes of glass imbedded in those heads that have lived! There they stand, those phantom birds, with wings outspread and one claw put forward, exactly similar in shape, color, and plumage to the birds that are soaring above the Nile and the Ganges, beyond seas, at this moment, and no less like other birds that lived six thousand years ago. The reptile on the ceiling, laughing down at them with his numerous long, sharp teeth, does, in very truth, resemble some one a little--but whom? Livette, as she puts the question to herself, suddenly comes to the conclusion that she is insane, utterly insane, to have had such an idea! She smiles at it herself. And she seems to _feel_ her smile. She does feel it. She fancies she can see it! And at the moment she is conscious of a sensation--and a painful sensation it is--of being there, in that same room, surrounded by those creatures and in the presence of a priest--_for the second time in her life_!