"You'll be committing murder next, if you look like that," she laughs. "Well, you are not very good company. Hello, there! Mercedes, Frasquita--anybody instead of this fool--let's amuse ourselves. Get the cards. Let us tell our fortunes, eh?" The three girls gather about the table; the other two shuffle and cut. The cards turn out well for them. Carmen watches them. After a moment she reaches for the pack. She is very nonchalant about it, and glances at Jose as she shuffles the cards. Then she sits half upon the table and cuts. A glance! a moment of sudden fear! she has cut death for herself! The blow has come to her in her most reckless moment. After an instant's pause she sings with a simple fatalism in voice and manner: In vain to shun the answer that we dread. She cuts the cards again and yet again. Still her dreadful fate appears. "There is no hope," she murmurs to herself, as El Dancairo starts up and cries: "'Tis time to be off. The way is clear. Come." The others, headed by Remendado and El Dancairo, file down the path, leaving Don Jose alone in the cave. It is a dismal scene: the loneliness of Jose, the menace of death in the air! While Jose sits with bowed head, a girl's figure rises behind the rocks, and almost at the same moment there appears the form of a man, as well. Jose hears the rolling of the stones beneath their feet and starts up, musket in hand. Just as he rises, he sees the man's head. The girl cries out as he fires upon the man, and misses him; then she crouches down behind the rock. It is Michaela, come to find Jose wherever he may be. She knows of his disgrace; it is killing his mother. The lonely old woman is dying. Michaela has come to fetch him, if he has not lost all memory of gentler hours. As Jose fires, the man shouts. "Hey, there! what are you about?" "What are _you_ about? What do you want up here?" "If you were not so ready with your gun, my friend, you are more likely to find out. I'm Escamillo the Toreador." "Oh, well, then come up. I know you and you are welcome enough, but you run a fearful risk, let me tell you. You haven't sought very good company, I suppose you know." "I don't care particularly; because, my friend, I am in love, if you want to know." "Do you expect to find her here?" "I am looking for her," Escamillo returns, complaisantly. "These women are all gipsies." "Good enough: so is Carmen." "Carmen!" Jose cries, his heart seeming to miss a beat. "That's her name. She had a lover up here--a soldier who deserted from his troop to join her--but that's past history. It's all up with him now." Jose listens and tries not to betray himself. "Do you know that when a rival tries to take a gipsy girl from her lover there is a price to pay?" he tries to ask with some show of tranquillity. "Very well, I am ready." "A knife thrust, you understand," Jose mutters, unable to hide his emotion. He hates Escamillo so much that he is about to spring upon him.