"Here is the eight of spades. Achilles is dragging Hector, chained to his car, around the walls of Troy; lower down a woman is kneeling before a tomb. Your husband, like the Trojan hero, must have died a violent death, probably upon the scaffold. But here is a singular thing, on the same card: opposite the weeping woman the bones of Pelops are crossed above the talisman of the moon, which means, 'Happy fatality.' To a great misfortune will succeed good fortune which is even greater."
Josephine smiled.
"That belongs to the future and therefore I cannot answer for it."
"You have two children?" asked the sibyl.
"Yes, madame."
"A son and a daughter?"
"Yes."
"See here on the same card, the ten of diamonds, your son takes a resolution without consulting you, which is of the greatest importance, not in itself, but in its results.
"On the bottom of this card is one of the talking oaks of the forest of Dodona, as you see; Jason is lying in its shade and listening. What does he hear? The voice of the future which your son heard when he decided upon that step which he has just taken.