"Ah, indeed! Well, I think you need her. I advise you to return to her." Don José needed her more than he knew.
"And if I went back—what about you?"
"Me? What about me, pray? I stay where I belong—with my friends."
"Then you expect me to give you up, for whom I have lost all that I had in life!" Realizing that he has given so much for so little, his bitterness becomes uncontrollable, and though he says nothing, Carmen surprises a horrid look on his face.
"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 José 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 José alone in the cave. It is a dismal scene: the loneliness of José, the menace of death in the air!