o see if
she can espy Jose. The girls urge her not to go too far; to keep out
of Jose's way, but she refuses point blank.

"Leave the fight and Escamillo? Not for twenty Joses. Here I am, and
here I stay," she declares. Everybody but Carmen thinks of the fortune
in the cave: death, death, death! But gradually the great crowd passes
into the amphitheatre, and Carmen has promised Escamillo to await him
when he shall come out triumphant; and Escamillo has no sooner bade
Carmen good-bye than Jose swings into the square in search of Carmen.

Carmen sees him and watches him. He does not look angry. As a matter
of fact he has gone through so much sorrow (the death of his mother,
and the jeers of his friends) that he has sought Carmen only with
tenderness in his heart. He now goes up to her and tells her this.

"Indeed, I thought you had come to murder me."

"I have come to take you away from these gipsies and smugglers. If you
are apart from them you will do better. I love you and want you to go
away from here, and together we will begin over and try to do better."

Carmen looks at him and laughs. Suddenly she hears cheering from the
amphitheatre and starts toward it. Jose interposes.

"You let me alone. I want to go in----"

"To see Escamillo----"

"Why not--since I love him----"

"How is that?"

"As I said----" At this, a blind rage takes possession of Don Jose.
All his good purposes are forgotten. For a moment he still pleads with
her to go away, and she taunts him more cruelly. Then in a flash
Jose's knife is drawn, another flash and Carmen's fortune is verified:
she falls dead at the entrance to the amphitheatre, just as the crowd
is coming out, cheering the victorious Escamillo. Jose falls beside
her, nearly mad with grief for what he has done in a fit of rage,
while Escamillo comes out, already fascinated by some other girl, and
caring little that Carmen is dead--except that the body is in the way.
Jose is under arrest, Carmen dead, and the great crowd passes on,
cheering:

"Escamillo, Escamillo forever!"

DEKOVEN

Smith and DeKoven, who have made countless thousands laugh, are living
still, and will very likely continue to do gracious things for the
comic-opera-loving public.

The very imperfect sketch of the opera, "Robin Hood," given in this
book, is lacking in coherence and in completeness in every way, but a
prompt-book, being necessary properly to give the story, is not
obtainable. Rathe