Djali spells out “Phoebus” with letters

Djali’s spelling of Phoebus’s name turns a goat’s practiced trick into an unintended disclosure. The alphabet performance exposes Esmeralda’s attachment to the captain before the assembled household, and Fleur-de-Lys’s recognition of a rival brings the scene to a sudden, personal crisis.

The Alphabet and Its Arrangement

Several minutes before the discovery, the child Bérangère had quietly coaxed Djali into a corner with a marchpane cake. While the others remained unaware, she and the goat became friendly, and Bérangère removed the bag hanging from Djali’s neck. Inside was an alphabet: each letter inscribed separately on a tiny boxwood block. She emptied the blocks onto the rush matting, turning Djali’s small collection into a scattered set of playthings.

Djali then selected letters with its golden hoof and pushed them into order. The animal showed so little hesitation that its action appeared trained rather than accidental. When the arrangement formed a word, Bérangère called the others to look. The letters read “PHOEBUS.”

Recognition and Exposure

Fleur-de-Lys ran to see the blocks and trembled. She immediately asked whether Djali had written the name. By then, the child’s exclamation had drawn the mother, the young women, Esmeralda, and the officer into the scene. The captain’s name was not obscure to those present: the young women recognized it as his, while Esmeralda’s response gave the performance a more intimate meaning.

Esmeralda turned red, then pale, and trembled before the captain, who watched her with a smile of satisfaction and amazement. Her reaction makes the spelled name more than an entertaining display: it publicly links her to Phoebus in a setting where Fleur-de-Lys is also present. Fleur-de-Lys first remarks on Esmeralda’s remarkable memory, but breaks into sobs and hides her face. She calls Esmeralda a magician; inwardly, she understands the more painful implication, that Esmeralda is her rival.

The Scene’s Reversal

Fleur-de-Lys faints, and her mother cries out for her before ordering Esmeralda away. The scene’s attention shifts at once from the goat’s orderly performance to its human consequences: the letters that had seemed like harmless play have precipitated a collapse and an accusation. The evidence does not establish that Djali’s act was intended to reveal Esmeralda’s feelings; its force lies in the contrast between the animal’s apparently deliberate spelling and the unplanned exposure it produces.

Esmeralda gathers up the blocks, signals Djali, and leaves through one door. Fleur-de-Lys is carried out through another. Their separate exits give physical form to the rupture the name has disclosed: the same brief performance brings the two women into direct emotional conflict, then sends them away in opposite directions.