Of the two creatures coming towards him, the lion tamer seemed only to notice the dog. He paid no attention to the man with the faded moustache and the steamed-up glasses, an old-timer puffed up with pride at being the one to bring the message from the people down below. Except that, now that he was here, Lucien’s anger had evaporated. He couldn’t see anything, he could barely breathe, his legs felt as if they were about to give way and he had nothing to say to this circus trainer ringed by his lions’ roars. Judging from the noises coming from the large round cage, the felines were agitated and excited by the presence of the newcomers. Lucien was as surprised as his dog by the size of the beasts; they were enormous, of quite another dimension to any of the animals round about. Their mouths were as wide as tree stumps and their bodies as heavy as horses. Even from a distance the reverberation from their growls could be felt. The lions were roaring in hunger, a sound that froze the blood, and, like mountain storms, filled the listener with terror, as though they were a lamb in the mouth of a wolf. Behind the lion tamer, Lucien could make out a slab of rock, flattened like a table, a butcher’s block on which he had just cut a carcass – impossible to tell of what – into large chunks. Lucien wiped his glasses with his fingers, and was able to discern red pulsating flesh, gleaming in the sun and attracting flies. That was why the lions were roaring. Le Piqueur had arrived at a bad time, right in the middle of dinner. Yet the lion tamer stood there in front of him, still mute and blocking his view so that Lucien could not tell what species of remains lay on the large sacrificial altar. The enormous hunks of meat the lion tamer had just cut did not come from a sheep, they did not come from a goat, nor a giant ewe, nor from deer. No, what the man had just divided up must come from something very large. There was at least two hundredweight of vermilion flesh. Perhaps a cow, or maybe a fat, well-padded man. The lion tamer went on blocking Le Piqueur’s view, and then extended his hand from above. Lucien did not dare shake the huge spade-like hand because it was covered in blood, and because of the way the man was looking at him.