BLUE BEARD
'I mean the key of the——; yes, that's what I mean. Where is it?'
'Oh! I remember now. You said I was not to use it; so, to make sure, I took it off the bunch and put it away in a drawer of my dressing-table. I will run and fetch it.'
'Do,' said Blue Beard, and, while she ran off, he stood there looking for all the world like a blue thunder-cloud before the lightning comes.
Once out of sight Fatima paused to collect her wits. Then, having made up her mind, she ran twice up and down stairs, and finally rejoined her husband, panting heavily.
'It is not there,' she cried in dismay. 'I put it in my jewel case,—of that I'm sure,—but now it's gone. Who can have taken it? '
'Go look again,' replied Blue Beard, dangerously calm.
She ran away again, and again came running back. 'No,' she said, 'it is not there. Who can have——?'
'Silence, madam!' broke in Blue Beard. 'That was no ordinary key; and something tells me it is in your bosom now.' And, with this, he gathered her shrinking form in his rough arm, and with a rougher hand searched for, and found—the key!
'So!' he said. 'You lied to me. And—what is this? How came this blood upon the key?'
Fatima was very pale, and trembling like an aspen leaf. 'I do not know,' she replied. 'Perhaps——'
'Perhaps nothing!' roared Blue Beard in a terrible voice. 'Madam! your face tells me you are guilty. You have presumed to disobey me; to enter that room at the end of the corridor. Yes, madam; and, since you would sooner indulge your fancy for that room than obey my commands, you shall go there and stay as long as you like. Seven and one are eight, madam!'
'Mercy! Mercy!' cried Fatima, flinging herself at Blue Beard's feet. 'Do what you will with me, but do not put me in that room.'
She looked up sobbing, imploring his forgiveness; and, if a
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