BLUE BEARD
come off. As she scoured and polished without result, terror slowly grew on her face. 'Alas!' she cried, there is Blue Magic in this. Now I know my husband has consorted with fiends: his beard for one thing, this bewitched key for another. If I am not mistaken, nothing will remove the stain of foul murder from this key.'
Nevertheless, she bethought herself of many things: of sand, and pumice, and strong acid, and she tried them all upon the key; but though she wore the metal away by hard rubbing, the bloodstain still remained, for, being a magic key, it had absorbed the blood of Blue Beard's victims, and was saturated through and through with it.
She was just beginning to realise that the task was hopeless when she heard the rumble of wheels, but she still went on polishing the key, for, whatever coach was approaching, she assured herself it could not be her husband's—thank Heaven, he was not due to return yet for six weeks, and by that time she might contrive to have a new key made, exactly like the old one. But presently, when the coach drew up at the gate, and the horns sounded in her husband's style and manner, she started up with a cry of dismay, and her knees trembled with sudden fright.
Her first care was to hide the key in her bosom; then she ran out, but, for very fear, could get no farther than the head of the main stairway, where she stood clutching the stair-rail, and quaking in every limb. There, in the hall below, stood Blue Beard giving some final orders to the coachman. With a quick movement he turned, and, looking up, perceived her standing irresolute.
'Yes, it is I, my darling,' he called up gaily as he advanced to the foot of the stairs. 'Some letters reached me on the road, showing me that my long journey was unnecessary. So, you see, I have returned to your arms.'
By this time Fatima was tottering down the stairs, bent on giving him a fitting welcome; for, though she feared him more than aught else, she must try not to show it. 'Seven of them!' she kept saying to herself, as she gripped the balustrade, 'and seven and one
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