Page:Popular story of Blue Beard, or, The effects of female curiosity.pdf/20

( 20 ) two minutes more, and then addressed her sister, "Dear Anne, do you see any one coming yet?"

"I see," said her sister, "a cloud of dust rising a little to the left."

I breathless agitation, she cried, "Do you think it is my brothers?"

"Alas! no, my dearest Fatima," returned her sister, "it is only a flock of sheep."

Again the voice of blue beard was heard, and she begged for one minute longer. She then called out for the last time, "Sister Anne, do you see no one coming yet?"

Her sister quickly answered, "I see two men on horseback, but they are still a great way off."

The hope of deliverance made Fatima exclaim, in the ecstasy of the moment, "Thank Heaven! thank Heaven! I shall yet he saved, for it must be my two brothers!—my dearest sister, make every signal in your power to hasten them forward, or they will be too late to prevent my fate."

Blue Beard's patience being now exhausted, he burst open the door in a rage, and made a blow with his scimitar at the wretched Fatima, with the intention of striking off her head; but she sprang close to him and evaded