Page:Story of Blue Beard, or, The effects of female curiosity.pdf/7

 was two or three times in danger of breaking her neck.

When she reached the door of the closet, she stopped for a few moments to think of the charge her husband had given her, and that he would not fail to keep his word in punishing her very severely, should she disobey him. But she was so very curious to know what was in the inside, that she determined to venture in spite of every thing.

She accordingly, with a trembling hand, put the key into the lock, and the door immediately opened. The window-shutters being closed, she at first saw nothing; but in a short time she perceived that the floor was covered with clotted blood, on which the bodies of several dead women were lying. These were all the wives whom Blue Beard had married and murdered, one after another. She was ready to sink with fear, and the key of the closet door, which she held in her hand, fell on the floor. When she had somewhat recovered from her fright, she took it up, locked the door, and hastened to her own room, that she might have a little time to get into humour for amusing her visitors; but this she found impossible, so greatly was she terrified by what she had seen.

As she observed that the key of the closet had got stained with blood in falling on the floor, she wiped it two or three times over to