Countess--Will you listen to me one minute?

Count--Who is in that room?

Countess--Your page.

Count--Cherubino! The little scoundrel!--just let me catch him! I don't wonder you were so agitated.

Countess--I--I assure you we were only planning an innocent joke.

[The Count snatches the key, and goes to the dressing-room door; the Countess throws herself at his feet.]

Countess--Have mercy, Count! Spare this poor child; and although the disorder in which you will find him--

Count--What, Madame? What do you mean? What disorder?

Countess--He was just changing his coat--his neck and arms are bare--

[The Countess throws herself into a chair and turns away her head.]