"Make haste," said the wizard. "Decide whether you will go on or not."
"Let us go back, sister," said Anne.
"I will go on," said Fatima. "I should die if I gave it up, I feel I should."
"Here's the gate; kneel down," said the wizard. The women knelt down.
"Will you see your first husband or your second husband?"
"I will see Bluebeard first," said the widow; "I shall know then whether this be a mockery, or you have the power you pretend to."
At this the wizard uttered an incantation, so frightful, and of such incomprehensible words, that it is impossible for any mortal man to repeat them. And at the end of what seemed to be a versicle of his chant he called Bluebeard. There was no noise but the moaning of the wind in the trees, and the toowhooing of the owl in the tower.
At the end of the second verse he paused again, and called Bluebeard. The cock began to crow, the dog began to howl, a watchman in the town began to cry out the hour, and there came from the vault within a hollow groan, and a dreadful voice said, "Who wants me?"
Kneeling in front of the tomb, the necromancer began the third verse. As he spoke, the former phenomena were still to be remarked. As he continued, a number of ghosts rose from their graves, and advanced round the kneeling figures in a circle. As he concluded, with a loud bang the door of the vault flew open, and there in blue light stood Bluebeard in his blue uniform, waving his blue sword, and flashing his blue eyes round about!
"Speak now, or you are lost," said the necromancer, to Fatima. But, for the first time in her life, she had not a word to say. Sister Anne, too, was dumb with terror. And, as the awful figure advanced towards them as they were kneeling, the sister thought all was over with them, and Fatima once more had occasion to repent her fatal curiosity.