Croustillac, much embarrassed, remained motionless before the pretty widow, first contracting his eyebrows with an angry air, then, on the contrary, he endeavored to relax his thin long face into a forced smile. While these successive expressions did not tend to put an end to Blue Beard's mirth, the chevalier said to himself that for a murderess, the widow did not have such a gloomy and terrible appearance after all. Nevertheless, the vanity of our adventurer could not easily brook the singular effect which he had produced. For want of better conclusion he ended by saying to himself that above all things he always struck the imagination of women keenly; it was necessary at first to astonish them, upset them, and that, in this respect, his first interview with Blue Beard left nothing to be desired. When he saw that the widow had become a little calmer, he said resolutely, and with superbly bombastic manner, "I am sure you laugh, madame, at all the despairing efforts that I make to prevent my poor stolen heart from flying quickly to your feet. It is that which has brought me here; I could not but follow, in spite of myself; yes, madame, in spite of myself. I said to it, 'there, there, softly, softly, my heart, it does not suffice, in order to please a divine beauty, to be passionately loving,' but my little, or rather my great and rash, heart replied ever by drawing me to you with all its strength; as if it had been the steel and Devil's Cliff the magnet; my heart, I say, replied to me, 'Reassure yourself, master; tender and valiant as you are, the love that you feel shall cause the birth of a love which you shall share.' But pardon me madame, the language of my heart makes me outrageously impertinent--it is doubtless this impertinence which makes you laugh anew." "No, sir, no; your appearance diverts me to this great extent because you resemble--ha! ha! ha!--in a strange way, my second husband. You have positively the very same nose--ha! ha! ha!--and in seeing you enter, I believed I saw his spirit--ha! ha! ha!--coming to reproach me--ha! ha! ha!--with his cruel end--ha! ha!" The laughter of Angela redoubled. The chevalier was not ignorant of the antecedents with which Blue Beard might be reproached, but he could not conceal his great surprise at hearing this charming little creature acknowledge the crime of murder with such incredible audacity. Nevertheless, the chevalier recovered his customary coolness and replied gallantly, "I am too happy, madame, to recall to you one of your deceased husbands; and of reviving by my presence one of your memories, whatever it may be. But," continued Croustillac with a gallant manner, "there are other resemblances that I would wish to have to the deceased--whose memory diverts you so much." "That is to say, you desire to marry me?" said Blue Beard to him. The chevalier was stupefied for a moment by this abrupt question.