Now he was obliged to summon assistance. In five minutes the house was in a ferment. Such servants as had not taken advantage of their mistress’s rare absence to amuse themselves elsewhere (among which was not Mdlle. Emilie), were immediately rushing about, some suggesting one thing, some another, till Sir Ralph wished he had managed the child by himself. At last, among them, they succeeded in reviving her. This time her uncle took care to have the cupboard doors shut before she opened her eyes; and he was only too thankful to agree, notwithstanding the amazement of the scandalized servants, to her proposal that he should take her away to Miss Freer’s house, where “those dreadful people could not come.” This was the history of the previous night’s adventures up to the time when Sir Ralph arrived at Mrs. Archer’s door with Sybil in his arms. Cissy and Marion listened in silence to his recital, but when, having got so far, he stopped for a moment to take breath, the former had a host of questions ready for him. “But what in the world did the child mean, Sir Ralph?” she inquired, eagerly. “ ‘Dreadful people without heads’—‘cut of in the court-yard.’ I can’t make it out in the least. And if, as May here suspects, Emilie, the maid, is at the bottom of it, what could be her motive? What good could it do her to frighten the child to death, as she nearly did? No, I can’t make it out.” “Nor could I, Mrs. Archer,” replied Sir Ralph, “till I heard what Sybil had to say this morning. During the Revolution it is perfectly true people’s beads were cut off in our court-yard, for there stood the guillotine. This is a fact sure enough, and well known at Altes. And I now perfectly remember it’s being mentioned to us when we first came here. Sybil, it appears, heard it too, and from the first it made a strong impression on her sensitive imagination. She tells me she never could bear to look out on the courtyard after it grew dark at night; for then this wicked Emilie told her the decapitated victims might be seen promenading about. Some, Emilie told her, with a view to heightening the dramatic effect of her story, might be perceived grubbing about among the stones with which the yard is paved for the lost heads supposed there to be buried. Others, again, would be seen marching along triumphantly like St. Denis, with their heads reposing under their arms. It is really too absurd,” he said, laughing, “though hideous enough to the imagination of a nervous little creature of eight years old.” “But what in the world did Emilie tell her all this for?” asked Marion, speaking for the first time.