d, but as it tottered it gave out the most soul-piercing,
unearthly yell it was possible for anyone ever to hear.

"They'm coming to life! They'm coming to life!" shrieked out Cherry, and
from sheer fright she fell on the floor in a fit.

All this noise and uproar reached the master's ears, and up he came,
to know what it was all about. And oh, he was angry when he found out.
First of all he ordered old Aunt Prudence out of the house then and there,
and then he picked up Cherry and carried her to the kitchen, where he soon
brought her to her senses again, but, strangely enough, she could not
remember what had happened, or why she was there. Her memory of what she
had seen had quite gone, and though she was always afraid, after that, to
go into that part of the house again, she could not remember in the least
why it was, or anything that had happened there.

Cherry felt much happier now, and did not worry herself about it, for Aunt
Prudence and her terrifying eye were gone, and she was left sole mistress.
So time passed on, and Cherry's master was so kind to her that the days
flew by like hours, and very soon a whole year was gone.

During all this time she had never once thought of her home, or her
parents, or her old life. She had everything she could wish, and you
would have thought she was bound to be happy; but no, nothing of the sort!
She soon grew accustomed to her happiness, and then she began to want the
things she had not got. Her curiosity increased every day. She longed to
know more about the mysterious part of the house, and a hundred other
things that she should never have troubled her head about.

She was particularly anxious to find out all about her master, for his
movements were certainly very strange, and puzzled Cherry. He went off
every morning soon after his early breakfast, and when he came back he
shut himself into the room where the stone figures were, and Cherry was
certain, for she had crept up and listened at the door, that she could
hear him talking to them!

What _could_ she do to get to know more, she wondered. She thought and
thought, and then one day her thoughts flew to the ointment. She had
often noticed how very bright and peculiar the little boy's eyes became
after she had anointed them, and that he often seemed able to see things
that were hidden from her.

Cherry grew very excited, she felt sure she had discovered the secret.
So the next morning, after she had bathed