Her companion, Fraulein Raffius, always lowered her voice in her presence, though when out of it she could play with us very merrily.

The elderly servant, who, singularly enough, was of noble family--his real name was Von Wurmkessel--did his duty as noiselessly as a shadow.

Then there was a faint perfume of mignonette in most of the rooms, which makes me think of them whenever I see the pretty flower, for, as is well known, smell is the most powerful of all the senses in awakening memory.
I never sat in my grandmother's lap.

When we wished to talk with her we had to sit beside her; and if we kept still she would question us searchingly about everything--our play, our friends, our school.
This silence, which always struck us children at first with astonishment, was interrupted very gaily by our aunt, whose liveliness broke in upon it like the sound of a horn amid the stillness of a forest.

Her cheerful voice was audible even in the hall, and when she crossed the threshold we flew to her, and the spell was broken.