When thus alone，I not unfrequently heard Grace poole"s laugh: the same peal，the same low，slow ha! ha! which，when first heard，had thrilled me: I heard，too，her eccentric murmurs; stranger than her laugh. There were days when she was quite silent; but there were others when I could not account for the sounds she made. Sometimes I saw her: she would e out of her room with a basin，or a plate，or a tray in her hand，go down to the kitchen and shortly return，generally (oh，romantic reader，forgive me for telling the plain truth!) bearing a pot of porter. Her appearance always acted as a damper to the curiosity raised by her oral oddities: hard-featured and staid，she had no point to which interest could attach. I made some attempts to draw her into conversation，but she seemed a person of few words: a monosyllabic reply usually cut short every effort of that sort.

The other members of the household，viz.，John and his wife，Leah the housemaid，and Sophie the French nurse，were decent people; but in no respect remarkable; with Sophie I used to talk French，and sometimes I asked her questions about her native country; but she was not of a descriptive or narrative turn，and generally gave such vapid and confused answers as were calculated rather to check than encourage inquiry.