One November afternoon, as Georg sat studying before the sitting-room fire with his mother, who had fallen asleep over her knitting, his attention was attracted by a pebble being thrown against the window. Raising his eyes, he beheld his aunt beckoning to him from the garden. Down went the book and out went the boy.
"What is it, Aunt Anna?"
For answer, the girl caught him about the neck and whirled him madly up and down the gravelled path.
"It's a secret, Georg, the best and biggest secret in the whole world. Nobody is to know it but you and me, and it is so lovely that I can't keep from spinning like a top!"
"Wait! Stop! Let loose!" and the boy broke from her clasp, half-strangled by the joyful energy of her arm. "What is the secret? Hurry and tell!"
The girl stood smiling and speechless, unable to find words to frame her tidings. Then glancing about to assure herself that no one was near, she bent quickly and whispered,—
"You remember, Georg, that poor Granny Wegler died last week. Well, her daughter, Mrs. Friesland, who came from Munich to take care of her, called here to-day to tell me—what do you suppose?"
"I don't know."
"She said that she had found a note written by Granny, saying that when she died, she wanted to leave her clavichord to me. Just think of it, Georg, I am to have that dear, beautiful little clavichord that stood in Granny's parlor, and you and I can play on it whenever we please!"
Georg's face went from red to white and back to red again with this stupendous news. Afraid that a shout would serve to recall him to house and book, he sought to express his delight by rolling over and over in the crackling brown grass and pulling up the dead blades by handfuls.