Grandfathers -- Fiction; Mountain life -- Switzerland -- Fiction; Orphans -- Fiction; Switzerland -- History -- 19th century -- Fiction
"Come here, boy, and stand in front of me, for I have something
to say to you. Leave off shaking and trembling, for I want you
to listen to me. You sent the chair rolling down the mountain so
that it was broken to pieces. That was a very wrong thing to do,
as you yourself knew very well at the time, and you also knew
that you deserved to be punished for it, and in order to escape
this you have been doing all you can to hide the truth from
everybody. But be sure of this, Peter: that those who do wrong
make a mistake when they think no one knows anything about it.
For God sees and hears everything, and when the wicked doer
tries to hide what he has done, then God wakes up a little
watchman that He places inside us all when we are born and who
sleeps on quietly till we do something wrong. And the little
watchman has a small goad in his hand, And when he wakes up he
keeps on pricking us with it, so that we have not a moment's
peace. And the watchman torments us still further, for he keeps
on calling out, 'Now you will be found out! Now they will drag
you off to punishment!' And so we pass our life in fear and
trouble, and never know a moment's happiness or peace. Have you
not felt something like that lately, Peter?"
Peter gave a contrite nod of the head, as one who knew all about
it, for grandmamma had described his own feelings exactly.
"And you calculated wrongly also in another way," continued
grandmamma, "for you see the harm you intended has turned out
for the best for those you wished to hurt. As Clara had no chair
to go in and yet wanted so much to see the flowers, she made the
effort to walk, and every day since she has been walking better
and better, and if she remains up here she will in time be able
to go up the mountain every day, much oftener than she would
have done in her chair. So you see, Peter, God is able to bring
good out of evil for those whom you meant to injure, and you who
did the evil were left to suffer the unhappy consequences of it.
Do you thoroughly understand all I have said to you, Peter? If
so, do not forget my words, and whenever you feel inclined to do
anything wrong, think of the little watchman inside you with his
goad and his disagreeable voice. Will you remember all this?"
"Yes, I will," answered Peter, still very subdued, for he did
not yet know how the matter was going to end, as the police
constable was still standing with the Uncle.
"That's right, and now the thing is over and done for," said
grandmamma. "But I should like you to have something for a
pleasant reminder of the visitors from Frankfurt. Can you tell
me anything that you have wished very much to have? What would
you like best as a present?"
Peter lifted his head at this, and stared open-eyed at
grandmamma. Up to the last minute he had been expecting
something dreadful to happen, and now he might have anything that
he wanted. His mind seemed all of a whirl.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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