Grandfathers -- Fiction; Mountain life -- Switzerland -- Fiction; Orphans -- Fiction; Switzerland -- History -- 19th century -- Fiction
"Adelaide, I know of only one punishment which will perhaps make
you alive to your ill conduct, for you are an utter little
barbarian, but we will see if we cannot tame you so that you
shall not be guilty of such deeds again, by putting you in a
dark cellar with the rats and black beetles."
Heidi listened in silence and surprise to her sentence, for she
had never seen a cellar such as was now described; the place
known at her grandfather's as the cellar, where the fresh made
cheeses and the new milk were kept, was a pleasant and inviting
place; neither did she know at all what rats and black beetles
were like.
But now Clara interrupted in great distress. "No, no, Fraulein
Rottenmeier, you must wait till papa comes; he has written to
say that he will soon be home, and then I will tell him
everything, and he will say what is to be done with Heidi."
Fraulein Rottenmeier could not do anything against this superior
authority, especially as the father was really expected very
shortly. She rose and said with some displeasure, "As you will,
Clara, but I too shall have something to say to Herr Sesemann."
And with that she left the room.
Two days now went by without further disturbance. Fraulein
Rottenmeier, however, could not recover her equanimity; she was
perpetually reminded by Heidi's presence of the deception that
had been played upon her, and it seemed to her that ever since
the child had come into the house everything had been topsy-
turvy, and she could not bring things into proper order again.
Clara had grown much more cheerful; she no longer found time hang
heavy during the lesson hours, for Heidi was continually making a
diversion of some kind or other. She jumbled all her letters up
together and seemed quite unable to learn them, and when the
tutor tried to draw her attention to their different shapes, and
to help her by showing her that this was like a little horn, or
that like a bird's bill, she would suddenly exclaim in a joyful
voice, "That is a goat!" "That is a bird of prey!" For the
tutor's descriptions suggested all kinds of pictures to her mind,
but left her still incapable of the alphabet. In the later
afternoons Heidi always sat with Clara, and then she would give
the latter many and long descriptions of the mountain and of her
life upon it, and the burning longing to return would become so
overpowering that she always finished with the words, "Now I must
go home! to-morrow I must really go!" But Clara would try to
quiet her, and tell Heidi that she must wait till her father
returned, and then they would see what was to be done. And if
Heidi gave in each time and seemed quickly to regain her good
spirits, it was because of a secret delight she had in the
thought that every day added two more white rolls to the number
she was collecting for grandmother; for she always pocketed the
roll placed beside her plate at dinner and supper, feeling that
she could not bear to eat them, knowing that grandmother had no
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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