HEIDI
The two must have left the valley a good hour’s walk behind them, when they came to the hamlet known as Dörfli, which is situated half-way up the mountain. Here the wayfarers met with greetings from all sides, some calling to them from windows, some from open doors, others from outside, for the elder girl was now in her old home. She did not, however, pause in her walk to respond to her friends’ welcoming cries and questions, but passed on without stopping for a moment until she reached the last of the scattered houses of the hamlet. Here a voice called to her from the door: “Wait a moment, Dete; if you are going up higher, I will come with you.”
The girl thus addressed stood still, and the child immediately let go her hand and seated herself on the ground.
“Are you tired, Heidi?” asked her companion.
“No, I am hot,” answered the child.
“We shall soon get to the top now. You must walk bravely on a little longer, and take good long steps, and in another hour we shall be there,” said Dete in an encouraging voice.
They were now joined by a stout, good-natured-looking woman, who walked on ahead with her old acquaintance, the two breaking forth at once into lively conversation about everybody and everything in Dörfli and its surroundings, while the child wandered behind them.
“And where are you off to with the child?” asked the one who had just joined the party. “I suppose it is the child your sister left?”
“Yes,” answered Dete. “I am taking her up to Uncle, where she must stay.”
“The child stay up there with Alm-Uncle! You must be out
[14]
