before they reached the cottage. She had tried
to talk on the way, but no sound could be heard through the heavy
cover. As soon as they were inside the hut she began: "Grandfather, we
must take some nails and a hammer down tomorrow; a shutter is loose in
grandmother's house and many other places shake. Everything rattles in
her house."

"Is that so? Who says we must?"

"Nobody told me, but I know," Heidi replied. "Everything is loose in
the house, and poor grandmother told me she was afraid that the house
might tumble down. And grandfather, she cannot see the light. Can you
help her and make it light for her? How terrible it must be to be
afraid in the dark and nobody there to help you! Oh, please,
grandfather, do something to help her! I know you can."

Heidi had been clinging to her grandfather and looking up to him with
trusting eyes. At last he said, glancing down: "All right, child,
we'll see that it won't rattle any more. We can do it tomorrow."

Heidi was so overjoyed at these words that she danced around the room
shouting: "We'll do it tomorrow! We can do it tomorrow!"

The grandfather, keeping his word, took Heidi down the following day
with the same instructions as before. After Heidi had disappeared, he
went around the house inspecting it.

The grandmother, in her joy at seeing the child again, had stopped the
wheel and called: "Here is the child again! She has come again!"
Heidi, grasping her outstretched hands, sat herself on a low stool at
the old woman's feet and began to chat. Suddenly violent blows were
heard outside; the grandmother in her fright nearly upset the
spinning-wheel and screamed: "Oh, God, it has come at last. The hut is
tumbling down!"

"Grandmother, don't be frightened," said the child, while she put her
arms around her. "Grandfather is just fastening the shutter and fixing
everything for you."

"Is it possible? Has God not forgotten us after all? Brigida, have you
heard it? Surely that is a hammer. Ask him to come in a moment, if it
is he, for I must thank him."

When Brigida went out, she found the old man busy with putting a new
beam along the wall. Approaching him, she said: "Mother and I wish you
a good-afternoon. We are very much obliged to you for doing us such a
service, and mother would like to see you. There are few that would
have done it, uncle, and how can we thank you?"

"That will do," he interrupted. "I know what your opinion about me is.
Go in, for I can find