"I mean that he ought to have learnt to read a bit by now,"
continued the grandmother. "Up there on the shelf is an old
prayer-book, with beautiful songs in it which I have not heard
for a long time and cannot now remember to repeat to myself, and
I hoped that Peter would soon learn enough to be able to read
one of them to me sometimes; but he finds it too difficult."

"I must get a light, it is getting too dark to see," said
Peter's mother, who was still busy mending his waistcoat. "I feel
too as if the afternoon had gone I hardly know how."

Heidi now jumped up from her low chair, and holding out her hand
hastily to the grandmother said, "Good-night, grandmother, if it
is getting dark I must go home at once," and bidding good-bye to
Peter and his mother she went towards the door. But the
grandmother called out in an anxious voice, "Wait, wait, Heidi;
you must not go alone like that, Peter must go with you; and
take care of the child, Peter, that she does not fall, and don't
let her stand still for fear she should get frozen, do you hear?
Has she got anything warm to put around her throat?"

"I have not anything to put on," called back Heidi, "but I am
sure I shall not be cold," and with that she ran outside and
went off at such a pace that Peter had difficulty in overtaking
her. The grandmother, still in distress, called out to her
daughter, "Run after her, Brigitta; the child will be frozen to
death on such a night as this; take my shawl, run quickly!"

Brigitta ran out. But the children had taken but a few steps
before they saw the grandfather coming down to meet them, and in