HEIDI
from time to time to enjoy the sight of them. For many hours she sat as still as a mouse; only now was she beginning to realize that she was going home to the grandfather, the mountain, the grandmother, and Peter, and pictures of all she was going to see again rose one by one before her eyes; she thought of how everything would look at home, but this brought other thoughts to her mind, and all of a sudden she said anxiously, “Sebastian, are you sure that grandmother on the mountain is not dead?”
“No, no,” said Sebastian, wishing to soothe her, “we will hope not; she is sure to be alive still.”
Then Heidi fell back on her own thoughts again. Now and then she looked inside the basket, for the thing she looked forward to most was laying all the rolls out on grandmother’s table. After a long silence she spoke again, “If only we could know for certain that grandmother is alive!”
“Yes, yes,” said Sebastian, half asleep; “she is sure to be alive, there is no reason why she should be dead.”
After a while sleep fell on Heidi too, and after her disturbed night and early rising she slept so soundly that she did not wake till Sebastian shook her by the arm and called to her, “Wake up, wake up! we shall have to get out directly; we are just in Basle!”
There was a further railway journey of many hours the next day. Heidi again sat with her basket on her knee, for she would not have given it up to Sebastian on any consideration; to-day she never even opened her mouth, for her excitement, which increased with every mile of the journey, kept her speechless. All of a sudden, before Heidi expected it, a voice
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