her eagerness Heidi struggled faster and faster up the steep
ascent, and they were no sooner at the top than she let go her
grandfather's hand and ran into the hut. The grandfather slung
the basket off his shoulders in which he had brought up a part
of the contents of the trunk which was too heavy to carry up as
it was. Then he sat down on his seat and began thinking.
Heidi soon came running out with her book under her arm. "That's
right, grandfather," she exclaimed as she saw he had already
taken his seat, and in a second she was beside him and had her
book open at the particular tale, for she had read it so often
that the leaves fell open at it of their own accord. And now in
a sympathetic voice Heidi began to read of the son when he was
happily at home, and went out into the fields with his father's
flocks, and was dressed in a fine cloak, and stood leaning on
his shepherd's staff watching as the sun went down, just as he
was to be seen in the picture. But then all at once he wanted to
have his own goods and money and to be his own master, and so he
asked his father to give him his portion, and he left his home
and went and wasted all his substance. And when he had nothing
left he hired himself out to a master who had no flocks and
fields like his father, but only swine to keep; and so he was
obliged to watch these, and he only had rags to wear and a few
husks to eat such as the swine fed upon. And then he thought of
his old happy life at home and of how kindly his father had
treated him and how ungrateful he had been, and he wept for
sorrow and longing. And he thought to himself, "I will arise and
go to my father, and will say to him, 'Father, I am not worthy to
be called thy son; make me as one of thy hired servants.'" And
when he was yet a great way off his father saw him . . . Here
Heidi paused in her reading. "What do you think happens now,
grandfather?" she said. "Do you think the father is still angry
and will say to him, 'I told you so!' Well, listen now to what
comes next." His father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and
fell on his neck and kissed him. And the son said to him,
"Father, I have sinned against heaven and in thy sight, and am no
more worthy to be called thy son." But the father said to his
servants, "Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him; and put
a ring on his hand and shoes on his feet: and bring hither the
fatted calf and kill it; and let us eat and be merry, for this my
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