impetus with which he had made his journey down had carried him
some little way beyond Mayenfeld. He bethought himself that it
was too late to get to school now, as lessons would already have
begun, and it would take him a good hour to walk back to Dorfli.
So he might take his time about returning, which he did, and
reached Dorfli just as Heidi had got home from school and was
sitting at dinner with her grandfather. Peter walked in, and as
on this occasion he had something particular to communicate, he
began without a pause, exclaiming as he stood still in the
middle of the room, "She's got it now."
"Got it? what?" asked the Uncle. "Your words sound quite
warlike, general."
"The frost," explained Peter.
"Oh! then now I can go and see grandmother!" said Heidi
joyfully, for she had understood Peter's words at once. "But why
were you not at school then? You could have come down in the
sleigh," she added reproachfully, for it did not agree with
Heidi's ideas of good behavior to stay away when it was possible
to be there.
"It carried me on too far and I was too late," Peter replied.
"I call that being a deserter," said the Uncle, "and deserters
get their ears pulled, as you know."
Peter gave a tug to his cap in alarm, for there was no one of
whom he stood in so much awe as Alm-Uncle.
"And an army leader like yourself ought to be doubly ashamed of
running away," continued Alm-Uncle. "What would you think of
your goats if one went off this way and another that, and refused
to follow and do what was good for them? What would you do then?"
"I should beat them," said Peter promptly.
"And if a boy behaved like these unruly goats, and he got a
beating for it, what would you say then?"
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