Page:Heidi - Spyri - 1922.djvu/134

 “Get along home with you and don’t try this trick on me again, or you may not come off so easily a second time,” and with that he turned and was about to shut the door. But Heidi took hold of his coat and said beseechingly, “Let me go up, just once.”

He looked around, and his mood changed as he saw her pleading eyes; he took hold of her hand and said kindly, “Well, if you really wish it so much, I will take you.”

The boy sat down on the church steps to show that he was content to wait where he was.

Hand in hand with the old man Heidi went up the many steps of the tower; they became smaller and smaller as they neared the top, and at last came one very narrow one, and there they were at the end of their climb. The old man lifted Heidi up that she might look out of the open window.

“There, now you can look down,” he said.

Heidi saw beneath her a sea of roofs, towers, and chimney pots; she quickly drew back her head and said in a sad, disappointed voice, “It is not at all what I thought.”

“You see now, a child like you does not understand anything about a view! Come along down and don’t go ringing at my bell again!”

He lifted her down and went on before her down the narrow stairway. To the left of the turn where it grew wider stood the door of the tower-keeper’s room, and the landing ran out beside it to the edge of the steep, slanting roof. At the far end of this was a large basket, in front of which sat a big gray cat, that snarled as it saw them, for she wished to warn the passers-by that they were not to meddle with her family. Heidi stood