Page:Heidi - Spyri - 1922.djvu/254

 said the doctor as he sat down beside his friend. I really “wish your mother was here; everything would be clear and straightforward then and she would soon put things in right train. You sent for me three times yesterday only to ask me the same question, though you know what I think.”

“Yes, I know, it’s enough to make you out of patience with me; but you must understand, dear friend” and Herr Sesemann laid his hand imploringly on the doctor’s shoulder—“that I feel I have not the courage to refuse the child what I have been promising her all along, and for months now she has been living on the thought of it day and night. She bore this last bad attack so patiently because she was buoyed up with the hope that she should soon start on her Swiss journey, and see her friend Heidi again; and now must I tell the poor child, who has to give up so many pleasures, that this visit she has so long looked forward to must also be cancelled? I really have not the courage to do it.”

“You must make up your mind to it, Sesemann,” said the doctor with authority, and as his friend continued silent and dejected he went on after a pause, “Consider yourself how the matter stands. Clara has not had such a bad summer as this last one for years. Only the worst results would follow from the fatigue of such a journey, and it is out of the question for her. And then we are already in September, and although it may still be warm and fine up there, it may just as likely be already very cold. The days too are growing short, and as Clara cannot spend the night up there she would only have a two hours’ visit at the outside. The journey from Ragatz would take hours, for she would have to be carried up the