But now Clara interrupted in great distress. "No, no, Fraulein
Rottenmeier, you must wait till papa comes; he has written to
say that he will soon be home, and then I will tell him
everything, and he will say what is to be done with Heidi."

Fraulein Rottenmeier could not do anything against this superior
authority, especially as the father was really expected very
shortly. She rose and said with some displeasure, "As you will,
Clara, but I too shall have something to say to Herr Sesemann."
And with that she left the room.

Two days now went by without further disturbance. Fraulein
Rottenmeier, however, could not recover her equanimity; she was
perpetually reminded by Heidi's presence of the deception that
had been played upon her, and it seemed to her that ever since
the child had come into the house everything had been topsy-
turvy, and she could not bring things into proper order again.
Clara had grown much more cheerful; she no longer found time hang
heavy during the lesson hours, for Heidi was continually making a
diversion of some kind or other. She jumbled all her letters up
together and seemed quite unable to learn them, and when the
tutor tried to draw her attention to their different shapes, and
to help her by showing her that this was like a little horn, or
that like a bird's bill, she would suddenly exclaim in a joyful
voice, "That is a goat!" "That is a bird of prey!" For the
tutor's descriptions suggested all kinds of pictures to her mind,
but left her still incapable of the alphabet. In the later
afternoons Heidi always sat with Clara, and then she would give
the latter many and long descriptions of the mountain and of her
life upon it, and the burning longing to return would become so