He was not so dense and shy as the children of the hamlet near us,
and Emily extracted from him that Miss Ellen was 'Our passon's young
lady.'
'Mr. Mears'!' she exclaimed.
'No: ourn be Passon Fordy.'
It turned out that this place was not in Earlscombe at all, but in
Hillside, a different parish; and the boy, Amos, further
communicated that there was old Passon Fordy, and Passon Frank, and
Madam, what was Mr. Frank's lady. Yes, he could read, he could; he
went to Sunday School, and was in Miss Ellen's class; he had been to
school worky days, only father was dead, and Farmer Hartop gave him
a job.
It was plain that Hillside was under a very different rule from
Earlscombe; and Emily was delighted to have discovered that the
sweet cottage bonnet's owner was called Ellen, which just then was
the pet Christian name of romance, in honour of the Lady of the
Lake.
In the midst of her raptures, however, just as we were about to turn
in at our own gate into the wood, we heard horses' hoofs, and then
came, careering by on ponies, a very pretty girl and a youth of
about the same age. Clarence's hand rose to his hat, and he made
his eager bow; but the young lady did not vouchsafe the slightest
acknowledgment, turned her head away, and urged her pony to speed.
Emily broke out with an angry disappointed exclamation. Clarence's
face was scarlet, and he said low and hoarsely, 'That's Lester.
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