Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: September 22, 2025
"I wish we could go on and on like this always," said Esther. "Wouldn't it be jolly! There would be no one to worry us, and no strangers to face." Penelope looked up quickly, her eyes alight with a sudden idea. "Oh, Esther, let's do it! Let's go on and not get out at Dorsham," she cried wickedly. "But could we go on much further?" asked practical Angela. "Isn't there any end to the railway?"
"Don't go away, please," she said in a pretty soft voice with a foreign accent. "I saw you, and I wondered if you had lost your way. It is not often we see strangers here, we are so far away from other houses." "No-o, thank you," stammered Esther shyly. "I I don't think I have lost my way. I was out for a walk, and had never been this way before. I have come from Dorsham."
When she told the children the news their excitement was great; but when, a week later, came another letter, asking, if there was a cottage at Dorsham or close by to be found, that it should be taken for them, if it would possibly do, their excitement grew intense.
"There isn't a church or a big clock in Dorsham, only a chapel. Let's go on and see." But Esther checked her enthusiasm. "We had better not stay away too long, or Cousin Charlotte may be frightened, and we want to stop at Mrs. Vercoe's before we go home. Let's go there now, shall we?" The suggestion was seconded with alacrity.
Miss Ashe's idea, on the other hand, was that with a good education any child had, at any rate, one strong weapon with which to fight her way. At Dorsham the post did not come in until ten o'clock, so that there was no correspondence to discuss over the breakfast-table. Not that the children expected any letters; they had never received one in their lives.
I I almost wish I'd never come to Dorsham, and yet I loved it so till this happened." During dinner Miss Charlotte looked at the four from time to time, first with faint surprise, then with anxiety. They were so quiet, so gloomy, so changed. When she had spoken two or three times and received polite, but the briefest of answers, she began to feel she must get to the bottom of the mystery.
"My name is Esther Carroll," she said, feeling some introduction was necessary, "and I and my sisters live with Miss Ashe at Moor Cottage." "Oh," said the lady vaguely. Evidently she did not know Miss Ashe or the cottage. "I have not the pleasure of knowing Miss Ashe. I never go to Dorsham.
"Oh, if only I had my farm!" cried Angela, and she went out and looked at the ground, as though expecting the foundations might have already begun to show. But no cottage was to be found next door or in Dorsham.
"Ah, but I was going to say, Anne is going to Dorsham presently, and he shall conduct you safely home." "Who?" breathed Esther, puzzled beyond politeness. "Anne. He well, he is not exactly my servant he is my friend and factotum; he and his wife live in the cottage at the back," explained the little lady.
"Why, it's in such a mess as you never saw in your life; anybody'd think there'd been a month's rain emptied over it, and all the hens in Dorsham scratching it over, and me only sowed the seeds this morning and left it as tidy as ever you see a bed, only so long ago as dinner-time." Anna, looking up, caught sight of Esther.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking