Page 8 - LN2-EXPLANATION

Pastures: grassland
Creeks: a stream or minor tributary

Para-13 Explanation
The narrator says that he knew that Bill was not helping him because of his
helping nature but because he was earning from him. He was getting paid for
the six hours he spent with the clerk, even the lunch hour during which they
were sitting idle on a hilltop. He was comfortable with this because his law firm
would bear all his expenses. So, he felt it to be dishonesty on his own part.
Anyways he was happy to get the company of such a cheerful person like Bill.
While they were sitting on the hilltop, they saw the beautiful grasslands and the
streams flowing through them. For the clerk they were very beautiful as he was
also a villager and did not like the city life much. Bill told him everything about
New Mullion. He explained everything and everyone in such a way that he felt
like everything had happened in front of his own eyes. Bill told him about the
minister’s wife who would sing so loudly in the church whenever she was under
debt (liability to pay off your credit or loans).
This means that she prayed to god for her problems. Then there were some
college boys who would dress in such a fancy way and the lawyer’s wife who
always failed in her attempt to make her husband wear both the collar and the
tie on the same day. The narrator says that Bill’s knowledge of his village
fellows was so good that it made him love the small town of New Mullion. He
says that now he knew almost everything about this place whereas he was not
much aware of the city he was living in.

Para-14
Bill didn’t know about colleges and cities, but he had travelled around a lot of
the country, and had had a lot of jobs. From his adventures he had brought back
a philosophy of simplicity and laugher. He strengthened me.
We left that peaceful scene of meadows and woods, and resumed our search of
Oliver Lutkins. We could not find him. At last Bill cornered a friend of Lutkins
and made him admit what he guessed, “Oliver’s gone out to his mother’s farm,
three miles north.” We drove out there, laying plans.