still,
there was truly something dramatic in the manner in which the would-be
actress sang the lines.

"Elsie Marley is grown so fine
She won't get up to feed the swine,
But lies in bed till eight or nine,
And surely she does take her time.

Do you ken Elsie Marley, honey?
The wife who sells the barley, honey?
She won't get up to serve her swine,
And do you ken Elsie Marley, honey?"

Both girls broke into natural, infectious laughter. Mr. and Mrs.
Bliss, or any one who had known Elsie Marley, could scarcely have
believed their eyes or credited their hearing. But Elsie's father, who
had died while she was an infant, had had a warm heart and a keen sense
of humor, and it might well be that his daughter had inherited
something of this that had lain dormant all the while. For truly, the
wholesome, hardy qualities brought out in others through simple human
association had had little chance to germinate in her hothouse
existence in the Pritchard household.

Despite the rumble of the train, four children in the rear of the car
caught the sound of the singing and came trooping up begging for more.
A pretty nursemaid followed with a fat, smiling infant. Elsie Moss
made her sit down with it (beside Elsie Marley!) and she herself
perched on the arm of the seat and sang song after song until it was
time to go into the dining-car. The children, wild with enthusiasm,
were not in reality more appreciative of the lovely voice than Elsie
Marley herself. The two girls went in to dinner together in happy
companionship.

CHAPTER IV

Elsie Marley lay in her berth that night for some time in a state
between musing and actually dreaming. She was conscious--partly
conscious, that is--of a new sensation of happiness. She did not,
however, at all realize how fortunate she was. She did not know that
for the first time in her life the door of her heart had been opened in
response to another. It was, perhaps, open only a crack. Possibly it
had been fast so long that it would not remain open. None the less, at
the moment it stood ajar.

After dinner the girls had talked late--late for sleeping-car hours,
that is to say. Elsie Marley herself had talked; had said more in an
hour than she had ever before said in a day. Questioned in a frank,
sympathetic manner by the other Elsie, she had been led to speak of her
grandmother's household and of her daily life there, going into details
so far as she knew