"Is it really and truly Elsie Marley?" queried the pale Elsie speaking for the first time like a real girl, though she had no girlish vocabulary from which to draw.
"Sure," asserted the other, delighted to be able to surprise her seatmate. And she sang a stanza in the sweetest voice Elsie Marley had ever heard, though she had heard good music all her life, and famous singers.
"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?"
"Is there—any more?" demanded Elsie Marley almost eagerly.
"One more, and then you just repeat the first. I've known it all my life. Mother used to sing it to me when I was a baby. Then a few years ago when I first went to see vaudeville, I 'got it up,' as they say, with dancing and a little acting. I used to spring it on people that came to the house. Dad liked it, but it made my stepmother feel bad—dad said because I was too professional."
She sighed deeply.
"Sing the rest, please, Elsie?" asked the other, using her name for the first time.
"I will if you'll let me call you Elsie-Honey? You see it really belongs."
Elsie knew that it was silly, but she found herself quite willing. She seemed under a strange spell.
"Only," she added, with a stronger sensation of discomfort, "after to-morrow it isn't likely we'll ever see one another again."