Elsie Marley, Honey

Elsie Marley, Honey, by Joslyn
Gray

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Title: Elsie Marley, Honey
Author: Joslyn Gray

Release Date: September 30, 2007 [eBook #22819]
Language: English
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MARLEY, HONEY***
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ELSIE MARLEY
by
JOSLYN GRAY
Author of "Kathleen's Probation"
Illustrated

[Frontispiece: Elsie . . . repeated the performance in a manner that was
only the more captivating.]

New York Charles Scribner's Sons
Copyright, 1918, by Charles Scribner's Sons

TO
MARY BULLIONS GRAY ANDERSON

ILLUSTRATIONS
Elsie . . . repeated the performance in a manner that was only the more
captivating . . . . . . Frontispiece
"Well, I mustn't stay here and keep you from 'redding' up your kitchen,
as you call it"

"You and I will do better with checks, Elsie, though Aunt Milly will
have none of them," he remarked
"Well, Elsie, we know the whole story now"

ELSIE MARLEY, HONEY
CHAPTER I
Mrs. Bennet, her travelling companion from San Francisco, having
proved to be talkative and uninteresting, Elsie Marley was more than
content to find herself alone after the change had been made and her
train pulled out of Chicago. It was characteristic of the girl that she did
not even look out of the window to see the last of Mrs. Bennet, who,
having waited on the platform until the train started and waved her
handkerchief in vain, betook herself indignantly to her carriage. Quite
unaware of any remissness on her part, Elsie settled herself
comfortably--Mrs. Bennet had disposed of her luggage--folded her
hands in her lap, and gazed idly out the window opposite.
A pale, colorless girl, the simplicity of her dress was in almost too great
contrast with its elegance--a contrived simplicity that left no room for
any trace of careless youth or girlishness. Slender and rather
delicate-looking, she had brown eyes, regular features, and soft,
light-brown hair waving loosely about her face and hanging in two long,
demure curls from a shell clasp at her neck. But her eyes were of rather
a shallow brown, her brows and lashes still lighter; her features were
almost too regular, and her skin, though soft and clear, was quite
colorless. Even so, she might have been pretty, perhaps lovely, had she
possessed any animation. But the girl's face and even her eyes were as
nearly expressionless as human features may be. She was like a
superior sort of doll with white cheeks in lieu of red.
After a little she opened a small leather satchel, took out a letter, and
perused it attentively. It was the last she had received from her guardian
and only living relative, Cousin Julia Pritchard, and, as she was to see

her soon, it behooved her to prepare herself so far as she might for that
occasion. For Elsie Marley realized, though dimly, that she was to
encounter a personality unlike any with which she had come in contact
in all her sheltered, luxurious life.
"My dear Elsie," the letter ran, "I find myself very much pleased at the
thought of having you with me. The heart of a woman of fifty cannot
but rejoice in anticipation of the company of a young girl with the
ideals, the vigor, and buoyancy of sixteen. And since we are both alone
in the world, you representing all my kith and kin as I believe myself to
represent all yours, it is only fitting that we should be together instead
of being separated by the breadth of our great American continent.
"You will, I am sure, like this great, busy, restless, humming city,
though the only home I have to offer you, I am truly sorry to say, is in a
boarding-house, comfortable though it is. Remembering Aunt Ellen's
beautiful home in California, which I visited fifteen years ago, I fear
the change may be difficult, though, for a young person, not too
painfully so, I trust. A boarding-house is the only home I have myself
known for thirty years, and this particular one is excellent and full of
interesting people, though the youngest among them are middle-aged.
"I am, I repeat, happy to say that I can give you a home here and clothe
you suitably. That will release your income, which can be put to any
use