Miss Billy

Name: Miss Billy
Author: Eleanor H. Porter

by Eleanor H. Porter

Pages: about 197
Category: Literature & Fiction
Language: English
Reading time: 3.6 h at 250 wpm

Start readingThe whole book, as cards or one word at a time. 2 h at 450 wpm in Read mode.

From the opening

Billy Neilson was eighteen years old when the aunt, who had brought her up from babyhood, died. Miss Benton's death left Billy quite alone in the world--alone, and peculiarly forlorn. To Mr. James Harding, of Harding & Harding, who had charge of Billy's not inconsiderable property, the girl poured out her heart in all its loneliness two days after the funeral.
“You see, Mr. Harding, there isn't any one--not any one who--cares,” she choked.
“Tut, tut, my child, it's not so bad as that, surely,” remonstrated the old man, gently. “Why, I--I care.”
“I'm not so sure of that, either,” retorted the man. “I'm thinking that Letty and Ann would LIKE to have you with us.”
The girl laughed now outright. She was thinking of Miss Letty, who had “nerves,” and of Miss Ann, who had a “heart”; and she pictured her own young, breezy, healthy self attempting to conform to the hushed and shaded thing that life was, within Lawyer Harding's home.
“Thank you, but I'm sure they wouldn't,” she objected. “You don't know how noisy I am.”
“But, surely, my dear, isn't there some relative, somewhere?” he demanded. “How about your mother's people?”
“There was only Aunt Ella, ever, that I knew anything about. She and mother were the only children there were, and mother died when I was a year old, you know.”
“It's even worse there. He was an only child and an orphan when mother married him. He died when I was but six months old. After that there was only mother and Aunt Ella, then Aunt Ella alone; and now--no one.”
“Why, there's one--a man but he isn't really father's people, anyway. But I--I have been tempted to write to him.”
“The one I'm named for. He was father's boyhood chum. You see that's why I'm 'Billy' instead of being a proper 'Susie,' or 'Bessie,' or 'Sally Jane.'

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Miss Billy

From the opening

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