Dawn of the Morning

by Grace Livingston Hill

Dawn was "boarding round," and the days she spent at the Butterworths' comfortable, weather-beaten old farmhouse were one continual jubilee for the family, and a season of triumph for the teacher. The best dishes and the finest table-cloth were got out, and a fire was built in the solemn front room. There, after the supper, which was composed of all the nicest things Mrs. Butterworth knew how to concoct, the family would gather around the teacher to listen while she talked or read to them.

And Dawn, because she wanted to help Daniel, and also because she thoroughly enjoyed the admiration and attention she was receiving, entered into it all, and hunted out stories to read to them, and finally gave them a taste of Shakespeare, which she read with remarkable understanding and dramatic power, considering that she had never had any interpreter but herself.

A new world was opened to the house of Butterworth. Even the old farmer sat open-mouthed and listened, watching the wonderful change of expression on the beautiful girlish face.

There were flowers in a tumbler on the dinner-table, stiffly arranged by Daniel's oldest sister, Rachel. Daniel wet and combed his tawny hair before he came to meals. It was unusual, and the smaller children noticed and followed suit.

It was one day when Dawn sat at the table, talking and laughing and making them all forget the common-placeness of life, with her cheeks as red as the late pink aster tucked in among her curls, that Daniel's mother noticed with a heart of satisfaction the look on her boy's face. That Daniel should take to a girl like that was all and more than her mother heart could wish. And why not? Were not the Butterworths well off? Was not their farm the largest and most flourishing in the whole country? True, they had not painted their house in a long time, and didn't go in much for fancy dressing, but that was easily changed; and the barns had always been kept in fine repair, which was a good test of prosperity. Thus Mrs. Butterworth meditated in the watches of the night, but she never mentioned the matter, even to the boy's father, for John was "turrible easy upset of an idea, an' it was just as well to let things take their own way, 'long's it was sech a good way for once."

But Dawn had no idea that any such notion had entered the good woman's head, and enjoyed her stay at the Butterworths' heartily, going on to the next place with regret.

There were places where boarding round was not altogether agreeable; where the rooms were small and cold and had to be shared with younger members of the family; where the blankets were thin, or the feather-beds odorous; where the morning's ham sizzling in the spider on the kitchen stove below came up through wide cracks in unappetizing smoke; where the master of the house was gruff, and her welcome was grudgingly given. Many a night she cried herself to sleep in these places, and wondered why she had been born to suffer so, and to be so lonely.

The thought of Charles, and of the day of her wedding, was growing to be like a dim and misty dream. She still hugged it to her heart, as a most precious treasure, but day by day it was becoming more unreal to her.

However, take it all in all, Dawn was perhaps happier than she had been since she was a tiny child with her mother. She was interested in her work, enjoyed the companionship of many of the children, and was pleased to feel that she was independent and self-supporting. Of her own private fortune she never thought. She had been told that there was money left to her by her mother's father, but it made little impression, and she had never cared to ask how much. It was just a part of the world she had left behind her when she ran away in her attempt to undo mischief she had never meant to do. She kept herself much more strictly than Friend Ruth had ever succeeded in doing, feeling as she did her responsibility, now that she was a real teacher. But she allowed herself many a playtime as the winter drew on and the snow-falls made coasting and skating possible. There was a hill behind the school-house where at noon she coasted with her scholars, shouting and laughing with the rest. Each boy strove to have the honor of her company upon his sled, but she distributed her favors impartially.

It was only when she went home with "Bug" Higginson, to spend her week, and discovered to her dismay where he got his nickname, that her heart failed her entirely, and she felt she had met with something she could not bear. However, that experience did not last forever and Dawn went cheerily on her way, brightening the whole town with her presence, which, now that she was set free from the confines and oppression that had always been about her, seemed to grow and glow with a beautiful inner life.