Dawn of the Morning

by Grace Livingston Hill

Mr. Winthrop had leisure now to think upon his oldest son, and the sin which he had been about to commit, and tears trickled down his cheeks as he watched through the long hours of the night. His wife vouchsafed him no word or look. To all appearances, she was asleep, but no one ever knew what struggles were going on within her soul. Perhaps she was holding herself in abeyance for the coming of the beloved son who would explain all.

In the spacious chamber assigned to him, Charles spent much of the night in a vision with a white-robed girl upon a hillside, and his waking visions and those sleeping were so blended that he was scarce aware when starlight merged into morning, and he heard the birds twitter in the branches near his window.

Of all that household, only Dawn slept. Her heart, bowed with its burden of apprehension, had reached the limit of endurance, and the long lashes lay still upon the white cheeks, while her soul ceased from its troubling for a little while.

She awoke with a start of painful realization, while yet the first crimson streak of morning lay in the east. Its rosy light reminded her of the day, and what it was to mean for her. With a sound that was like both a sob and a prayer, she rose quickly, and, slipping on the little white gown she had worn the evening before, nor stopping to do more than brush out the mass of curls, she hastened stealthily down the stairs and, taking care to close the door behind her that her escape should not be noticed, went out into the garden. She would slip back quietly, before the guests were astir, she told herself. She wanted one more hour to herself in the dewy garden, before life shut her in forever from freedom and her girlhood.

Five minutes later, her step-mother, in dressing-gown and slippers, crossed the hall hastily and pushed open the girl's door. She had fallen asleep toward morning, and had slept later than she had intended. But she had her plans carefully laid, and determined to settle the girl's part before any one was up.

At that same instant, Charles, whose heart was alive for the possibilities of the new day, stepped out on the balcony in front of his window, and with easy agility swung himself over the railing and dropped to the terrace beneath. He was too impatient to sleep longer, and felt that somehow he would be nearer his heart's desire if he got out into the dewy morning world.

He walked slowly down the carefully tended paths, into the garden, stopping to notice a bird's note here, the glint of dew-drops over the lawn, the newly opened flowers in the beds of poppies, bachelor buttons, foxglove, asters, and sweet-peas. A great thorny branch that must have evaded the gardener's careful training reached out as if to catch his attention, and there upon its tip was a spray of delicate buds, just half blown, exquisite as an angel's wings, and with the warm glow of the sunrise in the sheathlike, curling petals. Were they white or pink or yellow? A warm white, living and tender, like a maiden's cheek. He reached for the spray and cut it off, feeling sure he could make his peace with the mistress of the house when he confessed his theft. He stood a moment looking at the beautiful roses, one almost full blown, the other two just curling apart, like a baby trying to waken. He drank in their fragrance in a long, deep breath, and then, thinking his fanciful thoughts of the girl to whom he had given his heart so freely before he yet knew her, he walked slowly on to the little arbor hid among the yew trees.

Mrs. Van Rensselaer stood in the doorway of Dawn's room, aghast, scarcely able to believe her eyes. Yes, the girl was gone. Where? was her instant thought. Perhaps she had fled, and would make them more trouble. A great fear clutched at the woman's heart lest she had made a terrible mistake by not talking the matter over with her step-daughter the night before, and making her understand what she was to do. Now, perhaps, it would be found out by them all, and by her husband in particular, that she had not yet told the girl anything. Mrs. Van Rensselaer had a decided fear of her husband. Their wills had never really clashed so far, but for some years she had had a feeling that if they ever did, he would be terrible. She shrank back with a wild heating of her heart, and looked about the shadowy hall as if she expected to find the girl lurking there. Then her stern common-sense came to the surface, and she went boldly into the room and made a systematic search. It did not take but a minute to make sure that Dawn was not there, and that wherever she was she had taken nothing with her, save the clothes she had worn the evening before. It suddenly occurred to the step-mother that she ought to have gone into the room before retiring last night and made sure that her charge was there; but so sure had she been that she had heard Dawn come in, it had not occurred to her to do it. Besides, where could the girl go? She was very likely maundering about that dull old garden she had haunted ever since her return from school.

With that, Mrs. Van Rensselaer looked out of the window, just in time to catch sight of her young guest cutting the roses. With keen apprehension, she saw what might be about to happen, and knew that instant action was the only thing that could prevent a catastrophe.

Regardless of dressing-gown and slippers, and of the night-cap which concealed her scant twist of hair, she descended the stairs, strode out the front door and down the garden path, coming in sight of the young man just as he turned the corner of the yew hedge into the walk that led into the green arbor.