Dawn of the Morning

by Grace Livingston Hill

Then with a moan she threw herself back upon her pillows and lost consciousness again.

Charles stood looking down miserably at her for an instant, his mind in such a whirl of emotions that he scarcely knew which was strongest. Then, with a remembrance of Dawn, he turned, half-distracted, and pulled the bell-cord that hung by the head of his mother's bed. These fainting spells were frequent and not alarming, he knew. Stepping to the head of the stairs, he called:

"Betty, tell Aunt Martha to come to Mother at once. She has fainted again."

He waited only to hear Aunt Martha's quick, excited step upon the stair, and then he went to find Dawn.

Opening the door of the sitting-room, it startled him to feel the emptiness that pervaded the place. He had expected to find Dawn weeping in the big chair, or perhaps huddled upon the bed. That would have been Betty's way. He had often acted as comforter to Betty during her childish woes. Even in his anger and trouble, he was thrilling at the thought of how he would comfort Dawn, his own little girl. He was the only one in all the world now to whom she had a right to look for comfort.

He strode through the rooms hurriedly, looking in every possible place for her, and unwilling to accept the conclusion his mind had instantly jumped to, that she was not there at all.

He even pushed aside the curtains and stepped out upon first the front balcony and then the side one, thinking that she had taken refuge there from intrusion by Betty or the other girls. But there was no sign of her recent step, and in the darkness the tall grass down below on the terrace told no tales of a little crushed place where her bundle had fallen and where her feet had rested lightly when she dropped. Next morning, before any one would think to look, the grass would be standing tall as ever, and they would never know how she went.

Stepping back into the room again, Charles at once saw the writing on the sheet of paper lying on the desk. When he had read it, he caught it hastily in his hand as if it could give him some clue to her whereabouts, and started down the stairs and out of the front door to find her. He knew only one thing then, and that was that he must find her and bring her back before any one else discovered her flight. She could not be far away yet. Charles hurried out into the darkness. The family were attending to the mother, who had recovered consciousness. He could hear her moaning, and a sudden bitterness came over his soul, that her blindness and selfishness should make them all so much trouble. He had never thought of her in any but a gentle, loving way before, and it shocked his spirit to have to think differently now; but his indignation at her treatment of his young and blameless wife was roused beyond his present control.

He searched the grounds and garden carefully, going over every possible hiding-place twice. As he did so, he reflected that she could not have known where to go to hide, and he felt sure he would find her in a minute or two. The minutes grew into thirty, and he had found no trace of her. He went down the street quite a distance in one direction, only to be sure she would have chosen the other, and to hurry back. An hour passed with no trace of her, and then he began systematically to go over the grounds again, calling her name softly; but a screech owl mocked him, and the night wind only echoed back his voice emptily.

Once he drew near the house and under the balcony where Dawn had escaped. He heard his sister calling him, "Charles, Charles! Mother wants you!" and his heart grew bitter. Then Betty's head came out of the window, and she called again: