Dawn of the Morning Part 24

She gave the minister a most engaging smile, which put a well rounded period to her plea.

"How do I know that you have not run away?" he asked her, half smiling himself.

"Oh, I have run away," answered Dawn frankly. "I knew they would try to keep me if I told them, but I left word I had gone, and they will not worry. They do not love me. They wanted me to stay only because they felt it a duty to care for me, and they will be greatly relieved to be rid of me without any trouble. That is why I came. You see, they told me as much, and it was very uncomfortable. You would not want to stay where you knew you were in the way, would you?"

Dawn looked into the old minister's eyes with her own wide, lovely ones, and won his heart. She reminded him of his little girl who had died.

"I suppose not," he said in a half amused tone. "But don't you think it would be better for you to confide in me? Just tell me your real name, and where you come from, and all about it, and then I can help you better. I shall be able to recommend you, you know."

"Thank you, no," said Dawn decidedly, getting up as if that ended the matter. "If I told you that, and then you were asked if I were here, you would have to say yes. Then, too, if you knew, you might think it was your duty to let my friends know where I am. Now you have no responsibility about it at all, don't you see? But I don't want to make you any trouble. If you don't know of some work I might do here, I will go elsewhere. I can surely find something to do without telling my real name. I know I am doing right. You were so kind when you spoke to me yesterday, that I thought I would come and ask though I had intended going on this morning."

"Wait," said the minister. "Sit down. What do you want to do? What kind of work are you fitted for?"

"I have been educated at a good school," said Dawn, sitting down and putting on a quaint little business-like air which made the minister smile.

"Did you ever teach school?" There was much hesitation in the minister's voice. He was not altogether sure he was doing right to suggest the idea, she was such a child in looks.

"No, but I could," replied Dawn confidently. "And, oh, I should like it! It is just what I want. I love to show people how to do things, and make them learn correctly. I used to help the girls at school."

There was great eagerness in her face. The minister thought how lovely she was, and again that fleeting likeness to his dead child gripped his heart.

"You are very young," he mused, watching the changing expression on her face, and thinking that his child would have been about this girl's age.

"I am almost seventeen," said Dawn, drawing herself up gravely.

"Our village schoolmaster left very suddenly last week, to go to his invalid mother's bedside, and it may be some months before his return.

Indeed, it is possible that he will not come back at all. He intimated as much before he left. We have not had opportunity as yet to find another teacher, and the school has been dismissed for a few days until we can look about for a subst.i.tute."

"Oh, will you let me try?" Dawn sat on the edge of her chair, her hands clasped, her lovely eyes pleading eagerly.

"But some of the scholars are larger than you are."

"That will not matter," responded Dawn, undaunted. "I could always make the girls at school do what I wanted."

"There are some big boys who might make you a good deal of trouble,"

went on the minister. "Our school has the name of being a hard one to discipline. We have always had a man at its head."

"I am not afraid," said Dawn, fire in her eyes. "I should like to try, if you will let me. You cannot tell whether I can do it unless you let me try."

"That is true," agreed the minister gravely. "I suppose there would be no harm in your trying. I could talk with the trustees about it, though the matter has been practically left to me."

"Oh, then, please, _please_, try me! I am sure I can do it," Dawn pleaded, and the look of his dead child's eyes in her face conquered the minister's scruples.

"Very well, I will try you," he said, after a thoughtful pause. "I will see the trustees and have the notices put up at once. School will open to-morrow morning. But I warn you it will be no easy task. I feel that it will be an extremely doubtful experiment."

"Oh, thank you!" cried Dawn, her eyes bright with antic.i.p.ation. "I am not afraid, and I shall do my best. I am sure I can teach a school."

"Poor child!" thought the minister. "Am I doing right to send her into such a trial?"

Aloud, he only said:

"You will receive sixteen dollars a month, and will board around, Miss Montgomery."

Dawn looked up at the new name she had chosen, and saw a twinkle in his eye. She smiled in recognition of his acceptance of it.

"Where are you stopping?" he asked.

"I am at the Golden Swan," she answered. "I can stay there a little while yet. I have a little money, though it will not last many weeks."

She wrinkled her sweet face into dimples and smiled at him, as if having no money were a matter of little consequence.

He admired her courage, and, bending upon her a look of benediction, said kindly:

"We will arrange the matter of boarding as soon as possible. I will see Mrs. Gillette, the wife of the proprietor of the Golden Swan. They have a daughter in school, and possibly their two boys will attend also, though sometimes at this time of year they are both out working on the farm. But the Gillettes always take the teacher for their share of the term."

Dawn went smiling down the parsonage path. It seemed to her the larkspurs had grown bluer and the verbenas pinker since she came up a few minutes before, and her feet fairly danced down the street, she was so happy over her good fortune. It was like a beautiful story, the way it was turning out. She had no apprehensions about her ability to handle the village school, for she had had no experience of what bad boys could be; so there was nothing to cloud her bright day, save now and then a brief pang of longing for Charles. For the most part, her mind was too much filled with antic.i.p.ation of the morrow to have room for thoughts of the past. She went to the Golden Swan, and told Mrs.

Gillette that she was to remain there for a few days at least, then she found the village store and made a few simple purchases, among them needles, thread, and a thimble. Then she chose material for an ap.r.o.n, and hurried home to make it. The school-teachers she had known had always worn ap.r.o.ns. They were a badge of office. But the ap.r.o.n she made was not like Friend Ruth's. It was small and coquettish, and edged with a tiny ruffle.

Dawn knew how to sew beautifully, for that had been one of the accomplishments Friend Ruth required of all her pupils. With a pair of borrowed scissors, the young girl fashioned the garment, and cut the tiny ruffles, rolling the hems as she had been taught to do, and scratching the gathers scientifically. By night she had a dainty little ap.r.o.n ready to wear to school. It was a frivolous bit of a thing, but it filled her with delight, for it was such an ap.r.o.n as she had always desired, but had not been allowed to have while in school. Simplicity held sway where Friend Ruth ruled.

At the supper table it was whispered around that a new school-teacher had come to town. There were notices up at the corners and all the cross-roads. School was to "take up" on the morrow. Some of the people at the table looked suspiciously at the pretty young stranger sitting demurely by herself at the end of the table, and wondered if she were the new teacher, but others said no, she was entirely too young.

After supper Dawn went to the big book wherein were registered the names of the guests, and wrote down "Mary Montgomery" in a clear, round hand.

Mr. Gillette watched her carefully out of the corner of his eye. As he saw her about to turn away, he said gruffly:

"Put down the place. We like to know where our folks belongs."

"Oh!" said Dawn, a pink flush stealing into her cheek. What should she put? Then, quick as a flash, she thought, "I have adopted a name-why should I not adopt a home, too? I am on my way to New York. If I do not remain here, I shall go there-if I can get there. I will choose New York for my home. It is a large place, and no one will expect me to know every one there. Besides, it will also stand for New York State."

So, without another word, she wrote "New York" beside her name. She might as well have written "Heaven," for it stood to her as a kind of final destination, far away and pleasant, the only place now that she could look to for a real home.

"You ain't the new schoolmarm, be you?" inquired the worthy proprietor of the Golden Swan cautiously.

"Why, yes," said Dawn, happily conscious, and laughing merrily to think of the word "schoolmarm" as applied to her who but yesterday was a scholar.

"Now, you don't say!" said the proprietor, settling back in his chair and putting his feet on the office table in front of him, while he shoved up his spectacles to get a better view of her. "Some said as how you was, but I couldn't think it. You look so young."

"Oh, I'm quite old," said Dawn anxiously. "I'm far older than I look."

And she hurried away, lest she should be questioned further.

It was soon noised abroad that the new teacher was stopping at the Golden Swan, and many a villager dropped in to have a look at her. But she was nowhere in evidence. Up in the little whitewashed chamber, with her candle lighted and the shades drawn, she was standing before her tiny looking-gla.s.s, arrayed in her new, beruffled ap.r.o.n, and trying to look grave and dignified, and as much like Friend Ruth as possible.

If Charles could have seen her all absorbed, his heart would have been sadly cast down to see how little she seemed to miss him. But later, when she had put out her candle and crept into her bed, she sobbed a long time into her pillow with loneliness and excitement.

CHAPTER XIX