Dawn of the Morning Part 30

Rags barked questioningly. He wanted to tell her that he had been ordered to stay with her, but she did not seem to understand. He wagged his tail harder, but he did not budge.

"Go, Rags, good dog. Take that to Dan." She pointed out the door.

Rags cast a protesting, anxious bark at her, a furtive glance down the empty road, and hustled out the door. He reasoned that Dan was near at hand and must settle the confliction of duties himself. He could not but obey the one whom he and his master alike worshipped.

The minute the dog had gone, Dawn put on her bonnet, caught up her cape and bag, and slipped out of the door and around the school-house on the side farthest from the village.

She fled through the back yard, crept under the lower rail of the fence, and proceeded over into the meadow where they had coasted all winter.

In a moment more she was out of sight down the hill. She had but to cross the log which formed a bridge across the brook and she would enter the woods that lay at the foot of Wintergreen Hill. There she would be safe and could get away without seen by any one.

Daniel cut the string which held the note and sent the dog back to his post, while he slowly unfolded it and read, his hands trembling at the thought that she had written and sealed it, and that it was for him. A great tumult of emotions went through his big, immature heart as he tried to take it in. He had known something would happen, and was glad he had not gone away.

Rags hustled back to the school-house steps, but instantly he knew something was wrong. He looked into the empty room. She was not there.

He smelled his way up to the desk, but could not bring her into existence. He snuffed his way out to the steps and down the path in a hurry, then came back baffled, with short, sharp, worried barks, to hunt for the scent again. Snuff! Snuff! Snuff! Bark! Rags could not understand it. Yes-but it was-there was the scent! Snuff! Snuff!

Snuff! Bark! Bark! He tried it over again to make sure. The scent went around the left of the school-house, through the girl's play-ground. What could she have gone around there for at this time of day? Had the enemy come during his absence and stolen her away?

Rags hurried around the school, snuffing and barking, scuttled under the fence in a hurry, and away down the hill, his bark growing more sure and relieved every minute.

Daniel was not accustomed to receiving letters. He grasped the meaning of that first sentence slowly, having lingered long over the "Dear Daniel." But he got no further than the first sentence: "I am having to go away in a great hurry." He got to his feet rapidly and went around to the school-house door. A great fear was in his heart. The absence of Rags confirmed it. He entered the deserted school-room. No one was there. He stepped up to the teacher's desk. A letter addressed to the minister lay there. Daniel stood still by the teacher's desk, his heart filled with foreboding, and read the remainder of his own letter. As he finished, he heard a step outside the door, and, looking up, saw the stranger of the morning before him.

Instinctively he reached out for the minister's letter on the desk and put it with his own into his coat-pocket. Then he faced the intruder quietly, and something in his steady blue eyes reminded the man of his morning encounter with the dog. He felt that he had an enemy in the boy before him.

Winthrop took off his hat and inquired suavely:

"Is Miss Van Rensselaer here? This is the school-house, isn't it?"

"It's the school-house all right," answered Dan, "but there ain't no Miss Van Rensselaer round. Don't know no such person. You must 'a' ben told wrong."

"Oh, no; I saw her this morning. In fact, she must have expected me. I refer to the teacher of this school."

"The teacher's Miss Montgomery-Miss Mary Montgomery-an' she's gone. She boards this week with the Peabodys', up by the church, second house beyond. She hasn't been gone from here five minutes."

"That is very strange," said the visitor. "I just walked down past the church and did not meet her."

"She sometimes stops a minute to see how the blacksmith's little sick girl is, at the corner here. She might 'a' gone there, but she never stays long. You'd best go right up to Peabody's."

Daniel was anxious to get rid of the man, and he was certain that the teacher had not gone in the direction of the Peabodys', for he had watched the road every minute until he came around to the front of the school.

Harrington Winthrop took himself away, with a baffled look on his imperious face. As soon as he had pa.s.sed from sight, Dan reconnoitred the school-yard.

There was no sign of anybody. He listened, but could not hear the dog.

He gave a long, low whistle, and instantly from the distance, toward the woods, he heard a faint, sharp bark in answer. He whistled again, and again came the dog's response.

Daniel was over the fence in a second and down the hill, not whistling again until he reached the log across the brook. Then the dog's bark was nearer, but it ended suddenly, as if some one was holding his muzzle. The boy thought he understood, and bounded rapidly toward the place from which the sound seemed to have come. In a moment more he had plunged into the darkness of the woods.

CHAPTER XXII

Daniel found Dawn huddled at the foot of a tree, behind a thicket of laurel, with her bag beside her, and tears on her frightened face.

The dog had broken away from her and met him with a joyous bark, wagging his tail and running back and forth between them, his ragged, hairy body wriggling joyously; for had he not both of them here together, far away from intruding strangers? Why should not all be well now?

"Oh, Daniel!" said Dawn, in a voice that was almost a sob. "Why did you come after me?"

"I had to," said Dan, looking almost sullen. "I couldn't let you come off alone. Besides, you don't need to go. We won't let anybody hurt you. I can knock that fellow into the middle of next week if you say the word."

But the trouble was not lifted from her face.

"You are very good, and I thank you more than I can ever tell," she answered him; "but I must go away. He is a bad man, and he thinks he has some power over me. It would be of no use for you to knock him into next week, for he would be on hand again the next week to deal with. He would tell the minister and everybody that he had a right to take me away, and they would all believe him. He can make wrong things seem right to people. He has done it before. I'm afraid of him. I never expected to meet him here. There is nothing to do but get away where he can't find me. I must get away at once, or he may follow me. Will you please take Rags and go back now, and will you take a letter that I left in the school-house to the minister? I am so sorry to go this way, but it cannot be helped. I must get away from that man."

"Is he-has he any right?" began Daniel lamely and then burst out: "I mean, is he anything to you-any kind of relation, you know?"

"Nothing in the world, I'm thankful to say, and he never shall be as long as I live. But I never could feel safe again, now that he knows where I am."

Dan stood puzzled and troubled.

"Say, don't you know how you're going to make all the school feel bad if you go this way? The little ones'll wait for you to-morrow morning, and they'll go there to the school and you won't be there. We never had a teacher that made everybody like to study before. You oughtn't to go this way. You _can't_ go!" He stopped, choking.

Dawn looked at him a moment, the tears gathering anew in her own eyes; then suddenly down went her head in her hands, and she cried as if her heart would break.

"Oh, Daniel," she said, "please don't! I don't want to go. I shall never be as happy again, I know, and you have been so good to me! But I must--"

The big boy went down on his knees beside her then, and put his rough hand reverently on hers.

"Don't," said he. "Don't. I've _got_ to tell you something. Perhaps you won't like it-I don't know. I'm not near as good as you, and I don't know as much as you do, but I'll study hard, and go to college, and do anything else you say, just to please you. If you only won't go away. If you'll just stay here and let me take care of you! I love you, and I don't care who knows it! I've been feeling that way about you all winter, only I thought perhaps you'd like me better when I got more education; but now you see I've just got to tell you how it is.

Don't you like me enough to stay and let me take care of you? I love you!"

But Dawn interrupted him with a moan.

"Oh, Daniel! You too? Then I haven't got anybody left. Not a friend in all the world!" She sobbed afresh. Daniel dropped down on the moss beside her in dismay. His heart grew heavy as lead within him, and the world suddenly looked blank.

"Yes, you have," he said. "I'll be your friend if you won't let me be anything else. I was afraid it would make you mad," he spoke hopelessly. "I ain't good enough fer you, I know, but I'm strong, an'

I'd study hard and get an education, and I'll take wonderful care of you. You shouldn't ever have to work. You're a lady. That's why I like you. You're the prettiest thing that was ever made, an' I'd like nothing better'n to work hard for you all my life. But I might 'a'

known you wouldn't think I was good enough." He broke off helplessly, and she saw that his broad chest was heaving painfully and that his usually smiling lips were quivering.

She put out her hand and laid it gently on his.

"Dear Daniel," she said, "listen! It isn't that at all."

He caught the cool little hand and pressed it against his eyes that were burning hot with boyish tears he was ashamed to shed. It was years since tears had been in those eyes. He had almost forgotten the smart of them. He had scorned the thought of them even in his babyhood, yet here, just when he longed to be a man, they came to make his shame complete.

"Listen, Dan," said Dawn earnestly. "It isn't that at all. You're good and dear enough for anybody, and I do love you, too, for you've been very good to me. I love you for yourself, too, but not in that way, Dan, for I love some one else. I loved him first and shall always love him, and-and-I belong to him. I couldn't belong to any one else, you know, after that. I'm sorry, Dan, so sorry you feel bad about it, but you see how it is. I _belonged_ to some one else first."

"Is it _him_?" he blurted out fiercely.

"Oh, no, Dan! Oh, no! I'm very, very thankful it isn't that man. If it were, I should die. I couldn't love him. You wouldn't think I could!"