DAWN OF THE MORNING

CHAPTER XII

Dawn was already dressed for the wedding.

Her step-mother surveyed her with a kind of grim pride. The shimmering satin fitted the slim, girlish form to perfection, and the yellow lace set off the pink and cream complexion. It was a beautiful frock, and all who saw it would be sure to say so.

There had been some contention about the arrangement of the girl's hair. Dawn wanted to be married with her curls down her back, as she had always worn them, but her step-mother was firm. That could not be. If her hair had been only long enough to reach to her shoulders, it would not have seemed so absurd, for many young women wore their short ringlets all about the neck. But Dawn's hair fell far below her waist in rich, abundant curls. It was out of the question for her to be married looking so like a child.

The argument had waxed hot, and at one point Dawn had declared that she would not be married at all unless she could wear her hair as she had always worn it. Finally her step-mother threatened to go for the girl's father to settle the dispute. Dawn's face was white, and she turned away to hide her emotion. Then in a strange, hard voice she said:

"I will put it up if it must be."

After all, what did that or anything else matter? Certainly not enough to invoke her father's wrath upon her at this most trying moment of her life.

She drew the mass of beautiful curls up on her head, fastening them with a large tortoise-shell comb which had been her mother's and was treasured by the young girl. The ends of the curls fell in a little shower over the back of the comb, making a lovely effect. The step-mother thought it far too careless and mussy-looking, and frowned at the sweet, artistic head, but Dawn gave it a pat here and there and would have no more to say about it. With her own hands, she arranged the filmy veil. She would not have her step-mother's assistance. Mrs. Van Rensselaer stood by, watching the quick, assured way in which the young bride draped the delicate fabric. The elder woman was half jealous of the girl's deftness.

"Put on your gloves, and you'll do very nicely, though I must say I'd rather see your hair smooth for once. But the veil hides the frowsiness. Now, is there anything you'd like to know about what you've got to do?"

Dawn looked at her step-mother in horror.

"I haven't got to do anything, have I?" There was genuine distress in her voice. She had been so absorbed in the great thought of the result of this act that the ceremony itself, about which so many girls worry, had not entered into her mind in the least.

"Well," said Mrs. Van Rensselaer—there was satisfaction in her voice, for Dawn was unconsciously making it easier for her than she had dared to hope—"there isn't much, of course. Nothing but to keep your eyes down and walk in and say yes. It's all very simple. The main thing is never to look up. It is counted very bad manners to look up. A bride who raises her eyes during the ceremony, or before, is called very bold and—and immodest!"

The step-mother's voice sounded queer to herself, and she picked at an invisible thread on her sleeve. This was the first out-and-out bald lie she had ever told in her life, though she had made many a misleading statement; but that, of course, to a woman with a conscience, was a very different thing. This woman thought she had a conscience, and she was excusing her present action on the ground of necessity, and the circumstances. "She's getting a far better husband every way, anyhow, and it isn't as if she was much attached to the other man. One can see she was afraid of him. I'm really doing her a service, and she'll thank me when she finds it out." This was what she told her conscience now, and went on with her advice to Dawn.

"You want to walk downstairs very slowly, with your eyes on the hem of your frock. You mustn't look up for anything."

"I'm sure I don't know what I should want to look up for," said Dawn coldly. "I'd much rather look down. I'm glad it's quite polite to do so."

"That's right," commended her step-mother, with unusual alacrity. "And it won't do a bit of harm to keep it up some afterward too, at least, till you get out to the dining-room, and then you can look into your plate a good deal. People will only think you are shy and modest, and say nice things about you for it."

"I don't care what people think," observed the girl. "Is that all?"

"Oh, there'll be things he'll ask you—the minister, you know. The regular service. He'll say a lot of things, and then ask you, 'Do you thus promise?' And then you say, 'Yes,' or you can just nod your head."

"But suppose I don't like to promise those things? Won't he marry me?" The girl asked the question sharply, as if she saw a possibility of escape somewhere; but the older woman was so relieved that her task had been performed that she took little notice of the question.

"Oh, yes," she answered carelessly, thinking the girl was anxious about saying her part at the right time. "If you don't get it in, he'll go right on, any way, and it'll soon be over. You know Doctor Parker is very deaf, and he wouldn't know whether you said yes or no. Now, if there isn't anything else, I'll go down, for I hear more carriages coming, and I'll be needed. You're sure you don't want to see him before the ceremony."

"No," said Dawn, turning away from her with a quick gasp of her breath. Oh, if she need never see him, how happy she would be!

"Well, then, I'll go down. You be all ready when I call you to come. Now, mind you don't once raise your eyes until the ceremony is over and you are out in the dining-room. Above all things, don't look up at your husband even then. Nobody should see you look at each other. It makes them think you are foolish and silly."

"I shall certainly not look at him," said Dawn with white lips.

Then the step-mother went out of the room.

Dawn fastened the door and went quickly over to the stand, where the roses had been unnoticed by Mrs. Van Rensselaer. Had she seen them, it would have been like her to throw them out of the window, lest the water should upset on the white satin frock.

The girl bent over and breathed in their fragrance again, and then, carefully drying the stem on a towel, she slipped them up under her veil and fastened them upon her breast with a little pearl pin that had belonged to her mother. She went to her glass and viewed the effect through her veil, with a white, wan smile at the buds nestling among the beautiful lace. She would have one thing as she wanted it, any way: if she must be married, she would wear the flowers that had been given to her with a smile by somebody that understood. This was the last time she would have the right to wear another man's flowers. After to-day she would belong to her husband, but until she did she would wear the only flowers that had ever meant anything to her.

Then she closed her eyes and tried to get her spirit calmed, but she felt like one of those old queens in a tower that they used to study about at school: who was soon to go out and have her head cut off with the guillotine.

A few minutes later Mr. Winthrop again ascended the stairs to his wife's room.

"They want you to come down, Janet," he said gently. "Martha and the girls have come, and they are all waiting for you."

"I shall not come down until I have had a talk with my son Harrington," said that lady decidedly.

"Are you not coming down to the ceremony?" asked her husband. It went very hard with him to deceive the wife of his youth, but there seemed no other way to deal with her in the present situation.

"The ceremony?" She arose with alacrity. "What do you mean? Has Harrington come, and has he explained everything? It has turned out just as I supposed it would."

She stopped in front of the glass and smoothed her hair. She had arrayed herself in her best immediately after breakfast.

"I should think it was time an apology was due from you, Mr. Winthrop." Madam Winthrop stood haughtily in the middle of the room, aware that her small figure was elegant, and feeling that she had entire command of the situation. There was a becoming triumph in the brightness of her eyes and the set of her cameo lips.

"The wedding is to be at once," said her husband gravely, motioning her to precede him.

"What was Harrington's explanation?" she whispered, eager as any girl, now that she thought she had come off triumphant.

"There is no time to talk about it now," said her husband, again motioning her down the stairs.

She had a mind to make another stand before his grave authority, but in reality she was too much relieved from the awful strain she had been under during the past twenty-four hours for her to care to hold out against him longer. She went quietly down the stairs and took the place Mrs. Van Rensselaer most ungraciously assigned her. There was in that lady's eye something unquelled which gave the bridegroom's mother some uneasiness and took her mind from the ceremony, so that she failed to notice as the little procession passed by her almost immediately, that Harrington was not a part of it, and that her youngest son occupied the place of the bridegroom.

It was not until the clear voice rang out in the words, "I do," that something in the boyish accents made her look up and stretch her neck to see her son. How strange that Harrington's voice should sound so exactly like Charles's! But some one was standing so that the bridegroom's face could not be seen by her.

The little bride, with downcast eyes and palpitating heart, stood demurely by his side, her cold hands trembling within the gloves her step-mother had brought from New York for the occasion. One lay upon a fine black coat-sleeve that had put itself within reaching distance. She had not put the glove there herself. A hand, a strong, warm hand, had taken it and put it there, a hand that against her will had sent a strange thrill through her, and left her faint and frightened. That had been at the foot of the stairs, and she had walked with it thus down the room. She had not looked up to see to whom that sleeve belonged. She believed she knew, and it sent no pleasant thought to her heart. Yet she had to acknowledge that the arm had steadied her and kept her from stumbling, and had guided her safely into the vacant spot in front of the minister.

Dawn did not look beyond the hem of her garments, but kept her long lashes drooping on her crimson cheeks, a lovely but frightened bride. She felt keenly the moment the service began, and knew that she was surrendering forever her liberty and girlhood. Good-by to everything that she had ever counted happy in this life. No house, no pretty dishes, no handsome furniture, could ever make up for that now, and her heart cried out in anguish that she had not vetoed the idea when it was first proposed to her, before it had gone so far that retraction was dishonorable.

When the vows were read, and she heard their terrible binding import, she longed to cry out her horror in a great, echoing, "No!" that should leave no doubt in any mind, and would even penetrate to the good minister's deaf ears. But her tongue was tied by fear of her father and his friends, and she dared not lift her voice. Yet she would not speak to make promises her heart could not echo, and so she stood silent, with no nod of her head, no breath of a "yes." The minister, after waiting an instant for the desired assent, passed monotonously and solemnly on to the end, and pronounced those two, who knew each of the other as little almost as it was possible for two human beings to know, man and wife.

During the prayer that followed, Dawn had hard work to keep back the tears that were struggling to creep out and cool her flushed cheeks; but the breath of the roses at her breast seemed to steal up and comfort her, and once, just before the end, a strong hand, warm and gentle, was placed over her gloved one for just an instant, with a pressure that seemed to promise help. Yet because she thought it was an unloved hand, it only made her heart beat the more wildly, and she was glad when the prayer was ended and the hand was taken away.

They came crowding about her after it was over, in the order of their rank, stiffly at first and with great formality. The bride still kept her eyes drooped, barely glancing up at those who took her hand or kissed her and never once lifting her eyes to the man who stood by her side. It was the first and only mandate of her step-mother's that she obeyed to the letter and to the end.

Mrs. Van Rensselaer gave her a cold kiss, and whispered that she was doing very well; and her father gave her the second kiss she could remember from him since he had sent her own mother away, and said in a low tone: "Poor child! I hope you will be happy now!"

She puzzled over that sentence long. Why had he called her "poor child," and yet seemed so sure by his tone that she had attained a height upon which happiness was assured? It touched her more than anything else that he had ever said to her.

Mr. Winthrop bowed low over Dawn's hand and told her he was glad to have another dear daughter, and Madam Winthrop, coming up from the side away from the bridegroom, graciously kissed her and called her a sweet child. Then she turned to meet her son, and stopped aghast, saying, "Charles! Where is Harrington?"

Now, Dawn might have heard the disturbance and been much enlightened, and all Mrs. Van Rensselaer's fine plans might have been exposed, if it had not been that Madeleine and Cordelia stepped up to their new sister-in-law close behind their mother, while Betty had rushed in and smothered her with kisses, whispering: "Oh, you darling sister! How I am going to enjoy you!" The three girls stood gushing and fluttering over the young bride, so that she did not hear what went on.

For, as it happened, Charles bent low over his mother, so that the stream of relatives should not hear, and said in a quiet voice:

"Mother dear, congratulate me instead of Harrington. It is I who have been married. Harrington has just gone away on the train with his wife and children. Don't feel sorry, little Mother. You would not let us tell you. Be careful, Mother; people are looking, watching you. Mother!"

But Madam Winthrop said not a word. Instead, her pretty cameo face went white as death, and she slipped quietly down at the feet of her husband and son in a blessed unconsciousness. For the sake of herself and all concerned, it was the best thing she could have done. What might have happened had she kept her senses, it is not pleasant to contemplate, for she was a person of strong will and a fiery temper, although cultured and beloved beyond most women of her day.

They said that the room was close, and she had fainted. They made way for her and brought fans and ice water, but her husband and her son quietly carried her from the room, and when Betty suddenly realized that something was going on, and turned around, they told her that her mother had fainted. Someone—an angular old maid, with a sarcastic twirl to her mouth and an unpleasant way of always saying the wrong thing at the right time—told Dawn she hoped it wasn't a bad omen that her husband had had to leave her side just when the ceremony was over. This was the first intimation that the young bride had had that her husband was gone. She cast a sidewise glance and discovered that there were ladies all around her. She raised her eyes again, just a little higher, and swept a wider circle, and finally cast a guarded glance about the entire room, but could not see the dreaded face. Then she drew a sigh of relief at this small respite. She heard some one say that he had gone to help his father take his mother upstairs. Dawn had a wild impulse to fly away where he could not find her when he returned, but knew she could not.

She would gladly have gone upstairs to wait on the sick mother, if only he were not there also.

People kept coming around to congratulate her, and saying how sad it was that Madam Winthrop's strength had given way at just that moment. Betty stayed close by, and Dawn dared to look at the other girl's sweet dimpled face, all pink and white, with heavenly blue eyes and golden hair. They reminded the bride of him whom she had seen in the garden that morning. It was a pleasant thought, and Dawn continued to watch Betty, when she was sure her step-mother was not looking at her.

By and by Mrs. Van Rensselaer passed behind her and whispered: "They are coming downstairs now. Mrs. Winthrop is better. We will go out to the dining-room, and you must cut the wedding cake, you know. You are doing very well, only remember what I said: not to look around too much. A shy bride is the very best kind of bride."

A cold trembling came over the young wife. He was coming back, and a chill seemed to have crept into the sunny day. She hastily dropped her eyes, with the strange determination not to look upon her husband until absolutely compelled to do so. There seemed somehow a fascination to her in keeping this up as long as possible.

When Charles came down and hastened to her side, she was talking earnestly with his Aunt Martha, who was telling a pretty little incident of Charles's babyhood. Dawn had not the faintest conception of who Charles was, but she nodded and smiled, and Aunt Martha thought her a sweet child, and took her immediately into her gentle heart. She was somewhat aghast at the manner in which events had marched into the family history that day, but she thought it not polite to mention it to Dawn.

A distant relative of Mr. Van Rensselaer came up just then and murmured in a disagreeable whisper:

"Your husband is a sight younger than I expected, Jemima! I had been led to expect he was quite a settled man, a good ten or fifteen years older'n you, but he's real handsome. You mustn't get proud, child."

Dawn started back as if she had been stung, and became aware at once of a black-coated figure standing close by her side.

She was grateful to the people who kept talking to her and to him, so that there would be no chance of his speaking to her, or of her having to answer him now. She felt it would be more than she could do, and look at him now she would not, not till she absolutely must. It would unnerve her to look him in the face and know that she was his wife, and that he had a right over her from henceforth. Then, all at once, she heard his voice, and it was not Harrington's at all. A quick glance assured her it was her friend of the roses. Perhaps, then, Harrington was still upstairs with his mother. She drew a breath of relief.

A few mouthfuls of the wedding breakfast she managed to swallow, and she pushed a knife through the great white-coated fruit-cake, black with spice and all things good, which had been made when Mrs. Van Rensselaer first heard of the possibility of this marriage, and kept in ripening ever since. Dawn's step-mother was a fine housekeeper, and knew how to be ready for emergencies.

It was over at last, and Mrs. Van Rensselaer came to say that it was time for her to go upstairs and change her frock for the journey. Dawn had never before followed her step-mother with so much willingness as now. Her feet fairly kissed the oaken stairs as she mounted; but she had gone up only three steps when some one came quickly up and, standing by the stairs, touched her on the shoulder, saying in a voice that sent a thrill of joy through her:

"We're to go in the train; did you know it?"

Forgetting her vows and her step-mother's warnings, she looked down and saw that it was the young man of the garden again. Her face lit with a beautiful smile, and some people down in the hall, who were watching them, said one to another: "See how much they love each other, the dear children!" and turned away with a regretful smile and a sigh toward their own lost youth.

"Oh!" breathed Dawn. "I did not know it, but"—she paused—"I'm so glad you are going, too!"

In saying this, she had no thought of disloyalty to the man she thought she had married. It was merely the involuntary expression of her frightened heart that suddenly saw a rift in the dark cloud.

"Oh, so am I," he smiled. "And I'm glad you wore my roses next your heart. Put them on again when you come down, won't you?"

"I will," she promised, and let her eyes dwell on him for an instant; then fled up the stairs as her step-mother called in a voice intended to be a whisper:

"Jemima, do, for pity's sake, hurry! You will be late for the train, and then there'll be a great to-do."

Mrs. Van Rensselaer was in hot water lest the girl should learn the true state of affairs before she got away from the house. It had given the step-mother no small fright to see Charles talking with the girl over the railing. She looked at Dawn keenly, but there actually was some look of interest in the girl's eyes. Mrs. Van Rensselaer drew a sigh of relief as she hurried about to help the young wife with dressing.