Chapter 23

"Oh!" said the girl, rearing the pretty head with its wealth of bright hair, "as for that, I'm going to marry. If you like to exercise your authority I'll run away and you can't unmarry me. It is at grandma's wish you are here; she said to let old bitterness sleep for the time you are here, and so I will now that I have explained that I utterly refuse to recognise that a father is anything but a stranger unless he discharges the responsibilities of the office. For the sake of the race I maintain this ground," she concluded in words that had been put into her mouth by one of the speakers at Ada Grosvenor's election league, and the appearance of the ladies put an end to further contention.

Dawn's judgments were remorseless, as becoming clean-souled, fearless youth as yet unacquainted with the great gulf 'twixt the ideal and real, and untainted by that charity and complaisance which, like senility, come with advancing years.

The aunt was elderly and unprepossessing, and the stepmother of the type bespeaking champagne and too much eating for the exercise taken, for her head was partly sunk in a huge mass of adipose substance that had once been bosom, and the other proportions of her figure were in keeping.

The cups were spread in the dining-room, so thither we repaired to eat and drink while representations of Jim Clay and Jake Sorrel, senior, who had wept for the sufferings of the convicts, glowered down upon the gathering of plebeians who were half swells and the swells who were wholly plebeian.

Presently grandma and I excused ourselves and left Dawn with her relations.

"What do you think of 'em? Are they any better than Dawn an' me?" said the old dame as we got out of hearing. "How do I compare with that old sack of charcoal?"

Ay, how did she compare? As a slight, active, handsome woman, still vigorous at seventy-six, with one who, though thirty years her junior, was already almost helpless from obesity and natural clumsiness,--that's how she compared!

"Them's some of the swells for you--one of the 'old families,' who think they're made of different stuff to you an' me. What do you think of Dawn, Jim Clay's granddaughter, who drove the coach, when placed beside her aunt, the granddaughter of an admiral in the army?"

"She looks as though Jim Clay had been a general in the navy and she had done justice to her heredity," I gravely replied.

"Andrew, come here an' tell me how you managed 'em, an' what you think of the great bugs now you've seen 'em," commanded the old lady of that individual, as he emerged from the kitchen with both hands full of cake.

"Did you walk up to 'em an' say, 'Are you Mr and Mrs Mudeheepe, I'm Mrs Clay's grandson?' like I told you."

"No; I seen it on their luggage without arskin' them, an' one look at 'em was enough for me. I didn't bother tellin' 'em who I was. I didn't care if they had fell down an' broke their necks--the bloomin' long-nosed old goats! I just took hold of their things an' flung 'em in the 'bus, and the old fat one she says, 'Are you Mrs Clay's groom?' an' I says, 'Mrs Clay is my grandma,' an' she says, 'Oh'!"

"Well, you might have introduced yourself a bit better to make things more agreeabler, but they really are the untakin'est people I've seen for a long time. Ain't I delighted that Dawn took after my side! An' now, though she's me own, do you think I'm over conceited to think her fit for the king's son?"

"Certainly not," I replied; for it would have taken a very estimable son of a king to be meet for this Princess of the Break-of-Day, appropriately christened Dawn!

THIRTY.

FOR FURTHER PARTICULARS CONSULT 'THE NOONOON ADVERTISER' OF THAT DATE.

That was a grand wedding celebrated in Noonoon ere the orange blossoms had turned into oranges, but for details it would be better to refer to that most reliable little journal, 'The Noonoon Advertiser.' Only a few particulars remain in my mind, but the paper published a full account, including a minute description of the bride's gown and a careful list of the presents. It was much to the horror of Ernest that the latter was inserted, but it would have been much more horrible to Grandma Clay had the mention of so much as a jam-spoon been omitted, so he consoled himself with the reflection that it was only in 'The Noonoon Advertiser,' and took care to keep the list out of the account which appeared in the Sydney dailies. The curious, by consulting a back number of the little country sheet, may learn that Mrs L. Witcom (_née_ Carry, the ex-lady help) gave the bride one of many pairs of shadow-work pillow shams, and that Miss Grosvenor contributed one of the equally numerous drawn-thread table centres. Mrs Bray presented a ribbon-work cushion; Dr Smalley, some of the jam-spoons; Andrew, a bread-fork; and Mr J. Sorrel, great-uncle of the bride, a silver cream-jug; while Mr Claude (alias "Dora") Eweword kept himself in mind by an afternoon tea-set. The complete list took a column, and included dozens of magnificent articles from sporting associations and chums of the bridegroom.

The bride--a glorious vision in Duchesse satin and accessories in keeping, and with real orange blossoms in hair, corsage, and train; the proud shyness of the gentle and stalwart groom standing beside her, and the brave old grandmother drawn up a little in the rear, formed a picture I shall never forget. The old lady performed her office with flashing eyes, a steady voice, and an individuality which none could despise or overlook.

Excepting her grandmother, Dawn was unattended, and as the young couple came down the aisle, by previous request of the bride, I had the honour of accompanying the old lady from the church, and she said, as we drove away over the scattered rose petals to be in readiness to receive the guests--

"I've done it--give me little girl away, an' without misgivin's, for if she's as happy as I was she'll do. When the time was here there was some patches of me life wasn't too soft, but lookin' back, I would marry Jim Clay over again if I could."

The caterpillars that had been eating the grape-vines and giving Andrew exercise as destroyer, had turned into millions of white butterflies that flecked the golden sunlight like a vast flotilla of miniature aerial yachts, and enhanced the splendour of that balmy wedding-day. It was the month of roses, and, intertwined with jasmine and mignonette, they formed the chief decorations in the roomy marquee erected for the breakfast under the big old cedars overlooking the river. All Noonoonites of any importance sat down to the repast, and their names, from that of Mrs Bray to Mrs Dr Tinker, are recorded in 'The Noonoon Advertiser.' The last-mentioned lady did not exhibit any of her famous characteristics at the function further than to use a gorgeous fan she carried in rapping her husband over the knuckles every time his attention wandered from her remarks. The toasts were many and long, and it fell to "Dora" Eweword to respond to that of the "ladies." Since the announcement of Dawn's engagement to Ernest, "Dora" had been frequently seen out driving with Ada Grosvenor, and he paid her marked attention at the wedding; but this was private, not public, information.

After I had helped Dawn into her travelling dress I had a few words apart with Ernest while Grandma Clay bade a private good-bye to his wife.

"Well," he said, with self-contained and pardonable triumph, "I've won her in spite of that dish of water."

"Yes, we three have accomplished our desire."

"What three?"

"Mr and Mrs R. E. Breslaw and myself!"

"Oh, was it your desire too?" he said with a happy laugh.

The bride now appeared, and wringing my hand as he said--

"You'll come to us when we return," he stepped forward to place her in the carriage that took them to the railway.

The paper had better be again consulted for accurate account of the confetti pelting and other customary happenings that took place at the station. These details, and the real greatness of Dawn's match, and her aristocratic relatives, who, as often suspected, had not proved to be only a myth, were the chief theme of conversation for many days.

All the engines in the sheds at the time, and whose music had lulled me to sleep o' nights, blew the bride a royal fanfare as she entered her first, _engaged_, and further cock-a-doodled "good luck" as the train steamed out.

Most keenly of all I remember that it was piteously lonely, and as dreary as though the sun had lost its power, when the panting engine had climbed the hill from the sleepy little town, and dropped out of hearing on the down grade from the old valley of ripening peach and apricot, bearing the girl for ever away from the slow, meandering grooves of life of which her vigorous young soul was weary.

A meeting of the municipal council claimed Uncle Jake that night, Andrew went over to discuss the situation with Jack Bray, and the loneliness of the old dining-room was insupportable to grandma and me. Joy and beauty seemed to have fled from the scented nights beside the river,--even the whistle and rush of the trains breathed a forlorn note to my bereaved fancy, and there was a tear in grandma's eye as she said--

"Well, she's really gone for altogether--she that I helped into the world and rared with my own hand, and named after the Dawn in which she came. That's the order of life. It's always the same--you can't keep any one for always. I couldn't abear it here now--it seems as if everything in life was done, and there's no need for me to stay if Ernest puts Andrew in the way of this electrical engineerin' he's so mad for. Jake can board somewhere. He don't care about things so much. I'll go to Dawn: thank God she wants me, an' I've got plenty to take me away if she gets tired of me, as young folks often do of the old, and which is only natural after all. I can let or sell the place, an' w'en I'm gone it will be enough for Dawn if ever she's threw on the world like I was. Everythink seems fair with her now, but this is a life of ups an' downs, and there's no tellin' what may happen."

L'ENVOI.

What interest can there be in the play after the knight has settled affairs with the lady, or in the story-book when the heroine and hero have gone on a honeymoon preparatory to living happily ever after?--and that is what befell my tale in Noonoon.

I listen no more to the splendid music of the locomotives as they roar across the queer old bridge, nor watch the red light flashing from their coaling doors as they climb the Blue Mountain ascent and fire as they go. Their far-carrying rumble has been succeeded by the more thunderous voice of the sea on the rock-walled coast of my native land.

Four months have elapsed since the wedding in Noonoon, yet Ernest is still content to let his athletic ambitions remain in abeyance while he squanders his time in the sweet dalliance of love. Squander, I say; but on reviewing the expired years, how sanely sweet the youthful hours we dallied shine from amid the years we toiled, fumed, cursed, sweated, and strove to step past our brother in the bootless race for pleasure, opulence, or popularity!

Being able to indulge in the insignia of wealth, even without being the good fellow he is, Ernest finds it is of little significance that his hair is "what fond mothers term auburn," while Dawn's triumphs were assured from the outset. As mistress of a fine town mansion, with good looks, with smart ideas of dress, and smarter ability to verbally hold her own in any set, it goes without saying that her grandmother having "kep' a accommodation" is not remembered against her to any harmful extent in everyday life, where a large percentage of folks in all cliques have to survive the knowledge of their progenitors having been worse things than irreproachable proprietors and conductors of most exemplary accommodation houses for those who travel.

As Ada Grosvenor is not a girl in a book but in everyday life, I cannot record that she has married a man worthy of her. Such an one would have to be a leader of men--a prime minister, reformer, or other prominent worker in the cause of humanity--and as these do not abound in the quiet whirlpools of existence, I can only hope that she does not drop in for a too impossible noodle, as is frequently the fate of noble women. "Dora" Eweword would have done very well to discharge the clodhopping work of her earthly journey--could have made her bread-and-butter and carried her parcels, but if I can depend on Andrew's letters, which breathe more heavily of generosity than of grammar and gracefulness, this eligible and strapping young member of Noonoon society has been rejected a second time, so that Mrs Bray's fears that he would be made over conceited by adulation from marriageable girls seems to have been unnecessary.

Noonoon is enshrined in my heart as one of the pleasantest valleys on earth, so during enforcedly idle hours it has given me delight to paint its beauty, however feebly, and to put some of the doings of some of its folk in a story, that others might possibly enjoy them too. But I put the MSS. aside till, as the good country doctor so much esteemed in his circle expresses it, I shall have "pegged out," and the heroine and hero of the plot shall then judge whether it is fit or not for publication. It has interested me to write, but

"My life has crept so long on a broken wing . . . . . . . . That I come to be grateful at last for a little thing,"

and those whose lives are strong, fruitful, and successful may have no patience with the sentimental meanderings of an old woman who has outlived joy and usefulness.

* * * * *

And now, may the Lady of my tale, as her life progresses from dawn to noon, high noon to afternoon, dusk, evening, and night, have the Knight of her choice and peace always beside her, till new dawns break in other worlds beyond this place of fears and phantoms.

THE END.

End of Project Gutenberg's Some Everyday Folk and Dawn, by Miles Franklin