The Canton advocate. [volume] (Canton, D.T. [S.D.]) 1877-1897, 1878-04-02
" The Hour Before Dawn. y
AN ENGLISH STORY.

AN ENGLISH STORY.
The latest September days had come
in all their pefection-days when the
pure cool air seemed like an elixir Of life
and youth-when there was the first sug-
gestion of the exquisitely sad days of
the dying summer time in the hazy, red
gold atmosphere, that hung silently over
The hill-tops, and brooded like some pal
pable blessing over low-land and lawn.
Blanche Carroll sat on the low door
step OF the farm house that had been
her home that snmmer, looking out
through the twilight WITH wisttul eyes
that were blue as heavens dome.
Thinking-always thinking; it seemed
to her, since those other days, net yet a
year gone by, when instead Of being,
what ,ehe was now, Mrs. Pembertol
half assistant in the duties of the FAM
ily-half sister, daughter, friend what
over one choose to call the intimate re-
lation that existed between then--when,
instead of this, she had been belle and
heiress, whose sway was undisputed,
whose reign had been as magnifcently
Triumphant as its sudden ending had
been pitifully sharp and bitter.
She had never in all her eighteen years
of gay, joyous life, known what it m eant
to have wish ungratifed-a want, how.
ever imaginary, unfui6lled.
There had never been any lack of
ready money; there had been horses and
: carriages, and servants, at the girls sig.
nal, and trips to the Continent whenever
the fancy seized her.
Then had come the terrible financial
earthquake, and a week after Blanche
Carroll had learned from the lips of hel
distracted father that everything must
go, even to her jewels and laces anc
costly little elegances, so that his name
would not now be dishonored for the
first time in his life.
A week after that day, which had seem
ed the most dreadful of all possible days
some one had come to her and added the
very blackness of darkness to her woe by
telling her of how Mr.. Carroll was founc
dead in his Office chair-apoplexy or par
alysis-which was not yet decided
Blanch almost collapsed under that sec
ond blow. Never having remembered
her mother, she had loved her father with
double intensity. And when he was
dead and buried, the world yawned be-
fore with no protecting arms between hel
and ir-when there did not remain s
hundred pounds in all the wide world she
could call her own.
Poor Blanche!
And yet it was not the very worst
The worst of all was Elmer Westcourt's
detection, with scores of those she haG
implicitly believed were best, truest
dearest-others whose detection hurt hel
for the time, but whom she learned she
could really exist without.
But Elmer Westcourt! He had been
a., that was most noble, most perfect,
orandesI1 in masculine human nature
. FL him, she nd looked with almost the
reverence Of csvotee to her patron
saint.
His physical beauty had commanded
her passionate admiration, his qualities
of mind had called out her keenest ap-
probation, and his peculiarly masterful
way has taught the girl for the first time
in her life how sweet it Was to be govern
ed.
There had never been an engagement
between them, and yet Blanche had been
SO positively sure he loved her.
She had seen it in his eyes, time and
again. She had more than once listened
to sweet, suggestive words he had spoken,
in his low, thrilling voice. She had,
with good reason, built the most beauti.
full castles of their future together, and
had only been waiting his pleasure to
). speak, when her trouble came to her.
And, with all other summer friends,
.he too, had left her, without word
without a sign, to think what she chose,
totsufer or not, as the case might be,
Then, in her distress, in her sorely
wounded pride, her desolation of soul
Y Blanche had rushed away from London
away up among the green hills of Cum
be1land, where she was not mistaken in
supposing she had one friend left-Mrs.
iii, Pemberton, who, although personally a
stranger to her, Blanche knew had been
"a dear, warm friend in girlhood days of
her dead mother.
r0AAu ~ ~ C<1uAC w Pcboo sudV D1dACuC
Carroll made her home in the tenant
farmhouse, where, with light, womanly
duties and pleasant responsibilities, she
= was bravely striving to forget her bitter
past, and the sound Of Elmer Westcourt's
voice, and the look in his eyes.
She was thinking of all this as she sat
lin the twilight, that cool, breezy Sep
TENDER night, and into the beautiful
blue eyes had come such a wistfulness
and heartsick woe that dear, motherly
Mrs. Pemberton, looking up from her
knitting, saw the misery.
- -" II will never, never dol" she said,
enefgetically-so much SO that her kind
ly, emphatic tones brought sudden
dash Of color to Blanche's face. " It will
never do-the way you allow yourself to
, brood on things that you can't help. |
am really delighted to think John will
be home, soon. He will take you in
charge and make you give up these use
less memories, which only seem to make
you miserable. Such dear, blessed old
boy as my John is, Blanche, and 50 hand
some! Why, / confidently expect it
Will be case of mutual aft. 1ity, you
and he, unless he has lost h is heart
abroad this year he has been IN Ger
many.
A case Of affinity for her! Bl, 4ehe
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