The Coconino sun., 1919-12-12
DAWN
By JACK LAWToN

Jerome barris In the hour of his great success was but disillusioned. disappointed man. Still young and having won the golden key to favor, he drew back wearily before those doors 1t might open.
 During his years of struggle and need none of these friends. who now so eagerly strove to share his triumph, had made an effort to stretch forth a helping hand. Even the girl whom he had so deeply loved and who, had pro- fessed to return his love had grown weary waiting and had heartlessly tilted him for an acknowledged man of the business world.
 Now that the dream of Jerome Bar. ris was realized he smiled cynically at this same woman's proffered notes of econclliation-hls former love had be- come widow, but her charm for him had vanished before her insincerity and all this superficial adulation now wearied him. He longed to get away from 1t, to get back to certain spot which had often been his refuge.
 To Barris this small place, with the sea stretching out before. was home, his one sure haven.
 It was here that his great picture was born--fhe picture which had won for him fame and fortune Years ago, when his heart was sore with It's dis appointment, he had gone, after read ing the announcement of the one girls marriage, to the secluslon of this little house. there to shut out from curious eyes his deep hurt. And when at sun. down he sat upon the tiny porch boat had come drifting down golden beam toward him. And in the boat sat very young girl. Unbound, her golden hair rippled over her shoulders, and her up- raised face was glorified in the light.
 Barris called his great picture 'Maidenhood.'
 Impulsively he had called her as she drifted by, and had run down to draw her boat in to the shore. The girl, who was perhaps fourteen or fifteen years of age, acceded readily to his request that she pose thus again for picture.
 "Fll make the arrangement with your people," Barris suggested.
 "I have no people," the girl told him. and as she went on with the strange story of her own life he knew what had brought the shadow to her young eyes. She had been washed to the shore in boat tossing upon a stormy sea before she was old enough to re- member anything about 1t. A man and woman found drowned later were thought to have been her parents, but she had never known. A fisherman find. ing the child carried her to his wife who had befriended her, until as the girl grew and the wife became an in- valid the charge was transferred.
 They called her Dawn" the girl told him blushingly. because it had been at dawn that the fisherman found her.
 And as days passed and Dawn came to pose for the artist he learned more and more of the hard incongruity of a young life which longed for great things and must be satisfied with com mon duties. Dawn's heart was full of music and her mind yearned for knowledge.
 When upon his return later from the city Barris learned from his old house keeper that Dawn's invalid charge had died he sent at once for the girl and bade her make her home, in his house on the shore, arranging passage for her to and from school in the adjoin. ing village and finding her music teacher there. Then in the absorbing occupation of his city studio the artist forgot about the little girl, who never ceased to think of him with reverent adoratiOn.
 Barris, long absent from the house by the sea. sought 1t out again after one of his trips abroad and learned from the old housekeeper that his protege had secured position as teacher in nearby village and left word that he would hear from her later.
 The artist smiled and drowned. "She should have allowed me to complete her education" he said. Then his pleased eyes fell upon the inviting fur nishing of his beloved old room.
 You keep the place up we'll" he commended his housekeeper.
 That's Dawn" the woman ssplisd "she comes out here and sees that things is all new an convenient. We must keep 1t home-for him. she says"
 After that came to the artist regu. larly small checks in the name of the village bank, with notes in girlish hand.
 "Of course I can never repay what you have done for me-" wrote Dawn, "this Is just to assure myself that l would If could"
 And at length, wearied by labor and surfeited with fattering attentions, came %o Barris longing vNsh for the restful house by the shore And when he reached 1t at sundown, sailing again <hr wnIdov, otor <Oxxvo ovI him