Dawn
Copyright© 2024 by Eleanor H. Porter
Chapter 20: With Chin Up
Keith came in April. The day before he was expected, Susan, sweeping off the side porch, was accosted by Mrs. McGuire.
It was the first warm spring-like day, and Mrs. McGuire, bareheaded and coatless, had opened the back-yard gate and was picking her way across the spongy turf.
“My, but isn’t this a great day, Susan!” she called, with an ecstatic, indrawn breath. “I only wish it was as nice under foot.”
“Hain’t you got no rubbers on?” Susan’s disapproving eyes sought Mrs.
McGuire’s feet.
Mrs. McGuire laughed lightly.
“No. That’s the one thing I leave off the first possible minute. Some way, I feel as if I was helpin’ along the spring.”
“Humph! Well, I should help along somethin’ ‘sides spring, I guess, if
I did it. Besides, it strikes me rubbers ain’t the only thing you’re
leavin’ off.” Susan’s disapproving eyes had swept now to Mrs.
McGuire’s unprotected head and shoulders.
“Oh, I’m not cold. I love it. As if this glorious spring sunshine could do any one any harm! Susan, it’s LIEUTENANT McGuire, now! I came over to tell you. My John’s been promoted.”
“Sho, you don’t say! Ain’t that wonderful, now?” Susan’s broom stopped in midair.
“Not when you know my John!” The proud mother lifted her head a little. “‘For bravery an’ valiant service’—Lieutenant McGuire! Oh Susan, Susan, but I’m the proud woman this mornin’!”
“Yes, of course, of course, I ain’t wonderin’ you be!” Susan drew a long sigh and fell to sweeping again.
Mrs. McGuire, looking into Susan’s face, came a step nearer. Her own face sobered.
“An’ me braggin’ like this, when you folks-! I know—you’re thinkin’ of that poor blind boy. An’ it’s just to-morrow that he comes, isn’t it?”
Susan nodded dumbly.
“An’ it’s all ended now an’ decided—he can’t ever see, I s’pose,” went on Mrs. McGuire. “I heard ‘em talkin’ down to the store last night. It seems terrible.”
“Yes, it does.” Susan was sweeping vigorously now, over and over again in the same place.
“I wonder how—he’ll take it.”
Susan stopped sweeping and turned with a jerk.
“Take it? He’s got to take it, hain’t he?” she demanded fiercely. “He’s GOT TO! An’ things you’ve got to do, you do. That’s all. You’ll see. Keith Burton ain’t no quitter. He’ll take it with his head up an’ his shoulders braced. I know. You’ll see. Don’t I remember the look on his blessed face that day he went away, an’ stood on them steps there, callin’ back his cheery good-bye?”
“But, Susan, there was hope then, an’ there isn’t any now—an’ you haven’t seen him since. You forget that.”
“No, I don’t,” retorted Susan doggedly. “I ain’t forgettin’ nothin’.
‘But you’ll see!”
“An’ he’s older. He realizes more. Why, he must be—How old is he, anyway?”
“He’ll be nineteen next June.”
“Almost a man. Poor boy, poor boy—an’ him with all these years of black darkness ahead of him! I tell you, Susan, I never appreciated my eyes as I have since Keith lost his. Seems as though anybody that’s got their eyes hadn’t ought to complain of—anything. I was thinkin’ this mornin’, comin’ over, how good it was just to SEE the blue sky an’ the sunshine an’ the little buds breakin’ through their brown jackets. Why, Susan, I never realized how good just seein’ was—till I thought of Keith, who can’t never see again.”
“Yes. Well, I’ve got to go in now, Mis’ McGuire. Good-bye.”
Words, manner, and tone of voice were discourtesy itself; but Mrs. McGuire, looking at Susan’s quivering face, brimming eyes, and set lips, knew it for what it was and did not mistake it for—discourtesy. But because she knew Susan would prefer it so, she turned away with a light “Yes, so’ve I. Good-bye!” which gave no sign that she had seen and understood.
Dr. Stewart came himself with Keith to Hinsdale and accompanied him to the house. It had been the doctor’s own suggestion that neither the boy’s father nor Susan should meet them at the train. Perhaps the doctor feared for that meeting. Naturally it would not be an easy one. Naturally too, he did not want to add one straw to Keith’s already grievous burden. So he had written:
I will come to the house. As I am a little uncertain as to the train I can catch from Boston, do not try to meet me at the station.
“Jest as if we couldn’t see through that subterranean!” Susan had muttered to herself over the dishes that morning. “I guess he knows what train he’s goin’ to take all right. He jest didn’t want us to meet him an’ make a scenic at the depot. I wonder if he thinks I would! Don’t he think I knows anything?”
But, after all, it was very simple, very quiet, very ordinary. Dr. Stewart rang the bell and Susan went to the door. And there they stood: Keith, big and strong and handsome (Susan had forgotten that two years could transform a somewhat awkward boy into so fine and stalwart a youth); the doctor, pale, and with an apprehensive uncertainty in his eyes.
“Well, Susan, how are you?” Keith’s voice was strong and steady, and the outstretched hand gripped hers with a clasp that hurt.
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