Beyond Sunrise Read Online Free PDF Page A

both the bay and the thundering ocean beyond it. As she drew nearer, India realized the structure was slightly larger than most native huts, more like two huts put together. The walls were of woven bamboo, the roof of pandanus fastened with coconut fiber thongs to supporting purau-bough rafters. In place of window glass, bamboo blinds swung from the eaves, while on the porch, a young, dark-skinned, bare-breasted woman was squatting on a mat and grating a coconut. She looked up as India approached.
    "Is Mr. Ryder at home?" India asked, hesitating at the base of the steps.
    The woman was lighter-skinned than mostof the Melanesians of the island, perhaps part Polynesian, or even part European. A bare-bottomed boy of two or three gazed up at India from his mother's side, his eyes big and blue in a pale, even-featured face. A terrible suspicion forming in her mind, India stared at the child, then back at the nubile, half-naked woman.
    India was no innocent. She had heard of such things: white men keeping dark women as their mistresses. But that didn't mean she found the thought of having to deal with such a man any less disquieting.
    "Ryder inside," said the woman, her attention once more concentrated on the deft movement of her fingers. "You go in."
    India mounted the steps, then paused again before the open, darkened doorway. The woman had told her to enter, but she couldn't quite bring herself to do so unannounced. Raising one fist, she rapped her knuckles sharply against the frame. "Mr. Ryder?" she called, then stood listening as her voice faded away into a silence broken by the gentle swish of palm fronds and the boom of the distant surf.
    "Mr. Ryder," she called again, louder. Somewhere, a cockatoo screeched, but the stillness of the house's interior remained undisturbed. With a last glance at the bare-breasted woman on the porch, India stepped inside.
    Although primitive, the house's interior was surprisingly pleasant, with tall, open rafters and a deliciously airy atmosphere a more proper plank-and-iron colonial structure could never have achieved. The pale, diffused light filtering in through the bamboo blinds showed her a scattering of island-made furniture: sturdy mahogany and teak tables and settees, and numerous tall bamboo bookcases filled, to India's amazement, with shelf after shelf of well-worn books. Overcome with curiosity, she was halfway across the floor toward them, intending to study their titles, when a faint stirring followed by a strangled snore froze her in her tracks.
    Turning her head to search the shadowy recesses of the room, India found herself staring at a huge, elaborately carved Malaysian bedstead draped in filmy white falls of mosquito netting. From the crumpled depths of the bedding, a dark masculine arm emerged to flop over the mattress's edge and dangle there limply.
    "Mr. Ryder," said India.
    The arm didn't move.
    Remembering the man's state of undress the previous day, India approached the bedstead with some caution. A tousled dark head came into view, then a naked back, well strapped with muscle and darkened by the sun. Letting her gaze travel slowly down that taut, curving spine, India found herself both relieved and oddly disappointed to discover a twisted sheet obscuring any further details of the man's anatomy.
    "Mr. Ryder," she said again, louder, but received in response only another half snore that filled the air with incriminating fumes of brandy.
    She thought about shaking the bedpost, but it seemed too intimate a thing, to actually touch his bed. Instead, she grasped the edge of a nearby chest for balance and, lifting one foot, used the toe of her sensible lace-up boot to jostle the mattress.
    Nothing.
    A soft, melodic laugh from the doorway behind her brought India around.
    "You could dump him out of bed and it probably still wouldn't wake him," said the slim Polynesian boy who stood just inside the hut's entrance.
    India threw a disdainful glance back at the man in the bed. "I