Daybreak Read Online Free PDF Page B

had seen him last.
    There were many parties that year, and she went to them all. People liked Laura, as people always had done. She was, in a sense, a leader, for which she was thankful, but also surprised because she could see nothing special about herself, nothing different from most other girls except that she was able to entertain people at the piano.
    Dressed in red velvet for somebody’s formal dance at the country club, she was waiting to be called for one evening when Francis rang the doorbell.
    “You always come home unexpectedly,” she said with her new calm smile.
    “I covered for a fellow at the hospital last weekend, and this is my payback. I’m so darned glad to be here, Laura. But I’m holding you up. You’re on your way out, I see.”
    Her heart was wild, and yet she was able to keep that practiced calm.
    “Yes, to a dance, but not till half-past. Sit down and keep me company.”
    He drew up a chair near hers so that their knees almost touched. “Do you realize it’s two years since I saw you last? You’re so changed that I almost don’t know you anymore.”
    “I’m fifteen now.”
    “If I were fifteen, I’d bar the door to the fellow who’s taking you, and I’d take you to the dance myself.”
    “Your father says you’re working too hard.”
    “Oh, I’ve had a few twenty-four-hour stretches between sleeps. But that goes with the job, and I love the job.”
    “Is that why you don’t come home anymore?”
    “Dad says he has more free time than I have, so he’d rather visit me. He’s going to enjoy California again when I go back there for my fellowship.” Francis smiled. “He loved the ocean.”
    “How long will you be there?”
    “It’s a two-year fellowship. Then maybe I’ll go abroad for research. I want to specialize in rare diseases, then come back and teach.”
    “Elephantiasis and stuff like that?”
    “Like that. How do you know about elephantiasis?”
    “I pick things up when I read, and I read everything. Ever since you taught me.”
    “I’m proud of you, Laura. Glad and proud.”
    And with a touch of her own pride, she told him, “I skipped a year. I’ll be sixteen and a half when I graduate.”
    The dialogue came to a stop, although there ought to have been so much to say after their long separation.Indeed, Laura’s head was crammed with questions, but she could not ask them.
    After a moment, Francis asked one. “What’s been happening in the neighborhood? Anything interesting? All I’ve heard is that George Buckson’s bank has sent him to Hong Kong, and that Carol Baker’s engaged.”
    “But not to you?”
    His eyebrows rose. “Me? Whoever gave you that idea?”
    “My aunts.”
    “Of course, who else?” And they both laughed.
    The laughter restored them to where they had been two years before. A light relief moved through Laura’s body, an involuntary smile touched her lips, and wanting to display her lace cuff and the pink shells of her newly manicured nails, she rested her hand on the arm of the chair. If only the doorbell would not ring, if only they might stay alone like this.
    He was looking at her, eyes meeting eyes, and she saw in his that he found her beautiful.
    “You—” he began when the doorbell rang.
    “Oh darn, here they are,” she cried.
    Francis went to open the door on the cold air and the noisy little troupe. Jeanie was with Rick, Cissy was with Fred, and Hank had a corsage—a white one, thank goodness—for Laura.
    “We’re late,” Hank said in a rush. “I had to wait for the station wagon, so we all decided to meet here and save time.”
    Self-conscious in their clothes, they stood waiting while she made a quick introduction to Francis and hurried herself into her coat. Suddenly they looked like such kids, such awkward kids. They had neverseemed like that before. And Laura’s feeling of elegance evaporated; she partook of their awkwardness.
    Francis loomed over them, although the boys were almost as tall as