High Tide at Noon Read Online Free PDF

the world. . . . It was with her eyes still rapt, as one who has heard Voices, that she turned her head and saw someone standing at the far end of the orchard, by the cemetery gate. Her return to the thoughts of this earth was rapid. It was Simon Bird.
    In five minutes she could be safe in the meadow, in sight of home, she thought, remembering an instant of panic and struggle in the blackness of the schoolhouse entry during the Island’s Christmas party. She’d never spoken to Simon Bird since. But she had watched him, sometimes.
    She watched him now, standing motionless against a tree trunk while he came toward her through the long alley of sun-splashed bloom. He had a thin tanned face and flat cheeks slanting to a lean chin. His red hair was like copper with the sun on it, and he was slight and narrow-hipped in his snug dungarees.
    â€œHello, Joanna,” he said softly. “Pretty up here, ain’t it? Almost as pretty as you are.”
    â€œI’m not pretty,” she said, her throat roughening. “Don’t talk so foolish.”
    â€œSure you are. Oh, not like one of them candy-box covers down in Pete Grant’s store. You got something else. Fire.” His chuckle was a sound of secret amusement. “I ought to know that!”
    â€œWhat about those girls down in Cuba, that you told Charles about?”
    â€œOh, that trash.” He shrugged. “They’re second hand. everybody’s handled them. Me, I like to be first. How old are you, Jo?”
    â€œGoing on sixteen.” They hadn’t said it was Simon who hauled their traps, they’d talked mostly about his father and Ash. The other girls were always giggling about Simon, and she thought they were dumb, but it was true what they said about him—he was good-looking. And they all had an eye on him, too. But as far as she knew, he hadn’t looked back.
    â€œSee here,” he said. “Look what you did that night. You’re sorry, ain’t ye?” His eyes, his slow smile, wheedled her. He came close and she saw the faint little white line in his tanned cheek. She remembered, her heart hammering all over again, the thick darkness and her terror and her fingernails breaking his skin, his muttered, “Christ!”
    â€œWell, you wouldn’t let me go,” she muttered.
    â€œI only wanted to kiss you. Would you fight like that now, Jo?” His voice dropped. “After all . . . what’s a kiss between friends?”
    She wished he wouldn’t stand so near. It did some odd thing to her breathing. Her eyelids felt heavy, as if her thick lashes weighed them down. This was the time to run away, and she knew it. If she wanted to run away . . .
    â€œWould you fight now, Jo?” he murmured. Her feet wouldn’t move, and the tree bark was rough against her cold palms, and deep inside her head a voice mocked her. You don’t dare say no , it said. You’re a coward, wanting to run away. What are you scared of?
    I’m not scared of anything, Joanna answered it, and the sense of adventure was warm and sweet in her blood. She was not a child now, and it was time to find out things for herself. And deep down, in some wild, forbidden comer of her brain, she had never really forgotten how Simon’s mouth had felt on hers in the brief moment when he’d succeeded.
    I want to know , she thought defiantly. Was it wrong to want to know? So she tilted her chin at fate and said in a perfectly level voice, “I wouldn’t fight . . . again.”
    â€œI didn’t think you would.” Simon stepped back. He lit a cigarette and things became real again. The world broke in. Already the orchard was in shadow. The breeze was freshening, and the robins were singing as they always did when it was almost evening.
    Simon looked at her through cigarette smoke. “Take a walk with me, Jo . . . tonight. Only your folks won’t let you out. The old man’s not