Perdita by Hilary Scharper Read Free Book Online Page A

their camps on the shore, and then the men will be up early in the morning and off out into the Bayfishing.
    In the darkness, I sometimes feel like an animal observing them, hidden from their view and my obscurity gives me a certain sense of…powerful invisibility, though I surprise myself in expressing it thus. The boats seem so safe in the Basin, like children nestled cozily in bed while the wind roars beyond the channel and howls at its own impotence to reach them. Indeed, I could hear the surf pounding beyond the Point; it seems just a stone’s throw from the boats and their tranquillity. How fragile does their peaceful repose look from myvantage!
    It is still bitter cold in the evenings, and I borrowed Auntie Alis’s gray shawl to keep me warm. I love the sound of my skirts swishing through the dry grasses—as if I grow here, too, and am a part of this place, its flesh and blood. They were having a bonfire on the shore, near the Lodge, but I could not hear any voices. Sometimes it is so still I can hear a single whisper, but that won’t be until later in the summer. Now everything is thawing and stirring and returning to life in a grand cacophony ofwhispers.
    I cut Father’s hair today—a sure sign that the summer season is coming. His hands are dreadful, filthy from the paraffin, and they smell dreadful, too. They will be like that for the next seven months. He and Uncle Gil have been cleaning and cleaning and getting the Light ready. I helped them with the glass, but honestly I know they came and polished again after me. Uncle Gil handed me an enormous pile of rags to be washed, and I have hidden half of them from Auntie A. She will begin her complaining, and then we will have seven months of that, too!
    I begged Tad to let me trim his mustache. I can hardly see his mouth. But of course he will not let me. Tad is very particular about his mustache, and no one will ever be able to persuade him to grow a beard. Mother does not like them. That’s what he told me, and I am somehow pleased that he should still think of her wishes. He is always so kind to her—especially since her seizure—so gentle andattentive.
    I love my Tad’s face. He ever seems to be smiling, and his eyes twinkle so. Maybe Tad’s mustache hides his sadness, but to us he is always bright and safe and sturdy. This winter we almost ran out of food, but he never once betrayed any anxiety. I only knew of his worry when the supply ship came yesterday and I saw him bent over the table, his shoulders twitching slightly. The ice was so terrible this year! I don’t know how the men came through it, but Tad was grateful and they knew it, though they would not let him show his gratitude and they joked about the five skeletons they expected to find. Men are very fine sometimes—and sometimes very terrible, too.
    Now Tad will be up all night—and Uncle Gil, as well. I shall have to be quiet in the mornings when he is asleep. I shall make Auntie walk with me and keep her from making noise, for she has grown a little clumsy with age—though I should never dare to even suggest such a thing. We will go to her little Luke’s grave, and we shall make it tidy, and I think while she is praying I will make up a story for him, just as if he were a living boy. Auntie A. will like to go—it comforts her. And of course we can leave Mother quiet—she always is restful in themornings.
    But I—I am so restless with all these familiar things! I will be nineteen this year. Will I spend all of my days here? Living through the seasons like a blade of grass or one of the rocks down below? I feel as if I am waiting for something to happen and all the world around is poised, expectant—and yet it is only the spring coming. And the boats, and the boaters from the city, and the fishermen… They all come year after year. And yet, why do I feel this expectancy—for something! Forsomeone?
    April