Summer's Awakening Read Online Free PDF Page B

early that morning.
    'Dr Dyer! I heard you were here. How are you? It's good to see you.'
    Watched by Emily and Summer, the two men exchanged cordial greetings. For the second time that day she saw the American, as he was now, employing the same potent charm she had seen him exert on his niece at the lunch table.
    Towards her his manner had been courteous, but she had felt that he would have preferred to lunch with Emily à deux. Indeed, Summer had suggested going back to the cottage for her lunch, leaving them to spend the rest of the day alone together. Then he had explained that the lawyer was arriving at two, and Emily had insisted she must eat with them.
    Trying hard to be fair to the man, in spite of her intuitive conviction that he hadn't taken to her, she acknowledged that perhaps he hadn't actually 'exerted' his charm upon Emily, in the sense that a confidence trickster exuded false charm to gull his victims.
    Perhaps with people he liked, James Gardiner always was a charming, warm personality. Unfortunately, before they had finished shaking hands, she had sensed that he was writing her off as a dowdy, uninteresting female. And she had to admit that even before she had met him, she had to some extent prejudged him—and not favourably.
    Presently, after ten minutes' conversation, Dr Dyer said he had another call to make.
    'I'll see you to your car,' said James Gardiner.
    A few minutes after the two men had left the room, Summer noticed that the doctor had forgotten his gloves. But for Emily's disability, she would have asked her to run after him. However, running, or even hurrying, could make the child start to wheeze, so it was Summer who hastened to catch him up.
    By the time she reached the end of the West Corridor where it joined the Gallery overlooking and surrounding the Great Hall, the men were on the other side, almost at the top of the Grand Staircase.
    The acoustics of the Gallery were such that people on opposite sides could speak to each other across the abyss without raising their voices. She had already overheard the doctor talking about Barty, whom she took to be the local poacher referred to by James that morning.
    She was about to call out 'Wait a minute' when she heard the younger man say, 'Have you had much to do with this hulking great girl who teaches Emily?'
    'Summer? Yes... know her well. Her aunt was a patient of mine. A difficult, embittered woman, and not always kind to her niece. Summer has had a tough time of it since she lost her parents and came to England. She was born and brought up in America. She's a very nice girl, you'll find. A bit overweight, but that's—'
    'Overweight! She's as fat as a pig,' was James Gardiner's caustic interjection. 'She never stops eating. Chocolate biscuits with her coffee this morning. Two servings of dessert at lunch. She must weigh as much as I do, and most of her weight is blubber.
    They were descending the stairs now, their backs to the spot where Summer had instinctively paused when she heard his question to the doctor.
    She had not intended to eavesdrop but, while Dr Dyer was replying, she had been unsure what to do. Already James Gardiner had referred to her in terms which must cause him embarrassment if he realised she had overheard.
    Now, after his brutal description of her being 'as fat as a pig', she was literally frozen with shock.
    Dr Dyer said, 'I seem to remember you used to be able to pack away an amazing quantity of food, James. You always made very short work of any cakes and buns my wife offered you, after I'd stitched you up—or extracted pellets from your backside,' he added, with a reminiscent guffaw.
    James did not join in his laughter. His tone incisive, he said, 'I'm not sure that a girl who's an uncontrollable glutton is a suitable mentor for Emily. How serious is her asthma? I was under the impression that, with the development of inhalants, it was now as manageable as diabetes. Isn't Ian Botham an asthmatic?'
    'Yes, he's had it