Read Online The Girl he Never Noticed by Lindsay Armstrong - Free Book Online

goldfish.
    ‘Did you do all this?’ Liz asked, rather enchanted,surveying the menagerie and thinking how much Scout would love it.
    ‘No, silly. I’m only five,’ Archie replied. ‘Cam did most if it. But I helped. Here.’ He handed Liz a guinea pig. ‘That’s Golly, and this one—’ he drew another one out of the castle-like cage ‘—is Ginny. She’s his wife and they’re all the kids.’ Archie pointed into the cage.
    ‘I see,’ Liz replied gravely as she stroked Golly. ‘So where is Wenonah? And her puppies?’
    ‘Down at the stables. Wenonah can be a bit naughty about rabbits and things. She likes to chase them. But I’m going to train the puppy I get not to. Thing is—’ his brow creased ‘—I don’t know whether to get a boy or a girl.’
    ‘Perhaps Cam can help you there? He might have an idea on the subject.’
    Archie brightened. ‘He usually does. Now, this is something special—my blue-tongue lizard!’
    ‘Oh, wow!’ Liz carefully put Golly back and sank down on her knees. ‘Oh, my!’
    That was how Cam found them some time later, both Liz and Archie on their knees and laughing together as they tried to entice Wally the blue-tongue lizard out of his cave.
    Liz looked up and got up, brushing her knees. ‘Sorry, but this is fascinating. I was just thinking how much Scout would enjoy it.’
    ‘Who’s Scout?’ Archie enquired. ‘Does he like animals?’
    ‘She
—she’s my little girl, and she adores animals at the moment.’
    ‘You should bring her over to play with me,’ Archie said.
    ‘Oh—’
    Cam intervened. ‘We’ll see, Archie. Can I have Liz now?’
    Archie agreed, but grudgingly.
    ‘You made a hit there,’ Cam commented as they walked back to the house.
    ‘You get into “little kid mode” if you’re around them long enough,’ Liz said humorously, and stepped through the dolphin doors—only to stop with a gasp.
    The entrance hall was a gallery that led to a lounge below. It had a vast stone fireplace and some priceless-looking rugs scattered about the stone-flagged floor. It was furnished with sumptuously comfortable settees and just a few equally priceless-looking ornaments and paintings. The overall colour scheme was warm and inviting—cream and terracotta with dashes of mint-green. But it was the wall of ceiling-high windows overlooking the most stunning view that had made Liz gasp.
    A valley dropped precipitously below that wall of windows and fled away into the morning sunlight in all its wild splendour.
    ‘It’s—amazing. Do you ever get used to it?’ she asked.
    ‘Not really. It changes—different lights, different times of day, different weather. Uh—the study is down those stairs.’
    The study came as another surprise to Liz. It presentedquite a different view—a sunlit, peaceful view—across a formal garden to grassy paddocks with wooden fences and horses grazing, lazily switching their tails. Beyond the paddocks she could see a shingle-roofed building with two wings and a clock tower in the middle—obviously the stables.
    She turned back from the windows and surveyed the study. It was wood-panelled and lined with books on two sides. On the other walls there were very similar paintings to those in his office in Sydney: horses and trawlers. Her lips twitched.
    The carpet was Ming blue, and the chairs on either side of the desk were covered in navy leather.
    She sat down as directed, and he took his place behind the desk.
    ‘I don’t know how you manage to tear yourself away from the place,’ she commented, as he poured coffee from a pewter flask. She cocked her head to one side as she accepted her cup. ‘Was the menagerie your idea?’
    ‘More or less.’ He stirred his coffee. ‘Archie’s always been interested in animals, so I thought instead of mice in shoeboxes we might as well do it properly.’ He looked down at his mug, ‘It has also, I think, helped him get over the loss of his mother.’
    Liz hesitated, then decided not to