Story Snip from Larksong: Chapter 3 and Summertime Photos

Larksong is set in Montreal, July 1914.

In chapter 1, Alice, after her grandmother's funeral, arrived at the family cottage to take care of her grandmother's aviary, only to find that her parents had already leased the cottage to another family for the summer.

The only way she could have one more summer in her favourite place was to surreptitiously take on the role of governess to the two young girls...

In chapter 2, we met George, laid up at the hospital with a broken leg. Instead of joining his friends on a Grand Tour of Europe, he's being sent off to recuperate at a rented cottage in the country...

Now we return to Alice's point of view:

"Our brother is coming, too," the younger girl – Lucy – piped up. Mam said we'd be a bother to him if we all travelled up together, so she made James – he's our eldest brother, and a lawyer – drive him down. He's got a new Ford! James, I mean. And–"

"Take a breath, Lucey-Goosey," Eleanor said mildly.

Alice had figured that the easiest way to corral her new charges would be to take them swimming in the lake, and she'd been right. Jumping from the dock, eating from a filled picnic hamper, then sunning themselves on the shore, had cemented them as bosom friends in half an afternoon.

"I'm sure you wouldn't be a bother at all," she told Lucy politely, with a wink at Eleanor. The older girl grinned back, then returned to constructing her elaborate sand castle.

Alice, helping Lucy with her own, more slapdash effort, speculated about this mysterious George. If he knew about his sisters' governess, he might recognise that Alice wasn't the correct woman. She'd have to do her best in that case to shrug it off, pretend there'd been a colossal misunderstanding at the agency.

Except then she would be forced to leave the house. Possibly find a lodging in the village, which would require more explanations to longtime acquaintances. She would have to trek out to the house each time a prospective buyer wished to look over the aviary. In the meantime, could she trust the girls and the unknown George to properly look after the birds? Likely not.

"Does George need a governess as well?" she asked.

Lucy collapsed in a fit of giggles, for once incapable of speech, and Eleanor filled in the gap. "Goodness, no, Miss Alice. He's old! 21 and a BA!" The girl's chest puffed with pride. "He's just graduated, but he broke his leg horribly, playing hockey, so he couldn't go to Europe and has got to stay with us. James said it was a good thing, too, because it saves him the bother of keeping tabs us at the weekends."

George would be about two years younger than her, then. They were certain to have some friends in common. Yet another facet of her life which she'd have to hide all knowledge of.

Perhaps he would be a bookish type, if he was a BA. As the only BA in her own circles, she rarely had anyone to chat with about literary or political matters. No one in her set read the papers; they merely scoured the society columns, seeking their own names. Alice herself hadn't been mentioned in any column – save a line or two about a charity committee or fundraiser – since she had, for all intents and purposes, dropped out of her usual groups since graduating. She and George might have some interesting discussions about current events.

"When do you expect your brothers to arrive?" she asked the girls. If it was a few days hence, that would give her time to settle into her role.

"Here they come now."