Story Snip from Larksong: Chapter 21 and a Few Photos from Finland

omplications...

Here comes some more conflict!

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...
In chapter 3, we returned to Alice's point of view, and saw her bonding with George's younger sisters. Then she got a surprise -- George was arriving at the cottage that very day!

In chapter 4, we had a hint that Alice finds George attractive and interesting -- but also unbearably rude.

In chapter 5, they had their first argument.
In chapter 6, they argued once more, but the stakes were higher: war is on the horizon.

In chapter 7, George attempted a rapprochement. The chapter ended with him asking, "Why don't we both go sit in the parlour?"

In chapter 8, Alice had some feelings stirring...
In chapter 9, during their first evening together, they began to suss each other out over a card game.

In chapter 10, we reached the end of the evening, with harsh words from George, but a détente of sorts before they went their separate ways for the night.

In chapter 11, we started the next morning in George's point of view, with his dawning realization of his attraction to Alice.
In chapter 12, we saw that this realization did not lead to greater friendliness.

In chapter 13 (which I mistakenly also labelled as 12!), a new complication arose, in the form of the arrival of George's rather rude brother.

In chapter 13 (hopefully I won't make any further numbering errors!), George was busy with inappropriate (as he thinks) thoughts of Alice.
(I've skipped a scene where Alice takes the girls down to the lake and needs to pretend with a neighbour, Mrs Chase, that she is not a governess, but simply helping out with the girls. Then, while Alice is distracted, trying to spin her web of half-truths and discussing the threat of war on the horizon, Lucy gets up on a rickety boat tied up at the dock and fell off into the water.)

In chapter 14, on returning from the lake, Alice and the girls overheard an argument that ended with this outburst from George to his brother Albert: "I don't need your tales of self-pity. The question is, what are you going to do about it, now that you've f***ed it all up?"

In chapter 15, we witnessed the fallout from the argument, then shared a moment between Alice and George in the garden.
In chapter 16, Alice left George and resumed her governess role, and decided not to join George and Albert that evening in the parlour.

In chapter 17, Alice went out early the next morning, to find George rowing on the lake, and joined him.

In chapter 18, we viewed the early morning idyll from George's point of view and considered the age-old art versus artist dilemma.
In chapter 19, we closed the morning with Alice's point of view.

In chapter 20, we finally had a rapprochement. Alice, making up her mind in an instant, called out to George's sisters: "We're going on an expedition with your brother."

I've decided to skip the rest of chapter 20, in which we take a trip through the woods with Alice, George, and his sisters. There are friendly chats, the girls sign their brother's cast, and George begins work on a sketch of Alice. When they return home, the girls help Alice feed the birds in the aviary and clean it in preparation for the arrival of Mr Palmer, a prospective buyer visiting from Boston. Mr Palmer says he will make his decision on purchasing the aviary and return the next day. Throughout the day, there are hints of the gathering storms of war.

Now, in chapter 21, as Alice sees Mr Palmer off at the gate, a new complication emerges...

Alice walked with Mr Palmer down the drive, grateful no one had been around to hear them and learn her real name. She'd written to him weeks ago, back when she'd still been herself, before all this governess malarkey.

Mr Palmer had arranged for a carriage from the hotel to come collect him. As she waved him off at the gate, a second car appeared in a cloud of dust and swerved past the departing car, stopping directly before her. A young man laughing, took his hands off the wheel and looked her over. Another tanned fellow sat beside him, and a girl in a nurse's uniform unfurled herself from the back seat.

The fellow in front, blond locks curling out from under his driving cap, leaned over his friend and called out to Alice, "Is this the McKerrow cottage, ma'am?"

"This is Penhallow," she said, giving Gran's name for the place. If the man noticed anything odd in her tone, he didn't let on. "The McKerrow cottage," she confirmed. "The Cunnicks are renting it for the summer."

"We made it!" the other man cried. Doors were flung open on all sides, even as the driver rattled the car through the still open gate and up the drive.

Alice closed the gate and walked up after them as the car juddered to a stop. The driver jumped out and helped a girl down the step. "Out you get, Nursie!"

"You're a beast, Neil," the girl said mildly. She brushed down her uniform and peered curiously at Alice.

Neil and the other boy came around and Neil stuck out his hand. "I'm Neil McLaggan."

"Pleased to meet you." His handshake was firm but brief. "I'm Alice... Underwood."

She'd recognised his name instantly. The McLaggans were the second most important family of brewers and tradesmen in Montreal, after the Molsons. Neil must be the younger son; she'd met his older brother John many times.

"I'm the governess," she clarified.

At her words, the girl tore off her nurse's cap and shoved it into a pocket. Her lips were painted red, shining under the bob of marcelled waves that appeared from under the cap.

"Are you?" Neil said. "Funny, you don't look like my idea of a governess."

The other boy had been busy unstrapping the luggage. "Is the whole clan here, then?" he called. "Albert said there'd be room. Aren't the parents away?"

"They are," Alice allowed, doing her best to take no notice of Neil's familiarity.

"No adults, then?" the nurse broke in, ignoring Alice completely and turning a gleeful expression on Neil. "There's a lark! Mind my grip, Colin," she added. "The ground here's awful wet." She frowned in a prim sort of way, as if summer showers had no business falling on a path she was about to take.

"Are you expected?" Alice asked the group, now all gathered behind the car. Given Neil and the girl's brazenness, she did not much care if it sounded rude.

Neil glanced up. "Albert wired us from university days ago."

"We ran into Pixie at the station here," Colin chimed in, as Pixie slipped her arm through Neil's and he guided her onto the flagstone walk. "Seems she was sent to check up on Albert's brother."

Alice shouldn't mind their arrival at all, certainly not. It was nothing to do with her.

Except their casual air of belonging boxed her further into the uptight governess role.

And what was this about Pixie having been sent as nurse to George? What kind of nurse acted as the lady of the manor––and wore lipstick?

Alice had been relegated to servant status while Pixie was escorted up the walk as if she belonged to the house––Gran's house!

"I see," she said, matching Pixie's primness, giving vent to her feelings by moving swiftly past them off the path, as if to show how little a spot of wet mattered on one's boots out in the country. "I'll go tell them you've arrived."

 

I'm hoping to have my annual travel roundup done as part of the next Insecure Writer's Support Group Day post! But until then, as a teaser, here are some more photos from Finland in December!

Reindeer and huskies and treats and snowstorms, oh my!

What are some of your favourite candies and chocolates?