Story Snip from Larksong: Chapter 22 and Annual Travel Roundup

early travel roundup!

Last year's travel roundup is here.

Then there was our Christmas trip to Finland! I have a LOT of photos to share from that, so I'll put them in the next post. Teaser photos here!

January: Annecy, France

March: Olympic Museum in Lausanne

August: Zurich!

And James Joyce's grave

September: Lausanne aquarium

And the Swiss Vapeur Parc (mini trains!)

October: Rath Museum in Geneva

And various autumn photos

November: Manchester, to see Rhys Darby!



More of Larksong! Bit of a longer snip today, with some conflict and some flirtation...

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.

In chapter 21, as Alice sees Mr Palmer off at the gate, a new complication emerged, in the arrival of Albert's friends from university.

Now, in chapter 22, we see Alice and George's reactions and they might be close to admitting their attraction, but then...

The girls, hanging over the porch rail, accosted her the moment she'd turned the corner of the drive. "Have they come? Has the nurse come? We got letters and telegrams––"
"And Albert said––"
Their brothers appeared in the doorway and the sisters subsided as Alice announced, "Your friends have arrived, Mr Cunnick. They've brought your nurse, Mr Cunnick. If you'll excuse me, I'll need to confer with Elsie about meals and bedding."
She waited for Albert, and George on his crutches, to step aside, and marched past them. She wanted to hang about as the girls had done, perhaps in the aviary, under the pretext of soothing the birds after the excitements of the morning's change in routine.
But if the trio meant to spend the weekend–and possibly longer–then it wasn't fair to leave all the work to Elsie.
Alice herself could set up a cot beside the girls, but she'd have to move them to her room first, where they could share the wider bed, while Neil and Colin could have the two separate beds in the other room. As for food––
"Don't worry about it, dear," Elsie said comfortably, once Alice had announced the arrivals. "Albert's always got friends coming and going. You start moving the girls' things and I'll bake another pie. The roast'll do for lunch even with the extra mouths, and boys'll always feel full if they've had second and third helpings of dessert. Nurse'll eat in the kitchen with me."
Alice wasn't certain of that, but she nodded. Her thoughts raced along as she went upstairs and began shunting trunks across the hall.
She hadn't been formally introduced to Colin but she recognised him; his fiery red hair marked him as one of the Bleury Street McGills as obviously as if he wore a badge with his name on it. It wouldn't do for the governess to continue sharing the table in such company, no matter that George had invited her. Despite Neil's over familiar stance, at least Nurse Pixie would be put in her place.
The rooms arranged and fresh sheets laid on, she returned to the kitchen. Muffled sounds of greeting had floated up to her and now she could hear laughter from the dining room, above the clink and chime of cutlery and glasses. Pixie sat at the kitchen table, glowering down at her plate. She had replaced her nurse's cap at some point but had not thought to remove it at the table. Alice filled her own plate and took her seat between Elsie and Pixie. "How long have you been here?" Pixie asked without any preliminary greeting.
"A week or so," Alice began, but Pixie interrupted.
"It's a bit out of the way, isn't it? What do they do for fun?"
"Well, there is the lake."
"What do you mean, like water games? Sporting events?"
Alice stuffed a bite of bread in her mouth to keep from laughing at Pixie's horrified expression. "Surely you have a patient to tend to," she said once she'd swallowed.
Pixie shrugged. "He's handsome, no doubt, but there's only so much I can do while the cast's still on. His brother sent me down. He hinted that George––Mr Cunnick, I mean––might be despondent at not being able to run and leap about as usual. But I had him walk before me on the crutches before dinner. Now there's a fine specimen of a man! I've gone over his diet, too. He seems fine. Nothing worth wasting a weekend down in the boonies for. Though the pay packet comes in handy."
Alice had no idea how to begin replying to this remarkable speech and found herself inordinately irked at Pixie's reference to George as a specimen, as though he'd been ranked against a line of other patients. She didn't like the idea of Pixie looking George up and down, not one bit.
Elsie caught her eye and smiled, likely meaning to commiserate with her about having Pixie foisted on them. But in Alice's current mood it seemed to her that all her emotions must be plain to read on her face. Riled further by the thought that everyone might be privy to her growing attraction, she lashed out at Pixie. "There are always exercises he could do! That leg's going to be weaker than the other when the cast is removed. If you don't help him practice putting weight on it now––"
"Yes, yes, maybe." Pixie tore up her own bread and buttered it lavishly. "I've seen lots of broken legs in my time, and the best thing for them is to rest and heal. And while he does that... I wonder if that Neil fellow might take me to tea in the village? There must be a good class of restaurant somewhere, even in this backwater. Or maybe Colin knows––"
A round of laughter from the dining room silenced her as effectively as if Alice had, as she'd been longing to do, kicked her on the shin under the table.
She glanced at the door and, from the corner of her eye, saw Pixie do the same, staring wistfully, as if her desire to be with the boys could eradicate the barrier between them.
Alice felt doubly ridiculous, then, for if she hadn't begun this charade, she would have been out there and wouldn't have had to care one whit about Pixie's desires.
She returned her attention to her plate and finished her meal in silence. On her dignity, yet reflecting that if she had been out there, Elsie would have had to do all the work herself, for Pixie certainly wouldn't lift a finger.
Or there'd have been another governess, and the house so full that the youngest boys would've slept on the porch. The very idea: a McLaggan and a McGill camped out on a porch cot!
"What're you snickering about?" Pixie asked. "I don't see the boys looking twice at you."
"I don't wish them to," Alice retorted. "I've my own concerns," she added with an attempt at an air of mystery.
Pixie only smirked.
Elsie shook her head over both of them and, rising, poked her head into the dining room. "They've cleared off. Will you help me––"
"They've gone?" Pixie leapt up, butter knife clattering onto her empty plate, and ran out the door.
Alice, suddenly realising she hadn't seen George for hours and chastising herself for caring about it, heaved a sigh and rose to help clear the tables and wash up.


They'd gone swimming, it turned out.
Eleanor and Lucy burst into the kitchen wearing identical frowns and, without even being asked, let loose a torrent of indignation.
"It's not fair!"
"They didn't even––"
"Albert promised to take us to the lake––"
"But now he only wants to be with his friends––"
"He said he couldn't have two kids tagging along––"
"Kids!"
"It's not fair!"
Alice wrung out her dish towel and held up her hands. "Girls, girls, calm yourselves. I'll take you swimming."
"Thanks, Miss Underwood!" Lucy crowed, but Eleanor continued to mope, the picture of dejection.
"Is something wrong?" Alice hung the towel and filled the kettle.
"Albert's not going to play with us at all for the rest of the weekend, is he?"
"Er, likely not. But it's only a couple of days. We'll make our own fun. Besides, what about your other brother?"
"George has his own distractions," Eleanor said darkly. "He's got Nurse Pouty-Face drooling on him."
"That's not very polite, Eleanor," Alice said, more sharply than she'd intended as she bit back her frustration. She was grateful Elsie was occupied in the dining room. "Run along and find your pail and spade, Lucy."
As soon as the younger girl had left, she added, "You should watch what you say around your sister, Eleanor. Little pitchers have big ears."
They started up the stairs to change into their swimming costumes.
"She was the one to notice first," Eleanor said. "We heard George laughing and wanted to share the joke, but then we heard Nurse. I stayed where I was but Lucy ran round the corner to investigate. She's all fired up by the Holmes stories we've been reading. She tiptoed there and back and reported to me––she's Dr Watson, you see––that Nurse was poking fun at the birds and George was laughing."
Alice ought to admonish Eleanor for tattling and Lucy for spying but she couldn't speak for fear her voice would tremble.
She threw open cupboard doors and flung bathing outfits onto the bed but, as she began to help the girls with their gowns, she forced herself to slow her movements. It would do no good to get riled up over this...specimen.
She was here for the house, for the birds, to say farewell to Gran. She must stop wishing for more moments alone with George or for any sort of special regard from him. Especially if he proved so callous and shallow.


They came across George at the head of the dock, beside the spot where the paving stones gave way to tall grass. He was in the wheelchair, chin propped on one hand, watching Albert and his friends splashing at each other in the shallows.
Pixie emerged from the changing booth in her swimming costume, and now it was Alice's turn to watch, following the slow turn of George's head in the direction of her figure. Pixie did not look at him once, however, but ambled her thin, lithe body, curls bouncing jauntily, down the length of the dock.
Albert and the others were watching now, too. All eyes were on her as she lowered herself to the sunwarmed planks and leaned back, hands planted behind her.
"What are we waiting on?" Lucy piped up.
Alice laughed aloud at the contrast between the girl's innocence and Pixie's calculated movements.
"Nothing, dear," she said and took Lucy's hand.
She couldn't help glancing towards George once more, though, as she and the girls headed for an empty stretch of sand. Chin in hand, he gazed into the distance, as if he'd never even moved.
Lucy was content to sit at the waterline and occupy herself with building a ring of castles, while Alice supervised Eleanor as she went through the training routine from her previous year's swimming lessons.
Satisfied that she was able to hold her own in the water and not lose her head, Alice gave in to Eleanor's pleas and permitted her to take the rickety rowboat out a short way on her own. "Stay where I can see you," she said firmly, and settled back for a few moments' rest.
The sun was hot through her hat and caftan, but she refused to emulate Pixie and bare herself any further. She trickled sand through her fingers and watched a family of ducks across the water.
She steadfastly did not listen to the boys' splashing and raucous wrestling, the increased volume and force of which were clearly for Pixie's benefit. They laughed uproariously each time a cool drop struck Pixie's heated limbs and she squealed and waved her hands.
Even when I'm not playacting a governess, I don't squeal that incessantly.
She shaded her eyes with a palm, tracking Eleanor's slow, turning progress away from the shore.
After all, she knew nothing of significance about Albert and his friends. Perhaps they were fine upstanding scholars during the year. Who could begrudge them a little summertime fun?
What would she be doing, in all honesty, if her time was her own to spend?
Still hiding her eyes beneath her hand, she tilted her head away from Eleanor, slightly towards the shore.
George sat on, where his nurse had plunked him, hands in his lap, staring at the trees on the far shore.
Almost as though he might be looking at her, though like as not merely watching his brother and the boys, diving and swimming as he could not.
He raised an arm and shoved a hand into a pocket.
Diving for the flask, Alice guessed, and was about to turn away when he drew out his small notebook and began to scribble.
She was halfway up the beach towards him before she thought to check whether any of the others had noticed her. What could they think, even if they did so? She could sit where she liked, even as a governess, so long as she kept an eye on her charges.
Besides, if Nurse wasn't going to attend to her charge, Alice could fill that role as well.
"Shall I help you move to a more shaded spot?" she asked from a few paces off.
"I can wheel myself," he muttered, not looking up from his work.
She did not say anything further but settled herself on a nearby rock, bunching up most of the caftan beneath her to serve as a cushion.
Presently, he raised his pencil from the page and looked at her, mouth set in a line. "Why are you sitting here?"
If she'd known beforehand how rude the Cunnick boys could get, she might have reconsidered her impulse to stay at the house. It was high time George was lowered by a peg or two, governess' manners or no.
"I need to watch over both your sisters at once, and this is an ideal vantage point," she said in a biting tone.
It had no effect on him whatsoever.
"I meant," he continued, still barking, as though she wasn't worth the courtesy of polite speech, "why aren't you swimming with the others? My brother doesn't care a penny for social norms; nurse, governess, if you're a woman, he won't enquire past appearances."
The nerve! To equate her with the unmannered, low class Pixie!
What did he mean by "my brother"? That he himself would never stoop to associate with a governess? How dare he judge her on her supposed position alone!
Thoughts jumbled up like tangled wool by her contradictory reactions, Alice replied as spitefully as she could without giving herself away. "I can make up my own mind, Mr Cunnick, as to how I shall spend my afternoon. As it stands, I am preoccupied with fulfilling my duties and haven't time to be gallivanting with members of your social circle." She jumped to her feet and shook out her caftan, narrowing her eyes as she looked down at him. "I merely inquired as to whether you needed assistance. I know some people––"
"What do you know of anything?" he snapped, his glare losing none of its force for being aimed from a lowly seated position. "You have no idea what it's like to be trapped by your own body, dependant on others to move around, reduced to asking for their help when you––"
"When you've left your crutches up at the house. When you itch so badly, you wish they'd amputated the leg and had done. When––" She stopped, and resumed her seat. More charitable now that she'd recalled a little of what it was like to be in his situation.
Not to mention that she'd had Gran to assist her, and no fickle brother and nurse to dump her by the wayside.
George shut his notebook and returned it to his pocket. He looked at her, properly, mouth quirking up on one side and creating a dimple. "You do know, then."
Pixie had joined the boys in the water, and was pretending to run from them as they splashed water at her with the heels of their hands. Their cries carried up and down the beach, mingled with those of the crowd. The hotel already appeared full to capacity, all its patrons scattered on towels or chaise longues or rowing little boats in circles near the shore. She spotted Eleanor in their midst and waved; Eleanor waved back, a tiny water reed in the distance. None of the noise and bustle seemed to reach the sudden small space between George and herself.
He continued to eye her, speculative, and perhaps with a touch more kindness. "Is that what made you think of the switch?" he added.
"It's not a––" she began automatically, and he joined her on the last word–– "switch."
"I know," he said with a brief quirk of the mouth. "Thank you for the gift, whatever we call it. Blessed relief." His eyes clouded over. "I still owe you a prize from the other night."
"Never mind. I have no need of anything, really."
He did not seem convinced, but let the matter be. "Care to tell me how you know so much about broken legs? Broke one of yours once, did you?"
"Last year, in fact. I was staying at this cottage with my grandmother." Best to stick to the truth as much as she could; if she meant to describe her recovery, it would be easier if she wove her web of lies with only one or two threads. "I was on my bicycle near the train tracks. Maybe twenty minutes down the line from the station, when I heard a train whistle. I panicked, and in my haste to move away from the tracks, I slipped and lost control of my bicycle, and fetched up at the bottom of that hill." She pointed to the rise beyond the trees, off to the side of the lake.
"You fell here? And I thought my journey from the arena up the hill to Royal Victoria Hospital a long one."
"Ah, no, I wasn't taken to the hospital. The doctor here set my leg, in his surgery. It was only broken below the knee," she added. She let her gaze linger for a moment on the length of his cast, rising from bare foot all the way to below his hip, where a patch of shaved skin was exposed directly beneath where his trouser leg had been slit apart. Perhaps he'd tugged up the trousers earlier in an effort to reach under the cast with the scratching stick.
She raised her eyes to find him watching her. "I found the switch upstairs," she said swiftly. "It's the same one I used last summer."
"You carved it yourself?" he asked, and he matched her breathless tone, as if they were both suddenly running away from the words they really wished to speak.
His eyes were more blue than green today; possibly they shifted, depending on his location. Such long, dark lashes.
She blinked, slowly, trying to focus on answering his words, rather than gazing at his smooth cheeks. "The doctor did. He also told me it was important to exercise the leg, even by simply raising it at the hip while lying in bed or––"
She broke off under the force of George's amused expression. Was it her voice, wobbling like a school girl's, or her reference to such intimate matters as legs and beds, that had him smiling so?
She lowered her gaze once more to his cast, recalling how Eleanor and Lucy had crowded him, asking about all the names and signatures. Her cheeks were warm, and not from the sun.
There were at least four colours of ink and ten different names in her line of sight alone. "Who's this?" she asked, pointing at a set of block letters in red ink that spelled Society of Estel, Officer, First Class.
George bent at the waist to read the words she'd indicated. "This?" he asked, and unnecessarily pointed at the same spot. His finger brushed hers, clasped it for a second, then let go. "That's my mate, Ross." His hand remained on the cast, so she kept hers there, too, resting lightly, a bare half inch from his elegant, tapered fingers, waiting for a second touch, if he dared and if she dared let him.
"He and I started up our own club last term. We opened it to a few select graduating class members and we meant to continue it after we'd returned from Europe." Suddenly he balled his fingers into a fist and thumped the cast, directly over the word Estel. "He's there now. They all are. And if war comes, they'll declare for Canada and be ready to cross the Channel at a moment's notice. While I'll still be here, still useless. I'll be branded a coward," he finished, more quietly.
"You're thinking much too far ahead," she said decisively. His broken leg was a nuisance, a mere setback he had to overcome. "There may be any number of political wrangles that don't lead to war. And if not––though I certainly hope Sir Edward Grey can talk some sense––"
"Sense has nothing to do with it. It's what Austria is after––"
"In any case, no one would call you cowardly for something that's not your––"
"But they won't know! Once the cast comes off, who's to tell? Let me see your legs."
His command came so abruptly that for a moment she wasn't certain she'd heard correctly. Wrenching her thoughts from politics, she deduced what he intended to look for––the length and muscle of her leg, compared with the healthy one––but still shook her head, and folded the caftan more tightly about herself.
George waved an impatient hand. "Don't be ridiculous. If I was hale, we'd both be down there swimming with the others–"
"We would?"
They'd certainly made a habit of interrupting each other.
"Of course. Don't mind what I said before, about nurses and governesses and the like. I don't dwell on that sort of thing." He glanced at her and away, returning another Eleanor's waves with one of his own. 'It's being stuck in this chair that makes me ornery. Let me see your legs."
He'd flung her position at her again, right when she'd been so pleased that he'd wanted to go swimming with her and had nearly forgotten the role herself in the pleasure of talking to him naturally and easily. Now he was ordering her about, and it was back to being the dutiful servant.
Unwrapping the caftan, she rested on her palms and stretched her legs out before her, wriggling her toes in their sandals.
"It was the right leg, was it?" He looked, then looked away, as though burned, but his eyes slid right back to her form.
"Yes. You can tell, can't you?" She hadn't noted any disgust in his expression, quite the opposite, but frowned down at her legs. Slim and shapely, if she said so herself, but there was no getting away from the fact that the right remained skimpier than the other.
"Only now that I know," George said kindly, with a sudden improvement in manners. He turned aside again. "It's an odd place to convalesce, isn't it?"
"How do you mean?"
"Constantly reminding you of all that you can't do, swim or hike, or what have you. And those birds are the absolute end. Wonder what batty person thought of bringing that many breeds together in the first place. Pity you've had to be saddled with them, too."
He tossed her what he likely thought was an engaging grin.
"I happen to find that seeing to their welfare is the easiest and most pleasant of all my duties, Mr Cunnick," she said icily, rewrapping her caftan.
He could have no idea of her connections, of course, but she could no more refrain from defending Gran's pets than she could help her unsuitable attraction to the man she must defend them from. "Furthermore, I do not think it 'batty' to care for one's fellow creatures."
She gathered her feet under her and rose, a sudden ache growing in her healed bone. More rain to come that night, no doubt. "The birds are sweet and friendly and uncomplaining. Which is more than can be said about some people."
She turned her back on him and stalked off as smoothly as possible on sand, down the beach towards Lucy.
He called after her. "What's the matter, girl? What have I said?"

Pictures to reward you for reading the wall of text! The week we got snow, a day out in Geneva (at a Thai restaurant with a koi and goldfish pond!), and some yummy tea and eclairs!

Have you ever broken a limb?
If so, I hope you had a smooth recovery!