Purl One, Yarn Over, Purl Two Together, Knit One: October 2023

Thursday, October 26, 2023

Story Snip from Larksong: Chapter 12, Knitting, and Autumn Photos

elcome to the latest installment!

Larksong is set in Montreal, July 1914.

Visit my writing blog for the chapters in between! 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, a new complication arises, in the form of George's rather rude brother...

How he switched tack at the slightest barb! His recovery would take twice as long if he didn't learn to control his temper and stop his blood boiling.

Alice passed his request to Elsie––much more politely than George had phrased it––and went upstairs for her sewing basket. If he meant to take his tea on the porch, she'd head down to the garden and her bench, the one she'd had placed after her own accident, when being immobile had made her feel oddly isolated and she'd wished to keep an eye on the lake and grounds while temporarily unable to enjoy them.

She slipped into the girls' room, where both were now snoring gently, and quietly rummaged among their discarded stockings, pulling out the one she'd noticed yesterday, Lucy's, with the hole in the knee.

A stick propped against the wall caught her eye. Long, thin and sanded smooth: the scratching stick! It was George who owed her a prize and she smiled knowingly to herself at the thought that he would soon be further in her debt, for she'd found the perfect gift for him.

She snatched it up and returned downstairs, stopped short by the sight of a man in the doorway.

He stood silhouetted by the wavering sunlight behind him, which flowed through the birches lining the path to the lake and glistered off the distant water. The light softened his skin, calling to mind the thin-faced heroes in the paintings of Rossetti.

The next instant she'd reached the bottom step and was on a level with him, so that the sunlight no longer enveloped his form. It was regular daylight, and she could make out his features now. Wide blue eyes, a forelock that hadn't stayed put despite the amount of glistening pomade in his iron-black hair, and a long, straight nose.

A Cunnick nose.

"You must be the governess," he said, setting down a small case. "I trust that switch hasn't already needed to be brought down on either of my sisters?"

"Switch?" She realised she was holding the scratching stick, and had forgotten her sewing basket upstairs. She must look a schoolmarm indeed, down to her stern black gown. "No, this was for–– Isn't Mr Cunnick out on the porch?"

"If you mean my brother, I didn't see him. I'm Albert." He advanced a step, hand outstretched.

"Alice. Er, Miss Underwood."

He clasped her hand, his touch soft and warm. What was it about the Cunnicks that flustered her so?

"Geor–– Mr Cunnick did not mention you'd be arriving so soon," she said, as he slowly released her fingers. Albert was the youngest brother, she recalled, a couple of years behind George. But he already had that all-important air of a Montreal Cunnick. Kings of the mountain.

Alice's family was a match for them, of course, but she must remember her place as the governess. "There are two free rooms to choose from upstairs. I can have Elsie make up yours while I put together a late lunch."

"Thanks. I'll take my bags up. But I ate on the train, so don't bother about feeding me." He stepped aside and began to poke his head into the various rooms, still talking over his shoulder. "George wouldn't have mentioned my coming because he didn't know. It's only that I–– Well, I've left school and, with our parents gone––they're in Europe for the summer, as I expect you know––and the house closed up for the next few months... Anyway, I board at Kingston, it's Queen's that I've been–– As I say, I've left."

He pulled his head out of George's room and peeked into the cupboard under the stairs.

He was telling the whole truth about as much as Alice was the real governess, but it wasn't her place––neither as McKerrow nor as Underwood––to pry. "As you wish," she replied nimbly. "I'll find your brother and let him know you're here."

"Thanks," he said again, sweeping up his case. "Er, which room did you say––"

"The front room on the west side, if you prefer it. The other looks out on the woods, not the lake."

"That'll suit me, the lake view, I mean. I can see this household is in capable hands." He gave her a twinkling grin, then loped up the stairs two at a time. Not that she was watching.

"Has he gone up?" George asked quietly from behind.

She jumped, and whirled about to face him.

"Hey, don't point that switch at me."

"How did you come up the steps without us hearing you?" she countered, but lowered the stick, fervently wishing she'd stayed upstairs to mend and sew.

"Oho! 'Us' is it? Charmer Albert strikes again. The odious little–– Anyhow, I didn't come up the steps." He sucked in a breath past his teeth. "I was in the aviary."

"Anyhow," she echoed. "It's not a switch. If you must know, it was a gift for you."

"A gift? What sort of––"

She proffered the stick. The dubious tilt of his head made her laugh, reminding her of the birds. "For scratching."

His face cleared. "How did you know?" He grasped the stick and held it by his thigh, as if burning with the need to dig inside his cast and relieve the itching at once, but uncertain whether he ought to begin before her.

No doubt he might have––she knew the prospect of having relief so close was difficult to resist––but before she could explain or he could excuse himself, Albert's voice carried down the landing.

"There's the esteemed older brother I call Hop-Along Cassidy!" He bounded down the steps and jumped down the final three, landing with a slide across the flagstones and a flourishing wave of the arms, the toe of one patent leather shoe knocking against George's crutch.

George tilted but kept his balance.

"Others might call him George," Albert continued. "And you, Mademoiselle Governess, might refer to him as Mr Cunnick when you remember to be polite, but he'll always be Hop-Along to me. At least as long as that plaster of Paris continues to hug that wasted limb." He smirked and whipped a pencil out of a pocket. "Shall I sign it?"

"What are you doing here so early, Albert?" George asked wearily, speaking as though his brother hadn't uttered a word.

"Tsk!" Albert kept his dancing eyes on Alice. "See how he greets his baby brother? You could learn from your sisters, Cassidy."

"Oh, they're awake?" she interrupted. "I'll go up straight away."

"I woke 'em! Wouldn't do to have ol' fun-loving Albie around, and no one alert to appreciate it. 'Sides, it's past three. Surely you don't keep 'em napping till suppertime, mademoiselle?"

He was all over grins, but Alice could not read his tone. Did he truly mean to criticise a situation into which he'd only just entered?

"Albert, they've only been up there for an hour," George said, before she could think of a reasonable reply. "You know summer nights are long at the cottage. Lucy'll be tired."

"Hark! The nursemaid speaks! Guess you mean you get knackered early, older brother, now that you're no good, on the ice or off. Or d'you mean to spare the governess?"

"That's enough! Apologise to Miss Underwood."

"For what?"

Albert looked truly baffled, gazing at her, palms up. She certainly didn't want to come between the brothers by having George think he needed to save her dignity or some other such chivalrous nonsense.

"If you'll excuse me," she murmured. The sounds of raised voices had been coming from upstairs and she used it as reason to hightail it out from between the boys. "I'd better see to the girls," she added, as though they'd exchanged nothing more than vague pleasantries about Albert's journey.

"Why are you holding the switch?" Albert's voice followed her as she escaped upstairs. She could not hear George's reply.