Over Sea, Under Stone Chapter 2

 CN: Racist/colonialist imagery, abilism

We left off with the children speculating about Great-Uncle Merry's disappearance, and chapter two starts with his re-appearance during breakfast the next morning. He chats with Dad about the weather (even answers a question about it!), and again demonstrates his feigned 'deafness' by ignoring Barney's inquiry about where he was last night. The “family rule that they should never ask their mysterious great-uncle questions about himself” is revealed, as Simon and Jane shush Barney.

I'm seeing a divide being set in place, where Barney is given a child-like freedom from convention (asking questions that would be impertinent or simply 'not done' by adults, being free with his imagination) while Jane and Simon have crossed to the adult side and try to follow all the unwritten rules of interaction of the society around them while assigning normal explanations to what they see. That's not very elegantly put, I'm afraid. At any rate, this is a fantasy book, so it's fair to guess that Barney's fantastic ideas are nearer the truth than anyone else suspects. There will certainly be quests and King Arthur mythos before this is over, and “Gumerry” (Barney's old nickname for Great-Uncle Merry, which is a lot easier to type) will have a role to play. Ditto that yacht.

Despite the non-answer, Barney persists with his questions, taking advantage of everyone else's distraction ('Oh look, a storm!') to ask “Gumerry...did you find it, what you were looking for?” and gets an actual response “No, Barnabas, I didn't find it this time.”

The plot thickens. As does the weather. The kids are trapped inside by rain (Narnia parallel?), and their parents step out of the scene—Mom to work (painting, I assume) and Dad to visit the harbor master. After some puttering around, in which Jane looks over the books on hand, Simon makes paper airplanes, and Barney complains about the rain, they get onto the subject of explorers. Simon reveals knowledge of exploration and colonialism tropes, though he's a bit vague and/or wrong on some details, Barney asks some insightful questions (he comes across as much more mature than Simon in this scene), and Jane suggests exploring the house as a fun activity. The more she speaks, the more obvious it is that she's the trio's Hermione Granger: smart and practical. Her and Barney put together the idea of having 'provisions' on the journey, and get Mrs. Palk to provide them with some scones, cake, and lemonade for an indoor picnic. Simon eventually joins in the game, making himself “captain of the expedition”.

Meanwhile , Barney picks up that the locals (Mrs. Palk, Mr. Penhallow) seem to have a long history with Gumerry, aka “the Professor.”

The kids explore the house, making up cannibals and natives and golden treasures (lots of racist stereotypes invoked in the process). Simon is quite big on the colonialist stereotypes and takes the lead (ie, bosses the other kids around). Barney challenges him somewhat. Jane keeps getting to be the grey-raincloud/voice-of-reason, despite the trip being her idea in the first place. She reminds them not to interrupt Mom, that they aren't supposed to mess with locked things, that the telescope case isn't theirs to play with (but obeys Simon by re-phrasing it as part of the adventure: they're on land! with landmarks! they don't need a telescope!), and so on. Nonetheless, she continues displaying her intelligence and observation skills: noticing that one bedroom resembles a ship cabin and figuring that it belongs to the Captain, deducing the existence of a passageway to the attic. Barney helps a bit there in both cases, and it seems like the hierarchy for useful conclusions is Jane (intelligence, observation) > Barney (imagination, curiosity) > Simon (some knowledge and a bit full of himself, but will go along with the others' ideas).

They all end up cooperating to shift the wardrobe (Narnia parallel!) in the boys' bedroom, revealing a door behind it. The door leads to a dusty ladder to the attic, which the children climb as the chapter ends.

It feels odd note that for no one (read: Jane, designated mature party) to remark that the attic is possibly out-of-bounds for them. We're told, by their mother, that everything they should stay out of has been locked up, but nonetheless not to snoop through any clearly personal papers/belongings. While the attic isn't locked, per se, I think being blocked by a heavy piece of furniture demonstrates a similar intent, and is worth a least a discussion. On the other hand, Jane got to take the lead in figuring out where the secret door was and didn't have to be the stick-in-the-mud. Yay! May this trend continue.