The Great Unexpected

Naomi is aware that Finn talks differently from the way people in Blackbird Tree do, and she realizes he sounds like Nula. Naomi is desperate to see him again. It’s summer, and Naomi and Lizzie only have a few days before their families give them new chores. The women at Tebop’s general store are buzzing about a man called “Dangle” or “Doodle” who has recently arrived; they say he talks funny and asks nosy questions. Lizzie comments that the sudden appearances of Finn and the well-dressed “Dangle Doodle” man remind her of The Great Unexpected, a book on the girls’ summer reading list. Naomi thinks it sounds like her own life, except for the word “great.”

An old man called Paddy McCoul has come to visit Sybil, and her dislike for him is clear. She tells Miss Pilpenny to get her gun.

Lizzie and Naomi see Finn coming out of Witch Wiggins’s house. He says that Hazel Wiggins has “[a] thousand birds” and several coffins. He says he has to go to Cora’s house next, and they are amazed that he’s going to the home of someone they call “Crazy” Cora. They think it’s odd that Finn seems to know so many people in Blackbird Tree. At home, Naomi tells Nula about the “dapper” man who talks funny and seeing Finn at Witch Wiggins’s house. Nula reminds her that it’s rude to say this despite Hazel’s rumored ability to affect the town’s electricity. Naomi says that Finn went to “Crazy” Cora’s next, and Nula wonders how Finn knows her. Nula corrects Naomi, calling the woman Cora Capolini. When Joe gets home, Nula tells him about the movements of the two strangers.

Nula and Joe have an old red barn where they store tools, trunks, and scraps that might be useful someday. They decide that, as part of her summer work, Naomi should clean it up. Naomi gets a sick feeling, however, when she thinks about the trunks in the loft. The trunks make Naomi think of Joe’s donkey story, and she fears they might contain something bad.

Paddy McCoul approaches Sybil, calling himself her old friend, but she speaks to him harshly. He asks for the trunk that belonged to his son, and she tells him he doesn’t even deserve the dust on it. He threatens to engage a solicitor, and she threatens to shoot him.

Lizzie offers to help Naomi clean out the barn in exchange for Naomi’s help with her summer volunteer project: assisting the “unfortunate elderly” under the direction of Mrs. Mudkin from the Cupwrights’ church. Joe and Nula don’t go to church but, instead, have a “Sunday pause” where they go outside and enjoy nature. Naomi enjoyed these pauses until about a year ago, when they started to make her wonder what else was out there.

On Sunday, Naomi and Lizzie meet Mrs. Mudkin to learn about their duties. The woman explains that the girls might help the elderly to wash, do chores, read, and so on. They receive a list of the people they are to help, including two men they call old man Canner and one-armed Farley, as well as “Crazy” Cora and Witch Wiggins. The girls are a little worried about this work.

On her way home, Finn calls out to Naomi, asking if she knows where Elizabeth Scatterding lives, and, in shock, she tells him that’s Lizzie. She is compelled to tell him where Lizzie lives and watch him walk away. Her jealousy begins. Just then, she sees the “Dingle Dangle” man coming, and she realizes it’s rather odd that he and Finn came to town at the same time. He chats with her, and she asks him if he knows a boy named Finn, which greatly surprises him. She tells him where to find Finn, refusing to share her name. Naomi goes to the barn and decides to go to the moon. However, when she arrives, she does not see anything peaceful. Instead, she sees a huge image of Lizzie and Finn, laughing and blotting out the earth.

Naomi cannot remember her mother, having been only a day old when she died, and though she cannot recall the events that took place on “the day of the dog” (67), she does remember the fear she felt. Naomi was three, and she and her father were living on Joe and Nula’s property. According to what people have told her, one day, a dog ran onto the property and she ran toward it; it attacked her. Her dad saved her but was badly bitten. They were both hospitalized, and he did not survive an infection. Nula and Joe took Naomi in because Naomi had no one else. She remembers hearing Nula explain this to a teacher, and since then, Naomi has wondered if Joe and Nula would hand her over if someone showed up to “claim” her.

She recalls the photographs Nula used to show her, explaining that the people in them were Naomi’s mother and father, but they felt like strangers. Nula has a photograph of herself, when she was around seven, with an older sister, and she told Naomi it was taken before she was “sent away.” Nula said she was sent away because her family was so poor and that those with nothing could be sent or given away. Naomi asks if she, Joe, and Nula do have enough food and money. Nula confirms that they do, for today.

Naomi remembers some books Nula used to read to her about a boy and girl who could change themselves into other things just by wishing. Then, seeing a book about dinosaurs, Naomi announced that she would become a Pteranodon. She seemed so certain, despite Nula’s insistence that such a thing was impossible. When Naomi woke the next day as a person, not a Pteranodon, she felt like a different person, that everyone else seemed different too. One year later, her teacher read the class a book about a knight, and Naomi felt she “was the knight on the horse riding through the golden wood” (71). Afterward, Nula tried to make Naomi understand that it was just a story. However, Naomi told her that the story was in her head now, along with everything else she’d ever been told, so perhaps everything is a story. She went to bed very happy, feeling that she could be or have anything she wanted.

The electricity is out, and Joe concludes someone must have upset Witch Wiggins. Naomi is still irritated by Finn’s desire to visit Lizzie, and Nula asks about his last name. Naomi doesn’t know it, so Nula tells her about a Finn she used to know, called Finn McCoul. Years before, Finn McCoul came to Duffayn, flattering Nula, bringing her flowers and talking of the money he would inherit. He was a charmer, and he charmed her older sister, too. However, he turned out not to be very nice, and his name wasn’t even Finn. It was Paddy. That night, Naomi assures Nula that she has put Finn out of her mind, but it is a lie.