chunk: The other teacher is Alwynne Durand, an attractive nineteen-year-old woman without any formal training who lives with Elsbeth Loveday, her unmarried aunt and guardian. When Durand starts teaching at the school she is immediately popular with her students but also excites Hartill's attention â not just because the young mistress is as enthusiastic about teaching as herself, but also because Hartill is always on the lookout for companionship. The two women become close friends, and Durand spends more and more of her spare time in Hartill's flat, occasionally not returning to her aunt's for days. The couple also travel abroad together during the summer holidays. Although Loveday and Hartill hardly ever meet, a strange kind of antagonism develops between them, each woman fighting to spend more time than they do with Alwynne Durand and to be the dominant person in Alwynne's life.