Charlotte screamed exactly as a doll screams when you press it in the stomach,and Hamlet was so deeply astonished at the unexpected noise that he stopped his bad behaviour,sat on his hind legs,and gazed up at her with an anxious wondering expression.In spite of this unfortunate incident,the visit went off well,and Mrs.Cole said that she had never seen anything so lovely as Charlotte,and Mrs.Le Page said,"No,had anyone ever?"and Charlotte never turned a hair.The final arrangement was that there should be a picnic and soon,because "Mr.Le Page has to return to Warwickshire to look after the Estate--so tiresome,but I've no doubt it's all going to wrack and ruin without him."After the picnic had been arranged the Coles were,frankly,a little uneasy.The family of Le Page was not the easiest in the world to entertain,and the thought of a whole day with Mr.Le Page,who was a very black,very silent gentleman and looked as though he were always counting sums over in his head,was truly alarming.Moreover,in the ordinary way,a picnic,which depended so entirely for its success on the weather,was no great risk,because the Coles were indifferent to rain,as all true Glebeshire people must be.But that the Le Pages should be wet was quite another affair;the thought of a dripping Mrs.Le Page was intolerable,but of a dripping Charlotte quite impossible;moreover,the plain but excellent food--pasties,saffron cake,apples and ginger beer--enjoyed by the Coles seemed quite too terrestrial for the Le Pages.Mrs.Le Page and ginger beer!Charlotte and pasties!nevertheless,the invitation had been given and accepted.The Coles could but anxiously inspect the sky.
II
There was another reason why Jeremy looked forward to the picnic with impatience.A funny old lady,named Miss Henhouse,who lived near Cow Farm in a little cottage all by herself,called sometimes upon the Coles and told them stories about the people and the place,which made them "sit up in their chairs."She was an old lady with sharp eyes,a black moustache and a double chin,wore an old shabby bonnet,grey mittens and large shoes which banged after her as she walked.She leant on a cane with a silver knob to it,and she wore a huge cameo brooch on her breast with a miniature of herself inside it.She was what is called in novels "a character."There was no one who knew so much about Rafiel and its neighbourhood;she had lived here for ever,her father had been a friend of Wellington's and had known members of the local Press Gang intimately.It was from her that Jeremy heard,in detail,the famous story of the Scarlet Admiral.It was,of course,in any case,a well-known story,and Jeremy had often heard it before,but Miss Henhouse made it a new,a most vivid and realistic thing.She sat forward in her chair,leaning on her silver-headed cane,her eyes staring in front of her,her two chins bobbing,gazing,gazing as though it all had happened before her very nose.
How one night outside Rafiel Cove there was a terrible storm,and on the morning afterwards a wonderful,smiling calm,and how the village idiot,out for his early morning stroll,saw a splendid ship riding beyond the Cove,a ship of gold with sails of silk and jewelled masts.As he watched,from the ship a boat pushed out,and then landed on the sand of the Cove a wonderful company in cocked hats of gold lace,plush breeches of red,and shoes with diamond buckles.The leader of them was a little man with a vast cocked hat and a splendid sword all studded with jewels.The fool,peering over the hedge,saw him give orders to his men,and then walk,alone,up the little winding path,to the cliff-top.Straight up the path he came,then right past the fool himself,standing at last upon the turnip field of Farmer Ede,one of the greatest of the farmers of those parts.And here he waited,staring out to sea,his arms crossed,his eyes very fierce and very,very sad.Then a second time from the golden ship a boat pushed out,cutting its way through the glassy sea--and there landed on the beach a young man,very beautiful,in a suit of blue and gold,and he,without a glance at the waiting sailors,also slowly climbed the sea-path,and at last he too reached Farmer Ede's turnip field.Then he and the Scarlet Admiral bowed to one another,very beautifully,very sadly,and very,very fiercely.As the sun rose high in the sky,as the cows passed clumsily down the lane behind the field so the fool,with eyes staring and heart thumping,saw these two fight a duel to the death.There could be no question,from the first,how it would end.
The beautiful young man in his fine blue suit and his white cambric shirt had despair upon his face.He knew that his hour had come.And the eyes of the Scarlet Admiral were ever sadder and ever fiercer.
Then,with a sudden move,a little turn of his agile body,the Scarlet Admiral had the young man through the breast.The young man threw up his arms and cried;and as the Scarlet Admiral withdrew his sword,dripping with blood from his body,the young man fell backwards over the cliff into the sea.Then the Scarlet Admiral wiped his sword on the grass and,slowly and sadly,walked down the cliff-path even as he had walked up.He joined his men,they found their boat,pushed out to their ship,and even as they landed upon her she had disappeared.A moment later the fool saw the parson of Rafiel Church coming round the corner for his morning bathe,and two minutes afterwards nothing human was to be seen save the naked limbs of the parson and his little bundle of black clothes lying neatly upon a stone.Then the fool ran all the way home to his mother who was a widow,and sat and cried and cried for the beautiful young man who had been slain,nor would he eat,nor taste the excellent Rafiel beer,and he pined away,and at last he died,first telling this history to his mother,who,like all widows,was a garulous woman and loved a good story.
