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      Picnicing on the beach was quite perfect. They sat on the sand in their hats, ribbons waving in the air, and they pulled their shawls about their shoulders because the wind was colder than was comfortable. Iseult buried her legs in the sand and Emily lay flat on her russet beach rug and gazed at the silver sun which was melting at the edges as the cloud thickened across its image. 'Do you think it is going to rain?' asked Emily, addressing no one in particular.
      'I hope so,' was Iseult's whispered reply.
      'If it does we'll run down to the sea and swim in our clothes.' Emily knew that swimming in clothes was more naughty than swimming without clothes.
      Milicent could be seen far off across the flat sand, sorting shells for collection.
      'Mermaid treasure,' murmured Iseult, watching from afar. The air was misty with sand, making the landscape look as though it had been daubed by an Impressionist painter. Vincent was reading, holding the thin pages down with one hand to stop them fluttering. He was more conscious of the sound of the ocean swooshing in and out than the words on the page but still, that was perfect, more perfect, that sensation of being dragged away, away to some eternal place.
      Geoffery, who had been dozing, now stood up,'I fancy a plunge.'
      'It's quite cold,' mused Vincent, but only because it was. That was not going to stop them. They were wild children after all. They liked mud and rain and storms. 'Dangerous times', thought Vincent.
      There was a moments pause as Vincent closed his book, Iseult dusted her legs and Hazel looked out towards the vast sky and the vast sea that said everything about the world that cannot be said - forever, moving, terrifying, perfect. The word, of course, was sublime. 'Milicent!' cried Geoffery and Iseult called as well, 'Milicent!'
      'We're going to take a plunge!'
      Milicent came running towards them as they walked towards the greyness over the sea, towards that thin line of the horizon, cutting the world in half, announcing both its end and its infinity.
      They relished the coldness of the gentle lapping around their ankles, though none of them mentioned it, for all of them felt it the same. And they did not speak when their skirts and trousers were wetted or when the seaweed felt slimy beneath their feet or when their hats blew away and their hair fell in the wind. When they could no longer feel the ocean bed they swam just a little further out and each of them felt quite consumed in the greatness of it all.
      As though it had been planned they each then let themselves disappear beneath the surface. Down there, in the blue, they felt only the power of the ocean which, with all its monstrous force, might take them away from it all forever.
      But then they arose and, wiping the salt from their eyes, they found themselves laughing with each other, as though a great and wonderful secret had been shared.