Scarlet Hood

"We're going to have to go back to my cottage in the morning. If they come looking for you first there's going to be big trouble. If we get there early enough I think I can persuade Scarlet and Gustav to forget about everything."

*****

Chapter 8

The sun was just coming up as Granny and Wolff arrived back at the cottage. They walked through the door and made their way upstairs. She half expected what she saw when she entered the bedroom, but kept the smile from her face.

"Scarlet!" she said in mock outrage. "What on earth do you think you're doing? And in my bed too?"

"Granny! We thought that something had happened to you. We thought that…" she stopped when she saw Wolff standing beside her.

"You thought something had happened to me, and you were so concerned that you jumped into bed with Gustav, eh?"

"Yes. I mean no! He…" she indicated Wolff. "He tried to… you know!"

"Really? Just think about this for a moment Scarlet; how is it going to look if you tell the authorities? A woman, supposedly jealous of her virtue, freely and immediately gives it away to somebody else? They simply won't believe you. You know what they're like."

Scarlet considered Granny's words and knew that she was right. The Burghers were a misogynistic bunch of old fools. She would be berated for being a young woman of loose morals.

"I think that you two had better leave right now."

Elizabet and Wolff waited downstairs while the young couple got dressed. When they came downstairs she saw them to the door.

"And I expect an invitation to the wedding within the next few weeks," she called after them as they walked away. She shut the door and turned to look at Wolff.

"I think my Wolff looks hungry enough to eat Granny up," she said archly. She took his hand and led him upstairs to the bedroom. As they removed their clothes she told him, "If they've left a wet patch, then you're sleeping in it."

Wolff watched Elizabet finish undressing and then stripped himself. She was a good looking woman, she could cook, she had her own cottage, she seemed to like him and he seemed to know how to please her. What more could a man want? At that moment he could see no reason why any other woman in the world should be of interest to him.

*****

Epilogue

Scarlet and Gustav didn't even make it back to her parents house before they found the need to leave the forest path and re-consummate their romance. They arrived home looking flushed and announced their engagement.

Helmut and Magrit were delighted. They had, of course, been expecting this for some time.

The wedding took place four weeks later and the young couple moved into Gustav's one-room stone built cottage. He immediately set to work extending it into a larger abode. Within nine months Scarlet gave birth to a little girl with flaming red hair. Unlike her mother and grandmother, this wasn't her only child. She had six more – and all of them were little red-headed girls.