On this beautiful day, Derek went on his usual morning walk, over the stile into the open meadow filled with clumps of wild daisies. White heads rustling in the tall grassy areas, like the froth on the waves crest. At the bottom of the meadow was a large lake with a curious Chinese bridge, which led to a small grassy area close to a paper walled Chinese house.

Approaching the lake Derek noticed a beautiful young woman sitting on the bank dressed in a black flowing dress, with an oriental comb nipped into her hair just above two chopsticks that held a bun tight. “Good morning, I have never seen you here before,” he said with a warm smile on his face. The young woman looked up, smiling so sweetly answered “oh, I often come here I just love to sit by the lake and think”. Sitting close by her, they engaged in hours of conversation, during which Derek thought to himself what a beautiful woman this is not only on the outside but also within.

Suddenly the young woman who he found out was named Kathryn jumped to her feet, and said to Derek “do you fancy a cup of tea?” Without having to think about it, Derek said he would really enjoy a cup. Kathryn pointed to the bridge saying, “I have all that we need over in the paper house, shall we go”. With this, she started to walk so gracefully carrying the bunch of white daisies she had picked, onto the bridge pausing to see if Derek was going too.

Quickly catching up to her they started to cross, in a burst of spray as they were crossing a large black scaly serpent came out of the water. Wrapping itself around the bridge in front of them with more coils wrapping behind where they came from, trapping them in between. Kathryn startled by the serpent’s sudden appearance hid behind Derek, who was perplexed wondering what they could do. As the scaly monster in front of them hissed loudly, Derek said to Kathryn “I wish I had a sword to defend you sweet maid”. Without a pause Kathryn pushed the flowers into his hand, looking bemused he wondered what good they would be. Still there was nothing else to do, so advancing brandishing the flowers like a sword he lunged at the serpent. The flowers were thrust into the nose of the serpent covering it with pollen, turning that black scaly face into a yellow speckled one.

Amazingly the serpent uncoiled from the bridge, releasing them so they could finish crossing. The serpent then spoke while sat in the water, “can I have some tea too, please?” Although Derek stood, there mouth open wide not knowing just what to say, Kathryn said, “you are most welcome as long as you behave yourself Mr serpent”. Kathryn not waiting for an answer proceeded to collect the tea and implements to make it, laying it out on the lawn and proceeded to make it.

What a strange party it was, a beautiful woman, a talking serpent and Derek all sat around in a circle on the lawn drinking tea. Maybe the moral of this story is you cannot judge anything by its cover, you only have to ask Kathryn or Derek about that.