The Cool of the Evening
- After such a hot day, everyone is happy when the cooler evening arrives.
- For Charlotte, this is a good time for her to spin a web. She tells Templeton to bring her back some inspiration, because "I shall be writing tonight for the last time" (18.2).
- Uh-oh, that sounds pretty ominous to us.
- Templeton heads out of the pen. His first concern is food, but once he's eaten his fill of scraps he snatches part of a piece of paper to bring back to Charlotte.
- Templeton's a lucky little rat, because it turns out that he just so happened to grab a good word: humble. Charlotte says this word is perfect because it means both "not proud" and "near the ground" (18.12). Wilbur is both, so the word is two for two.
- Charlotte weaves "HUMBLE" into the center of the web. Because it's so dark, none of the people can see the word. The Arables and the
- Zuckermans head home for the night and Wilbur settles in to catch a few Zs.
- When Wilbur starts to chat with Charlotte, he realizes that she's not on her web. Instead, she's in a corner doing something mysterious.
- All she tells Wilbur is that she's "making something" and he'll have to wait until the morning to see it (18.31). That means we're stuck in suspense too.
- Back at the Arable home, Fern and Avery are off to bed. This has been a pretty great day. In fact, Fern says it's the best day ever.