A cool breeze washes down the Thames from the sea. Water is plashing round the columns that hold up the bridge, and further away, I swear I can hear waves crashing onto a shingled beach.
I'm early. I tried to contain my eagerness to come out. Darla is a changeful woman - on one occasion she laughs at me and grants me leave with a kiss, then next she is cold and disdainful, and sometimes she slashes at me with her nails, drawing blood which she does not even bother to lick away.
So I do my best to be nonchalant, as if it scarcely matters whether I am on time, or even go at all. It is just an amusement, and if the girl does not show up, it will be of no consequence. Indeed, I may not even go to the bridge - if some other pretty face takes my fancy on the way.
What good it does to pretend I have no idea; I have the feeling that Darla knows what goes on inside my head as well as I do, and is not fooled. As she always predicted, the slight preference I had for coming to find Anna rather than travelling to Europe immediately has metamorphosed over the past weeks. At first it became a longing, some dull ache in my chest just below my still heart. Then an obsession that would not allow me to attend to anything else or bear to hear of us leaving London.
And now, it is all consuming. The fact that she lives is inimical to my peace of mind; I cannot bear that she, who was mine in life, who used to care for me and consider my pleasure first and foremost, now walks the streets in daylight and forms bonds with other people, other men.
I see her.
She's entering the bridge at the other side of the river. She walks towards me, threading her way through the crowds, but I don't think she sees me yet; she glances from side to side intermittently. Whether she's looking for me or enjoying the crowds, I can't tell. She looks a little different, and I try and work out what has changed.
Her clothing was never extravagant, or calculated to ensnare a man, but it seems to have become even more modest since I last saw her, almost calculatedly so. She is wearing a dress of some pale grey stuff, with a plain and narrow skirt. It's so narrow, I wonder for a moment if she is wearing anything underneath, and then she kicks some straw from under her feet and I see a flash of petticoat. In this city, where it seems all the women, from my lady down to the milliner's daughter, are gaudy and overdressed, she looks inhuman, like a wraith walking amongst us.
I wonder if she realises that the absence of pleats and gatherings and an enormous crinoline (or layers of underskirts) emphasises her movements more - perhaps the opposite of the intended effect. I always loved the way she walked, and could watch her for hours as she moved about the garden or the house. She never attempted to glide, as proper ladies do, or swaggered for my benefit like the whores at the tavern, but her hips swayed naturally and her limbs swung with a animalistic ease. Her present mode of dress allows anyone with an eye for these things to appreciate her grace and innate sensuality.
I check the bridge for any men who might be admiring her, and then stop, because if I see any I might have to rip their heads off. Which would be fun, but might scare her away.
The dress buttons at the front to a high scooped neck and has full-length sleeves. I can see a tiny scrap of lace, peeping out from her neckline like the foam on the crest of a wave. When did she start with this nun-like fashion? At home she always wore her throat bare, and a bodice that seemed made for a lover to tease open and explore. Her arms were usually uncovered to the elbow at least. Indeed, if it were otherwise she could not have done her work without rolling up her sleeves.
I often used to come behind her as she bent over a washing tub, reach into the suds and run my hands along her bare arms. A short prelude to me turning her around, unbuttoning myself and guiding her hands to clasp me. Her hands would be warmed and softened by the water and the friction between her skin and mine eased by the soap. She quickly learned what I liked and would sheath me and slide her fingers slowly up and down, until I came, shuddering, in her hands, and then she'd clean me with her apron, which would be hurriedly removed afterwards and plunged into the tub.
The biggest difference is her hair. At my Mother's insistence, she always used to tuck it away under a handkerchief or a mob-cap. But I think it was naturally unruly, and didn't like the restrictions she imposed. Sometimes, it would make bid for freedom and she would pass a mirror, groan, and have to spend a few minutes taming it again.
Now some of it is gathered at the back of her head and held loosely, but the majority is freely falling around her shoulders, and she carries her hat, a large, black French-style cap, in one hand. Wisps of it fall over her breast, and the breeze sweeps it around her throat and then lifts it in a wild tangle which annoys her. She removes the pin from the back of her head, gathers a random sample of it together and refixes it, then pushes the rest back from her face and dumps the cap on her head, at a suitably Gallic, careless angle.
Suddenly I know what's changed. She just doesn't care how she looks anymore, and has no-one to tell her how she should dress. Her clothes have been chosen for comfort, or because she likes them. I doubt if she bothers trying to catch her own reflection in a polished surface any more than I do. She walks along the pavement without a care for anyone else; as if nothing could harm her; as if she were somehow protected from the world. She looks... at ease.
She's turned from a pretty lass into a beautiful woman.
My insides lurch as she draws closer; and my intentions are obscured to me again, as if a cloud had just passed over the moon and plunged us all into darkness. Darla would favour a quick and brutal kill, the sooner to relieve me of my obsession, has suggested, recommended and finally demanded it. But can I really give up this opportunity to possess her in other ways? Why shouldn't I have what he wanted?
Is she a false light beckoning me to madness and delusion? Or am I feeling a kick from the wheel, and should I give a little under its influence, in the interests of saving the ship?
She's alone.