kiss her underwater, perhaps, instead— hold her down with a kiss. He stepped into the tub, sank his frame beneath the surface, and reached out to beckon her in.
She stood at the foot of the bath, gazing on him fondly; then, with a sudden gasp, gripped one of his ankles and yanked it up with terrible strength. His head plunged under as she held him so, and he flailed desperately, kicking air with his free leg, hands grappling against the slippery sides, but all to no avail— and when she released his ankle at last, it slithered uselessly into the water.
Then, with gentle attention, she went to his side and closed forever his furious stare. The heat of the water had swollen the crisp flowers that floated about his head, and reinfused their colours, so that they seemed as fresh and blooming as the summer in which they were picked, upon some other riverbank— as if she had the power over their life, not death. And at that thought she let out a long, agonised cry, and ran shrieking down the stairs to the well.
‘I’ve chosen! I’ve chosen!’ she screamed, as she entered the space. ‘Oh, what I’ve chosen— I can’t survive it!’
But that person she expected to find there was absent. The moon had passed from its height and left the shaft in darkness, but no shadow concealed the splendid and timeless lady— she was gone. Thamesis called out again and again, and at last glanced over the circular wall into the well— it was quite dried up, as though it had been so for many years, and filled with silt and cracked mud. All that was left to show that moisture had ever dappled there, was a skelitter of dusty fish bones at the bottom.
She drew in her breath at the sight, full of awful foreboding. With a deep chill sinking through and through her, she returned to the apartment, wrapped herself in a thick coat and set out again, into the street this time. The sun began to glow through the sky, and quickly filled the atmosphere with light, though no heat to thaw the frosty city. Thamesis hurried, regardless of the cold— she was colder within— downhill to the embankment, where a ladder let onto one of the gritty beaches. She descended and picked across the blackened rubble towards the waterline, which is where I saw her from the bridge overhead.
And now, perhaps I should tell you that, as she stood there in anguish, her father Thames sent forth a school of his tritons to unfold the running waves and draw her below to his ever-pouring bosom— but since you would never believe in such a tale, I need only say that the tide encroached and lapped upon the debris shore, little by little, until its stones were sunken beneath the murmuring waters, and lost.
The end
Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed the story. It’s taken from my collection called The Green Lady and Other Stories. Find more stories and illustrations at www.benjaminial.com.
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