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In his trousers and his hessian boots, he could easily escape her, running away across the rocks and the stones. In her dress with the petticoats and slip-on shoes, she had a slippery hold on the sand. When Antony ran alongside the sea edge, trying to escape her, she followed as best she could, but then her foot got caught between two rocks. The shoe came off, her body twisted backwards, and her ankle clicked at an unnatural angle, causing enough pain to make her fall.
“Antony!” she cried his name as she fell, but the sand didn’t come up to meet her- instead the water did. A wave crashed in from the ocean and enveloped her dress.
She was instantly sodden, with her head under the water, finding it impossible to discern between the rocks and the sand beneath the murky green depths. She reached out at what she thought was a rock, trying to stand up out of the wave, but then the tide pulled her backwards. She was being dragged out into the sea.
* * *
“God’s wounds, Hermione!” Antony bellowed her name as he threw off his jacket and ran back toward her. The sudden high wave had come in out of nowhere. The tide should be retreating at this time of day, yet the one high wave had swept her away and was currently dragging her out into the ocean.
He dived in after her, scrambling for her in the sea. She was struggling against the pull of the dress. When he reached her, it was just his hand clasped around hers at first, then he kicked forward, swimming alongside of her enough to wrap his arm around her waist and drag her back with him.
As the two of them swam together, soon they were back in the shallows with the tide going out around them.
“Put your feet down,” he encouraged her, not letting go of her. He had one hand in hers still and the other around her waist. She did as he said, still coughing up some water while he helped her out of the ocean, toward the fossils and the stones.
Once there was a little distance between them and the sea, she snapped her hand out of his and tapped him around the arm. “Ow! What was that for?”
“You are the reason I fell in!” she shouted, though she didn’t walk out of his arm.
“I got you out, didn’t I?” he asked.
“Why did you get me out?” she said. “If you hate me so much that you cannot bear to look at me or speak to me anymore, why pull me out?”
“I’m not a monster, Hermione. I leave that for others.” Realizing he was still holding onto her, he released her at last and walked away, pushing the tendrils of hair back from his head and trying to shake the excess water off his body.
“I am not a monster,” Hermione pleaded, walking after him, stumbling slightly from the pain in her ankle, though it was clearly not broken. “If you choose to ignore me forever more, then that is your prerogative, but before you make that decision, would you at least let me tell you what really happened?”
“I know what happened!” he snapped, turning back around to her.
“No, you do not,” she insisted, following him and pushing him in his chest. He clung onto her wrists as she did so, unable to part from her. “Do you have any idea what happened to me before I came to Lyme Regis? Before I came to your house?”
“What do you mean?” he asked. Her words had brought him up short. He gazed at her drenched form, with the rivulets of water running off her blonde hair and the Pomona green dress that clung to her.
“I came here with a ruined reputation already, Antony.” Her words were miserable. She snatched her hands away from his grasp, although she held his gaze, breathing deeply, either from her anger or the dip in the water, he couldn’t tell which.
“I didn’t want to believe that tale,” he said, feeling his brow furrowing. She looked shocked, her face contorting.
“You know?” she asked. “You heard the gossip? When?”
“The other day. It was mentioned at the club,” he said, shaking his head. “Is it true? Were you really set to marry another man?”
“I was to be married. Then… then he never turned up.”
“What?” Antony couldn’t process the information. He took a step back from her, nearly twisting his ankle as he stepped over the rocks. He stumbled to stand straight. “Who? Who were you to marry?”
“Does that part even matter?” she said, shrugging. “The point is that I was waiting for him at the church door, and he never came. My reputation was in tatters.”
Antony couldn’t say anything. The tale fitted perfectly with what he already knew. He turned away from her, rubbing his face with the stress of hearing the story.Did she love him?
“My father arranged for my aunt to write to your mother so that we could come here. My father wanted me to…”
“To trick me into marrying you? I know that part!” Antony snapped, turning back round to face her as he dropped his hands.
“I never wanted to do it,” she said quietly, stepping toward him. With the one step, he moved back too, maintaining the distance between them. She gave up and fell still. “I told him no, countless times, but he told me if I didn’t do it that Phoebe’s reputation would be ruined too.”
“You are telling me you married me for your sister’s sake as well as your own?” he asked, motioning toward her.
“No! No, that is not what I am saying. I didn’t try to trap you into marriage.”
