I hardly knew where I walked. When I went to Beechen Cliff, thinking to enjoy the view, I saw only the children and thought of holidays past when I had walked on the same path. It had been delightful, the company of my taciturn mother and my rather too clever daughter. Luke Barlow’s daughter, in fact. He might show all sorts of cares for my physical form when it suited him, but he had been gone when I was heavy with child, or when I cried that I did not produce enough milk to feed the constantly hungry baby.

Those first years of her life, we had not come to Bath. We had hardly been able to keep ourselves well in London, let alone to afford a little holiday.

“Look!” said one of the little girls on the shore to another, their faces both pink where their bonnets were being blown back. “My flower is a violet!”

“That’s not a violet, darling,” said the girl’s grandmother without rancor. I passed the party, as I was more concerned with walking quickly than with actually looking at the beauty around me.

For the first time since I had married, I felt the fragile little box into which I had placed my life beginning to crumble. The part of my mind that adeptly added figures and performed business calculations was still perfectly well, and that little bit of my mind rejoiced that Luke Barlow would be able to obtain the right to marry again without any interference from me. It mean that I could leave Bath right away, and that no part of my usual life needed to change.

And yet, everything had changed. I had taken pride in my ability to find men only when I needed them, and on my own terms. My lovers had been unable to hurt me, as our time together was clipped and not at all romantic. For years, I had reasoned that this would suit me perfectly. And since I never believed I would see Luke Barlow, I never thought that I would have to resist him, even though some part of me believed that if I did see him I might be able to at least give him a decent tongue-lashing.

The clouds drew together over the shore, and I thought with a perverse delight that at least they were able to mirror what was in my heart. The violence of the waves made me shiver, and I walked the streets again, careful that anyone looking for me would not know me. With care, I might escape Luke Barlow forever. If he found me, I did not know whether I would strike him or scream.

It was better that he never find me, and I walked so many of the streets that I thought I would have little chance of meeting me. Finally, when my knees were weak and my breath was heaving, I thought to find a place where I might rest. But if I stopped, I might go mad, and so I changed my mind and resolved to keep walking.

After several minutes of pained steps, I was forced to change my mind yet again. I had always had a keen ear for hearing rain start in the distance, and I knew that in another instant I should be soaked. So I headed into the Exhibition Rooms, opening my purse without a thought for the price. At least I would be able to escape the company of children, and perhaps see paintings that confirmed my grim view of the whole world.

There was one painting that I thought might confirm that view with particular poignancy. It was a scene mostly of the sea, with the smallest little boat appearing just left of the center. The poor vessel was all closed in by the turmoil in the waves, and it looked as though it would surely be swallowed by the nearest swell. As I was gazing at the lonely thing, barricaded as it was by waves, I felt that no fog would ever be lifted from me. Though my return to London was inevitable, I might well spend every single day there in sorrow.

Grabbing angrily at a handkerchief, I moved into a different room. I was meant to stay angry, not to give in to sorrow. I could feel the sorrow in me, though, playing like some sort of desolate and pounding pianoforte. If I could only stay angry, I knew, I would be able to keep it at bay for some time.

Anger, though, does not make one into a very discerning art critic. I scarcely saw anything there until the nameless man approached me.

“I hope the evening finds you well,” he said.

“Quite well,” I said to him, not sure how to respond. My cheeks were not red, so preoccupied was I with trying to find my place in the world.

But as soon as he stepped within my line of sight, I quite lost the thread of my thoughts. He looked sun-warmed and eager, yet he spoke so low that I could scare hear him.

“One of the attendants will come into this room in a moment,” he said. “He shall address you as Mrs. Wilson. You are to follow him.”

Then he walked out, and I wondered if the whole thing might, perhaps, be a grand joke. After all, even if an attendant did come in, I might not wish to follow. The man was treating me as if I were privy to his little schemes, and I did not think I would like to follow an attendant all the way to another cheap inn.

But the man who came in seemed so decisive that I did not know how to refuse. “Mrs. Wilson,” said the young man, his expression prim.

When he turned on his heel, I followed him.