If only I knew who she was, oh how much better to be able to have her sit for me! Surely the funeral will be among the notices reported somewhere? I could search for her. But why would she agree to so much as speak to me? She found me at an opium den, with a raving drunkard. I fear if she remembers me at all it will not be with high regard.

When he saw the woman outside Mr. Chow Li’s house he recognized her at once as the same woman he had seen standing at the graveside in the cemetery that morning. The woman he had felt so compelled to draw. She had taken off her hat and veil and replaced them with a cape and hood, but there was no mistaking her. Bram was shocked to think of her frequenting such an establishment. Could such an elegant, apparently wealthy, well-spoken woman, a woman of unmistakable presence and poise, could she really lie among the dead-eyed clientele he had seen at the place? It made no sense to him.

She is too special for such habits. Too … powerful, somehow.

He surprises himself with the thought, but the more he recalls her, the more he knows he is right. There was a curious strength about her. There was something uncommon in her green eyes when she held his gaze.

What color were they exactly? Viridian? Emerald? How I would love to paint them from life; to see her here, in front of me. A man could surrender all his will to eyes such as those.

He is brought back from his memory of that night by the sound of Jane Mangan calling his name. He goes to the door and peers down the dark staircase.

“Ah, there you are.” She stands on the bend in the stairs on the second floor, a child on her hip, seemingly able to get around the house in the gloom without anything more than the small storm lantern she raises aloft. “We are about to eat. Mangan wondered if you ’d like to join us for supper. Do say you will. Nothing fancy, you understand. Just a simple stew.”

Bram hesitates. Oil paint glistens on the palette in his hand. The canvas still stands maddeningly empty. He is on the point of refusing, of letting himself be ruled by his passion, of losing himself in the act of creation once again. But he is only two days here, and Jane is so good and so gentle. She reminds him of his mother, and he cannot bring himself to snub her.