“Theo was the best husband I could have dreamt of. I was made better because he was in my life. He saw me as I was and saw me for what I could become. He educated me. He opened my eyes to so much culture and art…” I placed my hand on Dries’s for a moment. “Theo paid for his brother’s care. As would I, should you need it and had I the means. And when he himself fell ill… The rest of our funds were spent on hospitals.”

Brain infection had been the official cause of death given, instead of gone stark raving mad, to spare the legacy of a good man.

Wil squirmed, and I kissed his rosy cheek, then set him on the rug at my feet. I checked his hands to make sure he hadn’t been too chilled, but his tiny fingers were warm. I checked his feet too, removing the second pair of socks I had put on him for our outing. Then I removed the simple white hat and coat I had knitted for him. He fussed at being tugged this way and that, but as soon as I finished, he picked up a wooden block to play with, instantly content. He was a year old. I swore to keep him healthy and happy.

“I must remain in Paris,” I told my brother. “Theo’s friends will help me finish his work.”

“Have they been able to help so far?” A grievous sigh escaped him. “Theo’s artist friends might represent the most brilliant development in art in our lifetime, but they themselves have not yet been discovered. They cannot even help themselves. They cannot help you, Jo.”

“And you? Could you not lend me sufficient funds to last the year?” I shouldn’t have asked. He had his own wife, his own children now. And he’d only just told me that he’d left his job in Paris and would not start the one in Amsterdam for some weeks. “I’m sorry. Please forget I said anything.”

He bent down to run his fingers over Wil’s silky blond hair. “I will help any way I can. But I can help you more easily in Amsterdam. Would home be so bad? You will take care of our parents as they grow old. And you might yet meet a widower who needs a mother for his children. Surely there would be some fulfillment in that? Mama says Garrit still asks about you.”

Because I loved my brother, I tried to imagine the future he painted, but everything in me protested. My mind would grow dull, every last spark inside me dying one by one. No time to read my books, no time to think and write, no time to visit a gallery or an exhibit, no time to accomplish the great task Theo had set for me, the task of a lifetime.

“I think I would go mad.”