“As soon as I lay our son in his cradle, I will run out to the market. I will cook a hearty meal. We are here now, dearest. Our family is together. You will feel better.”

He held my hand and nodded without conviction, sitting collapsed next to me, his eyes glinting with tears. He twisted away so I wouldn’t see them.

The fiacre rolled forward under an ominous, blackening sky.

“How did it happen?”

“On Monday, Dr. Gachet wrote to ask me to visit.” Theo buried his face into my neck and his tears fell on my skin. “He said Vincent had wounded himself. He didn’t die from the shot at once. He was still talking when I arrived. I expected him to recover.”

I held our little son on my lap with one arm while holding on to Theo with the other.

“He died Tuesday.” Theo’s voice was a broken whisper. “Not long after midnight. He told me I wanted it to end like this.”

I swallowed a sob. “He wanted you by his side at the end. And you were there. The two of you together, always.” But oh, how I wished Vincent would have spared Theo all this suffering.

“Our mother is devastated.” Theo straightened and wiped his eyes. “We buried him in a sunny spot amid the fields at Auvers.”

“He is at rest at last.” I kissed my husband’s temple. “You were without me at your brother’s funeral, but you will not be alone in the rest of your grief.”

We slogged through August in a haze and suffered the city’s merciless heat, our plans for a holiday in the cool of Amsterdam forgotten. How strange it was for the postman not to come nearly daily with Vincent’s letters. I would see his uniformed, bulky form from the window and think I wonder what news from Auvers. And then I would remember.

We lived in sorrow, but at least our precious boy was well. My bleeding stopped. Theo’s melancholy lifted, and his cough that had worsened after Vincent’s death was easing again.

In the middle of September, we moved downstairs to the larger apartment. Since Theo was no longer supporting Vincent, we could afford the higher rent. We lost the light of the upper floor, and everything was still a mess and would remain so until we found the right spot for each piece of furniture, but at least fewer stairs meant an easier daily life. And we could properly store Vincent’s paintings, an important consideration, since more were on their way from Auvers.

We were discussing that, late at night in bed, when Theo had an idea that at long last brought him a small measure of happiness.