a worse father. On the other hand,” she said, with a reminiscent gleam in her eye, “as a draughtsman he was superb. He could draw anything, either from life or from memory. And as a colorist—”
As touching as this tribute to her late husband’s professional skills was, I interrupted.
“You were not with him when he died, then?”
“No. He was disappointed when my mother refused to have anything to do with me after the marriage. He had hoped that my being with child would reconcile her to the match, but when he realized it would not, he abandoned me, and his unborn son.”
“Oh, my dear Miss Vi—that is, er, Hephzibah . . .”
She laughed. “Never mind, Althea. You may go back to calling me Miss Vincy if you prefer. We are both used to it, and I do not go by my married name, for obvious reasons.”
“Oh, thank you,” I said. “I cannot think of you as a Hephzibah, somehow. But what did you do, Miss Vincy? Did your parents take you back once they knew your husband had left you?” This seemed unlikely, as Mr. Fredericks claimed she had been gone from her family home for over a year.
She cocked her head at a soft sound in the boy’s bedroom, and went to stand over his bed. She was clearly intending to take her place at his side once more, but I objected.
“Really, Miss Vincy, we ought to let him get some sleep. Our talking will disturb him, and he will do very well without your constant presence. We shall only be a room away, you know.”
“Ah, but I have been so close to losing him in the past few days, and in general I can spend so little time with him that I must make the most of it. Well, he does appear to be resting, so perhaps we should both take some tea and continue our talk in the next room.”
We were shortly provided with tea, in rough earthenware mugs, true, but hot and comforting, and some bread with butter and honey. When Nurse Braddock had retired, I ventured to continue my catechism.
“Perhaps you did go to stay with your great-aunt when your husband left you, thereby making your mother’s story true?” I suggested.
“Oh, no. My mother was far too angry with me, and Great-Aunt Anne would never have done anything to annoy her. When Mr. Annuncio and I returned from Scotland after our wedding, such as it was, he brought me back to London. He had married me, of course, for my money, and my money—that is, my family—was in London.
“As an artist, he had a circle of friends and acquaintances including a number of working portrait painters. When he deserted me, several of them were kind enough to help me by sending me some commissions, so that I might scrape a living painting miniatures on ivory. I managed to support first myself alone and then myself and Leon, by means of this work.
“It was one of his friends, a kind, good man named Drury, who discovered that Mr. Annuncio was dead, and went to the Whitechapel slum where he had been knifed in a fight. Mr. Drury saw him buried, and paid for it too.”
She put her mug of tea down and was silent a moment.
“I—I am sorry,” I said.
“Oh, I am not,” she replied. “Tho’ it is true that the world lost a fine painter. Had he lived he would have bled me white. He would appear from time to time, you know, demanding money. No, that sailor who killed him did me a great favor, and my son too. And when he was dead I was able to write to my parents. I could never have been reconciled to them while he lived, and I am quite fond of them. Of both of them,” she added.
I did not reply to this at once, for I was thinking. “Was it . . . was it so very dreadful, being a woman alone, earning your living in London?”
“No . . . in some ways I enjoyed it, tho’ it was a fearsome struggle much of the time. And of course I had my son with me every moment, as I do not have him now. But Leon has never been strong. I could not neglect any chance to improve the conditions of his daily life. The neighborhood in which we resided was not ideal for a delicate child.”
I sat musing for a moment. If I had