Finally, after the rector had retreated back inside his dark church in true confusion, there was only the other plumber (I had decided that he was no relation to Joseph) and me left standing in the chilly late-October wind in front of the church. I tipped my hat to the hungry man and walked all the way to my brother Charley’s home in South Audley Street.

Charley’s health had improved somewhat as the hot summer ended, and by mid-September he and Katey were spending most of their time at their London home rather than at Gad’s Hill Place. Charles was also working on various illustration jobs when he could, although the stomach pains and general disability struck often.

Still, I was surprised to find him not at home on that Thursday, 29 October, when I knocked at their door. Katey was home and she greeted me in their small and rather dark parlour. She knew of Caroline’s wedding and asked me to tell her “all the marvellous high points.” She offered me some brandy—which I happily accepted; my nose, cheeks, and hands were red with the autumn cold—and I received the distinct impression that she had been drinking before I arrived.

At any rate, I told her “all the marvellous high points,” but I expanded the definition of “high points” from the wedding ceremony to my entire history with Mrs Caroline G—. The tale is shocking, of course, to bourgeois sensibilities, but I had long known that Kate suffered from few of her father’s middle-class illusions. If the many rumours and reports were to be believed, Katey had long since taken a lover—or several lovers—to make up for my brother’s lack of ardour (or inability to express it). This was a woman of the world, sipping brandy so close to me in the dark and shuttered little parlour with its tiny coal fire offering most of the dim light we had, and I found myself telling her details of my history with Caroline that I had told almost no one, including her father.

And, as I spoke, I realised that there was another reason—beyond my need to unburden myself at long last—why I was telling Kate Dickens these things.

Reluctantly, secretly, painfully, I had come to agree with her insensitive father’s prediction that my brother would not be so long for this world. It was true that Charley’s affliction, while sometimes lessening, continued to grow worse in the overall scheme of things. It now felt probable, even to me (his loyal and loving brother), that Charles might be dead in a year or two, and this ageing (she was twenty-eight) but still-attractive woman would be a widow.

Katey showed her own indiscretion by saying, “You would be surprised what Father has had to say about Mrs G—’s marriage.”

“Tell me,” I said and leaned closer.

She poured us each another brandy but shook her head. “It might hurt your feelings.”

“Nonsense. Nothing your father could say would hurt my feelings. He and I have been friends and confidants for far too long. Pray tell me. What did he say about today’s ceremony?”

“Well, he did not say anything to me, of course. But I happened to overhear him say to Aunt Georgina… ‘Wilkie’s affairs defy all prediction. For anything one knows, the whole matrimonial pretence may be a lie of that woman’s, intended to make him marry her, and—contrary to her expectations—breaking down at last.’ ”

I sat stunned. I was hurt. And amazed. Could it be true? Could even the wedding have been another of Caroline’s ploys to trap me into marriage? Was she hoping that I would feel such loss that I would come after her even into Joseph Clow’s household, defying and denying all marriage bonds, and beg her to come back to me… to marry me? My skin rippled with something like revulsion.

Stricken, all I could choke out to Kate Dickens was “Your father is a very wise man.”

Surprisingly—thrillingly—she reached out and squeezed my hand.

Over a third brandy, I heard myself whining to Katey some words that, much later and in a much different context, I would share almost verbatim with Charley himself.

“Kate… do not be too harsh on me. Between my illness and the death of my mother and my loneliness, it has been a terrible year. Seeing Caroline married today, while being strangely satisfying in one respect, was also oddly disturbing. She has, after all, been part of my life for more than fourteen years and part of my household for more than ten. I think, my dear Katey, that a man in my situation is to be pitied. I am not… I have not been for a long time… I am not accustomed to living alone. I’ve been accustomed to having a kind woman there to talk with me, as you are now, Kate… and to take care of me and perhaps to spoil me a bit from time to time. All men enjoy that, but perhaps I more than most. It is difficult for a woman, a wife, such as yourself, to know what it is like for a man to be used always to seeing a pretty creature in his home… someone always nicely dressed, someone always about the room or hovering nearby, bringing a form of light and warmth to an old bachelor’s life… and then, suddenly, for no reason of one’s own, to be left alone as I am now, to be left… out in the cold and the dark.”

Katey was staring at me very intensely. She seemed to have leaned closer to me as I was explaining all this. Her knee under her long green silken dress was only inches from my own. I had the sudden urge to kneel on the floor, throw my head into her lap, and to weep like a child. I was certain at that instant that she would have put her arms around me, would have patted me on my back and head, perhaps even raised my tear-streaked face to her breast.

Instead, I sat there but leaned even closer. “Charley is very ill,” I whispered.

“Yes.” The single syllable seemed to hold no special sadness, only agreement.

“I have also been ill, but my recuperation is assured. My illness is a transient thing. Even now it does not interfere with my faculties or my… needs.”

She looked at me with what I thought was something like a thrilled expectancy.

I then said, softly but urgently, “Kate, I suppose you could not marry a man who had…”

“No, I could not,” Kate said decisively. She stood.

Reeling in confusion, I stood as well.

Kate called for her maid-servant to bring my coat and stick and hat. I was out on the cold stoop before I could think of anything to say. Even then I could not speak. The door closed with a slam.

I was half a block away, leaning into the cold wind, rain blowing into my face, when I saw Charley on the sidewalk opposite. He hailed me, but I pretended that I had not seen or heard him and ran on quickly, my hand holding the brim of my hat and my forearm hiding my face.

Two blocks farther I hailed a hansom cab and had it take me to Bolsover Street.

Martha R—, with no servants there at that time, opened the door herself. Her unguarded expression showed her true pleasure at seeing me.

That night I impregnated her with our first child.