Sorrow weighted her like lead. More than anything, she wanted the Jinni. Perhaps he’d even come early. He’d take her to Central Park, where she could walk beneath the elms. They’d put their preoccupations aside, give each other their full attention.
Soon, she thought, her head in her hands. He’ll be here soon.
* * *
“Staying late again?” Arbeely said.
At his worktable, the Jinni tightened a vise around an iron bar. “Not very,” he said. “This shouldn’t take more than a few hours. And Chava’s expecting me.” He peered at his partner. Did the man always look this exhausted?
“What is it?” Arbeely said.
If he told the truth—You look terrible, or the like—Arbeely would scold him for his lack of tact. “Nothing,” he said. “I was only collecting wool.”
The man chuckled. “Woolgathering. I’ll see you Monday. Say hello to Chava for me.” And the man put on his hat and left, coughing into his hand.
Alone, the Jinni fitted a hook around the iron bar and twisted, careful to keep the motion smooth and even. It took one’s whole body to cold-twist a wrought iron bar, and he’d developed a rhythm: the waiting bars stacked to one side, the finished ones to the other, placing the hook, gripping it, bracing, twisting—
Movement, from a nearby window. A young woman, her arms burdened with groceries, had paused on the sidewalk to watch him. He met her eye, not even meaning to—and she blushed, and quickly walked on.
A wave of desire washed through him as he watched her go.
He took a deep breath and set the hook on the table. This had been happening more often lately. Not the desire itself—that had never left him—but the urge to act upon it. To follow a woman who’d caught his eye, and let the evening go where it might. To counter the impulse, he pictured a woman’s face: not the Golem’s, but Sophia Winston’s. Pale and unwell, trembling beneath her shawls. All because she, too, had caught his eye.
I will never again take a human lover, he told himself. Lately it had become a second vow laid beside the first, a way to remain true to the Golem without resenting her for it. He told himself that, from a certain perspective, the two vows could be seen as one and the same.
He released the bar from the vise and laid it aside. He felt unsettled, in need of distraction. He’d bank the forge and then go back to his hidden workroom for a while, before leaving for the Golem’s boardinghouse.
He approached the forge, its warmth soothing away some of his irritation. He switched off the electric fan, bent to pick up the coal-rake . . . and stopped. Stood straight again, at the forge’s edge, and inhaled the heated air. Better, even, than his cigarettes.
He turned around, peering out the windows for pedestrians. For the moment, there were none. Quickly, before he could tell himself not to, he unbuttoned his shirtsleeves, rolled them up, and placed his bare hands atop the burning coke.
Heat and strength roared through him. There was a noise like wind in his ears. His eyes sharpened, showing him infinitesimal colors and patterns in the glow of the flames. Within moments he felt more alive than he had in months.
He lifted his hands away before his clothing could ignite. Every detail of the shop’s dark corners stood out in relief: flakes of plaster, strands of cobweb. He picked up an iron bar from the pile and it softened immediately, pliable in his hands. He could see the grain now, the dark striations running lengthwise through the bar, with microscopic clarity.
He went back to his hidden room and settled in to work. Before long he was surrounded by spirals and peelings and curlicues of wrought iron, an explosion of metal excelsior. He’d gotten caught up in the work; he’d be late to the Golem’s apartment—she’d be annoyed, of course, but he’d weather it . . .
“Ahmad?”
The Jinni started at the sight of his partner’s head poking through the curtain. “Arbeely, what are you doing here? Couldn’t you sleep?”
“It’s seven in the morning,” the man said.
“What?” said the Jinni blankly. He went to the curtain and pulled it aside.
Sunlight assaulted his eyes.
Disoriented, he followed Arbeely out to his desk. He’d thought it only an hour past midnight, two at most—but here was morning, the tobacconist’s open across the street, pushcarts and wagons vying for the spaces beside the curbs. Arbeely wore his Sunday suit and hat, and held a folded newspaper. “I went out for a paper, and I saw that the forge was still burning,” the man was saying. “And—well, it worried me, given what’s happened. Chava didn’t know any of those poor girls, did she? Perhaps we ought to install sprinklers—”
“What poor girls?” the Jinni said. “What’s happened?”
The man eyed him. “You don’t know?”
“Just tell me, Arbeely.”
The man sighed, and handed him the paper.
The Jinni unfolded it, winced deeply at the headline, read on. Triangle Shirtwaist, where many worked from the Lower East Side . . . nearly at closing time . . .
Chava. Where had she been when this factory had gone up in flames? Uptown, or at home?
He thrust the paper into Arbeely’s hands and ran from the shop.
* * *
Toby woke at dawn in the grip of his nightmare.
He sat up gasping, ready to burst out of his skin. His eyes focused on his bicycle, leaning against the door. In the next instant he’d donned his coat and shoes and was carrying it down the stairwell.
Outside, the streets were shrouded in morning fog. Black wreaths had sprouted overnight from doorways; they blurred to smears as he rode, his tires hissing on the pavement. He passed a newsstand, read the Times placard: One Hundred and Forty-One Dead in Factory Fire. He pictured the
