Anna said, “Are you still . . . ?”
The Golem saw her meaning. “Yes, sometimes,” she said, self-consciously. “Though . . .”
“Not like before,” Anna finished.
“Not like before,” the Golem agreed.
“You don’t think he’s . . .” The woman’s mind finished the sentence: an image of the Jinni, his arms around someone else.
“No,” the Golem said quickly. “It’s not that. And yes, I know—”
“Every woman thinks it won’t happen to her,” Anna said darkly.
“I know, but . . . I’ve been thinking about it, lately.” She paused. “May I tell you something in confidence?”
Anna rolled her eyes. “You have to ask?”
“Have you ever heard the name Sophia Winston?”
“I don’t think so. Is she one of the Winstons?”
“Yes, the daughter of the family. I met her, briefly.”
That earned her an incredulous stare. “Chava Levy, you’ve known a Winston all this time and you never told me?”
“I don’t know her, Anna, not really,” the Golem muttered, mindful of the others strolling around them. “I only met her once, years ago. She and Ahmad had been lovers, briefly.”
Anna’s eyes widened with images of gilded boudoirs, mussed satin sheets.
“Yes,” the Golem said wryly, “something like that. But . . . I think Ahmad hurt her, without meaning to. I don’t know how, exactly.” She described the young woman’s pallor, her shaking. “He could barely look at her,” she said. “And she refused to discuss it.”
“The poor girl,” Anna murmured. “What happened to her?”
“I don’t know. She left the country, and I never asked Ahmad for the details. But now I wonder if . . .” She paused, then said in a miserable voice, “Maybe I’m just a woman he can’t hurt.”
Anna gaped at her. “Chava! What a thing to say!”
“Yes, but what if it’s true?”
“Well, ask him!”
“But how will I know if he’s lying?”
“You won’t,” Anna said, “any more than the rest of us ever do. You’ll just have to decide whether to believe him.”
* * *
The Amherst’s tenants didn’t need to ask for news of Arbeely’s health; they saw it in the lightness of his partner’s step as he climbed the stairwell, his new willingness to nod hello on the landings. The showroom was still closed, the plate-glass windows hung with thick curtains—but now, anticipating Arbeely’s return, the Jinni pulled them back and saw the layers of dust on the balustrades and bedposts, the cobwebs between their bars. He fetched a rag and began to clean the first piece, a headboard he’d been especially proud of. Except—here was an ugly weld, and this twist ought to be finer, and . . .
It wasn’t long before he tossed the rag aside and began to pull apart the showroom in dissatisfaction. Each of his pieces seemed hobbled by flaws and compromises, spots where he’d altered the design to fit the limitations of his materials. Perhaps wrought iron was a dead end after all. Or—no, wait. Perhaps he’d been going about it wrong from the beginning.
He went to the supply room, scanned its contents. Wrought iron, pig iron, graded steel: all of it refined to standard ratios, this much pure iron to that much carbon, and then smelted without variation. All of it made to someone else’s specifications, not his own. But what if he could control the entire process himself? Without human tools or methods, human notions of what was possible?
He searched through the shelves, and found the cardboard box labeled Hibbing Ironworks. He tossed box and excelsior aside, hefted the lump of iron ore. Would it be it enough for a definitive test? He’d need immense heat, and a good amount of pressure. Luckily, he could provide both.
He found a ceramic crucible, placed the ore inside, and carried it to the forge. Then he rolled up his sleeves, and—after a quick glance out the windows—placed his hands upon the burning coals.
* * *
The Golem stood at the Asylum fence, lost in her thoughts.
You’ll just have to decide whether to believe him. And that was the crux of the problem, wasn’t it? Even if she dared to ask, even if she managed to pull some reply out of him, she’d never know, not truly. She thought of all his silences large and small, all the times he’d refused to explain himself, and wondered how to weigh them against everything they’d shared. How could she possibly decide? And how on earth had they ended up in such a state?
I haven’t enough apples for class tomorrow, and no time to shop, either . . . Perhaps I’ll have them make a raisin tart instead . . .
The Golem looked up. There was a woman on the other side of the fence, coming toward her, deep in thought. The Golem watched as the woman unlocked the gate and went through, closed it behind herself, and turned toward Broadway, despairing that the new semester had barely begun and already her students were running roughshod over her. But it wasn’t her fault that the girls stole ingredients out of the cabinets when she wasn’t watching—and besides, who could blame them? If she had to eat the Asylum food for years on end, she’d pilfer as many sugar-cubes as she could! Though what they intended to do with the missing baking powder, she had no idea . . .
Intrigued, the Golem followed after her.
The woman was in a hurry, but the Golem kept pace with her as first she stopped at a butcher’s—a chicken cutlet for supper, and a weisswurst for breakfast—and then went down into the subway. After a moment of hesitation, the Golem paid for a ticket and followed her to the southbound platform. From a discreet distance she watched as the woman pulled a compact mirror from her bag, fussed briefly with her hair, cast a critical eye at herself, and then snapped the mirror shut as the train arrived.
The carriage was nearly empty. The woman took a spot on a bench, and pulled a novel from her bag. The Golem found a seat nearby. The train pulled away and made its slow progress south, accumulating passengers here
