Iron Cast(5)

“Probably not,” said Corinne.

“Figured.”

Danny set down the glass on the worn wood of the counter and pocketed the key. Corinne headed toward the back, hugging the gin bottle. Ada reached over to pluck it from her arms and, ignoring Corinne’s indignant protests, handed it back to Danny.

“Thanks, Ada,” Danny said. “Give your ma my regards.”

“Will do, Danny.”

Ada saluted the bartender and tugged a still-protesting Corinne through the doorway at the other end of the hall. The narrow stairs went down half a level to the storage room, which was stacked with crates of liquor, boxes of dry goods, and anything else that had been shoved there and forgotten. That included Gordon Calloway, who was two hundred-odd pounds of sunflower seeds stuffed into a cheap suit. He spent eight hours a day sitting in a wooden chair in the storage room and was paid handsomely to do it.

“Johnny’s waiting in his office,” he said, spitting out a sunflower seed.

“Why yes, Gordon, my day has been swell. Thanks for asking,” said Corinne.

Ada elbowed her, but Gordon just grunted. Corinne went past Gordon to the wall in the corner of the room. She pressed against the wood paneling with one hand, and a section of it swung inward, revealing a flight of rickety steps that led all the way to the basement. When Ada had first come there, it had taken her days to find the right panel with any accuracy. She was still embarrassed thinking about the number of times Gordon had watched her out of the corner of his eye while she fumbled across the wall.

The only light in the stairwell emanated from the base, but Ada knew every step instinctively. The living quarters where Johnny Dervish’s chosen few hung their hats were cramped and a little musty, but no one had ever complained. There was a central common room with a ratty couch, floral armchairs, and a coffee table— usually piled with sheet music, books, and half-finished bottles of whiskey or gin.

Ada couldn’t hold back a sigh of relief. For the first time since fleeing Haversham, she didn’t feel the asylum’s presence bearing down on her. Maybe one day, the past two weeks would become a distant memory, something she could tell as a diverting story between cigarette pulls and frenzied turns on the dance floor. Until then she was just content to be here, hidden away in the tiny kingdom that Johnny Dervish had built. The Cast Iron meant safety—it always had.

She and Corinne shared a room opposite the stairs, with a low door partially obscured by a potted plant. Not much more than two army cots and a stack of milk crates, but they had made it a home, papering the walls with magazine cutouts and draping silk scarves from the plywood ceiling.

Ada shed her shapeless asylum garb and slipped into a skirt and blouse. She yanked the scarf off her head and tossed it into the corner. Her freed hair emerged cloudlike around her face. She examined it carefully in the mirror. Two weeks without proper care had left it worse for wear, but the damage was not irreparable. Out in society, she would garner nasty glares by leaving it free like this, but if there was one place she could always walk without fear, it was the Cast Iron.

Behind her, Corinne had stripped off her uniform and left it bundled in the corner with Ada’s scarf. She was dressing in a blue, low-waisted frock that appeared to have spent the majority of its life wadded in a ball. She leaned around Ada’s shoulder at the mirror to twist her fingers through her limp hair for a few seconds before finally giving up.

In the reflection, Ada caught a glimpse of something on her bed that she hadn’t seen before. She turned to find a small canvas painting, maybe twelve inches square, propped against the wall. It depicted a sprawling tree by a creek, ringed by the riotous glare of yellow-white sunlight. The emerald grass grew tall and wild, even in the dappled shade of the branches. There were clumps of vibrant purple wildflowers, painted with such dexterity that they seemed to have motion in the breeze. A wooden swing hung in the foreground, a picture of peaceful tranquility.

In front of the painting on the bed, tied with simple twine, was a bunch of purple wildflowers, the exact shade and shape as the ones in the painting.

“Saint left that for you.” Corinne was in the corner, hopping on one foot as she tried to free herself from her shoe. “He thought you might want some springtime, after the asylum.”

There was a pang in Ada’s chest, and she bit her lip. For a split second she was back there again, paralyzingly alone in a prison built for people just like her.

“Is he here?” she asked, struggling to keep her voice even.

“I haven’t heard from him in a while.” Corinne finally gave in and sat down on her bed to unbuckle her shoes. “You should have seen him the night you were arrested, Ada. He was a wreck when he got back to the Cast Iron. Johnny almost called the doctor.”

Ada pushed the painting facedown on the bed and turned her head so that Corinne couldn’t see her expression.

“Everything jake?” Corinne asked after a few seconds.

“I don’t want to talk about it.” Ada went back to the mirror and rubbed vigorously at the dark circles under her eyes.

Beyond her own reflection, she could see Corinne eyeing her, deciding whether or not to press the issue further. Finally Corinne shrugged.

“Come on,” she told Ada. “Johnny will want to know it all went without a hitch.”

Ada followed her out the door, relieved the moment had passed. It was rare that she kept anything from Corinne, but this was still too fresh a wound. She arranged her face into the wry expression she knew Corinne would expect.