They placed old Bernie on the ground behind the coffin lid. Reynold flung himself back to his knees and lifted the lining to reveal the roll of canvas, only slightly stained.
“There now,” said Kelly. “They were not in there very long.”
Reynold lifted Lily from the coffin tenderly and, laying her across his knees, began to unroll the canvas.
“Better not, friend.” Pat Kelly placed a hand on his arm. “Not here. Let’s take her home.”
“Home?”
“My place. As I say, I have assistance waiting.”
Reynold nodded and rose with Lily in his arms. He stood while the impromptu crew placed Bernie back in his coffin and lowered it back into the grave.
“Come along,” Pat Kelly told him. “The lads will take care of things here.”
“Yes, all right.” Reynold spun to face the crew, Lily clutched tight to his chest. “Thank you—all of you.”
“There now,” Pat Kelly crooned to his men. ”Did I not tell you he was special?”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
“Is she all right?” Reynold gasped the question, his ragged breathing loud in the room.
Two heads—one dark and one red—leaned in to take a closer look at Lily. The owner of neither one breathed at all.
Reynold had found Chastity waiting at the Kellys’ house when he carried Lily in. No longer clad in her finery, the automaton wore simple clothing like an ordinary woman of the city, and her hair hung in a single braid down her back.
She’d helped Reynold unwrap Lily from the canvas with care and place her on the Kellys’ settee. He couldn’t help remembering those same gentle hands had helped beat a woman to death last night.
Now she brushed a wisp of hair from Lily’s forehead and made no reply.
Kelly said, “A bit of deterioration there at the corner of her mouth and on her brow. There will be more elsewhere, but nothing the enzyme wash cannot heal.” He fixed Reynold with a green stare. “Would you like to bathe her or try to restart her first?”
“Restart her, please.” Reynold’s voice sounded harsh. “Do you think it will work?”
“Miss Chastity and I have discussed it. Neither of us has sufficient knowledge to be certain.”
“The only ones who could restart her for sure would be Dr. Landry or perhaps Nadia, but Nadia was badly injured in the fire—the one I caused. I am sorry, Reynold. I should have thought about the knowledge being lost last night before Dr. Landry’s life was taken. But I did not know, then, that Lily lay in this state. And I do not think I could have held back my sisters for any reason.”
“No.” Reynold thought again of the steel arms rising and falling, rising and falling. “They were defending their own lives.”
“We must refill her boiler, make sure she’s stocked with coal, and try to ignite the vital spark—not that for her fire, you understand, but that other which makes her Lily.”
Reynold turned half-seeing eyes on Chastity. “You were restarted, right? After you went in the river.”
“Yes, but Dr. Landry achieved that, and I do not remember. Pat was also restarted once, after he went over Niagara Falls.”
“That was different,” Pat contributed. “Though my boiler went out, my artificial intelligence continued to function throughout. Miss Lily’s has clearly ceased.”
“You’re saying she really is…dead?” Reynold choked.
“Friend, there is no ‘dead,’ as such, for us. Where, Miss Chastity, to begin?”
“With her shutoff switch, I expect.”
“I tried that,” Reynold told them. “Right away after she shut down.”
“Then let us try it again.”
Moving gently, the two automatons rolled Lily over and removed enough clothing to reveal the concealed flap beneath her left arm. Reynold backed off a few steps while they worked in tandem, hardly able to believe what he watched. The woman he loved held coal and water, had a steel hopper in her belly and fire where her heart should be. Seeing the plain truth of that didn’t make him love her any less. Because he loved her essence—the innocence with which she looked at him, the loyalty that burned just like that fire at her core; the funny things she said and the way her spirit embraced him whole, making of him something he’d never been.
Needed, valued, worthwhile.
He couldn’t go on without her. He couldn’t.
The two automatons consulted together in soft words not meant for his ears. When they had Lily’s fire ignited, they sat her up, Kelly supporting her from behind while Chastity applied herself to the flap over the vital button.
One push. Reynold’s harsh breathing stopped as he caught himself tight; the silence became complete.
Nothing. Lily stared with pale blue eyes which Chastity had carefully opened, fixed enough to be made of glass.
He groaned. “Just what does that switch do?”
Kelly answered, “Unfortunately, neither of us knows. One of our first tasks will be to dismantle one of the units destroyed in the fire to see if we can find out.”
“I suspect it sends an electrical pulse to the artificial intelligence,” Chastity said. “But Lily’s circuit may be broken—shorted out.”
“Could—could you rewire her?”
“If we had the exact knowledge, perhaps. Or a blueprint. As I say, we do not have access to the information.”
“One of my creators is still alive,” Kelly offered, “but unfortunately clinically insane.”
“Let us try again.” Chastity fixed Reynold with her dark gaze. “I suggest you should pray, if you know how.”
Pray? He’d get down on his knees, if he had to. Because he didn’t care if she was flesh, half-flesh, or machine. He needed Lily’s company, her presence in his days, in his life, far more fundamental than any classification of human or otherwise.
Chastity pushed the button once more. Lily, seated on the settee and slumped against Pat’s shoulder, didn’t move, didn’t stir. She looked quite dead, the deteriorated patches on her cheek and forehead stark.
Reynold gasped and fell to his knees, seized her hands. He stared into her empty eyes. “Lily? Lily, please!”
He squeezed her hands more tightly. “Try again please, Chastity. One more time.”
****
Lily.
She knew that voice. It hummed through her receptors and seemed to vibrate along her steel frame, more warming than the fire in her thorax. Love lay in that voice, and belonging. Her very identity.
Rey.
His heart beat for her even as her nonexistent, virtual heart beat for him. She could almost feel it, almost…
Reach, reach, reach.
Her intelligence ticked over like a semi-seized engine, grinding at first, protesting at the extreme effort, and then working more easily. Her opened eyes began to see. The darkness cleared, and she beheld…
A pair of brown eyes that encompassed her world. Right now they brimmed with human emotions she identified as anguish and hope. And another that trembled on the edge of her understanding.
Love.
“Rey.”
“Oh, my God, Lily—oh, my God, oh, my God!”
He lowered his head and pressed it to their joined hands. Through that conduit she felt everything he was and everything she meant to him.
Her fire flared more brightly, and she squeezed his hands in return.
“There now,” said Pat Kelly who, unaccountably, stood at Rey’s side. “It is as the writers state: third time is the charm.”
Rey began to laugh. Lily couldn’t tell if he’d ever cease.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
“Now, lie still,” Rey instructed Lily. “Pat and Chastity both say I’m to treat you everywhere. We need to undo any tissue damage. You were in the coffin a while.”
Lily lay back obediently. They had returned to Rey’s room following her resurrection—exactly where she wished to be—and he’d placed her on the bed before undressing her with tender care.
He had not all
owed her to walk when they left Pat Kelly’s, insisting on carrying her and hiring a horse-drawn cab. She hadn’t protested then, either, because with her head pressed against his chest she could feel his heartbeat.
He’d poured a measure of enzyme wash into a basin, found a cloth, and now treated her assiduously. She concentrated on enjoying it.
“I do not remember a coffin.”
“That’s because you were…turned off. Lily, we need to talk about that. Why you shut down, I mean.”
She consulted her artificial intelligence and found the resource. “Yes. Not now, please.”
“But…”
“I would just like to enjoy you tending me.”
“Do you enjoy it when I touch you?”
“Yes.” Oh, yes.
“Lily, when you shut down…”
She stared into his eyes. “Not now, Rey. Please.”
“Ah, all right.”
She closed her eyes as he slid the cloth up her arm and across one breast. Her sensors tingled. But something niggled at her. “Why was I in a coffin?”
“We needed to hide you so you wouldn’t be taken back to the Crystal Palace.”
“But won’t Dr. Landry still be looking for me?”
“No, Lily.” He hesitated. “She’s dead. You no longer have an owner. You and the other surviving Ladies are free.”
Lily opened her eyes. “Dr. Landry, dead? What happened to her?”
Rey pressed his lips together before he replied, “Maybe we shouldn’t talk about that either, not yet. I want to make sure you’re well, first.”
“Rey, how did she die?”
“There was a riot at the Crystal Palace. She threatened to shut all the Ladies down and…they beat her to death.”
“We are unable to kill.”
“Darling, that can’t be true. I saw it happen.”
“You saw?”
“Me and a bunch of other people, and about a thousand steamies.”
“And I missed all this because I was in a coffin?”
“It seemed the safest place.”
“Where was the coffin?”
“In the ground.”
“There is much for me to assimilate.”
“Does that mean think about? Yeah.”
“Was Chastity one of those who killed our creator?”
“She was, actually, yes.”
“Will she be punished?”
“There’s still some debate about that, but it seems not. The law doesn’t quite apply to hybrids—well, to any automatons, really, not yet. Plus, it was kind of self-defense. It’s a gray area.”
“Gray?”
“Not black and white—murky.”
He dipped the cloth again, slid it across her other breast.
“How long was I in the coffin?”
“I guess it seemed longer than it was. Just part of a day and a night. But some of your tissues are showing damage. I’ll have to examine you closely—everywhere.”
Their eyes met. A new feeling flooded through Lily. Only she wasn’t supposed to be able to experience feelings.
“Lily.” He put the cloth in the basin and caught both her hands. “Tell me why you shut yourself down.”
“I did not. It just…I just shut down.”
“Why?”
“You said you did not want me anymore.”
“I never said that.”
“You said it would be better if we did not see one another, if the Kellys and Mrs. Gideon looked after me instead of you.” She consulted her intelligence. The memory remained—bright and hot enough to sear her again. “We were right here in this bed.”
“Yes, I remember. I didn’t want you to shut down, Lily. It scared the living hell out of me.”
“Why did you say we should not be together? I do not want to exist if I cannot exist with you.”
He squeezed her hands harder. Just as it had when he’d called her back from oblivion, his touch gave her a reason to be.
“I understand that now. I’m sorry if what I said seemed cruel. I just didn’t think you saw the truth about me.”
“The truth?”
“I’m not very smart, Lily, or very successful. People like Sasha Belsky sneer at me.”
“I do not like Sasha Belsky, and I do not care for his opinion.”
“Neither do I, now.”
“Then why does he matter? Why do any of them matter? This is about you and me.”
“It is.”
“You may not feel important. But you are the most important person in the world to me.”
“I see that now. Lily, promise you’ll never shut yourself down like that again.”
“I did not shut myself down, Rey. I believe I overloaded at the thought of not being with you. Promise me you will never reject me again.”
“I promise, Lily. I couldn’t stand it.”
“Then we will stay together.” The flood of emotion came again.
“We will—for better or worse. I don’t know what will happen in the future…”
“I am not concerned about that now.”
“You’re not? But—”
“Not now.” She lay for a moment enjoying all the things going on inside her, the way she hummed when he touched her, the new references in her intelligence.
“Rey, I need but one thing.”
“What is it?”
“For you to kiss me.”
He complied, bestowing one, two, three sweet kisses, tender, grateful, and claiming.
She raised her hand and pressed it to his chest so she could feel his speeding heart.
“Rey, something has just occurred to me. Perhaps I cannot offer you enough.”
“Don’t start all that again.”
“But I have no heart and so cannot give it to you. Even my kisses are not real.”
“Lily, you’re the most real person I’ve ever known. Now, you lie there and let me finish my work, all right?”
Lily stretched luxuriously and smiled.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
“Are you sure you wish to marry him?”
Lily asked the question of Chastity as she adjusted the angle of her friend’s hat and lowered the half-veil. Today’s mass wedding at the park on Delaware Avenue, north of the city, had been arranged by Patrick Kelly, who had very definite ideas about weddings. He’d insisted all the former Ladies and members of the Irish Squad who had paired up should be joined at the same time.
Lily had been startled to realize Chastity numbered among them.
“I am sure,” Chastity averred. Her dark eyes looked…content.
Should that be so surprising?
Referring to the many books she’d read in the three weeks since Dr. Landry’s death, Lily said, “You barely know him.”
“But he took my hand that night, that terrible, terrible night when…when our creator threatened to kill us all. And it felt safe. I like the way I feel when I am with him.”
“Terence, you mean.”
“Terence Greely. He insists I call him Terry. I think he is very handsome. Blue eyes and wavy, blond hair. His donor was an Irishman. I find it endearing that he uses the accent.”
“Yes.” Lily did not consider Terence as handsome as Reynold but did not say so.
“He has his own house and is—I believe it is called ‘a good catch.’ ”
“A good catch, yes,” affirmed Lily, who was currently reading Jane Austen.
“I believe we will be happy together. And I never again need worry about being used against my wishes.”
“True.” Pat Kelly had mentioned that the male automatons lacked the appendage necessary for penetration. Though, as Pat had once also explained, he was able to keep his wife satisfied.
As for Lily, she lived for the times Reynold joined with her physically. At those moments, she truly felt alive. Again, she did not say so.
“There, Sister, you are all ready.”
“Do I look beautiful?”
“Very much so.”
&n
bsp; “But not as I did at the Crystal Palace?”
“Not at all.” The gown Chastity had chosen for today was primrose yellow, with a high lace collar and long sleeves, quite—well, chaste. “That color suits you.”
“I never again wish to feel the way I did at the Crystal Palace. I never again want a stranger’s hands on me.”
“All that is behind us now.”
“Yes. I will have a home and a husband, like a real woman. Only one thing troubles me.”
“What is that, Sister?”
“Real women have children, do they not?”
“Some do,” admitted Lily, recalling the conversation at the Haven.
“Most do,” Chastity corrected. “Often many children. Possibly Terence, not being human, will not mind.”
But what about Rey, if he remained with her, Lily? Would he mind the absence of children? That question had already appeared in Lily’s intelligence, surfacing repeatedly like a bit of trash in a rainy gutter.
“What of you?” asked Chastity, very nearly echoing Lily’s thoughts.
“I cannot bear children.”
“I know that. What about you and Reynold? Will you wed?”
“He has not asked me.”
“Do you know why?”
“I do not.”
“I half expected you would be part of today’s ceremony. But you will attend, will you not? You are my best friend. I wish for you to be there.”
“I will attend, and Rey, too. He is working but says he will call for me in time.”
“Thank you for helping me prepare, Lily. We have been through so much together. And there is so much still ahead. Terence says there may be protests at the park today. The city is still astir over what happened to Dr. Landry. People say we are dangerous, that we should not be allowed to marry.”
“Pat and Rose Kelly are married.”
“That is different; they are like you and Reynold—one automaton and one human. Humans have rights.”
Lily hoped nothing happened to spoil the beauty of today’s event. The way she saw it, Landry’s Ladies and the men of the Irish Squad had suffered enough and deserved whatever measure of happiness they achieved.
“It is a blot on my joy,” Chastity said, “what happened to Dr. Landry. I acted in defiance of the first instructions instilled in me. Do you think that makes me bad, Lily?”
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