“Hold my hand,” he said. She considered the hand but did not. He moved his head toward her. The flesh slid on the jaw.

She waited. She smiled at him. Buildings were sun-shocked in the corners of her eyes.

“Ah,” he said. A warmth moved into his face. The almost joke in it had returned. “She won’t be forced.”

“Correct,” she said. But she thought, Oh, you murderous girl, hello. I haven’t seen you for so long.

“Please,” he said. “Mathilde. Take the cold hand of a dying man.”

And then she took his hand and pressed it to her chest with both of hers and held it there. What didn’t need to be said stayed unspoken. He fell asleep and the nurse came out on angry tiptoes. Mathilde went into the apartment, sterile and tasteful, and didn’t linger at the pictures she once knew too well for the ferocity with which she stared at them, counting the minutes until she could leave. Later, she walked through the cold shadows and blaze of concentrated afternoon light that poured between the buildings, and she couldn’t stop; she could barely breathe; it felt too good to be on those coltish terrified legs once more, not to know, once more, where she was going.