e crucible with long tongs. He lowered the crucible to the
bottom of the furnace. "Put the top on," he said. Oliver lifted and
pushed the top over the furnace. The roaring became muffled, contained.
It felt safer. "Nice going, about the air," George said. "I thought we
were going to burn the place down."

"Physics," Oliver said. George looked down through the hole in the top.

"Nothing yet." He stood back. A few minutes later the ingot began to
slide toward the bottom of the crucible. "There she goes," George said.
"It's working." He opened the door of the kiln, and, using a different
set of tongs, extracted the flask. He set the flask, glowing cherry
red, upside down in a flat pan of sand. He shut off the gas and
unplugged the blower. "The top," he said, handing Oliver a pair of
heavy gloves and pointing. Oliver worked the top over one edge of the
drum, tipped it down, and rolled it onto three bricks.

George reached into the furnace with the long tongs. He lifted the
crucible from the furnace and walked with careful steps to the flask.
Holding the lip of the crucible over the flask, he tipped his body to
one side. The bronze poured like golden syrup into the hole where the
wax had been, quickly filling the mold.

George lowered the crucible back into the furnace. After the roaring,
it seemed unusually silent. "Intense," Oliver said. "Now what?" George
picked up the hot flask with the second pair of tongs and dropped it
into a bucket of water. There was a burst of sizzling and bubbling, and
it was quiet again.

"The temperature shock weirds out the investment. It changes state--to
a softer stuff that we can get off the bronze." George poured the water
into his bathtub and refilled the bucket with cold water. "Still hot,"
he said.

They drank wine while the flask cooled. When George could hold the
flask, he pushed the investment out of the cylinder and chipped at it
with a screwdriver. A hip appeared. "The Flying Lady," Oliver said.

"Damn!" George said, chipping and prying. Gobs of oatmeal colored
investment fell away. "Not bad!" George held up the Lady and the heart
on their bronze tree. "We cut them off and

polish. . ."

An hour later, filled with wine and a sense of accomplishment, Oliver
walked up Danforth Street. The bronze heart was solid and heavy in his
pocket. He warmed it in his hand, feeling the O, the plus sign, and the
F over and over again, a mantra said with the ball of his thumb. When
he got