Despite his annoyance, Ulmann let her calm him down, soothe his ego yet again, and nurture his soul with her murmurs and touches. An hour later, acting as though their conversation hadn’t taken a turn, he showed her new drawings of jewelry and asked her opinion. When he left, he didn’t ask for his key back.

In the morning, when she was spreading bread crumbs for the pigeons, Batya imagined herself doing so in the Barrio Norte apartment. She would fill the veranda with planters and grow flowers, herbs, and even a few tomato plants. Every day she would dust the furniture, scrub the toilet, and wash the tile floors; she would never assign the tasks to a maid. Everything in that small apartment—she now knew that it had only one bedroom and a separate sitting room—would be hers to take care of alone, symbols of her freedom. In her own kitchen, she would learn to cook for Ulmann, so when he arrived at night after tucking his boys into bed, she would show him her gratitude.

The dream was hers to pluck like a ripe fruit from a tree. It was so close she could taste it.

Her time for making a decision was running out.

Approaching the venue for her first competition, Batya treaded with caution on the unfinished sidewalk, trepidation and excitement fighting inside her. She hadn’t expected to still be in Buenos Aires when spring was pushing winter away, and if she and Sergio won tonight, there would be a second round of competition, then another. When and how was he planning to hide her if he was making her famous?

From nearby came melodious waltz music, and she hurried toward the ice-skating rink that had opened recently to serve the city’s insatiable hunger for amusement. Glikel, who had been invited to a private party of city officials, had reported about this miraculous arena. The officials had closed the venue one afternoon for their exclusive use and requested that Moskowitz send them polacas. Having no experience with ice, the men assumed that these prostitutes who came from snowy countries would know how to glide on it. Glikel told the sisters later that someone had attached blades to her shoes and pushed her onto the ice, where she kept sliding and falling. She showed the sisters the blue and purple bruises on her ample hips and thighs, which had cushioned her bones and protected them from cracking. Unfortunately, they hadn’t protected her from the disappointment of the clients, who sneered at her failure and sent her back without the gift of cash she had expected.