10
Bella the Goldsmith put down her eyeglass slowly, so as not to disturb the girl. Emily was in a kind of trance. Yet her hands were moving in a skilful way that Bella envied. She had not seen the like of this since she was a girl. Vague memories of her great-grandfather returned to her. What a goldsmith he was! And even he had admitted to being only a poor copy of his great forefathers. He had remembered some of the old skills. True enough, much of the knowledge was in the Book of Jewellification; that volume took years to read, and, of course, reading was not the same thing as actually doing. But this girl, this outsider, had read the Book in a short time—in no time, you might say. Now, what was emerging under her hands?
Ever since coming to the workshop, Emily had wanted to make a br
