Ben Dover's Arc

Chapter 127 of 150

Ben sat on Al's bench and worked the list in his head. He had the eleventh piece under the floor with the fox curled on top of it. He had coin sewn into three coats out in the yard. What he did not have was a name to sell to. Anita's runner would come tomorrow or the day after. She would want a name from him before she brought anyone at all. He wrote four names on the back of a feed slip. He crossed out three before Al brought the tea. "Payne's out," Ben said. "He already took the ten. He knows the eleventh is loose. If I sell to him now he'll pay half of half." "Cage's out," Al said. "Her men are still walking every road east." "That leaves two I've never met and one I'm afraid of." The door rattled. Al put his hand on the wedge. Ima Hogg stepped in with Ella Vator behind her and a small figure in a suit behind Ella. Ben had last seen Ima setting her own house on fire to buy him a morning. He stood up. "You said send word if I heard names," Ima said. "I heard three." She put a folded paper on the bench. Ella stayed by the door with her hands open at her sides, counting under her breath. The man in the suit stepped forward and set a shed antler on the bench next to the paper. It had a small notch scratched under the base. "That's mine," Tim Burr said. "Found it two roads over. Set down wrong. Someone's been walking your buyer list before you." Ben unfolded the paper. Three names. Two he did not know. The third he knew. It was his sister's name. "Eileen's buying?" he said. "Eileen's asking," Ima said. "Quiet. Through a broker. She has coin from the last job and she has a hall with stone walls." Ben sat back down. He thought about the fox pressed to the axle piece under the floor. He thought about Payne's carts passing at dark. He thought about the two strangers on the list and how one wrong pick would put men in this shed by morning. "Write Anita," he said to Al. "Tell her the buyer is Eileen. Tell her to bring Eileen here, alone, in three days. No broker. No runner. Her." Al took the pen. "Burn the other two names," Ben said. Ella stepped to the bench. She held her palm over the paper. The corner caught. She let it go to ash on the tin and did not touch anything else. She counted to four and closed her hand. "That's the pick made," Ima said. Ben looked at the floorboard. The hum had not started again. The fox was still asleep on the piece. He had a buyer now, and he had three days before she walked through the door.