Ben Dover's Arc

Chapter 149 of 150

The cart rolled on toward the coast. The rider was gone. Ben should have felt safe. He did not. Three chests sat under the tarp. He no longer knew which held the twelve pieces. The driver knew that too. Ben watched the man's hands on the reins and saw the greed had not died. It had only changed shape. A driver who could not name the right chest could still name the road. At dusk the cart stopped at a shed near the water. The driver climbed down. "We rest the animals," he said. But he walked to the shed door and looked back twice. Ben followed. Inside sat old cargo, forgotten and stacked. A battered chest of warped planks leaned in the corner. A charred bucket. A worn crate with a slumped, tired look. And one chest with eyes painted on its front, purple and wide, staring out from a green scowl. "You mean to open my three chests," Ben said. "Find the real one. Sell that word ahead." The driver did not deny it. "A man protects himself." Ben looked at the shed's junk. He had one move left. If the driver could not tell the real chest from a shed full of chests, his knowledge died for good. Ben pulled the three chests from the cart. He set them among the old ones. The sunken chest. The tired crate. The eyed chest with its awful stare. Six containers now, then seven, then eight. All roughly the same size. All battered. "Help me load," Ben said. "All of them. Onto the boat." The driver stared. "All of these? That's twice the weight." "You want more coin. I'll pay for the extra hauling." Ben lifted the tired crate first. "Eight chests reach the coast. One holds the set. You'll never know which. Neither will any man you tell." The greed drained from the driver's face for the last time. He saw it plain. He could sell nothing now. A buyer paid for a name, and Ben had erased the name inside a pile of junk. The driver grabbed the eyed chest and swung it onto the cart without a word. They loaded all eight. Ben lost the real crate again on purpose, deep in the stack. At the water a low boat waited. The driver passed the chests down one by one to a boatman. Salt, rags, and stone all sounded the same. The driver took his coin. He did not ask about the crate. He could not. "Coast by dawn," he said, and this time the words held nothing behind them. Ben stepped onto the boat. The driver's threat was dead. But eight chests now sailed toward the coast, and only one carried his twelve pieces. Before he could sell the set, he would have to open every chest and find it again.