Ben Dover's Arc

Chapter 38 of 150

They moved west through thinning pines. Ben carried the older chest against his ribs. Amanda's find. The wood was warm from his body and it hummed through the seams. Not loud. A thread of sound at the edge of hearing, steady as a wasp inside a wall. Any pursuer close enough would hear it and walk straight to them. Joe stopped first. He pressed his palm to the lid and pulled back. "It leaks." "I know," Ben said. "The felt's gone," Anita said. "We used the last strip on the tree relic." Amanda watched the trees. The striped animal was still there, two ridges back, keeping pace. She said nothing. Ben set the chest down and knelt. The carving on the lid was deep but the seams were old. Wood had shrunk. He ran a thumb along the join and felt air move against his skin. That was the hum's road out. "We need to close the seams," Ben said. "Not the wood. The gaps." They had no wax. No pitch. No felt. A branch cracked west of them. Ben froze. A man stepped out from behind a leaning pine with his hands open. Gray beard, stained jacket, tired eyes. Al Beback. He carried a small tin box under one arm and a coil of copper wire in his other hand. "Heard it from the creek," Al said. "Thought it was a hive." Ben stood. Al had guided them to the landslide. Al fixed broken things. Ben had not expected to see him again. "It's a chest," Ben said. "Seams are shot." Al knelt beside it without asking. He put his ear to the lid, then his palm. He opened his tin. Inside: wax cakes, a folded cloth, a short knife, a spool of waxed thread. "Old joinery," he said. "Shrunk. Not split." He looked up. "I can seat it." "How long." "Twenty minutes. Don't move it." Ben nodded. Al softened a wax cake in his hands and pressed it into the seam with the flat of the knife. He worked slow. He did not speak. When one seam was full he wiped the blade on the cloth and started the next. Justin stood watch north. Anita watched south. Amanda watched the striped animal. The animal sat down on its haunches and waited. Halfway through, Al stopped and tilted his head. "Hum's dropping." Ben listened. The wasp thread had gone thin. By the last seam it was gone. Al pressed the lid with both hands and held it there for a count of ten. He lifted his palms. Silence. "Done," Al said. He closed his tin. "Won't last forever. It'll want felt in a week." "A week is enough," Ben said. He lifted the chest. No thread of sound. No trail for a listening pursuer to walk. He looked at the striped animal between the trunks. It stood, turned, and went back the way it came. "West," Ben said. "Now."