Across the wide flat stone slabs of the cellar, Bram Ash moved along the eastern wall with a battered tin oil can in his left hand and a greasy tow-rag tucked under his arm.
He didn’t walk with the arrogant, heavy-heeled swagger of a court guard making a check. He walked with the slow, stooped, careful patience of an aging boilermaker who had been handed a shift on the midnight upkeep gang. He dragged a heavy wooden bench to the wall, climbed onto the pine seat with a soft groan from his stiff knee joints. Then he reached up to the iron swivel-bracket of the overhead copper lamp.
His thick thumb depressed the spring-loaded plunger of the oiler.
Click-shuck. Click-shuck.
Two drops of amber whale grease bubbled out of the narrow brass spout, sinking into the rusted joint of the hinge. Bram worked the iron arm back and forth with his scarred fingers until the dry, complaining squeak died away, replaced by the soft, oily whisper of lubricated metal. He wiped the excess grease with the tow-rag, climbed down from the bench. Then he moved four paces to the next bracket.
Len Vey watched him from the map table, his uninjured right hand resting on the smooth ash shaft of his sounding pole.
