The sound of hammer blows in a confined granite hall carries a physical violence that strikes the ears like flat slaps.
Vane swung a four-pound machinist’s hammer in short, heavy arcs. He drove the first narrowed iron spike through the upright guide channel of the drop-gate. The spike was five inches of forged tool steel, square in section, notched along its lower edge to catch the teeth of the runner track. With each bone-shaking stroke, flakes of orange rust and powdered mortar drifted down like soot. It settled over the shoulders of the second guard, who knelt in the sludge with a second spike braced between his leather mittens.
They weren’t taking chances with clockwork tolerances. A drop-gate held only by its balance weight and a shear-pawl could be lifted if three men took a timber pry-bar to the bottom rail. A drop-gate pinned by two through-spikes driven through its tracks was part of the mountain’s bedrock until someone brought an oxy-acetylene torch to cut the rails.
“Drive it flush,” Vane muttered between blows. His breath smelled of stale tobacco and salt pork. “Don’t leave a shoulder for a lever to bite.”
The second spike seated into the guide rail with a sharp, ringing report that signaled the iron had bottomed out against the granite backing.
