Sen put two crews on the jacks.
Breda’s at jacks three and four, the soft pair. Hollis’s at jacks one and six, opposite. They kept off the rail; Sen had them kneel at the jacks’ shoes, one person at each jack, each with a hand flat on the jack’s body above the base, feeling it rather than holding it. If a jack began to go, the hand on it would feel the steel move before the gauge did, and the crew would call it.
Then she went to the counterweight.
“Doss,” she said. “The nearest release. Jack four’s.”
The counterweight’s arm had six cables to the six jacks’ release collars, and a lever for each at the arm’s pivot. Sen put her hand on jack four’s lever and then took it away, and stepped back.
“Yours,” she said.
Doss put his hand on it.
“Hold it,” he said. To no one. To the lever.
