Silas unlocked an iron hatch behind the grain bins.
The stairwell beneath it was narrower than Daniel expected.
Wet stone walls enclosed a cellar lit by a single lamp.
Three people sat against the far wall.
A teenage boy held one hand over his mouth.
An older woman stared at the floor.
Beside them sat a man whose arm had been bound in a sling.
All three looked exhausted.
Daniel’s eyes searched their faces before he could stop himself.
His mother was not among them.
Silas watched him.
“Expecting someone?”
“No, sir.”
“Then mind your work.”
The crates were lowered into the cellar.
The old woman looked up and whispered a name.
“Ruth?”
Daniel almost dropped the lid.
Silas turned toward her.
“Quiet.”
The woman lowered her face.
Daniel saw a folded scrap of cloth in her hand.
He deliberately let one hinge fall from his pocket.
It struck the floor and skidded beneath the bench.
Silas cursed and ordered him to retrieve it.
When Daniel knelt, the old woman’s fingers brushed his wrist.
She pressed the cloth into his palm.
He closed his hand without looking.
Silas shouted for him to hurry.
Daniel fitted the hinge and climbed the stairs.
At the top he glanced through a crack beneath the wall.
A second passage ran behind the cellar, leading beneath the old waterwheel.
The building had more than one exit.
His father’s drawing had been correct.
The floor was not the bottom.
On the return journey Silas seemed almost cheerful.
“We’ll send them out after the rain,” he said.
Daniel asked whether the doctor would examine them first.
“Why would he?”
“They look ill.”
“Not your concern.”
The answer confirmed that the doctor served the operation only when useful to Richard.
Back at the shed, Daniel opened the cloth beneath his coat.
Inside was a small button carved from pale bone.
His mother had sewn such buttons on his childhood shirts.
He recognized a tiny star cut into the center.
The old woman had given him a message without a word.
He waited until midnight before showing Isaiah.
Isaiah touched the button and looked toward the dark yard.
“She’s alive somewhere.”
Daniel wanted to believe it.
The object was real, but its meaning remained uncertain.
His mother might have made the button years earlier.
Another person could have kept it as a memory.
Daniel forced himself to ask what the evidence truly showed.
The old woman knew Ruth’s name and carried a button associated with her.
