Daniel looked toward the unlit windows.
“Then ask now.”
Avery promised to carry the letter to a trusted contact the next day.
As Daniel prepared to leave, the minister asked whether he was alone in the effort.
“No.”
“Does anyone else know what you know?”
“Enough people to be in danger.”
Avery stood.
“Then we’ll keep their names off this page.”
Daniel left the meetinghouse with no guarantee of help.
Still, something had changed.
The secret was no longer contained within Blackwood House.
A single folded letter was traveling toward a place Richard did not entirely control.
Chapter 14: The Narrow Road to Bell Crossing
The following week Richard announced a visit to Bell Crossing to inspect a shipment of timber.
He ordered Daniel to accompany the carriage with a tool chest.
Daniel had not expected to be invited so close to the hidden operation.
He accepted without visible hesitation.
Isaiah watched him pack the tools and pressed a small piece of iron into his palm.
It was a wedge no larger than a thumb.
“If a door sticks, this might help,” Isaiah said.
Daniel understood that the wedge could open a warped latch or hold one shut.
He tucked it beneath the leather lining of his box.
The carriage traveled through wooded hills where farms stood far apart.
Richard read papers without speaking.
Silas rode behind them.
At noon they stopped beside a stone bridge.
Daniel saw a sign pointing toward the old Bell Crossing warehouse.
Its painted letters had nearly disappeared beneath moss.
A river carried dark water past the foundation of an abandoned tollhouse.
The warehouse itself stood beyond a grove of poplars.
Its windows were boarded, but wagon tracks crossed the yard.
Richard instructed Daniel to repair a broken interior door while he met a business partner.
The partner arrived in a gray coat and called himself Mr.
Fenwick.
Daniel recognized him as the man who had once evaluated Ruth’s sewing machine before her supposed sale.
Fenwick entered the office carrying an account book wrapped in brown cloth.
Richard followed him.
Daniel worked on the door with his back to the office.
Through the thin partition he heard fragments of their conversation.
A woman had refused another payment.
A boy had begun asking questions.
Whitcomb believed the woman could be persuaded by confinement, but Fenwick preferred a distant transfer.
Richard said the papers had to be settled before summer.
Daniel heard Margaret’s name.
