CHAPTER TWELVE — THE LOWER CHAMBER
The entrance to the lower chamber was behind a stack of broken firebricks.
Hester led the group there because she remembered where her husband had helped build the first kiln.
Pike attempted to block her path.
Sutter told him to move.
Ambrose followed them with a face like a locked door.
Inside, the kiln smelled of dry clay and old smoke.
Sunlight came through the roof in narrow strips.
The firing floor had partly collapsed, leaving a dark opening beneath the far wall.
Gabriel knelt beside the opening.
“The lower chamber is still accessible.”
Odessa picked up a lantern and handed it to Elijah.
He looked at his injured leg and then at the ladder.
“I can get down.”
Hester shook her head.
“Asa is quicker.”
Elijah disliked how reasonable she sounded.
He gave the lantern to Asa, who climbed down with careful feet.
A moment later, Asa called up from below.
“There’s more than pottery here.”
A second worker lowered a rope.
Asa tied it around a crate and the men above hauled it into the light.
The crate’s side had split, revealing rows of yellow dishes packed in straw.
Odessa reached for one and turned it over.
“This is from the year the sickness began.”
“How can you be certain?” Sutter asked.
“The foot ring was made on the old wheel, before we replaced its axle.”
Gabriel examined it.
“The maker’s impression agrees with her description.”
Ambrose laughed sharply.
“Two laborers remember a wheel, and you expect a business contract to collapse?”
Dr. Ellis took the dish.
“I expect the sale to stop until the contents are examined.”
She pointed at the uneven glaze.
“These pieces were intended for food.”
Louisa held up the matching bowls from her hotel.
“And some of them have already been sold as food vessels.”
Asa called from below again.
He had found another set of crates, this time covered with canvas.
The men hauled up two more.
A label on one announced that the contents were ornamental basins.
Gabriel removed the lid and found breakfast bowls.
Sutter looked at Ambrose.
“Your manifests are false.”
Ambrose stepped toward the crate.
“Those labels came from Shaw.”
“Shaw says they came from you,” Louisa answered.
Pike began backing toward the door.
Elijah saw him move.
He also saw that the overseer carried a box of matches.
“Do not let him into the upper storehouse,” Elijah said.
Pike broke into a run.
The youngest worker, Asa, scrambled from the lower chamber just as the overseer reached a pile of dry packing straw.
Pike struck a match.
Elijah limped after him, knowing he could not close the distance.
Then Odessa threw a bucket of clay water across the straw.
The match hissed out as it touched the soaked surface.
Pike cursed and lunged toward her.
Thomas seized the overseer’s arm while Gabriel pulled the matches from his hand.
Pike struggled, but three men held him against the kiln wall.
Dr. Ellis backed away, watching for another flame.
Ambrose stood still beside the crates.
He had not expected the people he dismissed to act together so quickly.
Elijah walked to the soaked straw and looked at the charred match.
“Now everyone knows why you wanted the goods out of sight,” he said.
Pike’s face reddened.
“You cannot prove what I meant to do.”
Louisa looked at the wet straw.
“We can describe exactly what you did.”
Sutter turned toward Ambrose.
“I will not advance another dollar against this stock.”
Ambrose stared at him.
“There are other assets.”
Elijah heard those words clearly.
Other assets meant the families waiting at the packing house.
The dangerous bowls had finally been brought into daylight.
But the people who made them were still in danger of being sold to pay for their own suffering.
