He shouted a brief, but impatient, “What?!” The sergeant gruffly bellowed back, “Firewood here. How much?” The cook’s expression went from impatience to incredulity, “You called me out here for that?!” He looked at the wagon then back to the sergeant, “All of it, of course!” He turned to enter the building. Another shout from the sergeant stopped him, “How much’ll you pay for it?” The cook turned back to face him, “Pay?!? Since when do we pay for firewood?” The sergeant sounded like he was rapidly losing his patience. Cooper was still smirking. He would’ve enjoyed just sitting and watching all this play out, if he weren’t getting wetter by the second. Birt was doing a good job of staying in character as the sergeant shouted back to the cook, “You said the last load of firewood we got was rubbish. You even tried blaming the poor quality of your cooking on the firewood. This here looks pretty good.” The cook walked over to the wagon, grumbling louder with every step. He peered over the side of the wagon and then at Birt, “The wood’s all wet now…how much?” Birt retorted, “There’s not a green stick in the bunch. I’ll take a crown.” The cook laughed, “You’ll take a gold crown?! I’ll just bet you would! It’ll take me a day just to dry it out. I’ll give you two silver for all of it.” It was Birt’s turn to laugh, “I’d sooner eat it than sell it fer two silvers! I’d not be let back inta my da’s house for less’n eight!” The cook leaned over the edge of the wagon again, “I see a few sticks of cherry and apple wood in there. I’ll give you five.” Birt hopped down from the wagon. His landing spattered several drops of newly formed mud onto the cook’s pant legs. The cook looked less than pleased, but Birt pointedly ignored it as he quickly stepped to the rear of the wagon and placed his hand on a large, wrapped bundle, “This here’s split wood and kindlin’. It’s mostly hickory, but some oak. It’ll git yer fire hot quicker, an’ it’s still dry. That’s partly why I’m holdin’ at eight.” The cook stepped carefully to avoid slipping. It appeared he had become resigned to getting wet and muddy. He opened the flap on the bundle to look, then addressed Birt, “We don’t normally buy firewood. You might just have ta haul all this home if you don’t sell it now, right? Six.” The cook crossed his arms over his chest, the cloak in his hands nearly dangling into the mud forming at his feet. Birt considered it, then gave the cook a grudging look, “Six.” He held out his hand. The cook shook his head, “I didn’t come outside thinkin’ that I was buyin’ anythin’. Start unloadin’ over there.” He pointed to a spot near the stable where some wood was already stacked neatly as he continued speaking, “I’ll go in an’ get yer coin.” Now it was Birt’s turn to cross his arms over his chest, “Not a twig comes off this wagon ‘til it’s paid for.” The cook threw his hands skyward, nearly losing his cloak in the motion, and turned back to the guard house. The sergeant was smiling wide, revealing that he was missing more than one tooth, “Watchin’ that just made my day – Rain an’ all.”
They led the horses and wagon over to the stable. Cooper wasn’t the only one inspecting the grounds without seeming to. Less than a minute later the cook emerged, trudged over and thrust the six coins into Birt’s outstretched hand. Birt made a show of inspecting each coin. Once he was satisfied he made a sweeping motion as if to push the firewood off the wagon; Balat, Spen and Cooper unloaded the wrapped bundle and began pulling the wood off the end of the wagon, letting it fall onto the ground. The cook turned to observe before he walked back into the guardhouse, “Wait! You’ve got to stack it! In a pile like that it’ll all get muddy!” Birt smiled, “You paid for firewood. Stackin’ it’s yer problem… but we’ll do it for another silver.” The sergeant fairly roared with laughter, “That’s funny! I’ll pay ye a silver meself to stack it. I’ll smile ever’ time I think o’ this from now on!” Cooper had been thinking that Birt had been dragging all this out unnecessarily but once the guard placed a silver in Birt’s hand, he and the rest of the guards turned and walked away without giving them another glance. They only seemed to be interested in staying out of the rain as much as possible. Cooper and Birt managed a brief conversation while stacking. Cooper joked, “If only they’d paid you for what you were really selling. You almost convinced me!” Birt chuckled, “At least we made most of our money back on the firewood. The coin spent on the blankets will be a total loss.” Cooper gave him a wink, “Well, not a total loss. We’re not done yet, but we surely aren’t going to get Loryn into the stockade.” He paused and straightened his back, “I’ll start the ‘human shell game’. Spen or Balat still needs to hide without getting noticed.” Cooper walked to the guard house to help finish with the blankets. Rukle or Naro would be coming to help with firewood. Birt knew better than to ask further questions. The plan was still going forward.
As circumstances would have it, both Loryn and Naro replaced Cooper. A few minutes later, Balat had dropped out of sight and Spen walked to the guard house to be replaced by Rukle. Once the blankets had been deposited inside, everyone returned to help with the wood while Dailen brought the emptied wagon around. Spen, Loryn and Rukle hopped on Dailen’s wagon and he drove it out of the quarry, leaving Cooper, Gaff and Birt to finish
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