Ines was washing black grease out of her cuffs when Mara brought news of the inspection. The workshop basin had a crack repaired with something meant for engines. Water escaped through it in slow, fat drops onto an overdue account.
“Manual gate,” Ines said. “Below the ferry approach?”
“The assessment wouldn’t commit itself to saying it worked.”
“That assessment and I have a professional difference.” She rescued the account and hung it over a pipe. “I’ve been freeing the accessible gear on my way back from jobs. Six evenings. No permit.”
Mara looked at the basin, then at her.
“It drains into the right bucket eventually,” Ines said. “The gate needs more supervision.”
“How much have you repaired?”
“Enough to know it isn’t scrap. Not enough to put water against it. I asked stores for its maintenance history. They sent me a disposal form.”
Mara described the shaded strip on Vesper’s assessment and the height corrected in brown ink.
“Bring your corridor measurements,” she added.
“Those establish access. They don’t tell us where water goes.”
“They establish that a plan can leave something out.”
Ines dried her hands. “That I can bring.”
The inspection notice arrived before the workshop shut. At eight the following morning, Mara and Ines met harbor overseer Dain beneath the ferry approach. He had the assessment in a wooden case and a mug whose handle had been replaced with wire.
“Forty minutes in the dry gallery,” he said. “No loaded trial. Nobody touches the operating wheel.”
“I want the inspection covers opened,” Ines said.
“Two. The third needs a crew.”
“Then write that we haven’t seen behind the third.”
He wrote it on his attendance sheet, resting the paper against his mug.
The gallery smelled of wet stone and old rope. Mara kept her satchel under her coat; both receipt pieces remained in their buttoned compartment, and the route book lay beside them. Above her, a cart passed over the approach with a loose board knocking against its bed.
Dain’s attendant opened the permitted covers. Ines crouched beside the first, holding her lamp clear while the attendant checked that the assembly was secured. She asked for an inspection mirror. Dain produced one wrapped in a sock.
Mara held the lamp when Ines needed both hands to sketch. The work involved long periods of looking, broken by requests for half an inch more light. Once Ines stopped to rub her wrist. No part of the gate moved.
At the second opening she pointed out a split in a bearing housing. Dain bent to look, then checked the old service drawing.
“That was reported as surface corrosion.”
They argued over what could be established without opening the third cover. Ines crossed out a sentence in her notes and wrote a narrower one.
By the time they emerged, Mara’s borrowed lamp had left a warm red patch on her palm.
Ines read her list aloud. “One replacement bearing housing, two seals, and the damaged stop assembly. A lifting crew for a shift. Then an unloaded test and a separate supervised water trial. That’s the repair requirement we can identify today.”
“Subject to the covered section,” Dain said.
“I’ve written it twice. Would you like a decorative border?”
He read her page and signed beneath the qualification.
They spread the assessment on the lid of Dain’s case. The current calculation treated the manual gate as unavailable. He laid a transparent service overlay across it and held the corners with his mug and two stones.
With the gate usable, he explained, part of the incoming water could be kept from the ferry approach within a limited range. Beyond that range, the benefit diminished. The outer yards would still take water. The inspection supplied no certified figure for how much protection could be gained.
“Could it reduce what the exchange has to cover?” Mara asked.
“It could justify calculating a smaller incursion. After a successful trial.”
Ines followed the overlay with her pencil. “And this route?”
“Closed during operation.”
“That’s the lower cart access to Bell Foundry.”
“For as long as the gate is in use.”
Mara pictured deliveries stacked at the top of the slope and men charging to carry each one down.
“My aunt’s stock comes that way,” Ines said. “So does half the heavy work I take.”
Dain turned his mug so the wire handle faced away. “There’s also the crew, fabrication, inspection fees. Stores won’t supply a casting against enthusiasm.”
Ines put her pencil behind her ear. “They’ve tried paying me with it.”
She asked him to enter the repair list for a formal estimate and a trial slot. He told her the assessment offer covered today’s inspection only; commissioned preparation would need a named payer.
“Put me down for the estimate fee,” she said. “Nothing fabricated without my written order.”
Mara waited until Dain went to fetch the form.
“Can you afford that?”
“I can afford to find out once. I can’t afford another circular.”
Dain permitted Mara to copy the relevant survey detail onto ordinary paper. She marked it COPY in large letters. Near fourteen Wren Passage, the plan ended the occupied property at the front lodging. A narrow line behind it carried the label DISUSED SERVICE STAIR.
She remembered the extra four feet Ines had measured when the old carbon made the entrance accessible.
“Is this length checked?”
Dain consulted the dates. “Carried forward from the earlier survey. The visit return says the rear was inaccessible.”
“Then that goes on the questions,” Ines said.
Dain added it. He took his assessment away; Ines kept the signed inspection notes and left for her workshop.
Mara reached fourteen before noon and opened her route book at the old address. Upstairs, Tomas had his sore knee on a second chair. He moved it when she came in, then swore quietly and put it back.
“Leave it,” she said. “I’m delivering a map. It can stand.”
She kept the book beside her and spread the ordinary copy on his table. First she told him what the inspection had found, including the covered section, the possible reduction and the cart access they would lose.
“So somebody has offered you a bill,” he said.
“Ines found it herself. She’s thorough.”
He smiled, then drew the copy closer.
Mara was taking the stopper from his water jug when he put his finger on the stair label.
“That’s wrong.”
“The length?”
“The use. There was a room above the rear landing. Its way out joined this passage.”
She set the jug down. “Did you measure it?”
“I was sent to check the front dimensions. I saw the stair in use.”
“Before the exchange?”
He nodded.
Mara pulled out the remaining chair. There was a folded shirt on it; she put that on her lap.
“Dain says they carried the survey forward.”
“They did.”
“You knew the label was wrong.”
“Yes.” He flattened a curl in the paper with his thumb. “I could have put it on the return. I left it alone.”
“Why?”
“I wanted them to accept my lodging.”
From downstairs came the scrape of something being dragged along the common wall. Tomas waited for it to stop. Mara kept the shirt on her lap.
“What did you think would happen to whoever used that stair?” she asked.
“I knew someone was using the room,” Tomas said. “I’d seen her carrying a basket up. If they took the passage out of the register, her way out went with mine. I could see that before I signed.” He lifted his thumb from the map. “I signed anyway.”