Rick laughed louder.
“Put that junk down, kid.”
Silas looked up.
Rick pointed toward the pile.
“Men twice your age already know those are dead.”
Silas turned the steel once more.
“Dead steel cracks.”
The farmers behind Rick chuckled.
“This one bent.”
Rick smiled.
“You’re sixteen years old.”
Silas said nothing.
Rick continued.
“If somebody could save fourteen of these, every farmer in Iowa would know his name.”
Silas reached into his jacket pocket.
Removed his notebook.
Emmett watched.
The boy wrote three names.
Three telephone numbers.
Three towns.
Then tore out the page.
He held it toward Emmett.
“Then maybe you’ve been asking the wrong farmers.”
The laughter around the truck stopped for perhaps two seconds.
Then returned.
Rick looked over Silas’s shoulder.
“Who are these?”
“Blacksmiths.”
Rick stared.
“Blacksmiths.”
“Yes.”
“You mean farriers?”
“No.”
“Actual implement work?”
“Yes.”
Rick smiled again.
“There’s nobody doing that kind of work anymore.”
Silas put the notebook back into his pocket.
“There are.”
“How do you know?”
“I went there.”
Rick shook his head.
Emmett looked at the names.
Virgil Ostrander — Iowa Falls.
Clement Tesdahl — Grundy Center.
Edith Borgmann — Hampton.
Below them Silas had written:
Tell them Silas Novak sent you.
Emmett looked toward the boy.
“They know you?”
“Yes.”
Rick laughed.
Silas did not.
He simply picked up another shank and examined the bend.
That difference stayed with Emmett.
On Monday morning, Emmett called Virgil Ostrander.
An older man answered.
“Hello.”
“My name’s Emmett Hassell.”
“All right.”
“I’ve got fourteen bent International cultivator shanks.”
Silence.
“Who gave you this number?”
“A kid named Silas Novak.”
Another silence.
Different this time.
Virgil said:
“Bring them over.”
The same thing happened when Emmett called Clement Tesdahl.
Then Edith Borgmann.
Each conversation changed immediately when Silas’s name was mentioned.
Emmett drove to Hampton first.
Edith’s shop sat behind a modest house near the edge of town. The building was old but organized with a discipline Emmett respected instantly.
Tongs hung by size.
Hammers by type.
Stock steel stacked neatly.
Coal bins covered.
Measuring tools clean.
Nothing decorative.
Everything useful.
Edith Borgmann was sixty-one years old, short, compact, and carried more strength in her forearms than her size suggested. She had inherited the shop after her husband died in 1979 and continued working when everyone assumed she would close.
She looked at Emmett.
“Silas sent you.”
“He did.”
“Where’d you meet him?”
“Swap meet.”
Edith nodded.
“He’s been coming here two years.”
“He says you can fix these.”
“I haven’t said that yet.”
Emmett almost smiled.
That was the answer he wanted.
Edith examined all fourteen shanks.
Slowly.
She separated two.
“Those worry me.”
“Why?”
“Stress fractures.”
“I don’t see them.”
“You’re not supposed to.”
She showed him faint surface changes near the bend.
“These straighten, fracture opens.”
“Can you save them?”
“I can make them straight.”
“That isn’t the same thing.”
Emmett nodded.
Edith looked at him approvingly.
“No.”
“It isn’t.”
She could repair twelve safely.
She refused to touch the other two.
“My name goes on my work.”
Emmett asked about replacement.
“Call Clement.”
“If he agrees they’re bad, I know a fabricator in Waterloo who can make two from pattern.”
“How long for the twelve?”
“Three weeks.”
“Cost?”
She told him.
Far less than buying another cultivator.
Emmett agreed immediately.
Before leaving, he asked:
“You really know that boy?”
Edith smiled slightly.
“Silas?”
“Yes.”
“He watches.”
“Most boys his age talk.”
“He watches.”
She turned toward the forge.
“One day he’s going to be better than the rest of us.”
“Does he know that?”
“No.”
“Good.”
Clement Tesdahl confirmed the two questionable shanks were unsafe.
He knew the Waterloo fabricator.
Silas located an original 1958 International Harvester parts manual at an estate sale and found the exact shank dimensions. He took the manual to the Eldora library and faxed the drawings to Waterloo.
The fax cost $1.25.
Silas paid from his own pocket.
He never told Emmett.
Two weeks later, he called the farm.
“How’s it going?”
Emmett recognized the voice.
“Waiting.”
“Edith?”
“Doing twelve.”
“And the other two?”
“Clement agreed with her.”
Silas was quiet.
“I thought one might have a fracture.”
“You saw that at the swap?”
“Maybe.”
“How?”
Silas explained oxidation patterns.
Emmett listened.
Then asked:
“You want to see the cultivator when they’re back?”
Silas answered immediately.
“Yes.”
“Saturday after they arrive.”
“I’ll be there.”
The crate arrived in mid-May.
Each repaired shank was wrapped in burlap and labeled.
Emmett unwrapped the first.