A small rattle from Walter Reese’s truck interrupted his question about how long I meant to wait. The salvage dealer was still in the chair beside Charlie’s entrance, resting his bad wrist against his stomach. A bus had passed close enough to stir the delivery notice in the window. After its engine faded, the glass rattled again.

I opened the truck’s rear door and folded back the blanket. On the side nearest the pavement, a narrow wooden strip had lifted away from the upper corner of the glass. The screw was still there. It just wasn’t holding much.

“Broken?” Walter asked from his chair.

“No. Come and look.” I held the strip against the frame with my thumb. The tapping stopped. “This needs securing before anybody carries it.”

Walter got up and stood beside me, his injured hand tucked against his coat. He looked where I was pointing, then at the rest of the cabinet. “You went over this already.”

“I checked underneath for somewhere to grip. Missed this bit.” I’d been ready to tell him the blanket had covered it, which was true enough. I’d also been the one looking beneath the blanket. “Got a screwdriver?”

He found one in the cab, behind the two wooden shelves we’d put there earlier. I tried the screw gently. It turned without drawing the strip back against the frame. A little brown dust fell onto my sleeve, and I stopped.

Walter watched me wipe it away. “Mrs. Mercer’s waiting at the lunchroom until nine. I told her tonight. She’s got enough to do without sitting there waiting for furniture.”

“I understand.” I laid the screwdriver on the truck bed. “I can pack around it, but I don’t know that packing alone will keep that corner in. We tip it coming up the steps, the frame moves, and we could lose the pane.”

“And then she wants another one.” Walter rubbed his forehead with his good hand. “I haven’t charged her enough for another one.”

Charlie came out of his bar carrying an empty carton. Somebody inside called for him; he called back that he’d heard, then held the carton towards me. “Any use?”

“Yes. Thank you.”

He looked at the cabinet, then at Walter. “You two earning anything yet?”

“Twelve dollars when it’s inside,” Walter said.

Charlie considered that. “I’ve got glasses need washing.”

“Give us another ten minutes,” I told him.

He left the carton and went back to his customers. I tore it into broad pieces and tucked them beneath the blanket around the cabinet’s lower corners. It gave us something better to rest it on if we had to set it down. The loose strip remained uncovered where we could see it.

Walter reached to hold the blanket for me, caught himself using the wrong hand and drew it back sharply. I took the cloth before it slipped. Neither of us said anything for a moment.

“I’m not adding anything for this,” I said. “But whoever helps carry it still gets his six.”

“I agreed to six apiece.”

“Good.” I pressed the cardboard flat. “What about the back of the lunchroom? Could we get in there?”

“I went through the front when she bought it. Didn’t go round.”

There wasn’t much point asking him again. We needed someone who knew the place, or someone to go ahead and look. I wanted that settled before we arrived with the cabinet halfway off the truck.

Two customers came out together, bringing the radio music with them. I pulled the truck door closer and stood aside. One man stepped over the torn cardboard before I gathered it up. By the time they’d gone, Walter had returned to his chair.

I put the screwdriver beside the open corner and went to the window. The notice still said six dollars. I added Pie cabinet. Two men to carry beneath the first line, then placed it back facing the pavement.

“Leave that chair there,” I told Walter when he started moving it. “There’s room.”

I stood beside the truck, near enough to the bar’s open door to be heard.

“Anyone here know Mrs. Mercer’s place on Palm Street? I could use a hand getting a cabinet over there.”