Raymond smiled. "I'm old. I'm allowed better guesses."
On the ride home, the truck felt hotter than before even with both windows down. Norah balanced the wrapped sample on her knees and watched cypress groves and fields pass outside. The discovery no longer felt like a puzzle that belonged only to her. It had become something with economic weight, historical weight, and the unpleasant gravity of decisions adults made when a family needed money.
Eli was quiet for most of the drive.
Near the county line Norah asked, "How bad is the tractor?"
He did not pretend not to understand why she was asking.
"Bad enough."
"How much?"
"Used transmission if we can find one, maybe eighteen hundred plus what we can do ourselves. Rebuild could run more."
"Fence?"
"Depends how much post we salvage."
"Road?"
"Gravel isn't free."
Norah looked at the paper-wrapped sample. "So fifteen hundred matters."
"Everything matters on a farm."
"Would you have sold if I hadn't seen the mark?"
Eli thought before answering.
"Probably."
The word disturbed her more than she expected.
He continued. "Not because I'm foolish. Because if a thing looks like debris, acts like debris, and blocks land I need, paying somebody to haul it away can be sensible."
"But Marcus knew."
"Marcus suspected."
"That's almost the same."
"No. It's the whole difference between business and fraud."
Norah looked at him.
Eli kept his eyes on the road. "Don't turn him into a villain just because he wanted to buy low. Timber buyers make money by knowing wood better than sellers. Farmers make money by knowing cattle better than people who buy beef at a store. Knowledge has value."
"Then why does it feel dishonest?"
"Because he called it worthless while trying to own it."
Norah nodded.
"That's the part you remember," Eli said. "Not that he saw value. That he tried to make sure we didn't."
At the farm, they went directly to the workshop.
Eli climbed a short ladder and began pulling old boxes from a loft shelf. Norah opened metal tins filled with bent nails, invoices, receipts, and pieces of machinery from equipment no one living could identify. Dust collected on her forearms. Spiders had built elaborate ownership claims over several corners.
"What are we looking for?" she asked.
"Anything my father kept from his father."
"Very specific."
"You'll know it when we don't."
Two hours passed.
They found a 1944 ration book, three receipts for tractor parts, a church bulletin from 1957, a photograph of Eli at sixteen holding a catfish nearly as long as his leg, and a coffee can full of brass tags stamped with cattle numbers. Norah was beginning to think the search had become another family archaeology project when Eli opened a wooden cigar box and went quiet.
Inside were eight black-and-white photographs curled at the edges.
The first showed men beside a wagon loaded with rough lumber. The second showed a sawmill with an enormous circular blade. The third showed a flooded low field Norah did not recognize.
Then Eli handed her the fourth.
Three men stood beside a stack of dark logs.
One was young enough that Norah could not place him at first. The second looked like an older version of Eli's father. The third wore suspenders and held a cant hook across one shoulder.
On the nearest log was a mark.
Two intersecting lines.
Curved notch.
Norah stopped breathing for a moment.
"Who's that?"
Eli pointed. "My grandfather, Amos Bell. That's my father as a boy. Man on the left might be Amos's brother."