Jim touched the tank. "There you are," he murmured.
He allowed the motorcycle to run long enough to satisfy his own ear and Frank's inspection, then shut it down. The silence that followed seemed to vibrate. Leon lowered his hands slowly. His hearing rang, but his eyes shone, and he could not stop staring at the machine.
Cole gave a low whistle. "Well, I'll be damned."
Wilson rubbed the back of his neck. "Little guy really saw it."
Frank leaned against the workbench. He did not know whether he felt more relieved or ashamed. The repairs he had performed over the previous days had not all been useless, but the failure to inspect one small place had nearly cost him a customer, his reputation, and perhaps much worse. He glanced at Leon, who was looking at the motorcycle instead of the men, and recognized that the boy had no idea how much had just changed.
Jim reached into the pocket of his leather vest and withdrew a thick silver money clip. There were bills folded inside, most of them creased by long use. He selected one and smoothed it between his fingers. The green paper looked startlingly clean in his weathered hand.
"Come here," he told Leon.
The boy approached cautiously. Jim held out a hundred-dollar bill. Leon stared at it. He knew what money did to adults, but he had almost never been allowed to hold enough of it to buy anything worth imagining. The bill seemed less like an object than a dare.
"I don't need that," Leon whispered. "I only told you about the wire."
"And nobody else did." Jim looked toward Frank and then back at the boy. "A mechanic gets paid for finding what other people missed. You did useful work. Useful work is worth something."
Leon shook his head again. His eyes had gone to the pocket of Frank's stained shirt, as if he expected the mechanic to make the decision for him. Frank stood still. A week earlier he might have told the child to take the money and stop wasting everyone's time. Now he understood that Leon was not being difficult. He was frightened by the gift.
Jim bent a little, took the child's small hand, and placed the bill in his palm. He folded Leon's fingers over it without squeezing. "Buy yourself a meal that comes on a plate," he said. "And buy yourself shoes that don't need repairing every time you walk."
Leon looked down at the crisp paper. He thought of his mother, the refrigerator, the nights when dinner amounted to dry crackers and water. He thought of what happened when adults found money they had not expected. He nodded without making a promise about how to spend it.