The Alloy of Law (Mistborn #4)(63)

“So that machinery the Vanishers are using,” Marasi said, “you’re thinking they can’t move it far on land? They have to ship it up the canal, and pick a place near the tracks to set it up and carry out their robbery?”

Her accent … Wayne thought. She uses more elevated diction around him than around me. She tried so hard to impress Wax. Did he see it? Probably not. The man had always been oblivious about women. Even Lessie.

“Yes,” Waxillium said, hiking down the hillside. “The question is, how did this thing—whatever it is—empty the freight cars so quickly and efficiently?”

“Why is that so odd?” Wayne said, following him. “If I’d been a Vanisher, I’d have brought a whole heap of men. That would let me finish the work faster.”

“This isn’t a question of simple manpower,” Waxillium said. “The train cars were locked, and some of the later ones had guards inside. When the cars arrived at their destination, they were still locked, but empty. Beyond that, from one of the cars, many heavy ingots of iron were stolen. There’s a bottleneck at the car door—beyond a certain point, more men wouldn’t have helped. There is no way they unloaded hundreds of ingots in under five minutes using just manpower.”

“A speed bubble?” Marasi asked.

“Could have helped,” Wax said, “but not much. You’d have the same bottleneck, and you can’t fit many people in a speed bubble. Let’s say you could have six workers inside, which would be really tight. They’d have to move the iron ingots up to the edge of the speed bubble, then drop the bubble and create another—you can’t move the bubbles once they’re up—and repeat.”

Wax shook his head, hands on hips. “The cost in bendalloy would be incredible. With one nugget worth about five hundred notes, Wayne can compress about two minutes into fifteen external seconds. To compress time equal to five minutes on the outside—gaining you enough time on the inside to move all of those iron bars—you’d need to spend ten thousand notes. The bars would be worth just a fraction of that; Harmony, you could buy your own train for that kind of money. I don’t believe it. Something else is happening here.”

“Machinery of some sort,” Marasi said.

Wax nodded, walking down the hillside, scanning the ground. “Let’s see if we can find any traces they may have left behind. Maybe the machinery had wheels that left ruts or tracks.”

Wayne shoved his hands in his pockets and walked about, making a show of looking, but the whole reason he’d come to get Waxillium involved in this investigation was because he was good at this kind of stuff. If there were people involved, Wayne was quite handy. But flowers and dirt … not so much.

After a few minutes, Wayne was bored, so he wandered over to where Marasi was looking. She glanced at him. “I do have to say, Wayne … that hat does not fit you very well.”

“Yeah. I just want to keep reminding Wax he owes me a new one.”

“Why? You were the one who let the man take your old one from you.”

“He convinced me not to fight back,” Wayne grumbled. Seemed obvious to him. “And then, he shot the guy wearing it, and the guy walked away!”

“He couldn’t have known the man would survive.”

“He shoulda grabbed my hat,” Wayne said.

She smiled, looking bemused.

Most people, they didn’t understand hats, and Wayne didn’t really blame them. Until you’d had a good, lucky hat, you wouldn’t understand the value of it. “It’s actually all right,” Wayne said softly, kicking around in the weeds. “But don’t tell Wax.”

“What?”

“I needed to lose that hat,” Wayne admitted. “Otherwise, it would have been blown up in the explosion, see? It was lucky it got stolen. It could have ended up like my duster.”

“You’re a very unique individual, Wayne.”

“Technically, we all are,” he said. Then he hesitated. “Except for twins, I guess. Anyway, there’s something I’ve been wanting to ask you. It’s a little personal, though.”

“How personal?” she asked.

“Well, you know, about yourself and all. The personal kind of personal. I guess.”

She looked at him, frowning, then blushed. Seemed the girl did that a lot, which was just fine by Wayne. Girls were pretty with a bit of color on them. “You don’t mean about me … and you … I mean…”

“Oh, Harmony!” Wayne laughed. “It’s not anythin’ like that, mate. Don’t worry. You’re pretty enough, particularly through the coppers, if you know what I mean.”

“The coppers?”

“Sure. Word with a lot of curves, like you. You have a pretty accent too, and some nice bounce to you in the cloud area.”

“Dare I ask what that is?”

“The white, puffy things that float high above the fruitful land where the seeds are planted.”

She blushed even further. “Wayne! That might be the most crude thing anyone has ever said to me.”

“I strives for excellence, mate. I strives for excellence. But don’t worry—like I said, you’re right nice, but you ain’t got enough punch for me. I like women what could take my face clean off with a good roundhouse.”