“But they’re not?” She picked up a nail and examined it.
“Not when you’re a precision carpenter.” He plucked up a nail from a different bin and held it up for comparison. “I noticed some customers taking the time to sort through our selection, picking out the exact sizes they needed. The process was inefficient. We have ever so many more carpenters shopping with us now that we’ve separated them out according to precise lengths.”
She dropped the nail back in the bin. “And that’s a nice service to customers, but I don’t understand what this has to do with people.”
“Why are people so different?” He held his nail up to the light. One edge of its head was slightly bent and a tiny divot marred the surface of the shaft. No other nail with those exact imperfections probably existed. It was unique. But because of its general characteristics, it fit perfectly into the two inch nail bin.
He tossed the nail back in its place. “We have functions, just like the items in this warehouse. We have places where our talents and uses are the most efficient fit.”
“Yes, but we also have desires and flaws. Where we are best suited might be where we least want to be.” She spun in a slow circle, taking in the warehouse. He’d designed so much of it, it was like she was examining him.
“My father wasn’t always successful.” Charles stared down at his hands. His mouth went as dry as the tobacco. He didn’t share this information with many people. “When I was young, my father was thrown in debtor’s prison. He’d tried to start many businesses, and always failed. Until the store.”
Miss Moore blinked. “I’m sorry. That must have been difficult. And where did you stay?”
“With him, mostly. Sometimes with other family when they had the space for my mother, sisters, and me.” His breathing slowed at the memory of their cramped home in that prison. “But I liked staying with my father best. And not just because I was with him.”
She took a step towards him. “You liked living in the prison?” Her forehead wrinkled. “Why?”
He swallowed. “For the first time I knew when my meals were coming. I knew that I’d find my parents there when I came home and not another eviction notice. I even got my first job there, helping the warden. He ran the prison in a very orderly manner and taught me much of what I know.” He shrugged. “If my father had been half as organized, he never would have gone bankrupt. And when he could finally convince some friends to loan him money for his grocer’s business, I made sure it was run with the same efficiency as that prison.”
Miss Moore reached out her hand, her fingers just grazing his arm before pulling it back. “I…I don’t know what to say.”
“There’s nothing to say.” He made his voice matter of fact. “That’s just how it was.” That prison had been his first experience of stability in a world full of chaos. It had been the first place he’d ever felt safe.
This warehouse had been the second. He surveyed the rows after rows of boxes and bins, satisfaction settling in his chest. It was the same satisfaction he felt after solving a case, after making the world a bit more organized.
“Come.” He took her to the far wall, to his pride and joy. “Do you see this?”
Her mouth dropped open as she stared up at the grain sorter. It was large, ten feet tall by five across, and made of copper and tin. “What is it?”
“It’s a device to sort grain. Wheat specifically.” The first one of its kind. “You take the wheat berries you’ve bought from the farmers and pour them into that opening at the top.” He pointed. “The berries roll down through the lengths of copper piping”—he traced a zig-zag pattern with his finger—“and any defects or contaminants are sorted out. The defects fall into that bin there to the left and the pure grain to the one on the right.”
“What sort of defects?”
Her apparent interest sent a jolt of excitement through Charles. If there was one topic he could give himself up to discussing wholeheartedly, it was about how his invention worked. “Foreign grains, stones, shriveled or sprouted kernels. That type of thing.”
She ran her hand along the machine, and for a brief instant, he imagined that same gliding caress stroking something on him. “How does it work?”
He cleared his throat. “Through a system of different sized holes in the pipes that sort the grain when the machine is vibrated.” It had taken him two years to perfect. Two years of trial and error, curses and celebrations. But he’d finally made something that mirrored just how his brain worked. “If bad grain gets sold, gets used, people can become ill. It’s important for things to be sorted into their proper places. The same goes for people.”
She didn’t look convinced. “And you’re having a problem putting me in my place.”
He didn’t appreciate the double meaning to that phrase. But she wasn’t wrong. “In essence, yes.”
She huffed softly. “I’m fairly certain I can’t be sorted like a piece of grain.” She flicked her gaze to his machine, to his chest, to the ground. Anywhere but at his face.
His fingers itched to pinch her chin, tilt her head back, force her to look at him. He shoved his hands in his pockets instead.
“I admit, I don’t know what to do with an assistant, especially one who has no experience in investigations.” And especially not a woman, someone he couldn’t send out on the streets alone to run errands. “I propose a sort of apprenticeship. I’ll train you to the best of my ability in the methodology and procedures of investigations. You will be… my protégé.”
He rocked onto the balls of his feet. Yes. A pupil. Someone to take under his wing. He wouldn’t see her as a woman, with the limitations inherent in such. She wasn’t someone to woo, or tup, or disregard. She was his to train. To instruct. And he would be the best teacher possible.
“I believe we have been at odds because neither of us knew our place in relation to the other.” He widened his stance. “Now that we understand our relative positions, we will get on better.”
She inhaled sharply, her bosom straining against the bodice of her gown.
His stomach tensed. One didn’t admire the breasts of one’s protégé. Even if his height gave him the perfect vantage point from which to view them. He stared at the top of her head, instead.
