A Wooden Form Opened Where Dalton Expected Only Dead Wood

Nora read Dalton's message without changing her face.

"Did he say those forms belonged to you before today?"

"He's called them my old junk for nineteen years."

"Find one of those messages."

I found a text from the spring cleanup. Dalton had written, Move your personal forms or I'll charge you rent.

Nora printed it. She sent him a letter that morning. It asked him to preserve company records and set a time for me to collect the personal tools and forms he had offered for pickup.

"We photograph everything," she told me. "We don't argue in the yard."

"Can he fire an owner?"

"Work and ownership are different questions. First we prove what you signed."

At ten, Beatriz backed her pickup beside the trash bin. Nora came in her own car. Dalton met us with a clipboard and his bright sales smile.

"Glad we could keep this friendly. Sign here."

The paper said I accepted the check as full payment for all claims against Cottonwood Fork LLC.

Nora held it by one corner.

"He won't be signing a release. We can sign a list of property collected."

"It's a standard receipt."

"Then it won't need that paragraph."

Dalton looked at me.

"You spent money on a lawyer over scraps?"

"You told me to pick them up."

Beatriz lifted the first form. She handled it with both hands, though she had carried heavier feed sacks with one.

"Careful," I said.

"I know how to carry work."

Dalton watched us load all three. He let me take my drawknife, two spokeshaves, and the wooden mallet my father had made. Nora photographed his signed pickup list.

Before we left, I looked through the open door.

The restoration rack had a blue tarp over it.

"Beatriz's saddle under there?" I asked.

"Thursday," Dalton said.

His voice had lost every bit of sugar.

We took the forms to Beatriz's outfitting barn east of town. She cleared a packing table while Nora set her phone on a stand.

"Tell me what I'm watching," Nora said.

I laid the oldest form upside down.

"My father hollowed these so they wouldn't split as they dried. The plates cover the hollows. I lined them with sleeves for papers."

"Why?" Beatriz asked.

"A pipe burst over our filing cabinet in 2009. Lost a year's order copies. These stayed dry."

I turned the four screws. Beneath the brass was a flat packet wrapped in clean cloth.

My hands stopped shaking when I touched it.

The first receipt was for a used band saw: $14,200, paid by Seongho Han. The second was for our planer, $8,750. There were receipts for clamps, benches, and the old duplicating machine we still used twice a week.

"Receipts help trace what went in," Nora said. "Where's the agreement?"

"Next form."

That packet held our original operating agreement and its capital schedule. My $96,000 was listed as cash and equipment, with each piece named. Dalton's $64,000 was listed below it.

The ownership column read Han, 60%; Rusk, 40%.

We had signed every page. So had the accountant who helped us set up.

Dalton had pressed hard with his pen. His name had left small ridges on the paper beneath it.

"He said we only shook hands," Beatriz said.

"We did that too."

Nora read for a long time.

The agreement allowed members holding more than half the interest to choose the manager. Selling company property above $5,000 needed written approval from both members. Customer property could never be pledged or sold by the shop.

"Any later transfer of your interest?" she asked.

"None."

"Any amendment?"

"None that I signed."

The third form held yearly contribution schedules. We had signed them through the previous December. Every one showed sixty and forty.

Nora photographed the originals, then placed them in document sleeves. She arranged secure storage and gave me copies.

"He can dispute these," she said. "But he can't turn them into a handshake by saying it loudly."

I sat on an overturned feed bucket.

Beatriz put a cup of water in my hand.

"You look worse than when he locked you out."

"I kept thinking I'd remember something wrong."

She tapped the schedule.

"Ink remembered for you."

Late that day, Nora sent formal notice of a member meeting. She demanded access to the books and asked Dalton to identify any paper changing my interest.

I returned his final-wages check without cashing it.

At supper, Nora called again.

"The insurance field inspector agreed to let you attend Thursday's inventory as a member whose interest is disputed. Dalton was copied."

"Did he answer?"

"Yes."

She read his reply.

"Tell Han to keep his mouth shut about the back room, or he'll wish he'd taken the check."