[center][b][h1]Bork[/h1][/b][/center]

The abbot was talking to somebody in his rooms when Bork returned.  A man, didn’t sound like the Captain.  Accent he couldn’t place.  The tailor, he guessed.  He and Talia had passed each other on their respective return trips, and he could smell the food.  He went back to his own space to get some work done.  He saw all the newly-arrived gear and stopped to look at it.

The dwarf grinned.  Seeing this hardware warmed his engineer’s heart.  He was already thinking of things he could do with such items when he arrived in his well-scribbled room.  Those scribbles were part of the reason he was here; he was ready to transcribe some of them into the abbot’s book, then he could clean the walls to make room for new ones.  

First into the book were his design and notes for the boardwalk.  He had store, office, and warehouse fronts measured out, and had sketched out a right of way extending behind those fronts, enabling them to expand rearwards as the need for their capacities grew.  

He put in notes that expanding Pigeon Spit’s fishing would be the quickest route to increasing food production.  Unlike farms, fishing would start production right away, and would use hardly any land.  Surplus could be dried and smoked and sold to visiting ships for some coin.  Even better, catching the right fish would enable the town to produce fish oil, which they could use for cooking and fuel.  More lamplight.  Safer nights.  Safer and more productive mines.  And another trade good to sell to visiting ships.

To make oil, one needed a press, and Bork had a design drawn up for one of those, too.  One he had cribbed from one of his books:  [i]De Re Molarum[/i].  And the toolhead could be changed out for pressing different things into oil.  Beech nuts (those were beeches he saw in the woods, right?) and, once the farms the abbot had in mind got going, flaxseed.  

Until they had a proper wainwright, their transport options would be limited.  He next copied a sketch and description for a makeshift wheelbarrow, basically a crate with an undercarriage and a pair of wheels made from reinforced barrel lids.  The log boom and timber raft designs he had shown the abbot earlier went in the book as well, and also designs for grading and laying simple roads.  These were dirt roads for now, not stone, though they did use rock dust and gravel to stabilize the bedding.  He also sketched the tools they would need to grade and tamp the road properly.  A well-built dirt road was better than people gave it credit for.  And it was easier on horses and mules, who for the time being would be doing most of the hauling on their backs, rather than pulling carts.

In the margins he wrote:  “needed professions:  fishermen, a presser, a glassmaker”.  There was enough sand and wood around here to make glass, he judged.  They would want bottles for the oil. They could also add glass beads to the costume jewelry line he had in mind.

Pushing the book back he looked up, and noticed with a start the hat on the table.  If it had been a snake, it could have eaten him by now.  The Abbot’s idea, perhaps?  He examined the hat and then tried it on.  It was a bit loose.  Probably made for another dwarf, he guessed.  One who didn’t cut his hair as close as Bork did.  Not many dwarves did.  Anyway, the hat would sit fine over his hood, or with a headscarf underneath.

Taking a break, he went up to see if the abbot was busy, and to ask him what all the gear was for.