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Show WORTHING FARM/17 behind the wheels and pushed. They sank up to their hips in mud, but the cart moved. It became a game to the boys, sloshing through the slime and shoving the cart out of every mudhole it stuck in. They laughed as Elijah pulled silently. They laughed as they entered the forest and the ground firmed. They were still laughing as Worthing Farm dropped away out of sight behind them and they were surrounded by trees and thin pillars of sunlight streaming through the leaves. They did not stop until the forest opened up again to a wide track with deep wheel ruts. Here the trees did not close above the top of the trail, and as they continued west and a little south the sun was directly in their eyes. The sun was just setting in red light as they heard the sound of hammering and sawing up ahead. Human voices soon reached them, the great shouts of men working. "Faster, dammit, you'll break your backs." Elijah recognized the voice of his brother, Big Peter, and just then the forest cleared away for many acres and in the middle of the huge clearing stood the inn. It was all made of new wood, and it rose three stories high off a heavy foundation of piles sunk into the earth. At the south end of the inn stood a tower rising another twenty feet or so off the top floor. It had windows all around it, and it stood higher than the highest of the trees. The roof of it had recently burned, and men standing in the tower were straining to pull up a load of wood from the ground. They held long ropes, and on the ground a giant of a man with flaming red hair bellowed up at them, "Pull it up! I've |