Nobody knew it was the last one, which is the whole of why it was a good day.
Wat had been the eye for the best part of a year by then and had, against his own loud predictions, turned out to be extraordinary at it. Osgar did the hands. Wat stood behind, and watched, and said things — short, specific, frequently rude things — and the standard of work at the Argenton forges rose measurably over a year in a way Cecily could actually demonstrate from the reject figures.
"You've made him better," Thomas observed, some months in.
"I've made nine of them better. Osgar's just the loudest about it." Wat was unbothered. "Turns out I can see a thing going wrong about four seconds before it does, and I never knew that, because when it was my hands I'd just correct it and think nothing of it."
He arrived at the works that Thursday at his usual hour, in the spring, complaining about the weather.
Thomas happened to be there. That was luck; he was not there often, and he had come to ask Osgar about a bracket for the school's north room and had got caught up watching, as people did.
Ralf — eighteen now, three years in — was working a scarf joint and making a reasonable job of it.
"Stop," Wat said.
Ralf stopped.
"Not because it's wrong. Because it's right and you don't know why." Wat came round, slowly, and pointed with his chin. "Say what you just did."
"I — heated it and I struck it."
"You struck it four times on the near side and three on the far, and you did it without counting, and the fourth one was lighter than the first three." Wat looked at him. "Why?"
Ralf stared at the metal.
"Because it was thinner there," he said slowly. "The near side had more in it."
"Aye. And when did you decide that?"
"I didn't decide it."
"No. You didn't." Wat straightened up, with some effort. "That's the thing I've been trying to get into you for three years and you've just done it in front of me without being told. You've stopped thinking about the hammer. Now you're thinking about the metal."
Ralf went red to the ears.
"That's the whole trade," Wat said, to the room generally, at a volume that carried. "That's it. The rest is practice. Anyone in here who's still thinking about the hammer, you've got another year yet and there's no shame in it."
He sat down on his bench afterward — the one by the door, positioned for watching — and Thomas came over and sat with him for a while, and they talked about nothing in particular.
About the bracket, mostly. About whether the north room's ventilation was as bad as Osbern claimed, and Wat's view that Osbern would complain about ventilation in an open field. About Alys, who had discovered the word no and was using it structurally.
"Your lad's got a good hand," Wat said, at one point, meaning Edmund, who was four and who had lately been brought to the forge twice and had been quite uninterested.
"He hasn't got any hand at all. He was bored."
"He watched the fire for nine minutes without moving. I counted." Wat shrugged. "That's not nothing. Might come to something, might not. I'd not push him."
"I don't intend to."
"Good. Everyone pushed me and I'd have got here anyway." He worked his fingers absently. "And if he's no use with his hands it doesn't signify. There's four of you at that council and not one of you can hold a punch straight and the town's done well enough."
Thomas laughed.
"I'll pass that on."
"Pass it on to Alaric specifically. He'll be wounded and he'll pretend not to be, and that's the best entertainment available to a man my age."
Thomas left around noon. He remembered afterward that he had said see you Sunday — the whole household had a standing Sunday supper by then that Wat attended perhaps two weeks in three — and that Wat had said something dismissive about the quality of the supper, and that neither of them had turned round.
It was a completely ordinary parting and Thomas was grateful for that for the rest of his life.
Wat died the following Thursday, in the same spot, correcting a hinge.