Sole has until one o'clock to explain forty kilos

"Efrén, switch the engine off and come to the window."

"I've got the Zorroza run at twelve."

"Bengoetxea gets here at one and he's bringing the sheet of tare discrepancies printed out. You're on it three times this September, and all three times it was me who logged the difference."

"You did?"

"I did. Logging them is my job. The 4th, the 17th and today: loaded you give me 24,180 and in tare you give me 8,900."

"There you go, then: fifteen thousand two hundred and eighty of scrap."

"My tare is 8,940."

"Your tare is 8,940 on forty-one tickets in a row since March. That's why I logged it."

"It must have rained inside. Or it's the diesel."

"It's raining, yes, and if it had got wet you'd weigh more, not less. And the diesel over three hundred metres of yard isn't forty kilos, which is forty-eight litres."

"The weighbridge, then."

"It was checked on 9 April with six five-hundred-kilo test weights and you've got the certificate hanging behind you, covered by your shoulder. And you put the tarpaulin back on before you weighed, because I saw you stow it in the side box."

"Then I don't know."

"No. Nor do I, and I've been not knowing for three weeks. What I do know is that a weighbridge that's breaking down doesn't hit the same number three times, and I've had 8,900, 8,900 and 8,900."

"So what do you want from me?"

"Two hours. Get onto the weighbridge again and then come down and tell me."

"I'm going."

"Stop. Your second axle is off the deck. A metre back."

"Like this."

"8,900."

"Well, you've seen it now."

"I've seen it twice now, which isn't the same as seeing it once. Come down and step over to the window."

"Sole, I've got the Zorroza one at twelve."

"And I've got Bengoetxea's sheet on my desk. The column is called 'tare difference' and last year it came to eleven thousand euros. In August Hilario and the Retolaza boy came off the route, and both of them went without anybody proving a thing: what was missing was somebody to explain the kilos."

"I've never stolen anything from you in my life."

"I know. If I thought you were stealing from me I wouldn't have given you two hours, I'd have given you the sheet. The trouble is that at one o'clock I have to explain forty kilos I don't understand, and I don't explain what I don't understand."

"Pay me the 15,240 and let's forget it."

"Ah. So now you do know what it comes to?"

"…"

"Efrén. Forty-one tickets at 8,940. Three days this month at 8,900. Always the same amount missing, always on the tare weighing and always at the same hour of the morning."

"All right."

"All right what?"

"Open the door and I'll come out and tell you."

"Tell me through the window, it's raining."

"I'm not telling you through the window with the loudspeaker on and the whole yard in front of me."

"…"

"Let me in."

"Come in. Wipe your boots, this is a hut, not a garage."

"Sole, why do you think I come in at a quarter past nine and not at eight like everybody else?"

"Because you sleep in."

"Because at eight Bengoetxea is out in the yard."

"I still don't follow you."

"Nata."

"Who's Nata?"

"My dog. A mastiff cross, black, with one ear split. I had her weighed last month at the vet's in Basurto, because she's getting on and she needs watching: thirty-eight kilos exactly."

"Thirty-eight."

"Thirty-eight. Your weighbridge reads in tens, doesn't it? That's why it comes out at forty for you."

"…"

"She rides with me in the cab. Ever since I lost the unit in Ortuella, which is where she used to sleep. She comes with me to Zorroza, to Amorebieta and everywhere else, and today she's behind the warehouse wall, in the shade, sitting."

"Go on."

"When I come in loaded, she's inside with me. When I tip, I take her down and leave her behind the wall, because the crane makes her nervous, ever since a sheet came down two metres from her. And then I drive up to weigh the tare and I forget to put her back in. And out comes what comes out."

"Out comes 8,900."

"Out comes 8,900."

"And on the 4th and the 17th Nata was behind the wall too."

"On the 4th and the 17th too."

"…"

"The yard rules say animals aren't allowed in. I signed them myself in 2021. If I say it, they take the route off me. And with the route go the payments on the tractor unit, four hundred and eighty euros a month until 2028. And I don't know what I do with the dog."

"Efrén, do you know what you were asking me for?"

"To pay me the kilos."

"No. You were asking me to log that you'd brought in forty kilos of scrap you hadn't brought in. At eighty-five cents that's thirty-four euros, three times a month, with my operator number in the corner of the paper."

"I hadn't thought of it that way."

"I know. That's why I opened the door."

"Why did you log it, then?"

"Because on the 4th it was one number and on the 17th it was two numbers the same, and two numbers the same can't be kept quiet. If I'd sat on them, today I'd be in here covering up something I don't understand, and on Monday covering it up again, and come December it wouldn't be your problem any more: it would be mine and it would be three months old."

"You could have told me on the 17th."

"On the 17th I did tell you. I told you that you were short of weight and you told me it was raining."

"…"

"So what now?"

"Now go and get the dog."

"Sorry?"

"Go and get the dog, put her in the cab and weigh. If she's inside when you come in loaded, she has to be inside when you weigh the tare, same as the flask and the two spare wheels you've had in there as long as I've known you. Nobody is asking you to hide her: I'm asking you to weigh her."

"And if Bengoetxea sees her?"

"Bengoetxea is in Derio until one. Run."

"…"

"8,940."

"8,940."

"15,240 of scrap. That's what you brought in and that's what I'm going to pay you."

"Sole, the thirty-four euros from the other times…"

"The thirty-four euros didn't exist. They never existed. You've spent three weeks being paid for a dog."

"Right."

"Not right. It's sixty-eight euros, the 4th and the 17th. And those two tickets are signed, closed and paid."

"And how does that get fixed?"

"The way everything gets fixed here: with another piece of paper. I write a corrective ticket dated today, with the two numbers of the old tickets and the reason written out. 'Tare corrected for unweighed passenger.' Sixty-eight euros I take off Friday's payment."

"Bengoetxea is going to read it."

"Of course he's going to read it. Bengoetxea has been looking for two months for somebody to explain a column of his spreadsheet to him, and I'm going to give him the only explanation he's had all year: signed, with the dog's weight, the date at the vet's and the name of the place where she was weighed. And do you know what he's going to do with it?"

"Sack me."

"Have a sign put up at the entrance saying that passengers get weighed. Because the eleven thousand euros from last year aren't all going to be dogs, Efrén, but some of them will be."

"…"

"And now listen to me properly, because I'm not going to say it twice. From tomorrow you come in at a quarter past eight, loaded, with the dog inside, and you weigh. You tip, you drive up again with the dog inside, and you weigh. Any day Nata isn't in the lorry, you tell me before you drive up and I write 'tare without passenger' in the observations box, which is what it's there for and has been there as long as the form has existed."

"Bring me the Zorroza ticket before three, Efrén, and don't make me weigh anything twice for the rest of the month."