The ringing comes before the stall. It is a dry hammer-blow on iron, repeated at uneven intervals, audible from the far end of the arcade even when the arcade is full of voices. Halfway down the row of stalls a man with a cane turns his head toward the sound, shifts his direction by a quarter. The cane stops tapping at the sides and taps only ahead.

The sound comes from the third pillar. The block is bolted into the concrete two fingers from the base of the pillar, and on the block stands the cobbler's iron last, its base inside a worn circle in the wood, its neck turned over toward the light coming in from the archway. The hole in the concrete around the wedge is widened, white at the edges.

The sound is an address and the address is the third pillar and the third pillar is Mulenga Chibesa's stall and Mulenga Chibesa's stall is where Bwalya arrives without asking anyone anything. The cane finds the pillar and stops. On the block, under the head of the wedge, a flat piece of wood is already slipped in.

The wedge comes out of the hole with two blows struck from below upward, and Mulenga lays it down beside the hammer; the iron last stays on the block, loose.

The council notice is glued to the pillar. It names the congestion of the pavement, the obstruction of pedestrian passage, the refuse and the health risk. It sets the first of October. It names the designated markets and not the days. Two stalls along, the greengrocer's frame is on the ground in bundled pieces, and the cloth stall is gone.

Mulenga sets the iron last on the boards of the wheelbarrow Beatrice has brought from the market. The ringing stops in the middle of the morning; between the second and the fourth pillar only wheels and voices can be heard.

Bwalya comes in from the archway during the silence. The cane rises along the pillar to the edge of the block, and above the block there is air. He takes his place third in the queue, the unfinished shoes in his hand.

"I asked for a sole, not a father," he says.

He says it out loud, and the queue turns. He says that he should go to the market, that the markets are the place where a man is in order, and that if on the second of October they take his irons away for his Wednesday, then on Wednesday he will not leave the house anymore.

Mulenga does not answer. He holds the wedge in his hand, does not lay it down and does not put it back in. The queue moves up one place. Beatrice puts her hands on the handles of the wheelbarrow and rests one foot on the block.

The iron last on the wheelbarrow weighs what it weighs on the block, and the boards of the wheelbarrow bend under the turned-over neck of the iron. Beatrice holds the handles low, at thigh height, and does not set them down.

Bwalya leaves the queue before his turn. Out loud, in front of the others in line, he says he is taking the shoes back the way they are. He puts the unfinished shoes on the stall, the upper face down, the loose sole turned up. Then he turns the cane toward the archway, toward the road that goes down to the market, and takes two steps in that direction alone. The first step is clean. The second falls short and the cane finds the frame of the dismantled stall. Bwalya stops in the middle of the arcade with his hand open at hip height.

Mulenga puts his palm under the neck of the iron and lifts it from the wheelbarrow. Beatrice does not let go of the handles. The iron goes onto the block the right way round, its base inside the worn circle in the wood, and the wedge goes into the hole in the concrete three quarters of the way, pushed by hand. Mulenga takes the hammer and strikes four times. On the fourth blow the edge of the hole crumbles and the white dust stays on the back of his hand.

"Why the hammer," says Bwalya.

"Wednesday you'll find me," says Mulenga.

He goes back to striking, and the ringing starts again in the stretch of arcade between the second and the fourth pillar, at the same uneven intervals as before.

The empty wheelbarrow moves more easily than the loaded one. Beatrice lifts it a hand's width, turns it toward the far end of the arcade. She says the October day at the market does not pay for itself, and that tomorrow the place next to hers will be given to someone else. The rubber wheel makes a noise on the concrete for the whole length of the arcade, then it stops making it.

"What is this thing called," says Bwalya.

Mulenga tells him the name. Bwalya repeats it at full voice, twice, his face toward the stall. Iron last. He goes back into the queue, which now begins with him.

About himself Mulenga says nothing. He takes the unfinished shoes from the stall and puts them underneath, in the crate of soles, turned the way Bwalya laid them down.

Then he raises the hammer and strikes flat on the head of the wedge, twice. The head spreads inside the hole as far as the level of the concrete, and the block will not come up again without splitting.