The spinning machine was stalled. It should work. It was supposed to work. As they looked at each part of the operation, it even seemed to work. But the thread it produced was clumpy and came apart with even gentle tugs. Miguel, nearly howling with anger, had stomped away this morning, cursing all the way. Munos, who was being pressured by Don Carlos, wasn't in any better a mood, and had left for Zamora to explain the delays. With those two gone, Agustin and Luis had time to experiment with a better way to card the wool.

They started, much to Lucia's dismay, by tearing apart a set of carding combs to see how they were made. "Any idiot can see how they're made!" she said. But, better to check, anyway.

Agustin and Luis were a bit embarrassed to have to admit that she was right. The carding combs were just bent pins, stuck through leather, which was then nailed to a flat piece of wood. After a handle was added to the flat piece, the carding comb was complete. But it, combined with some of the drawings they'd recently received, did give them an idea.

It took some time to find enough leather to cover a large and a smaller wooden drum. It took longer than that to make the tiny pins to insert through the leather, bend them at the correct angle, and secure them to the drum. And more time to construct a frame to hold them.

It wasn't an exact duplicate of the "drum carder" in the drawing. For one thing, in order to take advantage of one type of motive power they had available, Agustin and Luis positioned the drums differently. The drums were laid on their sides, supported in the air by a pole that ran through the center of each drum.