All the adventurers gather together and head over to the mess hall to get a head start on the chow line. Already there is Gristle Pete, slaving over the hot stoves, and a handful of grubby-looking human workers at a table. The adventurers take a table near the stairs in case they need to make a quick getaway, which also happens to be adjacent to a couple of the workers. Bilbo strikes up a conversation.

"Hi, I'm Fluebber, what's your name?"

"I'm Fakhud, this is Bhaman, and that's Thalnyl." Thalnyl is a dwarf, but not at all miniature. "Where you guys from?"

"We're from Phandalyn" answers Bilbo.

"You guys come to work on the road?" asks Fakhud.

"We're checking it out."

"Well, it's hard work and the weather ain't great, but the pay is good."

His two friends chuckle a little bit at this statement, and Bilbo can't tell if he's being sarcastic about the pay.

Just then, Gristle Pete calls out grumpily "Grub's ready! Come an' get it!"

Hooflepoof jumps up and is the first to reach the food. More workers start filing in from downstairs. Gristle Pete helps the workers serve their food, with most of his energy put into grumbling tiredly. He singles out Nars as he passes the line.

"You're a li'l fella. You big 'nuff for road work?"

"I'm tougher than some people think. You don't look like you're doing much road work yourself."

Gristle Pete takes it well. "My job's cooking, though I'm not sure how long I can keep this up. Hard to get a wink of sleep in this place."

The adventurers get their food and sit down. The food is surprisingly good.

After dinner, Gristle Pete pulls out a big pot of grog, and starts ladling it out to whoever wants some. The workers seem to really like it, but the adventurers find it terrible, almost undrinkable. They hang around, sipping gently, to see what will happen next.

The workers fairly quickly start to get rowdy. One of them, while carrying his mug of grog back toward his table, addresses the adventurers. "Look at these fresh-faced noobies!" he says, and his friends laugh loudly.

Elbolin speaks up. "Yeah, we're new at this, but we'll learn fast."

"Haha, bet you will!" says the worker. "You'll learn fast or you'll die!" His friends guffaw.

"How long you been working at this?" asks Elbolin.

"Been working like a dog all my life," says the worker, "but this job, since the first polliwog of spring!"

"Got any tips for succeeding at this job?"

"Yep! Quit while you're ahead an' go back to the city!"

The room erupts in drunken laughter. He's obviously more interested in entertaining his friends than in having any serious conversation. Gristle Pete, afraid things might get out of hand, takes control. "Alright guys, time to wrap it up, I gotta get some rest." He puts away the pot of grog, and one by one the workers finish their drinks and file out. The adventurers leave their drinks unfinished, and head back to their rooms.

The adventurers in the first-floor room are surprised to find a stranger asleep in one of the beds. Barry shakes his shoulder. He rolls over sleepily and says "what's going on?"

"Who are you?" asks Barry.

"Name's Grar, who are you?"

"I'm Bertain."

"You here to sleep, or just wake people up?"

Barry doesn't answer, and just climbs into his bunk. Elbolin gestures to him silently that he will keep watch, and sits in lotus position on his bed. The rest of the adventurers go to sleep.

Elbolin, being an elf and not needing to sleep much, meditates on his bed. The stranger snores occasionally. After a couple hours, Elbolin decides to sneak out. The central area of the roadhouse is silent, dark and empty. He sneaks down to the door to the warehouse room underneath the mess hall. It appears to be held closed with a normal latch, and no lock is apparent. As quietly as he can, he unlatches the door and sneaks in, but the latch squeaks a little. Within a few seconds he hears stomping upstairs, and Gristle Pete calls out grumpily from the top of the stairs "Who goes there! Let us people get some rest!"

Elbolin waits quietly for a few minutes until he hears Gristle Pete's footsteps, and a heavy groan as he lies back down on his bedroll. Then Elbolin quietly explores the warehouse. There are crates piled around, some of which have loose lids, from when Bog Luck inspected them. Inside, Elbolin finds foodstuffs; rice, beans, wheat, a few jars of spices and other ingredients. There are also large burlap bags piled around. Elbolin can't tell what's inside them, but they smell of molasses.

Looking around some more, he notices there is another door in this room, besides the one where he came in. He creeps up to it and listens; behind it, he can hear the rustling of items being moved around, and scurrying like large rats. He cannot see any light coming from behind the door, nor hear any talking.

He sneaks back out, this time without making any noise with the door, and creeps back to his room. He waits for an hour, and watches, and hears nothing. Then he decides to sneak back to the warehouse.

This time, the door squeaks and wakes Gristle Pete again, who again comes to the top of the stairs. "Consarn it, who's making all that racket! Guy can't get a wink of sleep!" His reaction seems pretty extreme for just the slight squeak of a door. Again Elbolin waits until he hears upstairs footsteps and settling down. Then he tiptoes over to the closed door on the back wall of the warehouse room.

He tries very quietly to open the door, but it doesn't open. It seems to be locked. He looks around for a key, but finds nothing, so he sneaks back to his room and gets his half-night of rest.