Chapter 2: The Clock’s Brass Latch And The Unfinished Document
I kept my hand suspended beside the clock, close enough to feel the cold from the rain-streaked wall but not close enough to touch the device again. The matte-black disk sat within the opened wooden housing, its double-sided tape pressed against the inner panel. A small green light blinked at a steady interval. It did not brighten or fade with the room. It simply continued, patient and indifferent.
Behind me, Emma stood with her stuffed rabbit held against her chest. I turned toward her and lowered my hand. The movement had to be calm. She had already brought me something frightening without understanding its size, and I would not make her carry my reaction as well.
I pointed toward the leather chair near the desk, then toward the rabbit, giving her a place to wait without asking her to explain anything again. She moved a few steps away from the clock. Her shoes made almost no sound on the rug.
The study seemed different once I knew what was hidden inside it. The rain tapped against the dark window. The desk lamp cast a narrow pool over the document I had been signing. My pen remained where I had left it, its tip touching the final line, while the clock stood several feet away with its carved walnut doors open like a wound carefully held apart.
I looked from one to the other.
The document had been beside me while the device was exposed. Whatever words I had written, whatever remained unsigned, had existed within reach of a listening mechanism. I did not know whether anyone had been listening. The green light proved only that the object was active or appeared active. It did not prove transmission, storage, or a person waiting somewhere for my next sentence. I refused to give the device more certainty than it had earned.
The brass latch caught my attention again. It was hidden beneath the carved edge of the clock’s inner panel, nearly invisible unless a person knew where to press. My father had built the clock twenty-two years earlier, shaping the frame by hand. The latch belonged to the clock’s original construction, but the device did not. Someone had found the concealed access point, opened it, and placed the disk inside.
I stepped back from the mechanism.
A strand of loose tape clung to the wood near the device. I noticed it, then stopped myself from examining it more closely. Every additional touch could alter the arrangement Emma had seen, erase a mark, or leave one of mine behind. I lowered the clock’s small panel only partway, enough to shield the device from the room without forcing it into place. The green light remained visible through the narrow gap.
That was the best preservation I could manage without tools, gloves, or knowledge I did not possess.
Emma watched me from the chair. She did not look at the clock now. She looked at my face, searching for permission to be less afraid. I kept my expression level and moved behind the desk. The distance separated her from the mechanism and put her within my sight.
The unfinished document waited under the lamp. I did not pick it up. I did not turn it over. I did not move the pen. Instead, I drew the desk drawer closed with my knee, hiding nothing important but creating a boundary between the paper and the rest of the room.
The first impulse had been to call Isabella’s name and demand an explanation. The second had been to pull the device free and crush it beneath my shoe. Both impulses would have changed the evidence. Either might also have warned the person who placed it there.
So I chose secrecy.
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I would learn what I could before revealing what I knew. Until then, the clock would remain in position, Emma would remain away from it, and the document would remain unfinished. The green light blinked once more behind the brass latch.
I stood between the desk and the door, listening to the rain, while the device continued its silent work.
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