The Returned Clock Left A Record He Could Not Collect

I put the phone down and left both hands flat on the bench.

Beatrice waited. She had spent enough years asking questions to know when silence did useful work.

"He wants it tonight," I said.

"Did you promise to hold it?"

"No."

"Then write down what he said. His words, and which ones you're sure of."

I wrote the time, 3:42 p.m., on the intake sheet. I put quotation marks around his last two sentences. Beside the rest, I wrote that it was my summary.

Then I called our local police desk.

Officer Lena Pike came in forty minutes later. She wore rain on her shoulders and carried a plain notebook. I showed her my work order and the pictures.

"Have you changed the clock setting?" she asked.

"No. Nor wound it."

"Please leave it that way."

She asked why the September date mattered. I found the newspaper on the library website and showed her the warehouse story. She read it twice.

"This may mean something," she said. "It doesn't tell us who used those numbers."

"That's what we said," Beatrice told her.

"And you are?"

"A neighbor with soup. Former postal inspector. Entirely former."

Pike took our names separately. She photographed the open case and wrote a report number on the back of her card. She said she would speak with the detective handling Conrad's claim.

"Can I give his property back?" I asked.

She made a call from the doorway. When she returned, she said they had no order to hold it.

"Don't destroy anything. Keep your records. Call if he threatens you."

I saved the original photo files and sent a copy through the upload link Pike provided. The receipt listed the filenames and the time. I printed that receipt.

The camera card and a backup drive went into the locked records cabinet across the room. I kept my tax returns there too. I had learned to give dull things a safe home.

Beatrice watched me put it in a folder.

"You like paper," she said.

"Paper doesn't need a password."

"It does need a dry drawer."

I looked at her soup bag.

"Was that a flood joke?"

"A very kind one."

Before I closed the clock, Pike asked me to record the visible settings. The date wheel matched October 7. The hands were two minutes slow. I photographed them beside the time display again, then replaced the tin cover and the back.

That did not prove the time had been right in September. I wrote that down too.

Conrad arrived at six with a young man who stayed near the door.

"My driver," Conrad said. "Owen."

The young man looked at the clock, then at the floor.

I handed Conrad an invoice. Inspection fee, $65. Deposit received, $180. Refund due, $115.

"You didn't even fix it."

"You canceled the repair."

I counted out his refund and gave him a pickup form. It listed the clock's serial number, its closed condition, and the fact that no parts had been replaced.

He read farther down.

"Copies of all photographs to be surrendered," he said.

"That isn't on the form."

He took a pen and wrote it in.

I drew one line through his addition and put my initials beside it.

"I can't sign that. My repair records belong to me. You agreed this morning."

His face stayed pleasant. Only his mouth changed.

"They're pictures of my property."

"They're records of the work you hired me to do."

"You're making this costly."

Beatrice rose from the spare stool.

"He owes you $115," she said. "That seems quite exact."

Conrad glanced at her and lowered his voice.

"Edwin has been under strain. People should be careful about feeding his worries."

"I brought lentils."

Owen made a small sound that might have been a laugh. Conrad turned, and the sound stopped.

At last Conrad signed for the clock without my records. Owen lifted it. Under his sleeve, I saw a small blue mark shaped like a warehouse stamp.

"Call me if you recall anything you misunderstood," Conrad said.

I locked the door after them.

Through the glass, I watched Owen tuck a blanket around the oak case. He handled it as if it might wake. Conrad stood beside the truck, holding his unsigned copy of the added demand. Then he folded it into a small, hard square.

Beatrice stayed while I washed the cups. She did not offer to take charge. I was grateful for that.

"Supper tomorrow?" I asked.

"At my place. You have one vegetable in your whole kitchen."

"It's a large onion."

"Seven o'clock."

The next morning, the shop was locked as I had left it. But on my bench, my own tall regulator was running.

Its mainspring had been let down for a repair. Someone had wound it during the night.

Under its pendulum lay a card with four words written in Conrad's careful hand.

Some Things Should Stay Closed.