Historical March 1995 article. Dates, prices, services and contacts describe the source period; current availability has not been established.
Henry had been a clockmaker for as long as he could remember. Although he was just in his early twenties, his memories were an eternity for him.
As a young child, he’d been apprenticed to a “docker,” Mr. Samuels.
He really didn’t remember much before that. At first he only went to the clock shop after school, a few days a week and on weekends.
But then once he turned sixteen, he stopped going to school all together.
He stopped going to regular school, that is. Because going to Mr. Samuels’ shop, ‘The TimeKeeper,” was an education.
He learned more there than he ever had in school. At first Henry was only allowed to clean the clocks.
The pieces would already be apart, and his job was to dip them in the solvent and then use a thin cotton cloth to wipe and clean them.
He got to be pretty good at this. Ile was seven, maybe eight, years old by the time he had this skill mastered.
The next step was to get to actually take the clock apart and clean the pieces. Gently he would take each piece from the clock, setting it at a precise place on his work table.
When the clock was all apart, he could look at the table and imagine the pieces coming back together again, as if by magic.
He wasn’t ready to reassemble yet, but he became fascinated with how all of the gears and pinions worked together.
Each clock was like a little universe. By the time he was eighteen, he was Mr. Samuels’ first assistant. Mr. Samuels was already old by then, so it really meant that Henry ran the shop.
He dealt with most of the customers and supervised three other apprentices, all younger — and much more clumsy — than he was. Henry became a very, very good clocker. Mr. Samuels had no children of his own and was so pleased with Henry’s work, that he had his will changed to give the tril‘Keeper to Henry upon his death.
He told Henry about this one night as they were closing. That was a mistake. Although Mr. Samuels was old, Henry knew that it could be a long time before he actually died. Henry wasn’t a patient person.
His success as a clocker surprised his friends and family because it seemed to require lots of patience. And patience was one thing that the people who knew Henry knew that he didn’t have.
In school he had many difficulties because he would blurt out answers or challenge others who disagreed with him.
His third grade teacher wrote on a report “Henry is impulsive and feels that rules are made for others.” In the clock shop, though, Henry could spend hours working on one clock, slowly bringing the inert metal to life.
But Henry hadn’t changed, he was still impulsive and he still felt that rules were for everyone else. Like waiting for Mr. Samuels’ death. “Other people might be willing to wait, but not me,” Henry thought. Why should he spend the best years of his life working for someone else when the store was really his?
It happened one night after closing. Henry hadn’t planned anything, but there was Mr. Samuels standing at the top of the stairs, peering down into the cellar. Without thinking, Henry slammed his body into Mr. Samuels.
There was a cry and a terrible noise as Mr. Samuels fell down the steps, rolling over and over and over.
Then there was silence. Henry went to the body and looked closely.
There was no breathing. “This was easier than I imagined,” thought Henry. Mr. Samuels was old and had fallen a couple of times before, so there was no question about the cause of his death.
The ceremony was simple and many of Mr. Samuels’ customers made a point of coming up to Henry and telling him how sad they were that his friend and mentor had died, but that they were looking forward to Henry keeping the TimeKeeper tradition of excellence alive. Henry smiled with each and made a point of using their names in telling them how much he would miss Mr. Samuels.
He had learned many things in watching Mr. Samuels, pampering customers not the least of them! Henry liked reading the newspapers, especially the tabloids that had big sections on crime.
He liked clocks most of all, but second was reading about murders.
He became a Sherlock Holmes fan, although he envisioned himself as much more like Dr. Watson.
He was proud of himself because he had committed The Perfect Crime.
But it bothered him that he couldn’t tell anyone.
He was smart enough, though, to know that one of the reasons it was perfect was that no one else knew.
But it bothered him anyway. One day he was creating a gear for a Seth Thomas mantle clock.
The clock was over a hundred years old, and this was exactly the kind of task that would hold his interest for hours.
But Henry kept making mistakes.
This was very unlike him; he took pride in his precision.
But part of the problem was that he couldn’t stop thinking about Miss Wendell. Miss Wendell was a few years older than Henry.
She would walk by the store almost daily and look inside for Henry and smile.
This had been going on for years.
She wasn’t married, Henry knew, but he couldn’t gather up enough nerve to talk to her.
Then last week she came in the shop and brought a clock to be repaired.
She had lingered and they had talked for a few minutes.
He found out that her first name was Renee.
When she left, Henry knew.
He knew that she was the one he would tell what had really happened to Mr. Samuels.
He knew, too, that he would have to kill her after he told her.
But that was all right.
Then he would have committed two Perfect Crimes.
He put aside the Seth Thomas clock and began to work furiously on Miss Wendell’s, Renee’s, clock.
She had brought him an eighteenth century French carriage clock, something that was worth quite a bit of money.
It had a hand-painted face, showing a boy and girl holding hands in a field. Henry smiled, thinking of holding hands with Renee.
Then he smiled even more, imagining what he would do to her after he told her about Mr. Samuels.
He kept himself from thinking of too many details, because he didn’t want to plan it.
It would just happen. That’s the way Henry liked things. Renee Wendell came into the shop a week later.
It was near closing time; Henry had let the apprentices leave early.
Her perfume grabbed him as she entered. Without looking up, he knew who it was.
She came to the counter and cleared her throat.
He looked up and saw that she was smiling.
He couldn’t help himself, and smiled back at her. “Is my clock ready?” she asked, tossing her head a bit as she spoke.
Her light brown curls dashed down her forehead, and Henry forgot what she had said. ‘Well,” she went on, “is it ready?” “Oh yes, indeed it is,” responded Henry. “But it’s not up here, it’s down in the cellar with the other expensive clocks that are in for repair.” Henry moved from behind the counter and began to walk toward the stairs to get her clock. “Can I go with you?
I would like to see other expensive clocks,” she said. Although no customer had ever been in the cellar, he couldn’t think of a reason why she shouldn’t go there. And then a wry smile crossed his face. “Of course,” he said, “you’ll enjoy seeing them.” His heart began to race, knowing what was going to happen.
They walked slowly down the steps, Henry in front and Renee following. Because the steps were so steep, it took a long time to get to the bottom.
She had begun to talk to Henry, asking him how long he had worked on clocks, what was his favorite clock, and so on.
But he was having trouble concentrating.
The smell of her perfume and the thought of what he was about to do had his heart pumping.
This was why he didn’t plan, he thought, the beauty and excitement of the moment were much richer.
They would both be surprised! Renee stood by a table looking at some anniversary clocks. Henry moved behind her and picked up an iron rod that had been laying in the corner.
She was saying something, but he wasn’t really listening.
He raised the rod above his head and brought it down on her neck with all of the strength and force that was in his body.
She fell to the ground without a sound.
All he was aware of was the smell of her perfume and the sound of his breathing. There!
He had done it again.
Another Perfect Crime. Henry sat down at the table and began cleaning an Ansonia clock.
He began to hum quietly to himself.
Originally published in The Times of Skinker-DeBaliviere, March 1995.
Read this article in the original newspaper issue.
Original source: SD_Times1995_03.pdf, printed page(s) 8, 7; PDF page(s) 8, 7.
