Chapter 4 - THE CLOCK THAT STOPPED AT 9:40
The estate locked down before dawn.
Steel shutters covered the ground-floor windows. Security lights flooded the courtyard. Armed men searched the western woods while Gabriel directed them through a radio.
Clara remained in Margaret’s room until footsteps approached.
This time Elias entered without knocking.
He wore a black jacket over his sweater. A compact pistol rested on his lap.
His gaze moved from Margaret to Clara, then to the strip of paper in Clara’s hand.
“What is that?”
Neither woman answered.
Elias closed the door.
“The person who entered my east wing knew the security code,” he said. “He reached a private archive, opened a locked cabinet, and removed one file.”
“What file?” Margaret asked.
“Chelsea redevelopment contracts.”
Margaret frowned. “Those are old.”
“They are also worthless to anyone who doesn’t know what is hidden in them.”
Clara felt the paper between her fingers.
Elias noticed.
“Give it to me.”
She hesitated.
“Clara.”
It was the first time he had used her first name.
She handed him the number sequence.
He read it once.
His face became still.
“Where did you find this?”
“In my father’s photograph.”
“Thomas Keane’s photograph?”
Margaret looked at Clara.
The secret was over.
“Yes,” Clara said.
Elias’s eyes lifted.
“Gabriel knew?”
“He recognized him at the gate.”
“And you came here under a false name?”
“Doyle is my mother’s name.”
“Convenient.”
“It’s legal.”
“Legality isn’t the issue.”
He examined the numbers again.
“You lied inside my house.”
“I needed to get inside.”
“To do what?”
“Find out what happened to my father.”
“Your father helped three men shoot me.”
“We don’t know that.”
“I was there.”
“Did you see him fire?”
Elias’s jaw tightened.
“No.”
“Did you see him arrange the meeting?”
“No.”
“Then you know what Gabriel told you.”
That struck him.
Margaret stepped between them before he could answer.
“Thomas called Clara after the shooting.”
Elias looked at her.
“What did he say?”
Clara wanted to keep the words private.
But privacy had become a luxury she could no longer afford.
“If Moretti survives, do not let him trust Gabriel.”
For several seconds Elias did not move.
Outside, radio chatter crackled through the courtyard.
Then he gave a quiet laugh without amusement.
“The final advice of a traitor.”
“Or a warning from someone who discovered the truth,” Clara said.
Elias rolled closer.
“You think Gabriel arranged my shooting?”
“I think my father believed he did.”
“Your father worked for Victor Sloane.”
“So did half the men around the waterfront.”
“Your defense of him is touching.”
“I’m not defending him.”
Her voice rose despite herself.
“I’m trying to understand why he disappeared, why Gabriel knew his face immediately, and why someone hid numbers inside the only photograph my father left.”
Elias looked down at the paper.
“Those numbers refer to the clock.”
Clara’s anger cooled.
“You know?”
“The clock stopped at 9:40 on the night my father died.”
Margaret closed her eyes.
Elias continued.
“He collapsed beneath it during a family dinner. Heart attack.”
“That’s why no one touches it?”
“My mother refused to have it repaired. After she died, Margaret continued the tradition.”
Margaret’s voice was quiet. “Some grief becomes architecture.”
Clara looked at the remaining numbers.
“Eleven, three, eight.”
Elias turned toward the door.
“Come with me.”
The entrance hall was guarded by two men.
Gabriel stood near the front doors.
His expression darkened when he saw Clara walking beside Elias.
“No one should be moving through the house,” he said.
“Then stop moving,” Elias replied.
“The intruder may still be inside.”
“He escaped through the west woods.”
“We found blood but no body.”
“Your men lost him.”
“My men are searching.”
Elias stopped beside the grandfather clock.
Gabriel’s gaze moved to the number strip.
Clara saw recognition.
Only for an instant.
But it was enough.
“What are you doing?” Gabriel asked.
“Remembering my father.”
“At four in the morning?”
“Grief keeps strange hours.”
Elias looked toward the guards.
“Leave us.”
Gabriel did not move.
“That includes you.”
“I’m not leaving you unprotected.”
“I have Clara.”
Gabriel almost laughed. “The maid?”
Elias’s eyes became ice.
“The woman who noticed an intruder before your entire security team.”
That was not true, but Gabriel did not know it.
He glanced at Clara.
Then he motioned for the guards to follow him.
“I’ll be ten feet away.”
“Make it twenty.”
When they had withdrawn, Margaret approached the clock.
Its wooden case rose nearly nine feet. Carved vines framed the glass. The hands remained fixed at 9:40.
Clara read the numbers again.
“Eleven, three, eight.”
“Could be a combination,” Elias said.
“There’s no keypad.”
Margaret opened the lower cabinet.
Inside hung three brass weights and a motionless pendulum.
Elias leaned forward.
“Eleven inches from the base. Three from the left. Eight deep.”
Clara crouched.
She measured using the width of her fingers, then pressed along the interior panel.
One section moved.
A hidden drawer slid open.
Inside lay a brass key and a small cassette tape sealed in plastic.
Elias picked up the cassette.
Margaret whispered, “That was there all these years?”
Clara examined the key.
A stamped number appeared on one side.
317.
“What does it open?” she asked.
Elias turned the key over.
“Safe-deposit box.”
“How do you know?”
“My father used the same bank for forty years.”
A sound came from the corridor.
Elias quickly placed the cassette inside his jacket and gave Clara the key.
“Hide it.”
She slipped it into her shoe.
Gabriel returned.
“Find anything?”
“Dust,” Elias said.
Gabriel looked at the open clock cabinet.
“Why is she touching it?”
“She isn’t.”
Clara remained crouched several feet away.
Gabriel’s eyes narrowed.
A security guard approached and whispered into his ear.
Something changed in Gabriel’s expression.
He turned to Elias.
“We found the intruder.”
“Alive?”
“No.”
“Who was he?”
“Dominic Vale.”
Elias went still.
Margaret gripped the side of the clock.
Clara looked between them.
“Who is Dominic Vale?”
Elias answered without taking his eyes off Gabriel.
“My former accountant.”
Gabriel continued.
“He fell from the cliffs.”
“After you shot him?”
“He was armed.”
“Did he fire?”
“He raised his weapon.”
“How fortunate that dead men cannot dispute details.”
Gabriel stepped closer.
“Dominic stole from you. He disappeared after the ambush. Tonight he broke into your archive. What conclusion would you prefer?”
“The correct one.”
“I’m trying to keep you alive.”
“You keep reminding me.”
“Because you keep making it difficult.”
The two men stared at each other.
Then Elias spoke quietly.
“Bring me the body.”
Gabriel’s expression changed.
“The tide took it.”
Clara felt cold.
“You said you found him,” Elias replied.
“We found where he fell.”
“Then you did not find him.”
“His blood was on the rocks.”
“That isn’t a body.”
Gabriel’s patience cracked.
“He was shot through the chest. No one survives that fall.”
Elias touched the bandage Clara had placed around his hand.
“People survive unlikely things.”
Gabriel looked at the bandage.
Then at Clara.
Understanding entered his eyes.
“You treated him.”
Clara said nothing.
“You were in his office.”
Elias answered for her. “I ordered her to help.”
“You told me no one was there.”
“I changed my mind.”
Gabriel’s anger was no longer hidden.
“You trust her after three days?”
“I don’t trust anyone.”
His gaze held Gabriel’s.
“That is what you taught me.”
A telephone rang in the security office.
One of the guards answered.
Seconds later, he returned carrying a cordless receiver.
“It’s Dr. Marino.”
Gabriel took it.
His expression tightened while he listened.
“What hospital?”
He turned away, but Clara heard the rest.
“No, don’t notify the police. Keep him sedated. I’ll handle it.”
Gabriel ended the call.
“Who is in the hospital?” Elias asked.
“No one connected to us.”
“That answer ensures he is connected to us.”
Gabriel handed the phone back to the guard.
“A man was found on the highway.”
“Who?”
“He had no identification.”
“Then how did Marino know to call you?”
Gabriel remained silent.
Elias’s gaze became dangerous.
“Who is he?”
Gabriel finally answered.
“Dominic Vale.”
The hall went quiet.
Clara looked toward the windows, beyond which Gabriel claimed Dominic had fallen into the Atlantic.
“If Dominic is alive,” she said, “whose blood is on the cliffs?”
Gabriel turned on her.
“This does not concern you.”
Elias’s voice cut in.
“Everything in this house concerns her until I say otherwise.”
Margaret stared at him.
So did Clara.
Elias ignored both of them.
“Prepare the car,” he ordered.
Gabriel shook his head. “You’re not leaving.”
“That was not a request.”
“The estate may be compromised.”
“It was compromised before she arrived.”
Elias pointed toward Clara.
“She comes with me.”
“No.”
The answer came too fast.
Elias noticed.
“Why not?”
Gabriel’s gaze settled on Clara.
“Because Thomas Keane’s daughter may be the reason Dominic came here.”
Margaret stepped forward.
But Elias raised one hand.
“You knew who she was from the moment she reached the gate,” he said.
“Yes.”
“And you allowed her inside.”
“I wanted to know what she was looking for.”
Clara’s stomach turned.
Gabriel had not failed to recognize the photograph.
He had deliberately admitted her into the house.
Elias’s voice became dangerously calm.
“You used my home as a trap without telling me.”
“I protected you.”
“You monitored me.”
“Someone had to.”
Gabriel looked at Clara.
“Search her.”
The guards hesitated.
Elias moved his chair between Clara and the nearest man.
“No one touches her.”
The words landed with unexpected force.
Gabriel’s eyebrows lifted.
“You’re protecting the daughter of a traitor?”
“I am protecting an employee from a man who has forgotten who gives orders in this house.”
For one second, Clara thought Gabriel might draw his gun.
Instead, he smiled.
“You want to visit Dominic? Fine.”
He gestured toward the doors.
“But if the girl leaves this estate, she does so in my vehicle.”
Elias looked at Clara.
“No.”
Clara understood.
Gabriel controlled the cars.
The gates.
The road.
Possibly every guard.
There was only one route he did not know she knew about.
“The service tunnel,” she said.
Margaret closed her eyes.
Gabriel stared.
Elias slowly turned toward his aunt.
“You neglected to mention a tunnel.”
“You were six when I last used it.”
“Where does it lead?”
“The western woods.”
Gabriel’s hand moved toward his radio.
Clara saw it.
So did Elias.
“Don’t,” Elias said.
Gabriel stopped.
A new sound came from inside the grandfather clock.
A faint click.
Then another.
The pendulum began to move.
No one had touched it.
The clock’s hands trembled.
Slowly, impossibly, they advanced from 9:40.
The bell rang once.
Behind the clock, a hidden panel opened.
A narrow passage descended into darkness.
At the bottom stood a wounded man with blood covering his shirt.
Dominic Vale raised both empty hands.
May you like
“Elias,” he gasped. “If Gabriel is still in this house, you have less than ten minutes to live.”
---
