The Clockmaker of Shadow Street

On Shadow Street the houses stood so tall and so close together that the sun peeked in only at noon, and even then just for a little while. At the very end of the street, under a sign with a copper pendulum, old Severyn the clockmaker kept his workshop. With him lived his apprentice, Andriyko, who was eleven years old and always in a hurry to get somewhere.

Andriyko could oil a tiny cogwheel, cut a watch glass, and polish a clock face until you could see your own nose in it. There was only one thing he couldn’t do: wait.

“Clocks don’t like hasty hands,” the master would say, setting his spectacles straight.

“I’m not hasty, I’m quick,” Andriyko would answer.

The master would only chuckle into his grey beard.

Every evening, when the lamps were lit along the street, Severyn took a little net and stepped out onto the cobblestones. For a long time Andriyko thought the old man was catching moths. Then one winter evening the master called him to come along.

“Look,” he whispered, pointing at a crack between the stones.

Something was glimmering there. Something warm and golden, like a spark from the stove. The master gave a gentle flick of the net — swish! — and the spark was fluttering in the mesh.

“What is it?” Andriyko breathed.

“A lost minute. Someone stood here today, cross about being late, and stamped about on the spot for a whole minute. So it dropped out. People lose them every day: when they squabble over little things, when they’re afraid to begin, when they’re waiting and don’t notice anything around them.”

“But what do you need them for?”

“Come along, I’ll show you.”

In the back room, where Andriyko had never been allowed, stood a tall clock of dark walnut. Instead of a face it had a glass dome, and under it dozens of golden sparks were circling, like fireflies in a jar. A silver key stuck out of its side.

“This is the Clock of Lost Minutes,” said the master, and he let the new spark go under the dome. It whirled happily among the others. “When someone runs out of time for something truly important, I give them back a little.”

“Who, for instance?”

“The day before yesterday, Mrs. Hanna the baker. Her sister was leaving by stagecoach, and Mrs. Hanna was just taking bread out of the oven. She’d never have made it in time to say goodbye. So I gave her three minutes. She ran all the way, hugged her sister, and even pushed a bag of pies into her hands.”

The master pointed to the brightest spark of all, circling right up under the glass.

“And this one I’ve saved for little Mariyka from house number three. In a week it’s the holiday, and she’s going to sing in the square. She’s so nervous she’s afraid she’ll forget the words. A minute to remember them.”

Andriyko touched the key with his finger. It was so cold it stung.

“And what if you turn it backwards?”

“Then time goes backwards too,” the master said calmly. “But remember this: the minutes here aren’t mine, and they aren’t yours. They belong to the whole street. Never turn the key for yourself.”

“I won’t,” Andriyko promised. And he truly believed it.

The next morning the bell over the door went jingle, and in came Mrs. Hanna: round, rosy-cheeked, with flour on her sleeve. In her hands she held a clock with a wooden bird on its little roof.

“My swallow’s gone quiet,” the baker sighed. “It was my mother’s clock. Every hour the bird would pop out of her little window and sing, ‘Tweet-tweet!’ And now she won’t make a peep, as if the cat’s got her tongue.”

“We’ll take a look,” the master nodded. “Andriyko, take the works apart and clean them. Only don’t touch the spring. I’ll wind it myself when I’m back from the fair.”

The master left. Andriyko laid the little screws out on a cloth, and the work went briskly. Then, outside the window, Ostap shouted:

“Andriyko! The pond’s frozen! The whole street’s out skating!”

“Coming!” Andriyko shouted back. “Just a teeny bit more!”

He looked at the spring. Why, that was a minute’s work! The master would wind it anyway, and this way would be quicker. Andriyko picked up the key and turned. Once. Once more. And again.

Twang!

The spring snapped, the works jumped, and the wooden bird flew off the roof and hit the floor. Crack! One little wing split clean in two.

Andriyko froze. His ears were ringing. Ostap was still calling, but now his voice seemed to come from underwater. With shaking hands the boy put the pieces in a box and covered it with the cloth. Then he hid the bird in a drawer, under some old rags.

In the evening the master came back from the fair and shook the snow off his hat.

“Well then, how’s our swallow?”

“There’s... one part that’s worn out,” Andriyko mumbled, not raising his eyes. “We’ll need to order a new one.”

“Hm,” said the master. And nothing more.

Andriyko never did go skating. The buckwheat porridge with milk that he always loved tasted of nothing. And the words “worn out” sat in his tummy like a cold little pebble.

That night he couldn’t sleep. From the workshop downstairs came the ticking of dozens of clocks, and they all seemed to be saying the same thing:

“Tick — you lied. Tock — you lied. Tick — you lied.”

Andriyko sat up in bed. “Just a little way back,” he thought. “Only to fix it. That’s not really for me. That’s for Mrs. Hanna.”

He crept quietly down the stairs. The workshop was dark, with only the moon shining through the window. Suddenly a long shadow with outspread arms rose up on the wall. Andriyko ducked down in fright. Then he looked closer. Why, it was only the master’s sheepskin coat on its hook! Then something rustled in the corner. The boy held his breath... and out strolled Murko the cat, yawning.

“Oh, bother you,” Andriyko whispered, but he smiled a little.

In the back room the golden minutes circled quietly under the dome. Andriyko took hold of the silver key. The cold ran through his fingers all the way up to his elbow. He turned it backwards.

The ticking changed. Instead of “tick-tock” it went “tock-tick.” Outside the window the snowflakes flew upward, back into the sky. The moon sailed backwards behind the rooftops. Smoke slid back down into the chimneys, and the lamps went out one by one. The sky turned pink, then pale, and suddenly it was broad daylight in the workshop. The little screws lay on the cloth, and the spring was whole and good as new.

“Andriyko!” Ostap shouted outside the window. “The pond’s frozen!”

Andriyko laughed with relief. It had worked! This time he wouldn’t rush. This time he wouldn’t so much as glance at that spring.

“On my way!” he shouted. “I’ll just finish up!”

“You always ‘just finish up’!” Ostap said crossly. “Everyone’s already skating, and you never come!”

Andriyko looked at the window, then at the clock. A minute. Just one minute of work, and he’d be free. His fingers reached for the key all by themselves...

Twang!

The spring snapped a second time. The bird flew off the roof a second time. And the wing cracked in exactly the same place as before.

Andriyko groaned. He dashed to the back room and seized the silver key. Then, suddenly, he stopped.

Under the dome it had grown darker. Not long ago dozens of sparks had been circling there, and now barely half were left. The rest had gone out while he was turning the key backwards. And the brightest one, Mariyka’s, trembled right under the glass, glowing ever so faintly, like an ember about to go out.

“Just once more,” something whispered inside him. “This time it’ll work for sure.”

And what if it didn’t? Then again. And again. Until there wasn’t a single minute left under the dome. None for Mrs. Hanna, none for Mariyka, none for anyone who might one day truly run out of time.

Andriyko looked at his hand on the key. It was the same hand it had been an hour ago, and it was still in just as much of a hurry. The key could bring back minutes, but it couldn’t teach that hand to wait.

Slowly, he let go.

In the evening the master came back from the fair and shook the snow off his hat. Andriyko was already waiting by the door. He held the box of parts out in front of him, and on top lay the bird with the cracked wing.

“Master,” he said, and his voice gave a treacherous squeak. “I broke the spring. You told me not to touch it, but I was in a hurry to go skating. And then... then I turned the key. I wanted to fix everything. And I broke it again. And because of me, lots of minutes went out.”

The master was silent for a long time. Then he took off his spectacles and wiped them with his handkerchief.

“I saw it had gone darker under the dome,” he said at last. “I was wondering whether you’d tell me.”

“Are you angry?”

“A little,” Severyn answered honestly. “About the minutes. But about the spring, no. I broke my first spring when I was nine. In the mayor’s very own clock! Oh, how I howled. The whole street could hear me!”

Andriyko sniffled and gave a shy smile.

“We’ll put in a new spring,” the master went on. “You’ll glue the wing yourself. And tomorrow you’ll take the clock to Mrs. Hanna and tell her everything, just the way you told me.”

“By myself?” Andriyko gasped.

“By yourself,” the master nodded. “You’re the quick one, after all.”

All evening they sat over the clock. The master fitted the new spring, and Andriyko glued the wing. Slowly. Very slowly. He held it until the glue set, counting to a hundred, and then to a hundred again. It turned out that waiting is work too, and no easier than any other kind.

The next morning the bakery smelled of poppy seeds and warm bread. Mrs. Hanna was taking golden braided loaves out of the oven. Andriyko stood on the doorstep with the clock in his hands, and his knees were shaking harder than they had in the night, when the coat on the hook gave him such a fright.

“Oh, my swallow!” the baker cried happily. “Is she ready already?”

Andriyko took a deep, deep breath.

“Mrs. Hanna, I’m the one who broke her. I was rushing and didn’t listen to the master. We’ve changed the spring, and I glued the wing. But you can see the seam. I’m sorry.”

Mrs. Hanna took the clock, held the bird up to the window, and studied it for a long while. Andriyko waited for her to frown. Instead, she suddenly laughed.

“See this little patch on the other wing? When I was your age, I dropped the bird on the floor. Oh, how I cried! And my mother glued it and said, ‘Now she has a story.’ So now there’ll be two patches: one mine and one yours.”

She moved the hands round. The little window creaked, and the bird peeked out and sang:

“Tweet-tweet! Tweet-tweet!”

And Mrs. Hanna slipped a still-warm poppy-seed bagel into Andriyko’s pocket.

That same evening, when the lamps were lit, the master held out the net to Andriyko.

“Tonight you’re the one collecting. We owe the street a debt.”

Andriyko walked the cobblestones for a long time. By the pond, where the children were skating, there were more lost minutes than anywhere else. Someone was scared to let go of a hand, someone was squabbling over a sled. Swish, that was one. Swish, that was two. Ostap helped too. He couldn’t see a single spark, but he held up the lantern. They kept at it until both their fingers were numb with cold.

Back home, Andriyko let his catch out under the dome. Seven sparks. They whirled merrily among the others, but under the glass it grew only a tiny bit brighter. Up at the top, Mariyka’s minute still glowed ever so faintly.

“How many went out that night?” Andriyko asked quietly.

“Forty-two,” said the master. “I’d been collecting them since autumn.”

Forty-two in a single night. And seven in a whole evening.

Meanwhile the master took the silver key out of the clock, threaded a string through its loop, and hung it around his own neck.

“Don’t you trust me anymore?” Andriyko whispered.

“I trust you,” Severyn answered. “You told the truth, and that isn’t easy. Your hands, though, not yet. The key will stay with me until the dome is crowded again.”

“Will that take long?”

“We’ll see.”

It took a long time. Every evening Andriyko took the net and went out onto the cobblestones, but minutes didn’t turn up every day: three one evening, one the next, then none at all. Mariyka’s minute never did brighten before the holiday, and Mariyka sang in the square without it. She remembered the words, though not right away. And Andriyko stood in the crowd with his fists clenched until the song was over.

The silver key hung around the master’s neck until spring. And every time Andriyko crossed the workshop and passed the back room, the clocks on the walls ticked after him:

“Tick — wait. Tock — wait.”