Page 1 of The Watchmaker of Dachau

Prologue

Cornwall, England

1980

The window was open, letting the cold winter air seep into the bedroom, chilling her as she lay asleep.

She woke, her nose cold, and pulled the covers over her head. She could, she knew, climb out of bed and simply close the window, yet she had never closed it, not even when it rained, or when it snowed and ice appeared in spider-web patterns on the glass. It was the freedom she loved – to make her own choice of whether to have the window open or closed. It was silly, but it had become such a habit – almost a compulsion – and she could not let it go.

Eventually, she turned in her bed to face the window, allowing the covers to slip away from her face. The room was a muggy grey that came with an early winter morning, when the light was late to find the earth, and purple and grey snow clouds muffled any sun that could find its way through.

It was time.

She shivered, not from the cold but from the realisation that it was actually going to happen, and she would have to face it, face them all and let them see who she once was.

Bracing herself, she swung her legs out of bed, as elegant as a dancer, and flexed her toes to get the blood moving. Bit by bit, she dressed herself in a slim cornflower-blue dress which nipped in at the waist, and gathered her hair into a loose chignon. She stood, staring at herself in the full-length mirror. She squinted at her reflection, seeing herself as a young woman again. Then she stopped and opened her eyes fully, to see herself as she was – the fine lines on her face and the wisps of grey in her hair showing the time that had passed, the minutes, seconds even, each part of her had been marked by time.

She slicked on some light pink lipstick and rouged her pale cheeks, concluding that she was done. As she was about to leave the bedroom, her right hand suddenly gripped her left wrist, feeling the soft skin under her fingertips. How could I forget?

She opened her jewellery box and took out a gold watch, the gemstones in the strap winking dully in the light.

Fastening it, she looked outside.

It had started to snow.

Chapter 1

Isaac

January 1945

The sky looked as though needles had been sent through velvet, causing pinpricks of light to glitter from above. Isaac watched the stars, waiting to see if one would shift its anchor and speed across the thick void, leaving a trail of light and a year’s worth of wishes.

His breath hung above him, curling upwards like dragon’s breath, and he soon had to admit defeat and lower his gaze to concentrate on his deep steps through the crunch of the iced snow.

All around him was silence, and that did not unnerve Isaac – it soothed him. In silence there was no menace, no death. Only in silence did he know he and others were safe.

He reached the corner of the street he had known all his life, now blanketed with snow, causing it to look like another world; a cleaner, perhaps brighter one. As a young boy he had played on these streets with his friends whilst his father had worked in the shop, fixing clocks, locks, and anything that anyone else could not. He had taken pride in his ability to figure out the complex workings of a carriage clock, or perhaps a locked puzzle jewellery box. His face was always aglow in the evening, as he related how he had finally managed to compete his latest quest – a watch sent from England by a man who had been recommended his excellent services, or a carriage clock, with its tiny roundabout of little gold mice underneath, from a lady in Munich. Isaac had sat many a night, listening to his father’s tales of the mechanics of time, of locked treasure chests, making him feel as though he were on an adventure, not merely repairing the broken items of those around him.

He shook the memory from his mind as he crossed the street towards the shop that was now his. He looked left and right and stood for a moment, checking that the silence was still his friend. He brushed the snow from the keyhole, and as he did, his arm caught a veil of the icy powder on the door, uncovering the corner of the star, one he now wore too.

The click of the latch seemed too loud in the street, and Isaac hushed it as if it would obey, like a baby soothed by hearing its father’s voice.

Upon opening the door, a thud of snow fell from the low-hanging roof and Isaac felt his heart beat faster. He closed the door behind him slowly, carefully, seeing his tracks in the white being covered already.

He dared not switch on the light – a bare bulb that hung in the middle of the room – and instead lit a candle, its milky wax melted and bent to one side.

The shop had been closed now for almost a year; the dust long settled into thick grey grime that covered the glass display cases, obscuring the gold, bronze and silver watches and clocks that lived inside. A grandfather clock that stood in the corner dully ticked the seconds away, echoing in the stillness.

Isaac walked to his chair behind the counter, the floorboards creaking underneath his feet, and sat down, placing the candle on the worktop. He rubbed at his leg; the cold had made the stiffness from his childhood injury worse, and the muscles and tendons tensed beneath his skin with the same knot of fear Isaac felt in his heart.

He bent down and slowly got on all fours. With bent arthritic fingers he prised away a small floorboard, revealing the prize within – his grandfather’s pocket watch. He sat back on the chair and pressed the tiny clasp. With a quick snap, the plain gold cover opened and the watch face could be seen, the hand frozen in time at 3:20. Isaac tapped the glass, as he had done as a child, as if this tiny tap would make the hands start moving once more.

‘Silly,’ he said into the quiet. ‘Silly old man.’

He wanted to put the watch into his pocket and take it home, but he knew he could not. This was just a visit to an old friend, to a memory, to one part of his family that was still close by. Hannah, his wife, had died ten years before; before the world had gone mad, and before the rest of her family in Berlin had been rounded up and disappeared into the night.

Isaac knew now where they had gone, but then it was as though they’d simply disappeared. He was glad now that Hannah had died when she did.