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He told her what he rarely thought of any longer: his childhood, in the Arizona desert, absent parents. Long hours to fill. “Time dragged. I was drawn to what marked the passage. Studying watches, collecting watches,makingwatches. It made those hours bearable.
“But then timepieces … they weren’t enough. I needed to put the theory behind them into something bigger. Just as complicated, just as elegant. But more intense.
“I got the answer when a friend’s life was destroyed. A drunk driver. He ended up in a wheelchair.”
“Like Lincoln Rhyme.”
“Hm. The driver? No remorse. None. I decided to kill him. But I realized I’d need to plot it out as carefully as a watchmaker plans his timepiece. It’s not hard to kill someone. You—”
“Hit them over the head with a pipe.”
He paused. His very words, with the exception that the weapon in his illustration would be a brick.
He said, “No elegance.”
“And then there’s escape.”
Hale offered, “It worked. He died. I got away. The line was crossed and I knew I’d never go back.”
“What’s next for you?” she asked.
“Underground. For a while, at least. With Lincoln’s death, there’ll be people after me.”
She said, “Always happens with a public target.”
“You?”
“A kill. College town. No one connected to the school. An OC informant. But I’ll use the faculty as a cover. I’ll be a poet.”
Hale couldn’t fathom how the wheels and springs ofthatplot would work.
Simone eased onto her back and tugged the sheet up to her armpits. Not from modesty, but because the trailer was drafty. “You must have hundreds of clocks and watches. Is there a favorite?”
“Always the next one, the one I’m working on at the moment.”
She nodded; she understood this too.
“But of those I’ve made in the past? A clock made out of meteoric iron.”
She said, “Kamacite and taenite. Alloys of nickel and iron. For one job, I had to be a geologist.”
“The only naturally found metallic form of iron on earth. Meteorites.”
She was considering something, eyes on the ceiling. “But … springs? Iron wouldn’t have elasticity.”
“No springs. I used a weight escarpment. I carved a small chain out of the iron. Another favorite? Not one I made. I acquired it. Made out of bone. It does have some metal. But I think you could make a tension device from bone that could power it.”
“Human bone?”
“I don’t know. I suppose it could be tested. Maybe there’s some DNA left.”
“Who made it?”
“A prisoner in Russia. Political prisoner. He was on a work detail and they let him have tools. It took him a year. He made it asa bribe for one of the guards to let him escape. It could be sold for thousands. In dollars. You couldn’t carry enough rubles to buy it.”
“Did it work?”
“The clock worked fine. His plans didn’t. The guard took it and shot him.”
