The Horologist Read online

  The horologist glanced up. “Some boundaries seem like they’ll go on forever. You can keep fighting and fighting them, but you’ll never get to where you’re going. Sometimes, you must reassess the boundary itself to see that most limitations, like fears, are just an illusion. Only when we have exposed such a fabrication are we able to step outside the loop.”

  It was clear that the horologist wanted Oliver to learn something in this moment. He stepped down and took the plastic bottle. His grip compressed the thin container and sent a cloud of suspended solids up into the water.

  Why is this the only option? Oliver thought. He studied the mixture swirling in his hand, then realized, Who am I to clear the muddy water? He grew patient, and the water cleansed itself from the mud as the heavy silt drifted to the bottom. There are forces much larger than ourselves, he thought. At times, there is great advantage in inaction.

  Oliver carefully descended the stairs to H.B. and handed him the water, cautioning him to sip from the top with care. Then Oliver and the horologist began to climb to the unmarked door. Out of earshot, Oliver asked, “Why give him anything? Doesn’t that just encourage his behavior?”

  The horologist calmly shook his head. “Oliver. Oliver. That poor soul usually only speaks to himself. H.B. must have seen some good in you.”

  “Good in me? He must be mad.”

  The horologist grinned. “Things aren’t always as they seem. You may only pass by that fellow once. It’s best to do any good you can while you have the chance.” Now at the portal, the horologist placed his hand on Oliver’s shoulder. “I’d like to show you something.”

  The door was a shade below black and had a white, parallelogram handle with no keyhole. The realm which they stepped into had no height. No length. No dimension. It was a place without simple answers or explanations.

  In front of them was a clock of cosmic proportion. It was a derivation of something infinite, a substrate of a supreme fabric. The satellite-sized dial was lathered white, with platinum bearings and bold markings. Behind the dial swayed a titanic pendulum, which swung back and forth in asymmetrical shifts. Between the men and the dial, hovering over the black-and-white tiled floor, were two mechanical gears. One black, one white. The simplicity of these instruments suggested extreme complexity.

  The horologist spoke with solace. “I caution you to prepare yourself, Oliver.” He moved to the hovering mechanics. “This black gear, Oliver, is death. It slows down time when a soul passes.”

  Turning to its white brother, “And this is life; it speeds up time to balance death. The white gear propels time forward, and the black gear pushes time backward. Time is based on their resonance.”

  Oliver watched as the gears opposed each other with countering clicks. “Each time death backs up, life must work harder. Oliver, I’m concerned that one day the white gear will fail. Aeon upon aeon have flowed through these gears, and at some point, one must give.”

  Somewhere behind the bliss, bewildered shadows conferred. Oliver sensed the gravity of these statements. “What can I do to help?”

  “Unfortunately, Oliver, it is not up to me.” The horologist handed him a pair of unnumbered die—one white, the other black. “Remember, Oliver, death is only a change in time.”

  Oliver looked up from his hand as the horologist slipped back out the door. Oliver followed, but when the white knob flipped shut, the door morphed into the black-and-white checkered tile that was around the room. Oliver understood that he was meant to stay, and that the horologist again wanted him to learn something.

  He made way back to the oscillating gears, now grasping what he had been asked to do. He expanded his chest, tightened his forearm, and tossed the contrasting die across the floor. They rolled and toppled and rolled and toppled. The echoes ricocheted off the tile with increasing sound as the die trundled near the swaying pendulum. And when they crossed its path, the erratic metronome swung itself and knocked them into a further cascade. And something changed.

  The black and white die began snowballing in size as they absorbed the tiles. Each flip of their faces absorbed more and more matter as the die grew into behemoth cubes.

  The black die had just recoiled off a wall and was headed directly towards the white gear of life when the horologist’s words came back to him. Only when we have exposed fabrication are we able to step outside the loop. Oliver planted his feet in front of the white gear as blackness toppled towards him. The towering die seethed with faint internal shadows and snapped down on Oliver like the hammer of a .357 Magnum. Oliver was nothing in that moment. It was not as simple as darkness or an absence of light. It was just silent. Oliver was compressed to the point where he could be no more.

  Suddenly, he was back atop the bevel staircase above the restaurant. He felt irreducible and inviolate, vast and incalculable. Neither H.B. nor the horologist was there. The only person on the steps was a handsome bathroom attendant. Oliver turned back towards the unmarked door. It read, Men’s. A restroom. Oliver headed for the bar, just looking to escape this macrocosm.

  He strolled past the pianist to get a drink, and finished it leaning against the piano, not sure if was dreaming or awake. A hand came to his shoulder followed by a soft voice. “Oliver?”

  He turned, and what he saw frightened him.

  She was radiant and glowing, a model with gorgeous cheekbones sharp enough to carve ice. It was Isabella, wearing a white cocktail dress and looking like heaven. Oliver could not take his eyes away. In this land of tropes and misdirection, Isabella had come back to him.

  Oliver shifted towards her, and she to him. Her breasts rested against his chest as Oliver set his palm to her cheek. Their eyes closed. Their lips met. It was everything they had been waiting for. Everything.

  But when Oliver opened his eyes, Isabella was disappearing into starlight, and she held the heavy alloy pocket watch Oliver had seen before. She turned his hand and set it in his palm. Oliver was inanimate as he watched her fade. The pianist stopped playing and looked at Oliver’s solemn face. “Love is not what you have, Oliver. Love is what’s left over, after time has burned everything away.”

  Oliver stared blankly, his hand out as Isabella’s palm dissolved over his.

  The pianist resumed. His hands navigated the board while he spoke, looking at Oliver.

  “We spend our lives waiting until we’re perfect or bulletproof to go after what we really want. Don’t squander opportunities that may not be recoverable. Don’t turn your back on the things that truly matter in your heart. Time only speeds up as you go. Don’t wait to do what’s right.”

  Oliver could sense that, in this complex multiverse, a far-reaching and illimitable plan was being devised. But there was still that one lingering question. It had yet to be addressed and might never be a concern, but the question was still there.

  THE MENTOR

  THE SAME RESTLESS energy that inspired Oliver and Leo to leave home had propelled them across hemispheres all the way to New York City. Moses signed them to his investment firm and mentored them for five years in the lucrative business of real estate private equity. During the first year, his staff put Oliver and Leo through a rigorous analyst program. The following four were spent directly shadowing their mentor.

  As the boys grew into young men, they gained impressive insight from Moses. With each year of prosperity, the comfort of success settled further and further in, and with each year of experience, Oliver and Leo grew busier and busier with their work. Time accelerated, but not forward. It expanded geometrically in a flat disk, spiraling outward from its epicenter. For Oliver and Leo, life had grown quickly, then tapered out. Everything they had done, they seemed to do over and over again. Days were indistinguishable, superimposed from office to office, subway to subway, nightclub to nightclub, restaurant to restaurant. A VHS tape on fast-forward, zipping along.

  It was early morning with the sun not shining in New York City. Leo had finished his breakfast and was reading the Saturday paper while Oliver w
as still eating. Leo took notice, but didn’t say anything as he watched Oliver comb through a letter he received in the mail.

  Once Oliver had settled in financially, he’d hired a private investigator to try and get back in touch with Isabella. Part of it was curiosity, part of it was just having the means, but deep down there was a small ember of hope that burned in the young man.

  Unfortunately, Isabella had left for university while Oliver was with Gabriel the clothier. Isabella’s parents declined to provide information about their daughter’s whereabouts. The private eye had informed Oliver that no university would supply confidential information about their students, and that because he never received a lead, he had no way of knowing where to look, or where Isabella might have gone after that. Yet, twice a year, the investigator would still send a letter confirming the status of the case. Leo recognized the look of distress on Oliver’s face, and tried to turn his attention to something else.

  “Got to leave in fifteen. All set for these meetings?”

  Oliver dropped the letter beside his plate, nodded, and took the coffee to his room to shower.

  Oliver and Leo were in Grand Army Plaza two hours later. Moses held a folded newspaper under his arm and jawed to another man on the curb. “I’m only interested in the exceptionally rare at this point.” The men shook hands, turned back-to-back and proceeded in opposite directions, each with an entourage at their hip. That concluded the first meeting.

  From twenty paces away, Moses looked like a mountain of health. He was six foot one with heroic shoulders and a butch walk. Close-up, though, his face was leaden. Above his creased forehead were thinning locks of white hair. No matter—Moses was still a brilliant investment tactician of imposing power. He was still methodical, and majestic.

  Oliver, in his windowpanes, and Leo, in his pinstripes, strutted by his side. They had become the very model of industrious and enterprising young men. They were seriously handsome, but their success came with a color that gave their faces weight beyond their years.

  The cadre’s next stop was an executive conference room on the forty-fourth floor of a skyscraper. Moses and his team stood before the office building on this weekend morning with sincere distaste. There were mortgages to be paid, cars to be purchased, and private school tuitions to be billed. Money had its flexed grip around their necks; it had them working on their day off.

  The squadron of lawyers, accountants, and the investment team marched into the high-ceilinged, marble lobby and made for the elevators.

  “Closed.”

  This word was an earthquake. The gentleman seated behind the reception desk notified them that the elevators were down. Moses froze and began a short spasm of coughing. “What?” His voice echoed across the white tundra of the lobby.

  The third in the annual wave of snowstorms had knocked out the power to the elevators. Moses and his team were now forced to climb forty-four flights up to the meeting. The lumpy businessmen wheezed and barked as they lugged their briefcases and bellies up the frigid concrete steps. Their team had pored over all the little details of the negotiation so they could enter the meeting with unencumbered minds; but now, that objective was shot.

  In the conference room, the cold and sweaty group dropped their coats and took seats around the executive table. Everyone sat but Moses, who stood before the floor-to-ceiling window and looked out north over the skyline. If Central Park is where fortunes are spent, this was where they were made. The view was worth a million bucks. He studied it and imagined the Upper East and West sides wrapping the park like a diamond necklace.

  Eighty minutes later, at the tail-end of the meeting, every glass of mineral water was empty. The contract had been executed and the legal counsel now robotically congratulated the counterparty, “Gentlemen, you are now the owner of 6 Bond Street.”

  As everyone began packing their supplies, a taunt echoed off the table. “Moses, thanks for the cherry.”

  This transparent provocation came from the new owner of 6 Bond Street. He had an oily voice and wore droopy eyes, a doctored face, and slicked-back hair, which resulted in a forehead that could only be described as a sniper’s dream. If that wasn’t enough, his frumpish suit was a measurement too wide and it had a gaudy, double-tiered lapel that should have remained in the nineteenth century.

  No one had moved, and no one had said a word, when Leo, wanting to defend Moses, straightened his spine to speak words that would end in false teeth. But Moses sternly indicated that nothing was to be said. Leo’s mannerisms reverted in his chair.

  The purchasing team then exited, and every pair of eyes faced Moses. All decisions passed directly from his hand, and there was never a breakdown in discipline. Oliver and Leo remembered their mentor’s creed from early on. “In fighting, you never get enough, but in yielding, you get more than expected.” And they had seen how this worked for Moses. He was notoriously straitlaced and had an improbable success rate on deals with infinitesimal odds. Moses never became angry. He never made a threat. Moses was a man of principle.

  “Not everyone is bound by civil conventions. Let’s all forget about it. Besides, he overpaid.”

  The conference room slowly cleared as the team sectioned off to their individual offices. Oliver and Leo stayed behind. Moses, still standing before the window, sighed. On the wall opposite the window hung a colossal painting of a lion. The beast had been fabulously depicted in a rich golden hue, which made him look intentionally elegant.

  “You know, every time I look over my shoulder in these meetings, my eye catches that painting. Do you know what it reminds me of?”

  Oliver and Leo took a moment to observe the canvas and its mass applicability. Their mentor went along.

  “Every morning in the safari, both the lion and the gazelle wake. If the gazelle is going to survive, it must outrun the slowest member of its pack. It doesn’t matter where they are headed; it doesn’t matter how the gazelle feels that day. The gazelle has to run. The lion is defined by the same rules. No matter where the pack of gazelle is headed, no matter how the lion feels, no matter what it wants, the lion must get to running. Every living creature in this world has to wake up and run to survive. That’s what the mural represents—a reminder to stay on the hunt.”

  Leo flipped his foot over his thigh and faced the picture more directly. “And how do you tell a lion from a gazelle?”

  Moses took a chair across the empty table. “The gazelle is only running because the lion is chasing him. If the lion were to stop, the gazelle would stop. But a lion wakes and runs because he loves the hunt. People think a lion is who he is because of how ferocious he is when he chases his prey. But what they don’t think about, what truly defines the king of the jungle, is that when a lion sees a wounded gazelle, he sits quiet, and lets the wounded pass.”

  “Why is that?” Oliver asked.

  “Because eating is not a concern for him. That will happen one way or another. The challenge that the lion lives for is outmaneuvering the capable, healthy, and able gazelle. That is what drives his paw.” Moses fidgeted in his chair. “Oliver. Leo. When we met years ago, I saw the lion in two cubs. I saw your potential, and the magnetism and animal force you both carried. You’ve hunted with me for a long time and have grown so much. But when we met, you were hungry, off on an adventure, on the prowl. I fear that you have grown comfortable and complacent. And I cannot be the lion who tames his cubs. It’s time you two return to the frontier and relearn the hunt. I have domesticated my beasts, and I will not do so anymore. Come.”

  The boys wearily followed Moses down the icy stairwell and back outside where vinegary steam purled and twisted from the cavities of the streets. When they reached a white-and-black building on the southern border of the park, Moses sunk his heels into the concrete.

  “No matter how smart you think you are, you have to have a place to start. You two now have an exceptionally strong foundation, and you must now build yourselves up.”

  Moses looked to the top of the
skyscraper. “Remember, it takes years to rise, but less than a minute to fall. Never gloat; never let outrageous pride or arrogance soil your thought; never dismiss rationality because you think you have it all figured out. Or you will slip.”

  They continued their walk, passing a lot of people. The ones who stood out were not the traveling tourists who loitered on the sidewalk with a camera around their neck and sparklers for eyes, with no idea which way was up and which was west. No, the people who stood out were the nearby residents. The people who didn’t care what they wore as long as it was Valentino or Dior or Kiton, who didn’t care where they ate as long as it was Marea or Cipriani’s or Jean-George’s, who didn’t care where they summered as long as it was Montauk or Monaco or the Maldives. The people who danced in their nests of nobility, and nowhere else.

  Halfway between Columbus Circle and the Plaza, the three turned downtown. Oliver’s eyes landed on a woman heading straight for them. She moved rapidly in her glossy-black, impractical stilettos, and her locks of blond hair popped with each heel click to the concrete. A red cashmere coat lay open for onlookers to see her jewel-neck dress and cleavage sitting beneath the silk scarf around her throat. This outfit was selected by a designer at Barney’s who knew her husband’s bank account could routinely take blows of Armani, Saint Laurent, and Christian Louboutin. The cost of her never-on-sale garments would clothe a small village in Africa, but that wasn’t her problem. She moved to promote maximum envy from males of status and maximum resentment from everyone else.

  As the distance between Oliver and this vixen narrowed, his mind very quickly drifted into the clouds. He offered her his arm and fell in her stride. Oh, may I escort you on your walk home, miss? Are you in the mood for a pre-noon cocktail at the Four Seasons? Oh, you are; perfect, I have nowhere to be. They would each have two martinis and be so lustful that they’d order a third but leave $150 on the table without touching the final round. She probably had a condo stashed somewhere in the Upper East, and they’d have a great afternoon frolicking around her imported, silk sheets.