My father stood in the hallway, still as a tin soldier, gazing at the grandfather clock. The clock looked back at him suspiciously. He turned and said, “John I’d like you to have it, we won’t have room when we move and it would be nice to keep it in the family”. I was taken aback thinking, ‘that man has tended to the old clock since his father died twenty-five years ago, all the weekly wind up and daily checking, adjusting the minute hand. What do I know about clocks’?
I have to admit, part of me was pleased that he wanted me to have it and yet a thing like that would not really fit in our house. But not wanting to upset him I said, “thanks dad, I’ll treasure it.”
Driving home with the back of the car half open, the thing sticking out, I tied an old red rag to warn drivers, thinking, ‘it’s a red rag to a bull, at least as far as Mary my wife is concerned.’
“I think that’s going to be a bit of a white elephant,” she said, just as I was warming to the idea of getting it all set up in the sitting room. Once home I couldn’t get the retched thing going. It clearly objected to being moved and didn’t think much of its new owners. We had to get an expert in to have the thing regulated. This involved taking it back to his workshop, replacing the old cat gut, pully strings, making various adjustments and keeping an eye on it for a week or so.
Finally the clock was returned and set up in the corner of the room. It seemed to be ticking away happily and chiming to its hearts content and all seemed well until we went to bed. “Hang on,” Mary said, “is this going to chime through the night!” “Well yes, I suppose so, I can’t just turn it off for the night time,” I answered. “I don’t sleep well at the best of times, never mind with that thing calling out the hours.” She groaned.
We put up with the constant chiming for a week or so and then Mary said, “I’ve had enough, there must be a way to turn off the chimes.” I contacted the clock man who said I could insert a peg that would stop the chiming but still allow the clock to work. “Thank god for that,” Mary cheered, in triumph.
Six years later my father died. As he was lowered into the grave, standing in empty silence, I thought about the clock. There was something about the coffin that reminded me. ‘It would have been fitting,’ I thought, ‘to have buried him in the clock case as it was about the same size.’ It was a crazy idea but then grief can do strange things.
I know this will sound far-fetched but when we arrived back home the clock had stopped. ‘I must have forgotten to wind it up,’ I thought. But on checking, found that was not the case. I gave it a nudge but nothing.
Ten years later and it still stands, silenced like my father.