The Clockwork Guest

The rain had stopped an hour before midnight, leaving the cobblestone streets of Osterley-on-Wold slick and gleaming under the dim gaslights. I had come to this fading English spa town for a pharmaceutical conference, but it had ended prematurely, and I found myself with a night to kill before my train at dawn. The town, once a fashionable retreat for Victorian invalids, was now a skeletal relic of its former glory. At this hour, the only signs of life were the occasional flicker of a curtain and the distant bark of a dog.

I walked aimlessly, my footsteps echoing against the shuttered facades of decaying hotels and abandoned bathhouses. The air smelled of damp stone and rotting leaves. A fog began to creep in from the river, wrapping itself around the lampposts like spectral fingers. I was about to turn back when I saw it: the Grand Hydro, a sprawling Victorian edifice that seemed to lean out of the darkness, its turrets and gables clawing at the sky. A single light burned in the lobby window, and a carved wooden sign above the door read ‘The Grand Hydro.’

I pushed open the heavy oak door, and a bell chimed somewhere deep within. The lobby was a cavern of velvet and mahogany, lit by a single crystal chandelier that shed a sickly yellow glow. Behind the reception desk stood a gaunt man with slicked-back hair and a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. His nameplate read ‘Mr. Wexley.’ He wore a threadbare frock coat and spoke in a clipped, precise tone.

‘Good evening, sir. You must be the last guest. We have a room ready.’

I hesitated, but the weariness of the day had seeped into my bones. ‘How much?’ I asked.

‘For you, complimentary. The owner insists. We rarely have guests on weeknights, and we like to keep the place lively.’ He slid a brass key across the counter. ‘Room 12. The lift is out of order, but it’s just three floors. Mind the stairs, they have a mind of their own.’

I took the key, its teeth cold against my palm. As I turned to the staircase, I noticed a grandfather clock in the corner, its pendulum frozen mid-swing. I asked, ‘Doesn’t that bother you?’

Mr. Wexley’s smile tightened. ‘It keeps its own time, sir. We don’t question it.’

I climbed the stairs, each step groaning under my weight. The wallpaper was peeling, showing layers of different colors from different decades. On the second floor, I passed a door with a sign that read ‘Museum of Curiosities – Open by Request Only.’ A faint ticking sound emanated from within, regular as a heartbeat. I paused, but pressed on.

Room 12 was at the end of a winding corridor. The key turned with a click, and I entered a chamber straight out of a gothic novel. The bed was canopied with dusty velvet, and the wardrobe was carved with faces that seemed to twist in the shadows. But the most striking feature was a large, ornate clock on the mantelpiece, its hands frozen at exactly 11:59. I tried to open the wardrobe to hang my coat, but it was locked. Beneath the bed, I noticed a scuffed leather trunk.

I sat on the edge of the bed, and the ticking from the museum grew louder, now accompanied by a rhythmic, whirring sound, like gears meshing. It seemed to come from all directions. I tried to read a book from my bag, but the words blurred. I felt a growing sense that I was not alone.

Suddenly, a voice whispered from the wardrobe: ‘He’s coming.’ I spun around, but the room was empty. The wardrobe door was now ajar, revealing a dark interior. I approached cautiously, my heart pounding. Inside, hanging on a single hook, was an old-fashioned suit, a pinstriped number with a starched collar. On the floor lay a pair of scuffed brogues. The clock on the mantelpiece ticked once, then the hands sprang to life, spinning backward to 11:58.

I slammed the wardrobe shut and retreated to the bed. Then I remembered the trunk. I dragged it out and found it unlocked. Inside, wrapped in yellowed muslin, were journals, dozens of them, all dated from the 1890s to the present. I opened the one on top, and the handwriting was a spidery scrawl.

‘November 4th, 1901. The clock in the museum stopped today. We all heard it, as if a heart had ceased beating. The owner says it’s a sign. He’s started winding it again with his own hands, but the hands resist. They want to go backward. I fear, I fear what we’ve brought here.’

I flipped to the last page, dated yesterday. ‘It is my turn tonight. I have served the Hydro for forty years, and now I must join the others in the museum. I hear them ticking in the walls. They wait. They always wait. When the clock strikes twelve, the doors open, and the guests arrive. Do not be a guest. Be a keeper, if you can. But once you wind the clock, you belong to it. And the clock never stops.’

The grandfather clock in the lobby began to chime, each gong resonating through the floorboards, a deep and somber toll. I counted: twelve. The museum door opened with a groan, and I could hear a procession of footsteps, slow and mechanical, ascending the stairs. They were coming to my floor.

I snapped the journal shut and bolted to the door, but it wouldn’t budge. The doorknob spun uselessly in my hand. The footsteps grew closer, a chorus of clicks and whirs, as if automata were walking, their gears grinding. I pressed my ear to the wood, and I heard Mr. Wexley’s voice, but it was different now, hollow and metallic.

‘New guest, join the collection. The clock needs winding. It feeds on time.’

I looked around for a weapon, but the room was bare. I grabbed the brass candlestick from the mantelpiece, and as I did, the clock’s hands snapped back to 11:59. The footsteps stopped just outside my door. A key turned in the lock, and the door swung open.

In the doorway stood a figure, humanoid but made of brass and porcelain, its face a cracked mask with lifeless eyes. It wore a Victorian suit, the same suit I’d seen in the wardrobe. It spoke with Mr. Wexley’s voice: ‘Welcome, guest. We have prepared your clockwork. It is time to join us.’ Behind it, in the hallway, stood a procession of similar figures, each holding a different part of a mechanical body, a limb, a torso, a head.

I stumbled back, knocking over the trunk. The journals spilled onto the floor, opening to a page with a diagram: a human figure with clockwork grafted onto its limbs, its chest cut open to reveal a winding key. The caption read: ‘The Final Guest.’

I looked at the grandfather clock, and its face now showed my own reflection, but my eyes were glass orbs, and my mouth was a grim iron grate. I screamed, but no sound came out, only a series of ticking clicks.

I am now part of the collection. I write this in the museum, among the other automata. The clock still says 11:59, but it is always midnight here. And I can hear the footsteps of the next guest who will wander into the Grand Hydro, and I will be the one to wind the clock and welcome them.