The Watchmaker’s Hand

Dr. Gomez suctioned some gunk from the nose and mouth and rubbed the infant with the cloth. Yes, she seemed to be breathing fine and was crying softly.

Glancing at Sachs: “Have to get the cord. I need your help.”

Right. Has to be cut. That much she knew. Sachs pulled from her back pocket the sleek Italian switchblade she always carried. Hit the button. It snapped open.

The doctor stared.

Sachs said, “We can sterilize it.”

The woman frowned. “I just meant could you hold her while I clamp?”

Oh.

She put the knife away. And carefully took the baby.

In less than a minute the cord was clamped and severed and, to Sachs’s relief, the infant was in the arms of her mother, who was sobbing — maybe in fear of another cable strike or the falling tower, though possibly from the birthing experience. Both, probably.

“Can she walk?” Sachs asked.

“Bleeding, a chair’s better.”

The mom: “Bleeding! You didn’t tell me I’d be bleeding.”

A cheerful response: “Yes, I did, ma’am. You’ll be fine.”

There was a wheelchair in the corner. The doctor and Sachs got the mother into it.

Sachs pushed the chair into the corridor.

Hell, both exits were now completely backed up. The severed cable had panicked everyone and that caused a crush. Several people had tried to carry the massive beds down the stairs but hadn’t been strong enough and pieces of furniture were sitting on the tops of the steps, jamming the doorways.

Rescue workers were trying to calm everyone and free the beds. This wasn’t working.

Sachs thought back to her promise to Rhyme that she would only wound the Watchmaker.

She now changed her mind.

She pushed the mother and baby toward the closest exit while Dr. Gomez, noticing with a frown that a nurse at the opposite exit had fallen, hurried toward her.

“I want a pain pill!” the new mother demanded.

Sachs ignored her.

Just then another cable broke free and exploded into the window where Dr. Gomez was walking to the injured hospital worker. The woman disappeared in a cascade of dust and glass shards.

No...

“Doctor!”

She couldn’t see if the woman had been hit. She parked the wheelchair next to the west exit and started toward where she’d last seen Gomez.

She still could see nothing of the strike’s aftermath; the smoke and dust were too dense.

Then she noticed something odd and paused.

On the linoleum floor in front of her, a shadow appeared and began to move.

What...?

It filled the floor, a latticework of black lines.

The shadow of the mast.

She turned to the window just as screams filled the corridor.

“It’s coming down!” someone cried.

Sachs dove to the floor and rolled against the wall, which she figured would provide some protection. Unless of course the crane simply caved in the entire floor, burying them all under a breath-stealing andiron of debris...

Claustrophobia...

At least she wouldn’t have to suffer that horror for very long; the collapse would ignite the gas and flammable solvents and burn everyone here to death within minutes.

And she noted too: the coughing had stopped.

Waiting for the crash...

Waiting...

For the crash that didn’t happen.

Instead of the deafening sound of collapsing metal and glass, another noise grew evident and then increased in volume.

Thump, thump, thump...

She rose and made her way cautiously to the window. She turned to her left and saw Dr. Gomez was on her feet and walking to the injured worker.

The crane was still looming in sight. But no longer moving their way.

Thump, thump...

About forty feet above the mast was a helicopter. A hook had been lowered from a winch above the open door and had snapped onto the front jib.

The craft was big, but hardly meant to lift weights like the crane, and a worker sat strapped in the doorway, his hand on a control on the winch. If the mast finally gave way and fell freely, he would have to release the cable so it didn’t pull the craft to the ground with it.

But so far the chopper was handling the load. The mast sank slowly.

Down, down, slowly...

Twenty feet from the top of the building.

Then ten.

With a resounding metallic clang, the mast came to rest against what would be the steel girder of the crown. The helicopter remained in position.

The cable slacked, and the tower and jib were stable.

The worker pulled the pin, releasing the cable. It fell, shimmering in a band of sun, and dropped straight down as the helicopter hovered for a moment, like an angel’s halo above the genuflecting crane, and then rose slowly into a faultless sky.

42

She was outside the main building, watching crews run cables from the tower and jib to rebar rods set in the concrete foundation of the addition.

Reminding her of what amounted to the murder weapon that had killed the operator’s friend in such a horrid way.

Here, at least, a better ending.

Crews were also atop the main building, dismantling the jib and lowering the segments to the roof where, she supposed, another chopper would remove them.

Her phone purred.

“Rhyme.”

“I heard. It got lassoed.”