Page 20 of The Book of Lost Hours

Moira’s arm slid from Amelia’s shoulder to her waist, holding her in a half embrace.

“Mr. Gravel, a man was murdered in the time space by a Russian timekeeper. Something like that is bigger than whatever beef you have with the department. You’ve made it clear you won’t cooperate with us.

But perhaps you’ll set aside your prejudices long enough to help Ernest’s niece.

” She pressed a hand between Amelia’s shoulder blades, propelling her forward.

“Amelia has no role in this petty feud between the department and the rebels, but if you don’t talk to her…

if you don’t tell her what you know about how and why Ernest Duquesne was killed…

then you’re sending a child into a gunfight without a weapon. ”

James’s eyes followed Moira out the door. As it clicked behind her, Amelia felt her heartbeat pulsing in her throat. For a moment, James stood still. Then he let out a breath that might have been a laugh and passed a tired hand over his face.

“My god, that woman is a real piece of work.” His body released some of the tension he’d been holding, and he leaned against the wall. “Your uncle really left you that watch?”

Amelia nodded, swallowing hard.

“And they let you keep it?”

“Well. I wasn’t supposed to wind it, but I did it anyway and so—” She broke off, hoping he’d figure out the rest.

To her surprise, he chuckled. “Ernest always did say you were a troublemaker.” He said it with a levity and fondness that surprised her.

“So you knew my uncle?” she asked.

“Uh-huh.” James went over to the window and pulled aside the curtains to look out, tracking Moira’s movements. “I was real sorry to hear that he was gone.”

There was a creaking sound as the door to the bedroom opened. Two small, curious faces appeared briefly before Edith shut it. A little girl and boy, maybe five years old.

Amelia looked back at James. “Is it true what she said? Were you really the last person to see him alive?”

He eyed her steadily, tapping his knuckles against his arm.

“Look, I don’t know what to tell you. He came here, yes, but whether I was the last to see him is up for debate.

My guess is that the department figured out that he stopped by and are just using it as another way to harass me.

I’ve been on their list for a long time now. ”

“Because you…” How had Moira put it? “Believe in a different ideology?”

James snorted. “Is that what they call it? I guess you could say we have different ideologies. Different ideas of what’s right and what isn’t.”

“And they don’t like you because you have a different idea of what’s right?”

“They don’t like me because I’m a Black man who refused to give up his watch or join their cause.

Because I work to preserve the memories of my people, not theirs.

Slaves and civil rights victims and the like.

People they would sooner leave out of history altogether because they don’t like what our memories say about them.

They think I’m one of the rebels that have popped up these past few years, but I’m not.

I’m not trying to disrupt anything, just trying to keep our version of the story alive.

” He glanced out the window one final time before stepping away from it at last. “So what has she got you wrapped up in this for anyway?”

Amelia shifted a little on her feet, wondering how much to say. “She wants me to find a book that my uncle was looking for. She said it’s blue with a flower stamped in the center. Have you heard of it?”

She couldn’t help but feel hopeful. That maybe he would just tell her where it was, and all this could be over. But then she saw his eyes glaze over in a dark, distant sort of way.

“Yeah, I’ve heard of it,” he said cautiously.

“Do you know where it is?” she pressed.

“I’m afraid I can’t help you with that,” James said at once. “The book is missing. Has been for years. What’s she want with it anyway?”

Amelia gave a half shrug. “She said there are stolen memories in it.”

“Stolen, huh?” James said, more to himself than to her. “That’s rich.”

Amelia frowned at him. “Well… if they aren’t stolen, how did they end up in the book?”

James began rubbing the back of his neck, fighting himself with each word he put forth. “Have they told you anything about someone named Lisavet Levy?”

Amelia shook her head. “Who’s she?”

James took so long to answer that she was afraid he was going to ignore her question. At last, he sighed, resigning himself to whatever consequences might come from telling her all this.

“She was a Jewish girl who lived in the time space back in the forties.”

Amelia’s eyes went wide. “ Lived in the time space?”

“Uh-huh. Her father was a clockmaker who made timekeeper devices for different government entities. His family had been doing it for generations. Which of course made him a target of the Nazi Party when they caught wind of him. They came for him on Kristallnacht, and he hid Lisavet in the time space to keep her out of harm’s way.

He died shortly thereafter after he refused to make new watches for them, and she was stuck. ”

“For how long?”

“No one is sure exactly. At least ten years, maybe longer.”

Ten years. Amelia couldn’t imagine what that must be like. “And what does she have to do with my uncle?”

“As she got older, she started interfering with some of the work the timekeepers were doing.”

“Interfering how?”

“That’s complicated. Governments try to regulate what gets remembered in the time space. Sometimes they destroy things that they deem as dangerous. They burn memories. Lisavet Levy tried to save them. Kept ’em all in this book she carried around with her. The one they’ve got you searching for.”

Amelia straightened up. Timekeepers burned memories?

James continued. “It wasn’t until 1946 that anyone even knew she was there.

Ernest is the one who discovered her. It was his job to try and stop her from interfering with the US timekeepers.

Eventually, other groups learned what she was doing, and she became a target, not just for the CIA, but for the Russians, the British, and just about any government group with a stake in the game.

Then suddenly, she vanished from the time space sometime around 1952.

She disappeared, but the ideas she sparked didn’t.

Ever since then there are timekeepers who have been carrying the torch that Lisavet Levy lit all those years ago.

Trying to salvage what people like Moira Donnelly and that boss of hers, Jack Dillinger, want to destroy.

That’s what they mean when they talk about rebels.

It’s just a blanket term they use for anyone who doesn’t believe in their grand vision of what the past should be. ”

Based on the way that James was talking, Amelia wasn’t sure she entirely believed his assertion that he wasn’t involved.

“What happened to the book when she disappeared?”

“Odds are she hid it somewhere,” James admitted. “Hid it good too. People have been looking for over a decade.”

“And Lisavet Levy? What happened to her?”

“Nobody knows. At least nobody who will admit to it. It was covered up, you see. One day, everyone just stopped talking about her, your uncle included. I asked Ernest about her once, when we got a little bit more comfortable with each other and he acted like he had no idea who or what I was talking about. But somebody knows what happened. If I had to guess, I’d say that woman you came here with does. ”

“Moira?”

James nodded. “I only heard things through the grapevine at the time, so this is all speculation. Back then, even I knew that the person who would take over Jack Dillinger’s director role if and when he moved out of it was supposed to be your uncle.

Then Lisavet Levy started interfering with things, and circumstances changed real quick.

I got the sense that Ernest was at risk of losing his job over it.

Then, five years later, when Jack finally got promoted…

Moira Donnelly got his old job. Before that, she was just a secretary.

No college education, no previous experience.

And all of a sudden, she’s the director of the whole damn department. ”

“I thought that was because Uncle Ernest took a different job. In timekeeper relations.”

James shrugged. “Maybe. Or maybe not. Either way, suddenly the son of the TRP’s founder is in another department and a secretary with only five years’ tenure is director of a major branch of the CIA.

Stuff like that doesn’t just happen. I’m not one to gamble, but I’d wager my shop, the mortgage, and all three of my children on the odds that Moira Donnelly played some kind of role in what really happened to Lisavet Levy.

I’d bet it’s what got her that job.” He suddenly moved away from the window, coming closer.

“I really have no idea what happened to your uncle. I wish I did. When he stopped by to see me last, he was just passing through the neighborhood on his way to New York. Said he needed to go there to pay a visit to someone about some things that had gone down at the department that he wasn’t okay with. ”

“Things? What things?”

“I don’t know. He wouldn’t say. But the thing is… he was going to see her .” James jerked his thumb in the direction of the window.

“He went to see…” Amelia broke off, the name sticking in her mouth.

James responded, but Amelia didn’t need the confirmation to know he meant Moira. Moira was the last person to see her uncle alive. He had gone into the city to see her and had never come back. What if he hadn’t died in the time space at all?