In a quaint little town known as Old Town, where every hour was celebrated by a jolly clang of bells, an ancient clock stood tall in the square, quietly marking the passage of time. Day by day, this clock would tick away, its pendulum swinging back and forth, while hundreds of people bustled about, unaware of the story brewing inside.
For deep within the clock, there lived a tiny inhabitant named Tick Tock. He was no ordinary creature; he was a merry little person endowed with the delightful duty of ensuring every cog of the clock rotated perfectly. Each morning, he would wash the clock’s face and wind it up tight, even singing songs to make his job more enjoyable. His life was cluttered yet joyful; countless cogs and wheels shared the clock’s heart and kept it alive.
But on this fateful day, something terribly wrong happened. Tick Tock was polishing the clock’s face, admiring the shining brass beneath when suddenly, everything around him froze. The hands on the clock lost their rhythm, and a stillness enveloped Old Town. “Oh, what a toil this day is! I can’t believe it’s gone midnight already!” grumbled a little Old Man, peering grumpily at Tick Tock through the glass face.
With a sudden realization, Tick Tock gasped, “Then this is a terrible case indeed! Time has come to a standstill, and if it doesn’t start again promptly, it will never! I must go up to the big clock and see what mischief has gone on.”
Hastily, he dashed up the polished brass staircase to the clock room. And there, to his horror, he discovered the hands of the clock twisted and tangled, unable to move forward. “Oh, this is a most ungrateful job!” he muttered, trying to free the hands but only managing to entangle himself further. “Why must Clock People do all the work, while common clocks can sit back and look on?”
Just then, the roguish crossing-sweeper turned around at the sound of the clock chime and was astonished to see Tick Tock struggling amidst the clock hands. “Gold bricks!” he exclaimed, “why, what be you up to, little feller?” And without another word, he bent down, took Tick Tock in his hand, and thrust him among the bony cogs. They didn’t hurt Tick Tock, but found the old fellow’s bristles useful for giving their windings a good cleaning, which no doubt contributed to the smooth working of the clock afterward.
The bony cogs then linked together, forming a merry little chain right up to the questionably graceful lady at the second elbow. “And where did you come from, I wonder?” the elfish lady inquired of our friend, to which Tick Tock replied, “Oh, I live inside the clock and whenever anything goes wrong, I’m sent to see to it. My name’s Tick Tock, what’s yours?”
With an incredulous laugh, the lady said, “I live up here where I can keep my eye on the pendulum, which you might not know, since you seem very unobservant, swings to the next elbow every minute of the day and night! You mark that now!”
Tick Tock thought the windings had scarcely moved since they put him in, but perhaps that was because fellow-feeling tends to draw minute hands together.
Now was the old cogs’ chance to put the hands straight again. Tick Tock introduced them all and with much clattering and winding, got them all to work. Then the same fellow cogs took Tick Tock on their shoulders and carried him down the polished brass stair to where the angry old man had been pacing and grumbling all the time. Soon as the winding was finished, the minute and hour hands began slowly to work round, the proper cogs gave the clocks’ big hands a shoving push, and that night all Old Town turned out to see the bright lights in the beholder clock. It was poorly paid for being built, and how it cried and complained about working hard at night!
The clock in the square struck one, and every other in the place chimed the hour to everyone else’s liking. Tick Tock flew downstairs where the old man was still grimacing, and when he saw that everything was working nicely, shut his mouth with a click. Tick Tock then jumped on top of the hour hand, instantly postponed five minutes for the screw and put in, half past one, climbed on Mistress Minute’s back and flew past the minute of old time. Not a breath, not a sound, could be heard in the wide street of Old Town.
It seemed rather late for Old Town, and Tick Tock, with a sigh of relief, vacated his perch on the dial and rolled himself into the bowels of the clock.
“I am glad that’s over,” he remarked, getting himself a night cap from a cog in a sort of cupboard in the wall. “Time is a tiresome creature, but it does slide down awfully well when you take it properly. Ah, the one-eyed fellow’s nuts!” And with that rhapsody on his lips, he closed his eyes like the old man’s mouth, and half an hour later even Time was fast asleep.