Run: 2026-09-23-01M37PQ1NREFXMPAJP3X9JY5J7

The rain had not stopped for three days when Inspector Clara Voss arrived at the iron gates of Harrowgate Manor. A young constable waited beneath a black umbrella, his face pale, his hands trembling as he opened her car door. "The body is in the library, ma'am," he whispered, as though the dead man might somehow still overhear them talking. Clara stepped inside, shaking water from her coat, and noticed immediately that every clock in the hallway had been stopped. Each one showed the same time, a quarter past midnight, their brass hands frozen like silent witnesses refusing to speak. In the library, Lord Edmund Harrow sat slumped in his leather armchair, a glass of brandy still in his hand. His eyes were open, fixed upon the portrait of his late wife that hung above the cold grey stone fireplace. Four members of the household had gathered by the window, and Clara sensed that at least one was already lying. "Nobody touched him," the butler said stiffly, but Clara saw the faint red smear of lipstick on the brandy glass.