What Walter Gave Back
Chapter 12 - What Walter Gave Back
Walter Combs, the pawn shop owner who had first purchased the watch from Scott and later sold it to Daniel, reached out several months later, having followed the story's public resolution through local news coverage.
"I've been thinking about that watch since the day I bought it," Walter told Daniel, during an unexpected visit to the Meridian Grand's offices. "I felt wrong about it then, and I feel considerably more wrong about it now, understanding everything that man had actually survived to walk into my shop that day."
"You didn't do anything wrong," Daniel said. "You gave him money when he genuinely needed it, more than the offer he initially accepted, if I remember your account correctly."
"I still profited from another man's desperation," Walter said. "I want to do something to make it right, if you think Scott would be willing to accept it."
Walter had brought with him a considerable sum, the profit margin from the watch's original sale to Daniel, along with a formal apology he'd written out carefully in advance.
Daniel arranged a meeting between Walter and Scott, uncertain how the encounter might unfold, given the specific, complicated history connecting the two men through an object that had once represented Scott's lowest, most desperate moment.
"I don't blame you," Scott told Walter, once the pawnbroker had finished his careful apology. "You gave a desperate man money when he had nowhere else to turn. I've thought about that day a lot too, actually. You were kind to me, in the small way your position allowed. I remember that clearly, even through everything else."
Walter, visibly moved by Scott's grace, offered the profit margin as a gesture of goodwill, which Scott, after careful consideration, accepted, understanding it as a genuine attempt at repair rather than simple guilt money.
"I want to ask you something," Walter said, before he left. "What made you finally decide to walk away from everything, that specific day you came into my shop."
Scott considered the question seriously. "I'd spent six weeks trying to find any other job in this city, using my real name, telling the truth about what happened. Nobody would hire me. Every interview ended the moment they called my previous employer for a reference. I finally understood I couldn't provide for my family here anymore, not with that accusation following me everywhere I went. I thought disappearing and starting over somewhere new was the only way to eventually come back to them with something to offer again."
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"Did that plan ever actually work," Walter asked gently.
"No," Scott admitted. "I just kept sinking further, month after month, further from any version of the life I'd promised my family. I think, honestly, if Eli hadn't found Daniel's watch that morning, I might still be out there right now, too ashamed to come home with nothing to show for eleven months away."
