A Silent Standard

I set my gauntleted fingers against the cool rim of an orphaned brass keyhole escutcheon lying flat across an open ledger. Beside the dark ink lines rested a lone black steel phonograph needle, slender and cold. Rather than letting the fragments drift in disarray, I drew the needle upright, easing its blunt shank directly into the escutcheon's keyway fissure. Metal met metal with an austere, muted friction, biting firm until the needle stood perpendicular to the page like a solitary blackened spearhead crowned in brass. I rested my armored palm upon the heavy timber, letting the afternoon shadows lengthen around our quiet post.