00:00The logbook was already open when Elias Vane climbed the tower stairs that night,
00:04open to a page dated tomorrow. The handwriting was his own. Forty days. That is how long Elias
00:11had kept the light at Gull Rock. Forty days alone with the gulls, the fog, and the sea
00:17chewing at the rocks below. The entry read, the light failed at two in the morning. I did not
00:23relight it. Elias laughed. A short sound the stone walls swallowed. The lamp was burning bright above
00:29him. The oil was full. At half past one, the lamp guttered. The flame sank low, blew at the edges,
00:35and the great lens slowed and stopped. Elias ran. He cranked the winch. He cursed. He fed the flame,
00:43and at two minutes past two, the light burned again. He did not sleep that night. At dawn,
00:48he opened the logbook with shaking hands. A new entry in his handwriting dated the next day.
00:53The foghorn sounded at midnight. I did not wind it. The foghorn was manual, a great brass crank in the
01:00lower room. Elias sat beside it all evening, his hand on the cold metal, determined. At eleven fifty-eight,
01:06his eyes closed. For a breath, no more. At midnight, the horn sounded. Long, mournful, alone. Night after
01:14night it continued. Each entry a warning. Each warning unprevented. The gallery door stood open.
01:22I did not close it. It stood open. The supply boat turned back. I did not wave. It turned back.
01:29On the thirty-ninth night, Elias took the logbook down to the rocks and threw it into the sea. The
01:36waves carried it back. It lay at his feet, dry, open to a new page. He tried to burn it.
01:43The matches
01:43would not light. On the fortieth night, he wrote nothing. He sat in the dark at the keeper's desk and
01:49waited. The pen moved by itself across the page. The supply boat came at dawn, as scheduled. The
01:56lighthouse stood empty. The lamp was burning, though the oil tank had been dry for a week.
02:00On the desk, the logbook lay open to today's date. One fresh entry, in Elias Vane's careful hand.
02:06I am the light now. Do not let it go out.
