A small parcel sat beneath the warehouse office's glass counter. Its label had faded around the string. New employees were told not to move it, but nobody could explain why the dispatch ledger marked it delivered.
When the office closed, Tomas found a second receipt pinned under the first. The intended recipient had died before collection. Her husband had signed for the parcel, then asked the clerk to keep it until he could bear to open it. He returned each month to pay for storage, although the clerk never charged him.
The last visit was recorded eight years earlier. Tomas traced the husband's address to a niece, who came with a photograph of both relatives standing beside a half-built model boat. The parcel held the missing brass propeller, ordered before either of them knew there was little time left.
She took the parcel and both receipts. Under the counter, its outline remained pale against the darkened wood. Tomas covered that rectangle with the office's final inventory sheet, leaving the delivery date blank until he watched her carry it through the gate.