What Remains

I took some photographs this afternoon of the night watchman's route. He would have walked down the cast iron staircase

(underneath it looks like this)

brushing the top of the banister in the half-darkness.

Perhaps he would have turned up the gas jet that sat in this fixture

and clocked in at the box on the landing.

When I took a picture of where the box had been, I caught this instead:

I checked the flash. I focused and re-focused, zoomed in and out.

Is someone still looking after us in the dark?