Enemies (1979)

Richard Harris, a reporter for The New Yorker, published this thriller through Richard Marek in 1979; Ballantine's paperback followed. By the jacket's account John Flood, an award-winning newsman, wakes up in an alley one morning next to the body of a murdered young woman and spends five days in flight from enemies known and unknown, holding a secret he can tell only the President. (Open Library)

Watches

Timex (unidentified model): Flood comes round on the gritty concrete of the alley with his memory gone, raises his left wrist and stares at the Timex: 5:22 (p. 4). Breaking into a flag factory at night, he times the alarm by it, 2:04, 2:06, then shines his flashlight on the Timex at 2:09 and gives whoever the alarm might bring three more minutes before going in (p. 94). It reads 2:42 when he finally falls onto a bed fully clothed (p. 158). The maker is named; the model is not.

Source text: He raised his left wrist to his face and stared at the Timex […] The Timex stood at 2:42 when he fell onto the bed, fully clothed except for the windbreaker and his shoes, and fell instantly asleep. (Richard Harris, Enemies, scan cataloged as Ballantine Books, 1980 (copyright 1979; this edition published by arrangement with Richard Marek Publishers), pp. 4, 158; Internet Archive scan OCR)