Black Machine 2
Mark Petterson

Black machine was on again. Two shoppers took it down, wound it up. They stepped back until their feet touched the opposite aisle, and they said "Fantastic" and "Wonder if we could get it home." Then an employee found them and that was that. They left to wander the bathtub aisle.
Kids liked to touch it.
Three or four minutes passed and it turned itself off.
The manufacturer called and asked if it was selling. All the manager said was, "I can't tell." Then there was some problem with the phone and they settled for emails.

It was silent for a time. A seeing-eye dog sniffed at it and then kept going. He was trained.
The little man saw it and immediately ran away. The college student was fascinated, but his girl wanted to look at the daffodils. Then a Catholic family with eight children talked to the manager.
"Have you tried it?" he said.
"No," said the father. He ordered his oldest to wind it up and tell him what he saw. The boy got lost on the way to the aisle and came back in twenty minutes. By then the manager had asked them to leave. They were wasting his time.