STARK: Clothes line dissapears if you try to add it to the clamp

[sev-]

I'm playing the Windows GoG version of The Longest Journey when I came across a problem and couldn't move forward. In Chapter 1, I had placed the inflatable duck on the clamp and was viewing the result when I opened up the Inventory while still full screen on the combined object. I got the clothes line out of the Inventory and tried to add it to the clamp. The clothes line disappeared from storage but the clamp didn't update to show the image of the rope as well. When I tried to use the clamp on the Key, it wouldn't pick it up.
I went back to an old save and tried again, this time combining the clothesline to the clamp in the storage window and it worked.

Saved Games.zip

[Thunderforge]

I loaded up these games. In the broken one, if you look at the combination of items, the clothesline is part of it. But as you said, the inventory icon doesn't show the clothesline and April can't use it to pick up the key. Also, while the ducky can be removed, the clothesline can't.

I've noticed that when playing around with the earlier save that there are a few ways to make the inventory icon not show up correctly. One that I was able to reproduce fairly reliably.

1. Open the inventory
2. Click on the deflated ducky and select the mouth
3. While the breath sound effects are going, click the deflated ducky again and select the hand
4. Repeatedly click on the clamp (April will say it won't work) until the breath sounds stop and it attaches
5. Quickly attach the clothesline

This results in an icon of clamp + ducky w/o clothesline. In this situation, April still can use it properly though, so it's not exactly the bug. But maybe there's some similar circumstances that can cause this.