Stuffing the box into his pocket, and gathering his things together, they headed back to the cottage. The big cranes, which had been removing the twisted wreckage from the railway tracks, had gone. Now, with only a few men and machines left to finish up, it was clear it would soon look as though nothing had happened.
‘See that?’ he said, without really meaning for it to sound like a question.
Halting by the garden gate, Arthur peered through a crack. Spying that the coast was clear, he slipped through, darting between apple trees, until he reached the tool shed about halfway down the slope. The key, as always, was under the rusting watering can.
‘Come on, come on!’ he mumbled, trying to coax the old lock whilst at the same time keeping a wary look out. After a rather unfortunate incident a few years ago when he’d almost, accidentally, demolished it, he’d been banned from ever entering again. The door swung open with a click.
‘Cat—quickly!’ he whispered, closing and barring it behind them.
Built about the same time as the cottage, the shed had gradually become lopsided over the years and now resembled an old barn. Doubling as a storage area, there were pieces of furniture, planks of wood, tiles, and all manner of bits and bobs that someone had once thought might one day be useful, piled up against two of the walls. In the centre was a large, heavy, wooden work bench. Arthur placed the box on top of it.
‘Ready?’ he asked, rummaging about in a rusty toolbox and producing a hammer and chisel from it.
‘Only if you’re sure you know what you’re doing,’ said the cat, jumping up next to him.
‘What’s that supposed to mean? I thought you wanted to open it?’
‘I did! I do! I definitely did, for sure!’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘I don’t know. What if it’s just not meant to be opened? Maybe there’s a reason that it fell into the lake and all those men came looking for it.’
Arthur frowned at him. Placing the sharp end of the chisel into the faint line, he picked up the hammer. ‘OK, here goes nothing,’ he said and struck it gently but firmly. When nothing happened, he struck it again a little bit harder.
‘I don’t get it. I’ve hit it twice and there’s not even a mark on it.’
‘See. That’s what I was saying. Maybe it’s not meant to be opened.’