Page 35 of The Side Road
‘There’s a key. It was with the original set of house keys.’ He looked at Tash. ‘Any idea where Elsie kept her spare keys?’
Concentrating, Tash screwed up her nose. ‘Yes,’ she said. A lightbulb moment.
In the kitchen, Tash opened the cupboard under the sink. Behind the cleaning supplies, she found an old Quality Street tin. After dragging it across the shelf, she picked it up and heaved it onto the table. It landed with a thud.
The rusty tin looked one hundred years old. On the lid was a faded picture of a soldier in military uniform, and a young lady wearing a bonnet was offering him chocolates. Tash pushed the tin toward her father.
Mia wondered about the validity of the treasure hunters – if they missed this, what else had they missed?
Oliver looked optimistic. After gripping the tin, he removed the lid. A waft of pungent, metallic air escaped. Inside were hundreds of loose keys. Silver, bronze, steel, and brass in every size and shape imaginable.
Mia was amazed; who in their right mind keeps hundreds of keys, but neither Oliver nor Tash seemed fazed.
‘I wish they were chocolates.’ Tash sighed. She looked at her father. ‘We can’t YouTube this.’
‘No. Trial and error.’ Oliver carried the tin outside. He placed it on a chair by the garage door.
‘Do you think we’ll find an old car?’ Tash asked.
‘I’d be happy with a bed,’ Oliver replied.
They got to work. Tash sorted the keys into similar shapes and sizes. Making several piles, she separated large wrought-iron styles from car keys and smaller ones. She handed her father anything that looked like it might open a door.
Oliver tried each key in the tilt door at the front of thegarage. When it didn’t fit, he handed it to Mia. She tried the pedestrian side door. Keys that fitted but didn’t unlock the garage, Tash put to one side. She called these second-chance keys.
Half an hour later, Mia inserted another tarnished silver key into the lock. No different to many others she had already tried, the key turned and clicked. She tried the door handle. No luck. After jiggling the key back and forth, she tried the handle again. The door opened.
‘We did it!’ Tash cried.
Oliver joined them at the door. Inside the garage, it was pitch black, even darker than the basement, and Mia shivered with anticipation.
‘I think Tash should go first.’ Oliver had his hands on her shoulders. ‘In case Elsie decided to stick around and haunt the place.’ With a firm grip, he urged her forward.
Wriggling out of his grasp, Tash stepped behind her father.
Oliver laughed. Reaching inside, he searched for the light. Finding it, he flicked a switch. Nothing. After opening the torch on his phone, he headed into the darkness. They heard him rummaging around. The tilt door banged and rattled. It shook from side to side and moaned and creaked.
‘It’s putting up a fight,’ Mia said.
‘Ollie will win,’ Tash said, jumping up and down.
A few moments later, the door tilted upward. As Tash and Mia joined Oliver, light flooded into the garage. Dumbstruck, no one spoke. The place was crammed with boxes and furniture, floor to ceiling.
‘Was this here when you bought the house?’ Mia asked.
‘It was empty, but that was five years ago.’
‘It’s like an antique store,’ she said.
‘Ah.’ Oliver stepped forward. ‘My boxes. I was demoted to the garage.’
Inside, there were long trestle tables holding crates filled with household items and books. Furniture everywhere. After eighty years, Elsie had accumulated a small mountain of belongings.
Tash and Mia began searching through the junk. Tash discovered a box of board games. She opened a Snakes and Ladders set and rolled the dice.
Mia found a gramophone, an old organ, and a box of cookbooks; one written by the Country Women’s Association. She flicked through the pages, reading the recipes. ‘Fascinating,’ she whispered. ‘They filled a cob loaf with cream cheese and bacon.’
‘I’m going in deep,’ Oliver said. He shuffled around a large bookcase and headed to the back of the garage.
