Shackleton and the Recliner

I had walked into the cul de sac and was making my way along, looking for the house number 3.

The set of keys that I had been provided with were hanging from my index finger being just one more thing to carry in addition to  my clip-board, equipment and ladders but I had to regularly check that they had not somehow fallen off noisily into a drain gully or silently onto a grass verge.

It was a short terraced block and so number 3 was just one house down from the narrow service road.

I nudged open the timber gate with my knee and edged up the garden path to the front door. Depositing all of my apparatus I was left with just the bunch of keys. I like to guess, out of a large cluster, which is the correct key. A Yale type lock is a bit of a give away, perhaps more so where the manufacturers brand name is engraved just below the aperture.

The handle and lock of number 3 looked a bit battered. This could be due to a forced entry or a recent, hasty change if the house has been, unfortunately, repossessed by a lender or loan company. My first selection was wrong. I should have taken that as an omen. The other slim keys either fitted snugly but would not turn or were a complete mismatch.

In frustration I rattled the front door and then stood back to think. One key on the ring was a traditional mortice type, thick barrel and shaped unique head. It must be a back door key. I checked to make sure that my pile of items on the path would be safe and walked out of the gate and along the frontage of number 1 to the opening of the service road.

As is the current trend to prevent trespass down the rear of terraced houses the usually open vehicle wide passage was firmly locked with a tall, stout wrought iron gate. I did not have a small key of the type needed. Back at my start position at the front door I decided to have a quick look through the living room window. Just inside, in an easy chair I could see an elderly lady. The small slit window adjacent had a hand written notice saying "door bell not working-knock hard on window".

I was worried in case a harsh knock startled the lady and so tapped lightly and hesitantly. Peering again through the glazing there was no movement whatsoever from the occupant of the chair. I knocked a little harder and more earnestly. There was a little bit of activity from the old lady indicating that she had in fact been asleep as she raised herself up a bit and resumed reading a magazine that had been hidden from me on her reclined lap. I knocked hard enough to cause the double glazing to rattle in the brick surround and waited for the door to open to me.

Nothing happened.

She remained seated and engrossed in articles on celebrity infamy and true life stories of lust and infidelity. In a final attempt to be noticed I rapped my knuckles so hard on the glass that they felt positively bruised and battered.

I decided to ring the client who had provided the keys. I hid my annoyance in a very professional manner and told him that I had not managed to get the door open. He was extremely surprised to hear that the house was lived in. It was, after all, a house that he rented out and to his knowledge it was completely vacant and devoid of furniture.

The mystery deepened as I checked my instruction sheet to read to him the address....number 3. He replied that I should actually be at 3a. I have not moved so swiftly as I did with all of my equipment at that moment exiting the garden and trying to appear to nonchalantly just wander up to 3a, just a few doors up the street.

I took longer than usual to inspect that property, occasionally checking from behind the blinds that I was not the target of a vigilante neighbourhood watch after my ceaseless harassment of a harmless and evidently very, very deaf local resident.