One day, during one of the many weeks my husband was away, two policemen came to the door. I was a bit alarmed at first because at the time I was in the habit of speeding slightly on occasion, so I thought perhaps I hadn’t paid my most recent fine. Wanting to make a good impression, I invited them into the kitchen for a cup of tea.
Well it was nothing to do with speeding, it was to do with his firearms, the ones he never used. I had forgotten to pay the firearms license, so the guns needed to be taken away.
Bad cop: We need to seize the firearms.
Good cop: Could you please show us where the the gun cabinet is?
This was slightly awkward as the gun cabinet was in the corner of the tiny office I had at the back of the house and it was a terrible mess because it had also somehow become the junk room.
Bad cop: Where’s the key?
Good cop: We will need to open the gun cabinet if you don’t mind.
I suddenly realised that the bad cop’s question might be a trick question because the gun cabinet key is supposed to be hidden safely somewhere far away from the gun cabinet so I looked imploringly at the good cop until he said, gently, “do you know where the key is?”
Prepared to lie about anything and everything as I wasn’t used to having two uniformed police officers in such close proximity, it was a relief to be able to say, truthfully, that I had no idea where the key was.
I was given 24 hours to find the key in order for the firearms to be seized.
After they left, I began to search the house for the key. The only thing I remembered about the key was that it was rather large as, ever since it became law to have a gun cabinet, we had never opened it and, in fact I didn’t even know if it had guns in it or not.
I didn’t want to bother my husband while he was away and, due to his eccentric habits of secretly hoarding and hiding things, I didn’t want to have another argument about that; I also didn’t want him to know that I had incurred a fine!
Well it took a lot longer than 24 hours to find that key; it took about a week during which I found many stashes of tiny antique keys. The bad cop sent the good cop out to visit me on several occasions and, despite his good intentions, I still felt a bit like some sort of criminal.
It wasn’t until I suddenly remembered that we might have put the gun cabinet key in one of the the cupboards of an antique sideboard in the dining room we never used that I had an aha moment. But none of the many tiny keys worked to open its cupboards. The situation had become desperate partly because the good cop had become far too friendly and I suspected the bad cop might want to put me in jail.
The locksmith idea only came to me just in time, sort of. As he carefully pried the sideboard cupboards open and I was about to say “how to you want me to pay you?” wads of $50 notes fell onto the carpet – around two thousand dollars! “I’ll take cash please,” he said, laughing.
Oh and the gun cabinet key? It was wrapped in a paper towel on the windowsill adjacent to the gun cabinet in my tiny, disorganised office at the back of the house.
When my husband eventually came home, I decided just to tell him bits of the story and not the whole thing.
jmgoyder 
I could imagine the anxiety at the door to begin. When you said about being prepared to lie about everything made me smile. So refreshingly honest. So good to see you back. ā¤ļø
that is hilarious and good call on the limited telling of the story )
I’ve missed your life. š
What a splendid story, so glad it turned out all right.
Very good!!!
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I don’t know what I would have done in the same situation. I never wanted my husband to know things that he may be able to say, I told you so. I am so glad that you found the key and that the locksmith was a nice person after seeing the wad of money fall out. We all have a story that makes us laugh, right?
An amusing story in the telling which must have been far from funny at the time.
Having a couple of cops at the door would be unnervng and would make feel nevous
Loving the way this unfolds…
š¤š
this had me chuckling