Around the lower-left front corner are a number of marks suggesting the bloom of some decaying vegetable matter that may have lain alongside the box. Along the lower front edge there is a smear of something brown and waxy, as if it had stood in old oil or perhaps been held by a hand smeared with grease. Its handle is rusted stiff at an unhelpful angle. It is spotted with rust stains but the rust is not its own - it may have stood beneath a source of iron-rich water, dripping in the way that stalactites do.
Inside the space is rich, full and cool. It is rectangular and solid and smells of stone, or money. The underside of the lid, ceiling to the space, is so flecked with rust that the black paint appears to have been applied later. In its marks can be read the standing figures of three of the apostles. The floor of the space and the lower parts of the walls are both rusted and not, paint-flecked and not. There is a sheen of bare metal that glows faintly. Piled in one corner are the fragments too small to retrieve and catalogue. They can only be said to point towards the infinite.
Sixty-one larger objects have been removed and can be listed thus:
1. A lead sleeve, 1½ inches long, of unknown purpose bent into a shallow curve like the canine of a carnivore. Around it has been wound in a tight, almost obsessive spiral, an unknown length of rather elderly string.
2. A small screwdriver, 3" long, coated in rust, as used by electricians.
Its handle is longer than its arm.
3 and 4. A pair of damaged keys, joined by a twist of wire. One is toothless, the other is crippled. The surface of both is scarred as if following a hideous accident.
5. A floorboard nail, 3" in length, bent like a dancer or a flickering candle.
6. A short plastic rod of a milky whiteness, like the conceptual model for a pencil stub.
7. A coin of unknown stature.
8. A metal bracket, 1" x ¾",pierced by three holes, one of which is blocked such that it resembles a startled chorister.
9. A green, plastic hook of no integral strength in the shape of an S.
10. A large drawing pin.
11. A hairclip whose legs are rusted into modesty.
12. A metal bracket 3.8" wide from which protrudes a semi-circular flange.
13. A small nut, perfectly square, whose hole is perfectly circular.
14. A nut (unrelated).
15. A drawing pin whose thumb-plate is notched. Around the base of its pin is a cluster of small hairs.
16. Two small springs, wedged together.
17. A fine metal collar or sleeve as if forced from a fountain pen.
18. A black, threaded washer of 1" diameter whose outer edge is notched in two rows for ease of use.
19. A small book hinge, astonishingly orange.
20. An unidentifiable fragment.
21. A crumpled twist of paper of uncertain purpose.
22. A short, fat screw, overgrown with fluff.
23. A split-pin, once chromed for domestic use.
24. A minute pair of pliers, one handle of which may have been snapped off in frustration.
25. A clean brass fixing resembling a medieval hat, for use in domestic electrical work.
26. A straight dependable brad. Unused.
27. A white plastic brush nearly 6" long. At one end its bristles are starting to escape.
28. A thin paper fragment, carefully curved at one end.
29. An enormous metal bracket, not quite rectangular in the head.
30. A fine metal lever or clamp resembling part of a lobster.
31. A beautiful key with mouse-like tendencies.
32 - 54. Twenty-two assorted small nails and screws, the longest of which is bent, only one of which has lost its head.
55. A single screw, more robust than the last but quite useless.
56. A screw from the dashboard of a Cavalier. It has a round head.
57. A thinner screw beautifully rusted.
58. A washer of comfortable size.
59. A large eyehook, slightly bent, lightly crusted.
60. An adjustable metal waist for garden or dungeon use.
61. A fairly new book hinge, about the size of a butterfly whose wings are almost square and spotted with six identical holes.
