Chapter 3. Make a Plan

The next morning John, Moana and Flynn met at the intersection on their bikes and rode to school, quietly and excitedly discussing what they might find when they went back to the ‘Dump’ after school.
John told his friends that he’d asked his Mum about the place to see what she knew, and that she’d offered to do some research on it.  He also told them what Mum had said about the old inventor guy who used to own the place.
“Woah,” said Moana “That’s freaky!”
“Yeah,” said Flynn “I wonder if we’ll find some cool inventions or something?”

Again the school day seemed to drag, and the boys found it a little hard to concentrate. Eventually they were back on their bikes racing away from school, heading in the direction of the ‘Dump’.
Once there, they leaned their bikes against the shed, looked around and decided which piles to check out this time.  Moana found a pile of metal pipe scaffolding, Flynn found an old snow sled, and John found some old wheels, chain and metal rods.
“You know what this reminds me of?” John said to his friends with a grin “That TV programme ‘Make Something’ where the teams of kids have to make cool stuff using junk”.
“Yeah” agreed his friends.  They all looked at each other grinning “Let's do that, what shall we make?”
“Did you see the episode the other night where they had to put a motor on a pram and ride it?” said John.
“Yeah,” laughed Moana and Flynn “That was cool”.
“Hey guys,” said John “We’ve found some old motor-mowers, some old plastic seats, some wheels and some scaffolding, are you thinking what I’m thinking?”
“GO CARTS!” they all yelled.

They decided to get as many of the parts they needed as possible and put them in smaller piles near the shed.  Soon there were wheels of various sizes, bits of metal pipe, some plastic seats, rope, and a couple of motor-mowers.  Standing back to admire their work, it became clear they were missing something; they needed tools before they could go any further.

John remembered his grandfather’s old DIY magazines.  “Hey guys, I have this old magazine at home with an article on how to build a soap-box derby racer, that could help us to work out which bits go where”.
“Yeah, that would help,” said Moana “Shall we call it a day for now and come back tomorrow with the article to do some more?  I could try and grab a few tools out of the garage to bring along?”
“Great idea,” said Flynn “I’ll do that too”.
“And me” agreed John.

When John got home Mum was sitting at the computer. “Ah there you are,” she said smiling, “I’ve been looking up some information on that old place by the playground, seems we have a bit of a mystery”.
“Oh really?” said John, he didn’t want to show too much interest in case Mum got suspicious.
“Yes, now the chap who used to the own the place was called Frederick Chalmers. He had no family, and when he died and his Lawyers read the Will they discovered that he had hidden the Property Deeds somewhere.  Apparently the Will stated that the person who was able to find the Property Deeds would become the next owner of the property and all that was located on it.”
“Wow,” said John “I guess nobody found the Property Deeds, since the place has been abandoned all this time.  I wonder where he hid them?”
Mum and John exchanged shrugs. “Yes, I wonder if anyone apart from the Lawyers even knew about what his Will said?” Mum said to John.

The next morning the boys met at the intersection on their bikes, and rode to school, John telling Moana and Flynn about what Mum had found out.

“Man that place just gets weirder and weirder” said Moana.
“Yeah,” agreed Flynn “Still cool though. I can’t wait to get back there again after school.”

The boys got through the school day, and pedaled as fast as they could back to the 'Dump'.  Once there they all got the tools they’d managed to grab from home, and put them in a pile.  John also got the DIY magazine out of his schoolbag, open at the article about making a soap-box derby racer.

The boys crowded around the article and tried to work out which tool they needed for each part of the job.  It was slow going and a little frustrating for the boys, but they did manage to get a pair of wheels attached to an axle, and found the best pieces of pipe to make a strong, but fairly light frame.  They were puzzling on how to weld the frame together, then attach the axle to the frame when Moana had a great idea. “Hey guys,” he said “Maybe we should see if we can get into the shed, there could be a whole lot more tools in there we could use”.
“Great idea,” said John “We just need to get that lock and chain off the doors. We only need to move the doors a little bit, then I reckon we could squeeze in there.”

The boys wandered over to the shed and tested the chain and lock, it was pretty old and rusted in places, and when they rattled it large flakes of rust broke off and showered onto the ground.  They each grabbed a heavy tool and had turns hammering the lock and chain, until eventually it broke.  Hot and sweaty from hammering the chain, the boys caught their breath for a few minutes and then all three together pushed and pulled the old sliding doors of the shed.  Tiny milimetre by milimetre they moved the doors, screeching from lack of use, until there was a gap about 30cm wide.

John was first to squeeze through, then Moana, then Flynn.  It was dark inside due to the very dirty single window, and it took a minute before their eyes adjusted enough to see properly.  There was stuff everywhere.  More piles with covers over them, benches along the back wall with dusty tools strewn about, spider webs, the odd bird dropping and a fine layer of dirt seemed to cover most things.

John wandered over to the bench and began looking at the tools, Moana went over to the nearest pile and pulled the corner of the tarpaulin cover up, all he could see at first were table legs, whatever was piled under the cover appeared to be sitting on a table.  He pulled the cover back further and gasped in amazement and delight;  there on the table was a model of the 'Dump' in miniature.  It was pretty accurate, with the shed, piles of stuff, and the paths in and around the piles.  The only difference was the small wire track which wound around and through the items represented.  

The boys clustered around the model and stared for a few minutes, admiring the handiwork and the likeness to the very place they’d enjoyed investigating so much.

“What do you think that wire track thing is for?” asked Moana  “It looks a bit like a roller-coaster track”.
“It does remind me of something,” said Flynn  “You know my ‘marble race’,  where you put the curved tubes and stuff together and then let the marbles go through it?”
“Oh yeah,” said John “I wonder if that’s what you do with the wire track?”

The boys started looking around for any marbles that they could try in the model, sneezing and coughing as they stirred up clouds of dust moving piles of papers and rags, boxes of magazines, coils of wire and old tools.  “Hey what about this?” Flynn called as he opened a small hinged timber box from a drawer at one end of the work benches. Inside the box was lined with red felt and there were shiny ball bearings of different sizes all piled in together.  He brought the box over to the table and the boys each took a few bearings to see if they’d fit on the wire track. Moana’s were both too small and simply fell straight through the gap between the wires.  Flynn had one which was too small by about two milimetres, and one which was far too big and wouldn’t fit through the holes where the track went through the miniature shed and junk piles.  John’s first one was also too big, but his second one rolled along the track, picking up speed. The boys grinned watching it loop through each of the items, and around the junk piles, they laughed when it knocked over a little sign that said “keep watching” (even though it seemed a little strange). They marveled at how smoothly it rolled along the track with a metallic hum, a little like when you put a coin into a vending machine.  Finally the ball bearing came around the last curve of the track, rolling to the side of the miniature shed, and stopped at a letterbox. John reached for the ball bearing to set it going again when suddenly the miniature letterbox opened and the ball bearing fell in, which in turn flipped a spring to pop open a very well-concealed latch in the ground just behind the letterbox, revealing a tiny toy envelope.

The boys looked at each other in amazement. “What does it mean?” asked John.
“I don’t remember seeing a letterbox around the side of the shed” said Flynn.
“It's pretty overgrown out there, maybe  we should have a look?” said Moana.

The boys squeezed back through the gap in the shed doors and walked around to the side of the shed. It was very overgrown and it took them a few minutes of yanking tall weeds and grass out of the way before they found the letterbox, and had cleared a small space around it.  They began looking for a way to open the letterbox, but couldn’t find a catch.  Finally in frustration John poked his hand into the letter slot at the front, and felt the latch on the inside.  Flicking the latch with his finger, John felt the top of the letterbox pop open, revealing a small winding handle.  Glancing up at his friends, who grinned back in encouragement, John began winding the handle.  It was stiff, but not impossible, and at first John didn’t think it was doing anything, but suddenly he realized that the ground behind the letterbox seemed to have started to shift and move a little.  After four more turns he definitely saw a crack in the ground in a straight line, about 20 centimetres behind the letterbox.  Six more turns and the crack had become three cracks in the ground; like a square “U” shape, and the front edge was beginning to lift.  “Hey I think it’s a trapdoor” said John excitedly. More turns saw dirt and few straggly weeds slip and slide toward the back of the trapdoor.
“This is getting tiring,” said John “Your turn Moana”.

Moana took over and turned the handle quickly, watching as the front edge lifted up more and more.  Soon he was tired too, and let Flynn take over for a while.  After another 20 or so turns from Flynn the trapdoor had opened wide enough for the boys to see that it neatly covered a small solid metal box about the size and depth of a rectangular oven roasting dish, set into the ground, the trapdoor making a good seal as the lid.  Inside the box was a thick plastic zip-lock bag.  Carefully, John reached in and lifted out the plastic bag, it was a little dusty, but was still sealed.  He gently pulled open the plastic zipper to reveal a large envelope made of thin waxy cardboard, sealed with a length of thin cord wrapped around some small disc-shaped toggles in a figure-eight pattern.  The envelope looked vaguely familiar, and he realized where he’d seen something like it before; when Mum brought some work home with her from the office.  “Hey guys,” he said excitedly “I think I know what this is.”  Moana and Flynn watched intently as John unwound the cord holding the envelope closed, reached inside and pulled out a small pile of documents. The heading on the top one said “Certificate of Title” and there was a drawing, like a map, showing the fence lines of the 'Dump'.  There was another document at the bottom which was headed “Last Will and Testament of Frederick Chalmers”.

The boys looked at each other with a mixture of confusion, amazement and excitement showing on their faces.  “I think these are the missing property Deeds for the dump,” said John excitedly “If what Mum found out is true, then we just became the owners of the dump”.  Moana and Flynn let out whoops of laughter and the boys high-fived each other.

Suddenly Moana stopped and became serious. “Maybe we should find an “Expert” or two like the teams on ‘Make Something’ have to help out.  Would it be a good idea to ask our parents?  We’re going to need someone who knows about all the legal stuff aren’t we? And I think we could use some help to make the go-carts” he finished with a grin.
“Yes,” agreed John “Mum can help with the Legal stuff”.
“and Dad can help us build the go-carts” said Moana.
“yeah mine too” agreed Flynn.

Moana’s dad was a Mechanical Engineer, so knew plenty about motors and building stuff.  Flynn’s dad was an Electrician, and was great at fixing things.

“OK,” said John “We need to get them all together to show them what we’ve found and what we want to do. Do you think we’ll get into trouble for poking around here?” he frowned, suddenly worried.

“Weeeell, technically we own the place now,” said Flynn “So they can’t really tell us off, can they?”

“So we need a plan,” said Moana “Its Saturday tomorrow, how about we have a picnic at the park, all of us together, and then we can bring our parents here and show them what we’ve found”.

The boys agreed, and decided that they’d had enough excitement for the day, so carefully put the documents back into the envelope and inside the box in the ground, wound down the trapdoor lid, and replaced the top of the letterbox back into position.  They pulled a few straggly bushes over to cover the trapdoor and then grabbed the tools they brought, hopped back on their bikes and rode home.

A few phone calls between them all later, and the picnic time had been set; 11.00am at the Park, and their parents were all looking forward to a nice catch-up!