Hidden Treasure  

Grace Hassell

It was just another normal day at the Perth warehouse, phones ringing, orders being boxed, and stock being refilled. It had been a busy morning, so Hukitu was in the process of filling the stacker when something caught his eye. A piece of worn paper tied in twine and sealed with wax laying on top of the fittings. This wasn’t a usual find; the stock forms shouldn’t be inside the boxes. “Renuel, there was a piece of paper in this box, do you have to process this?” asked Hukitu holding the paper up. Renuel raised an eyebrow, “I’ll take a look”. After tearing the twine from the wax Renuel knew he immediately needed to get this to AJ.  

“What is this map I’m looking at; I mean I can tell it’s of the inland western coast of Australia but… why?” said AJ. “You can seriously tell all that from just looking at it, it’s just a line with ocean on one side and mountains and an X on the other” replied Renuel. “It’s the way the line is, that’s WA” AJ reiterated tapping the map. “That doesn’t explain why though” AJ added. “Right, it was found in a box of fittings” Renuel explained. “Leave this with me, I’ll talk to Mitch about it” said AJ. Renuel nodded and went back to work. Meanwhile AJ snapped a picture seeing if there was anything similar online, maybe he should call Caboolture and ask if they were missing something. 

What was supposed to be minutes researching turned into hours and time to knock off had come. Mitch knocked on AJ’s door, “Did you miss the time?” AJ looked up from his computer confused before looking at the time, “Oh, wow that went by fast…” AJ said. “What’s got you working so hard” asked Mitch leaning against the doorframe. “Look, Hukitu found this map, which he gave to Renuel which he gave to me, it was in a box of fittings we received, that’s beside the point” AJ paused reeling in a deep breath, “Mitch I have reason to believe that this is a genuine treasure map pointing out the location of where miners from the 19^th century hid their gold during the WA gold rush”. At first Mitch thought AJ was joking but AJ didn’t crack a smile. “Holy, you’re being serious, where?” said Mitch.  

*** 

Mitch and AJ looked at each other then down at the map standing at the entrance of the Crystal Cave in Yanchep. “This is open to the public; someone was bound to have found it” said AJ in defeat. “Yes, but there is a secret passage, so maybe not” Mitch said flipping the map around to show the map of the cave system. The pair made their way into the depths, standing in front of a dead-end where a rock with the exact symbol as the map lay. Mustering their strength, they slid the rock to the side, with ease. Turns out it was fake. Beneath the rock there was a hole and, in that hole, lay a small wooden box with a rusted looking chains and lock. The men looked at each other their smiles growing wider by the second. 

*** 

Once they arrived back at the warehouse the sun was rising, and the early risers were arriving for their next day of work. AJ and Mitch were working away on opening it with no avail. “What are you two doing?” asked Hannah. “Trying to open this box” said Mitch sounding defeated.  

“Oh, here you go… I thought we weren’t supposed to do the scavenger hunt until this weekend” said Hannah handing them the key and walking off.