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Chapter 11
The next day Darren was up at the crack of dawn as usual. Once he had completed his morning chores on the farm, he got the car out of the garage and was soon on his way to Exeter. His GPS enabled him to locate the company without too much trouble and, half an hour after leaving the farm he was parking in the company's car park.
The research he had conducted on the Internet the previous afternoon had told him that the company was a reasonably small one and that they only made these boxes to order. It was impossible just to buy them off the shelf, so Darren was very hopeful that they would keep records of each box purchased.
As he approached their entrance door, Darren was beginning to feel slightly nervous. Having never played the detective before, he didn't know the correct way to go about it, so he had to play it by ear. When he had discussed it with Sarah, they had agreed to stick reasonably close to the truth but not to mention the specific contents of the boxes. When he walked through the door, he was faced with his first obstacle - the receptionist.
"Hello," said Darren, "I'm hoping you can help me. I've found a couple of boxes that were made by your company and would like to return them to their rightful owner. If I give you their serial numbers, would you be able to tell me who bought them?"
"Well, that's not the type of information that we normally give out. If you would like to wait here, I'll get our manager to have a talk with you."
While the receptionist was away, Darren was feeling quite pleased with himself. He had been half expecting to get shown the door straight away. A meeting with a manager had to be a step in the right direction. When the receptionist returned, she was accompanied by an elderly gentleman.
"Good morning. I'm Mr Wright, the general manager. And you are Mr…?"
"Cooper, Darren Cooper."
"Well Mr Cooper, as our receptionist has explained, we cannot give out the names and addresses of our customers to anyone except the authorities without the customer's permission. You say you've found two of our boxes. Where exactly did you find them?"
"My girlfriend found them when she was digging in the vegetable patch in her family's back garden. They appeared to have been buried there on purpose, although we have no idea why or who by."
"I see," said Mr Wright, "that certainly does seem very suspicious. I take it you managed to open the boxes. What was in them?"
"Sorry, I'm not prepared to divulge their exact contents, but I can tell you that they appear to be worth an awful lot of money. I'm sure the owner will want them back."
"I see. Well, as I said before, I can't give you the information you are looking for without the express permission of the owner of the boxes. If you wouldn't mind waiting here, I'll see if I can contact him and see what he has to say about the matter."
After Darren had given Mr Wright the serial numbers of the two boxes, he had to wait a bit longer this time, getting more nervous with every passing minute. What if the owner of the boxes was the same guy that had been found dead in the garden? They would never know who he was and, with no further clues, their enquiries would just dry up. What if the manager was telephoning the police instead of the owner of the boxes? All Darren could do in that case was stick to his story and hope that it wouldn't get Sarah and him into trouble.
Eventually, Mr Wright returned to reception.
"I have spoken to the owner of the boxes and he has agreed that I should give you his details. Indeed, he is quite keen to recover them as soon as possible. However, before I can do that I need your name and address so that we know who the details have been given out to."
Darren gave Mr Wright his true name as he already knew it, but gave him a false address. Not knowing what he might be getting into, Darren didn't want to risk the possibility of anyone turning up on his doorstep making demands. Mr Wright then gave him a slip of paper with the name, address and contact numbers of the owner of the boxes.
"Thank you, Mr Wright," said Darren. "I'll be sure to get them back to him as soon as I can."
With an inward sigh of relief, Darren returned to his car, leaving the car park as fast as he could without looking suspicious. As soon as he had seen that the address was a local one he had decided to go on a quick recce mission of the property to see what he could discover. Then it would be time to get home and meet up with Sarah.
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