“I leave Caroline this box. I hope she enjoys what it has to offer.”

And that was it. Mr Marchant, the solicitor, remained impassive.

“Is that it?” I spluttered. “A box?”

Marchant held my gaze for a moment. “I can only read you Mr Hartman’s will, Miss Bellman. I can’t change the contents.”

“Well…..how big is this box? The size of a crate? The size of a matchbox?”

Marchant shrugged slightly. “Somewhere in between” he replied.

And that was that. Henry Jack Hartman, known by all and sundry as just ‘Jack’ never did anything in between. He was my partner, my best mate and my kindred spirit and I missed him like hell but sometimes he could be an infuriating sod. Nothing was ever straightforward with him. There were always twists and turns, a sleight of hand, elaborate practical jokes with a grin and a wink.

An hour later, at home, the box was sitting in the middle of my lounge, taking centre stage and almost daring me to remove the lid. It was about three feet square and not particularly solid. It was varnished in a mahogany stain and seemed relatively new. What in the name of God, or any other deity you care to mention, had Jack placed inside of this waiting receptacle?

The box was heavier than it seemed. I briefly contemplated the bizarre and unlikely possibility that Jack had placed a gold bar in there. He was, as the saying went, “not short of a bob or two” from a fairly hefty sum left to him by a grudging stepfather.

But no, that was far too conventional for Jack the Trickster. He’d make me work at this. There was no padlock to the box, no combination lock with a number so cryptic it would take a small army of whizz kids to decipher. Hesitating for a moment, I cautiously opened the lid to find….another box, this one about two feet square.

Ohh, that old game, I thought. Boxes of ever decreasing size like those traditional Russian dolls. Till I arrive at what? Nothing at all? I was not impressed at this plodding lack of originality.

I dutifully opened the lid and, there it was, another box, this time about eighteen inches square. I pulled it out with both hands, gave a long weary sigh and opened the lid.

Then BWOINNNGGGG! With a sudden burst of movement, something bright, something colourful, something quite insane leaped out at me, then sprang back on itself. A demented clown, its absurd face painted in lurid scarlet and lemon yellow, grinned at me like an escapee from Toy Penitentiary.

A Jack-in-the-Box.

Of course it was.

I recovered my breath and my wits while the ridiculous clown on a spring waved around drunkenly. I held the head in both hands. It had been custom made to resemble Jack himself, silver earring, freckles on the nose and wearing that unfashionable but beloved black jacket with military epaulettes.

In its mouth was one of Jack’s usual and very anti-social cigarettes. No, not quite a ciggie. It was a tightly rolled piece of paper. I removed it, carefully unfolded the paper and realised it was an HSBC cheque.

The cheque was made payable to myself, Caroline Bellam. It was signed Henry Hartman.

Finally, I thought, the end is in sight.

But on the line for ‘Pay’ he had written ‘£Hope-You-Like-The-Box only’

I crumbled. He was tormenting me from the grave. Jack’s revenge for eleven years of being thoroughly nice to each other.

I collapsed onto the sofa, glaring with some venom at the series of boxes and the maniacal Jack doppelganger hanging over the edge and  now looking worse for wear.

This can’t be right, I reasoned. Jack could be a pain sometimes, but he wasn’t mean. He’d give his last pound to a beggar if he could.

I racked my brains. He was always playful with words. I thought about the actual will: “I leave Caroline this box”.

Then the message on the cheque: “Hope you like the box only” Only.

Then, like a sudden slap around the face, I realised.

I’d left a hammer and nails near the TV from where I’d hung a painting. I picked up the hammer, approached the largest three-foot box and struck it full force in the middle. It immediately splintered because it wasn’t solid wood and had been carefully constructed with ply panelling on the inside.

As I demolished all four sides, I could see that they had been crammed with wads of coloured paper. But more than just paper. Queen Elizabeth the second stared at me regally and each note displayed a white ‘50’ in the corner. I carefully prised them loose from what remained of the box.

There were hundreds and hundreds of them.

I smiled triumphantly.

I went to the kitchen to open a celebratory bottle of something, but not before I put the grinning Jack back in his box.