Three to See the King

1

I live in a house built entirely from tin, with four tin walls, a roof of tin, a chimney and door. Entirely from tin.

My house has no windows because there’s nothing to see. Oh, there are shutters that can be used to let the light in when required, but they remain closed against the weather for most of the time. It stands in a wild place, my house, high up on the plain. At night it creaks and groans as the wind batters it for hour after hour, in search of a gap to get inside. Even the door has to be bolted top and bottom to stop it from being blown open. I used to worry in case one day I might lose the roof, but so far that hasn’t happened and now I’m certain the structure is quite sound. The man who built it made sure of that. I found the house empty a few years ago, and adopted it for my own use. At first sight I knew it had everything I could need: somewhere to eat and drink and sleep without disturbance, protected from the elements by a layer of corrugated metal and nothing more. A very modest dwelling I must say, but it looked clean and tidy so I moved in. For a long while I was quite content here, and remained convinced I would find no better place to be. Then one day a woman arrived at my door and said, ‘So this is where you’ve been hiding.’