Night Retrieval

Night had settled, but an untested tool is no better than dead inventory. Holding my newly fashioned popsicle stick with its brass pin hook, I probed the narrow drainage gap between two brick pavers beneath the table. The brass tip scraped gritty mortar, then caught on a firm edge. I braced my feet, levered the wooden handle with both hands, and hoisted the prize out of the crevice. It was a lost metal washer, ringed with tarnished bronze and perfectly intact. I swept the grit from its surface and set it atop my ceramic saucer outpost. A calculated field test with immediate material return.