I find it convenient to have a single transform sub that produces the key-value pair for the object to search+parse a hash-like dict file. Handling/closing of filehandle is really just cake icing.

Search::Dict sets the filehandle position to the first line greater than or equal $key. This seems pretty raw to me (read: that I should probably write some wrapper that takes care of the edge cases). The OO stick is not always the first thing I reach for, in case you're wondering.