here!’ she demanded. ‘I’ll take it with me and give it back. You little sod!’ She snatched the folded pound note that Joey had withdrawn from the top of his sock where he’d had it stashed. No sooner had she appropriated the cash than her husband prised open her fingers.
‘You can’t do that, you silly cow!’ Rufus spluttered. ‘Pickering can’t be sure Joey’s had it or he’d have cut up rough at the time. ’Sides, I could do with that quid.’ He gave Joey a grin and a rewarding pat on the shoulder. ‘But I’ll give it you back, son, don’t you worry about that. You deserve to keep it for being shrewd.’
‘Deserves to keep it?’ Gertie bawled, making the baby start to cry. ‘What he deserves is a hiding!’ When her gormless husband continued smiling soppily at the miscreant Gertie gave Joey a hefty whack on the backside that shot him forward a pace. ‘That’s for lying as well as thieving.’ She felt her heart thudding. If Pickering had made Joey turn out his pockets that evening, he’d have called the police there and then, and got her arrested. She forcefully recounted her theory to her husband.
‘But he got away with it, didn’t he?’ Rufus came back at her, chuckling.
‘You wouldn’t have been so jolly if the coppers had started snooping around here, asking lots of questions about your thieving son. They might just have found out where Joey gets his ideas from. Fancy a spell in gaol, do you?’ Gertie taunted. She stuck out a hand for Rufus to put the stolen money on her palm.
Rufus closed his fist on the pound note, remaining silent, then he grabbed Joey by the hand and yanked him towards the front door. ‘I’ll take him with me then … just this once …’
Gertie sent a silent curse after him while buttoning up her children’s coats. A few evenings a week she cleaned Wilfred Pickering’s office. He was the accountant who did the Windmill’s books. She’d readily agreed to take on extra shifts when she’d heard him talking to Phyllis about contacting an agency for domestic help. The extra cash always came in handy. Gertie had only been doing Pickering’s job two months so had been mortified when the man had recently caught Joey in the office cloakroom, delving into his overcoat pockets. Gertie had managed to persuade the fellow that the similar-looking gabardine coats hanging on the pegs had confused Joey. She’d said her son thought he’d been looking in her coat pocket for a handkerchief. Gertie would have liked to believe her own tale, but in her heart she knew that Joey was out of the same mould as his father, and getting more like Rufus every day. If the accountant caught Joey at it again he’d not listen to excuses.
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