Tommy said dryly, ‘I take it you ain’t got me money then? Or do you always try and top people as they come in here?’

Vita gave Tommy the gun. ‘He’s out of his mind with worry. We’ve had a lot of trouble...’

‘Don’t tell them anything, Vita! Let Tommy do his worst. You can’t get blood out of a stone.’

The old man’s voice, full of dignity, made Briony intervene. ‘Look, Mr Goldstern, you remember me, don’t you?’

His face softened. ‘Of course I do. Every Monday regular you brought in your mother’s wedding ring to pop. I gave you seven shillings and you brought back nine shillings on the Saturday. Briony Cavanagh ... my wife Etta thought you were the most beautiful child she had ever seen.’

Briony sat beside the old man. Smiling at him she said to Vita, ‘Make a cuppa, girl, we’ll all have a little chat.’

Vita went to make the tea and Tommy pulled out a chair and straddled it, the old silver-handled gun still in his hand.

‘By rights, Solly, I should knock you from here to Kingdom come for the stunt you pulled on me.’

Solly’s face was grey. His skin seemed to become baggier by the second. Briony had thought of him as an old man all her life, it was the way when you knew people from children, but he seemed to be ageing in front of her eyes.

‘Shut up, Tommy, let him talk.’

Solly shrugged his shoulders and held out his hands helplessly.

‘Vita’s husband Isaac, he worked for me. I borrowed the five grand off you, Tommy, to buy a particularly nice tiara from an old lady. Beautiful workmanship, white and yellow gold, with diamonds and rubies. It was one of the finest pieces I’ve ever seen.’

‘All right, Solly, we get the picture. What happened?’

‘Well, Isaac, he has five children by my daughter Vita. I had him work for me because he couldn’t keep a job down. Here I could watch him. Make sure the children were fed. You know the score.’

Briony and Tommy nodded.

‘He waited ’til I resold the tiara to a jeweller up West who had a buyer for it. Then in the night he came and took the money, also every bit of the cash I’d saved over the years, and - even Vita doesn’t know this - all my Etta’s jewels. They were to be hers one day, Vita’s. He had taken up with a young girl, a slut of the first water, a goy! We haven’t seen him since.’

Briony laid her hand gently on the old man’s arm, her heart going out to him.

Tommy on the other hand said waspishly: ‘You was gonna top me over that ponce Isaac!’