As soon as Mrs Abner had sat down at the piano, Mal had said, ‘You’re in the best of hands now, Sadie. Pick you up at eight fifteen. Be good.’ Mrs Abner had begun to move. ‘No, please don’t get up, dear – no need to show me out,’ he’d told her. His plan had been to leave the night-latch open on his way outside. ‘There’s a little nib you press to stop it closing,’ he’d explained to her ahead of time. ‘It’s as if they want you walking in and taking everything.’ So that’s how it had gone. He’d strolled back to the car and made a show of driving off, flashing the headlights through the window. Her singing lesson had continued. Tone-deaf Sadie had got worse and worse – it hadn’t taken any effort to act out her part. She’d whined her way through ‘Bread of Heaven’ and ‘Jerusalem’ for half an hour, as loud as she could manage. The widow had grown more and more exasperated, but she’d stayed at the piano. Meanwhile, Mal had parked the car around the block, crept back into the house and rummaged in her study for the treasure he was after. At eight fifteen, he’d rung the door bell. Mrs Abner had sprung up and said, ‘Oh, what a shame. We’d only just begun …’ There’d hardly been a wrinkle of concern in Mal’s expression as he’d forked out twelve and six on to the widow’s palm and said goodnight – he’d even waved to the old lady from the car before they’d driven off. ‘Sadie, my dear girl,’ he’d said, through smiling teeth, ‘that went like bloomin’ clockwork.’ As soon as they were on the road and out of sight, he’d shared the take with her. ‘First prize,’ he’d said, dangling a set of keys above the dash. There was a massive chunk of cork attached to them by wire.

‘Next time, you can pay me twelve and six instead,’ she’d said. ‘It wasn’t worth it.’

‘Shows what you know.’ He’d snatched them from her grip. ‘They’re for a cuddy boat. Her old man’s pride and joy, or so they tell me. It’s not left its moorings since he croaked.’

‘So who tells you?’

‘Folk I know.’ He’d tapped his nose. ‘Loose lips sink ships.’

‘Well, how much do you think it’s worth?’

‘Enough that we can put our feet up for a while. As soon as I can get the thing upriver, anyway.’ He’d reached across to squeeze her hand and she’d squeezed back. ‘Don’t tell me that you didn’t get a little thrill from all of this. The blood is pumping, isn’t it? You’ve got a flutter in your heart, I know it. You’re a natural.’

‘I suppose it was all right.’

When a job had gone to plan, small flickers of Mal Duggan’s kindness would show through. His mood would sweeten for the next few days and she’d feel lifted by him. ‘There she is,’ he’d say, when she’d approach him from across the room, ‘my young accomplice.’ There’d be compliments on her appearance – ‘Got to say, Joy, you don’t half look gorgeous with your hair done that way’ – and praise for her abilities. He’d rabbit on about how different she was from all the older women in his life, who’d only wanted to get married quick and fill the house with babies and complain about their figures. How much fun she was to be around compared to them. How much he relied on her. ‘I swear, it’s like we see the world with the same eyes,’ he’d say. ‘A proper understanding, you and me have got, Joy, don’t we?’ True affection wasn’t in his nature, but she could take these little things he said and make them fill the empty space.