Except I didn’t burgle it, or rob it, or anything, okay? I just trespassed and ended up with some items that I can’t give back now without admitting that it was me.

Mam’s had to sign some form for the school letting me visit this McKinley man and she thinks it’s great, like I’ve been ‘selected’ and it’s a great honour, and of course I can’t tell her the truth. She makes me brush my hair twice and Fit Billy, who has recently started to have breakfast with us, says it’s too neat and ruffles it up for me again, making Mam tut and laugh.

So anyway I’m late and Susan Tenzin is already waiting at the address on Collingwood Terrace that looks out over the mouth of the Tyne and, in the distance, the crumbling ruins of the old clifftop priory.

‘So. In and out, yeah?’ I say, trying not to pant from running.

Susan holds up a bag. ‘Good morning, Malcolm. Enough time for tea and butter cake, though.’ The hot night has become a cool autumn day, and she looks like she’s dressed to go somewhere posh. The skirt and knee-socks are there, with blinding-white trainers and a neat navy-blue jacket, buttoned up. Even though Mam’s made me put on my best jeans and a clean hoodie, I immediately feel inferior.

I have an old baseball cap on as well, because I’m worried in case someone in the house recognises me.

‘He’s expecting us,’ Susan says. ‘He has a carer who lives with him. Mrs Farroukh’s already been round too, to check him out.’

A carer? That’ll be the woman who chased me the day I stole the Dreaminators. I look up at the tall terraced house and the huge black door with peeling paint. Susan mounts the steps to the front door. I am at the bottom and still wary. ‘So, if old Farroukh’s already been round, why didn’t she just, you know, visit him herself?’

Susan replies over her shoulder. ‘She did, but Community Outreach is a valuable opportunity for Marden Middle School students to foster links with elderly people in the area,’ she says. She’s obviously memorised it. ‘You know what Mrs Farroukh’s like. Thinks we all live in a bubble of social media and should get out and meet people in our locality. I cannot actually say I disagree.’

I pull a face behind Susan’s back. She pushes the doorbell: a round button in the middle of an ornate stone carving on the side pillar. Behind the door, I can hear footsteps, and the door opens wide to reveal …

A large, middle-aged woman with big hooped earrings, and short-cropped Afro hair. I know from her outline that this is the woman who followed the dog out of the yard and down the lane.