I let myself in one day when Dario was asleep and everyone else was out. I wasn’t working myself now. It took too much time and the money wasn’t good enough. I made up some of the difference from people’s carelessness. Pippa was the best. She left notes lying around in her room and never noticed if they disappeared. Since Peggy’s death, I’d collected forty pounds from her. And twenty from Miles, when he left his wallet at home one day by mistake. A few coins from Astrid, so far. Mick and Owen were trickier, and Dario never seemed to have any money on him. One time, though, I lifted some weed from his room and sold it back to him. I said someone had given it to me at work and I didn’t want it, but I thought he might. He insisted on giving me something for it, and I could tell he felt a bit guilty that he was ripping me off. For me the crunch had come when we were finishing the work on the house, which the landlord was doing up before selling. While we were adding the last touches – painting the walls, laying down the last skirting-boards – this couple had come to look at it.
