Josh remained frozen — his eyes moved neither left, nor right, but were cast firmly at a point just in front of his feet. Mrs Johnston reached over and gently removed the boy’s coat and handed it to the store manager. In a matter of seconds, the manager was holding the box of stolen 35mm film in his hand.
At this exact moment, it occurred to Josh that his allowance money was in the same pocket as the film. If he’d acted a bit quicker he might have been able to convince everyone that this was all just some sort of honest mistake — that he’d put the film in his pocket to keep it separate from the other groceries and then forgot all about the purchase.