Pops and robbers

Not a good start to the week. It's Francis' last day in the office and he's feeling understandably tense. There's only so many tears and sympathetic glances that any grown man can endure and he's now had so many that I'm seriously considering setting up a petition on the Downing Street website to ask for statutory limits to be set.

Leo, meanwhile, is in disgrace. An inveterate thief and an incompetent one, to boot - though only, I suspect, because part of him wants to be caught - he's hidden a half-empty family size bottle of undiluted Ribena, Pepperami wrappers and assorted sweet wrappers in his sock drawer, in the sure knowledge that they will be discovered as soon as I go on my clean underwear rounds.

We try not to shout because, as soon as we do, his behaviour gets worse. But it doesn't make any difference. Soon, Leo is is acting as if he'd been asked to put on a demonstration performance of a child totally at odds with normal family life. He shouts, he makes funny noises. Francis is on the point of losing it. "If you behave like that, I'll behave like this!" he roars.

I call Leo upstairs and, fortunately, he comes. We have a quiet chat, he goes downstairs again and mutters something that Francis accepts as 'sorry'. An uneasy calm is restored, and lasts until Beth and Leo leave for school. So far, so good. Let's hope he manages to hold it together at school today. And that Francis turns in a definitive performance as Mr Equitable at the office - at least until he's got his final cheque in his hot little hands.