Lost & Found

Winnie sighed at the thought of her regular walk to the post-office to pick up her giro. It was quite a step, but with God’s good help, she’d get there yet again.

Winnie was only fifty-eight and as fit as most middle-aged women but for the last few months she’d been suffering from a harmless but painful condition in the heel of her left foot, which made it very difficult for her to walk any distance.
A spur, the doctor had called it and gave her some cream that did nothing at all to relieve the pain. She’d go to the chiropodist next week, perhaps he’d be able to fix it.

As she walked along the road, she let her mind wander as she disregarded the pain in her foot. She’d just read the morning paper. By! The world was getting to be a wicked place!

Jesus had His work cut out with the people these days. She made a mental note to add to her prayer list the muggers of the elderly woman she’d just read about, because they needed help. Bad people who did these things needed prayers as much as the victims, because only Jesus God could help them. She knew that.


She got to the post-office and picked up her Giro. She looked around her, wary about who was watching her pick up her paltry few pounds. You couldn’t be too careful these days and she’d already decided what her plan of action would be, should she ever be unfortunate to attract the attention of a mugger.
Winnie was prepared.


In the end she’d decided money wasn’t important enough to get hurt over. Not these days. Not since she’d discovered Jesus God. Once upon a time, money was the be all and end all of everything to her and she had spent most of her time and considerable talents pursuing it.


She shook her head as she remembered how clever she had thought herself in those days. She had been very good at her job and had thought that that was enough. But that was before she had been saved. Now anything left at the end of the week went into the church collection.


She left the post-office and as she made her way down the road, she noticed a young man walking a little way behind her. It made her uneasy. As quickly as her foot allowed, she crossed over the road and sure enough, he followed her.


A car passed slowly and stopped a little way ahead. She looked to see if there was anyone around, but there was no-one.


It was all over in seconds. The young man ran past her, knocking her off balance. She grabbed at him to save herself and there was a brief struggle before she fell, heavily, to the ground. He’d got her bag and jumped into the waiting car before she could even look up. Then they were gone.


She picked herself up, thankful she wasn’t seriously hurt, just a bit bruised and made her way home.


Back in her flat, she made herself a cup of tea and sat down to consider what had happened. The police would catch no-one - she didn’t even get a good look at him.


Winnie wondered what the young man would think when he opened her nearly empty bag. She never carried anything of any real value in her bag, it was more out of habit and something to do with her hands that she carried it.


Taking her purse and other items out of the deep inside pocket of her coat, she wished she could be a fly on the wall wherever the muggers were.


She would love to see them go through her bag to find nothing more interesting than a packet of tissues, a bag of mint imperials and a well-thumbed bible. And the note. Yes, she had been prepared. Just in case it ever happened to her, she had written a note to her would-be muggers and kept it, always, in her bag.


She sorted through the other items on the table and opened a black leather wallet. Nearly two hundred pounds in cash, driver’s license, membership to some gym or other. Silly boy! Fancy taking I.D on a job! Obviously not a professional thief like she had once been then! Still, the money would go to a good cause, the old lady who’d been mugged and others like her.


Winnie’s church had taken up her suggestion and started a fund for them. And they would pray for the muggers, like her friends had prayed for her when she was the best `dipper’ in the county. Nothing like a poacher turned gamekeeper for results!


She patted her old `lifting’ coat with the deep inside pockets and smiled.



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