I am in love with my shoplifter. Paying customers may come and go, but it is the light footstep of my beautiful thief that quickens my heart.

I run what, in times gone by, would have been called an emporium. I still call it that, but with an actorly voice and raised eyebrow. My four units have colonised the arcade at the back end of the shopping centre. More often than not, shoppers will catch their toe on a nest of tables placed just by the shop door. Momentarily discombobulated, their eyes will fall on my best furniture in the window, upon which stand art deco vases plump with plastic flowers, a fanned display of brass objets, and Wedgwoodesque pastoral figurines tempting them in like sirens. One missing of course, though only I know that. My shoplifter tucked a comely peasant girl under her arm one day in June, though really I was hard pushed to say who was the more pretty.

If mahogany and porcelain does not appeal, just a few steps away my secondhand books section throws out its beguiling papery odour. Fading Penguin Classics at the front, to draw in discerning readers to bask in their warm orange glow. One evening in July I came upon the gap where Nancy Mitford’s Love in a Cold Climate should have been. My nose caught the subtlest of perfume in the air, and I thought of a line in the book about life being sad and often dull, but there are indeed currants in this cake. Or something like that. My shoplifter’s larcenous taste is perfect.

On from the books, and I will hold my hands up to two charges, to be served concurrently, of bric and indeed brac. In the last units I have piled everything high, low, and sideways. Novelty toys for dogs, miscellaneous kitchen utensils, small electrical items, every cleaning fluid you could ever need from washing cars to scrubbing gravestones. And a battery-powered radio that is stuck on Absolute 80s FM. From here, my light-fingered love has taken, over a 4 month period, a three pin plug, a large egg whisk, two decorative door knobs, and a feather duster.

You may ask why I never confronted her. Or you perhaps would inquire what came first, the discovery of the shoplifting or the sparking of desire. These are easy questions to answer. I loved her the first moment I set eyes upon her. I loved her by the time I realised she was robbing me from under my nose. I didn’t want to stop her in case she never returned to my shop.

For a long time she limited her thieving to small objects that could be snaffled surreptitiously into her coat pockets. Every couple of weeks, she would drift into the arcade, usually late of an afternoon, to make her choice of my wares. Carefully, I would steal glances at her. She was like a nervous squirrel gathering acorns. As soft and delicate too. Her movements swift, eyes flicking about her. After a short while, a slim hand would dart to a shelf, silently lift whatever had caught her interest, and secret it on her person. Then, cheeks flushed pink, she would flit out again. My appreciation of her increased proportionally with the depreciation of my stock.

Over time her pilfering has got more blatant, and her manner more confident. Why, one day in August, she even nodded her head in my direction. I was there, sat at my till pretending to do a crossword. That day she carried off a zebra-pattern umbrella, shoved up her sleeve so her arm stuck out rigid as she left the shop. I could see she was smiling.

Her boldness inspired me. I found some shiny red ribbon in a drawer and began tying a little bow on particular knick-knacks in the shop, something I thought might appeal to her magpie gaze. A scented candle. A pen with multi-coloured nibs. A small brass ornament in the shape of a hare, the ribbon like a jolly scarf.

At first, she appeared not to notice my carefully placed ‘presents’. Then, in early September, as she was gracefully loitering by my bookshelves, she made a discovery. I watched her run her fingers along the book spines, tapping them like keys on a piano, as she moved deeper between the shelves. She paused, spying a red bow like a jewel. By the stillness of her head I could tell she was considering the significance of this curio. She reached out and slid the book from the shelf. I had tied the ribbon, like a bookmark, between the pages of an obscure French novel, Le Grand Meaulnes. With practised ease she vanished the book about her, turned on her heels, and was out the shop on a scented breeze.

I had been holding my breath the entire time, my heart beating furiously. I thought about my shoplifter getting home, inspecting the book, untying the ribbon, turning to the pages it marked. The scene of the first meeting between the romantic hero of the novel and the beautiful girl who would enchant him. Half way down the page, his impulsive first words, “tu es belle”.

This morning, the air outside feels autumnal. I have come in early, wearing a new jumper, my beard neatly trimmed, my manner nervous and expectant. The arcade is quiet. I’ve dusted the tables and cabinets. I’ve straightened the Penguins. I’ve tied a piece of red ribbon around the aerial of the battery-powered radio. I’ve placed the radio by my till, and turned it on. With luck, it’ll be playing a love song when my shoplifter comes by.