I am guessing that your question refers to Roald Dahl's short story "The Umbrella Man," although you did not specify it in your question. The old man goes into The Red Lion pub and buys a triple whiskey with the pound he received from the narrator's mother for the umbrella he sold her. Then from where they are standing outside spying on him through the window see the following:

Slowly, he turned away from the bar and edged back through the crowd to where his hat and coat were hanging. He put on his hat. He put on his coat. Then, in a manner so superbly cool and casual that you hardly noticed anything at all, he lifted from the coatrack one of the many wet umbrellas hanging there, and off he went.

The girl's mother is shocked and outraged, but her daughter simply says, "Neat" and "Super." She admires his nerve as well as his inventiveness. The story does not say what the girl's mother does with the umbrella, but it seems likely she will keep it, since she got a twenty-pound umbrella for one pound, and since it would be impossible for her to find the owner. The little old man has undoubtedly gone off to sell another umbrella to earn enough for another triple shot of whiskey.