Our story centers on three characters: Irving, Frances and Smalley.
Irving's making a pretty big mistake early on. He's having a guys night out and has just gambled and lost his paycheck. Pretty serious worries when you've got a wife at home and she's expecting.
Irving does have some brains and realizes he KNOWS he can't just go back home and say he gambled his paycheck away. He's walking around and he meets up with this cop that basically asks him what he's doing in that neighborhood and the cops warns him it's a bad/violent neighborhood. Well, this gives Irving his idea. He dirties himself up, tears his suit and he's gonna go with 'I got mugged and the mugger stole my money' excuse
Irving puts the cherry on the sundae by picking up a rock and cutting his own face. John Smith does an excellent job in this scene where Irving cuts his own face but unfortunately the makeup job is rather lacking so you honestly might find yourself laughing at this cut on Irving's face. It looks laughably bad.
Irving goes home and tells his pack of lies to his wife (Frances). Poor Irving had a massive brainfart because he didn't consider the idea of getting the cops involved. He genuinely thought he could shovel this garbage to his wife and it'd all be forgotten. Nope, Frances is buying the lie but wants to see the wrong doer punished. You can't exactly have somebody take 96 bucks from you and they get away with it.
Irving does have a lot of consideration going on in his heart and mind. He's very upset and feels guilty when the cops call him and say they caught the guy that mugged him. He even tries to safely voice his doubts to Frances without completely outting his misdeed. He brings up the worry that this supposed mugger might have his own money and it might be used towards rent. Frances shuts him down by telling him he's not making any sense.
Irving goes to the station and the guy being accused of being the mugger says he's never seen Irving before. Irving gets back $92 out of his $96 paycheck. Irving declines to press charges because he knows that guy's innocent and didn't do a thing to Irving.
The next morning rolls around and Irving stops off at Smalley's place. Smalley is his boss. Irving's there to pick up some vouchers. Imagine Irving's surprise and amusement when Smalley enters with his face busted up. He really got mugged last night. Smalley's description is of the guy that was supposed to have mugged Irving. Lot of people might snark at the coincidence of all of this but I genuinely don't care. I'll like the story.
But here's the end that honestly cracks me up as much as the lady in "Hooked" threatening to cut off her husband's allowance. I'd forgotten to mention that Smalley is very condescending about Irving's marriage and he's putting him down for being married/being a newlywed. Smalley says to Irving that he knew he took all of Irving's money in the game last night but wanted to hit him up for a bit of money to borrow. Irving pops out with an answer that's probably gonna fuel more jokes from his boss. I think Irving really thinks he's coming up with a smackdown response as he reminds Smalley that he can't give him the money because he's a married man. Way to make yourself sound whipped, Irving!