Weapon I let the tots play about with (8)
I believe the answer is:
stiletto
'weapon' is the definition.
(stiletto is a kind of weapon)
'i let the tots play about with' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
'i' is found in the answer.
an anagram of 'let' is 'tle' which is within the left over letters.
'the' could be 't' (the is pronounced as a 't' sound in some dialects) and 't' is found in the answer.
This explanation may well be incorrect...
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for stiletto that I've seen before include "Long dagger" , "Slender dagger, heel" , "Dagger with slender blade" , "Small dagger with a tapered blade" , "Dagger; tapered heel" .)