A PLAUSIBLE THIEF.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXIII, Issue 4436, 5 July 1922, Page 2

A PLAUSIBLE THIEF.

Several householders in the northern suburbs of. Melbourne have been visited recently by a well-dressed young man of very plausible speech and taking ways. Ip one case—and the others were not so very dissimilar (says the Age)—the young man called at a house in Flemington and, representing himself as a bank clerk who had been transferred to the local branch of the State savings Bank, asked the lady of the house whether dhe could accommodate him with board and lodging. Her, house, he said, had been recommended to him as a quiet, homely place, and that was just what lhe wanted. He was invited inside. After admiring the piano and one or two pictures he discovered that a button on nis ha-1 broken away, and overcome ay modesty he asked for a needle and cottor. and for tihe use ofl a quiet room in which he could sew on the button —when he found it. How could such a request be refused ? The housewife gave him needle and cotton, and led him to her son’s bedroom to find the missing button and—so on. Five minutes later he departed, profuse in his thanks. The housewife thought he was “such a nice young fellow,’’ until her son returned Home and foupd that £4 10s had disappeared from his, bedroom.