RANDOM REMINDER

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 33063, 2 November 1972, Page 20

RANDOM REMINDER

CAT BURGLER?

A lady from the deep south suffered a traumatic experience one day. Having already marked the presence of six pints of milk at the gate, she was bewildered and more than a little incensed when, half an hour later, she went to collect them, and found bottles, carrier and all, vanished without trace. The victim of this daring daylight robbery was a young housewife studying home economics, who had recently discovered that the bottles cost more than the milk they contained, and the added loss of the bottle

carrier seemed unjust beyond endurance. There was more to come. A short time afterwards, she discovered that the empty bottle carrier had been returned, but any pleasure was destroyed by the extraordinary fact that someone had strewn the path with raw beetroot. Completely baffled by this new development, and at a loss for something better to do, the lady telephoned the milkman, babbling out the whole sad tale. At the end of it, the milkman was as confused as his customer. “Are you saying I left beetroot instead of milk?” he demanded, in a tone

that suggested he had his own ideas about what was in the bottles. “No, of course not,” answered the hapless housewife, limply wondering what she had expected of the milkman.

The neighbours could throw no light on the mystery and to this day it remains in the annals of unsolved crime. The lady's husband was quietly sympathetic. After all, he had once stumbled out of bed, thrown his dressing gown down and walked out of the room in his pyjamas, holding a coat hanger in front of him.