AN INDISCREET SHOPPER.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 18 October 1924, Page 10

AN INDISCREET SHOPPER.

BOASTFULNESS ENDS CAREER. “Sixpenn’ortli o’, them oranges and a pie,, please 1” A small man of about H years shrilled the request. With an important air he produced a purse. The Fendalton storekeeper eyed that purse with curious gaze. It was a plump one; rather, it bulged. “How is it you’re not at school, sonny?” he remarked. “Jtiaw. I’m not goin’ to no school,” remarked the little man boastfully. “I do as I like. Me. farver and me muvver can’t make me do nothin’. Why, they tried a red-hot poker on me. But they couldn’t frighten me.” “Well, so long, sonny.” “So long!” But the storekeeper did not mean that remark really to represent a farewell. He let the little man swagger off, and then watched him from afar off. The defier of his “farver” and “muvver” entered another store, and emerged later with bulging cheeks. The storekeeper, who was curious about that purse, and also- concerning several things that had happened in the neighbourhood recently, jumped on a bicycle and went for a policeman. The policeman, who was interested in the whereabouts of a- small boy, gave the matter his urgent attention. The small boy was encountered, still munching, and on him were found the bulging purse, an electric torch, and other article's which several Fendalton residents had missed. The hoy, his boastfulness gone like the mists of the morning, admitted that he had b r °ken and entered three Fendalton houses during the week. The Fendalton “burglar,” thus taken into custody on Wednesday afternoon, is an escapee from the Christchurch Receiving Home.