A BURGLAR FAMILY.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19764, 15 April 1926, Page 14

A BURGLAR FAMILY.

PASTRY THEIR OBJECTIVE. A MIDDLESEX EPISODE. THE MYSTERY SOLVED. A “oat” burglar has been busy at Pinner in Middlesex. Ho has shown a fancy for one particular house, and time after time has escaped with “rich” spoil. Disregarding jewellery, hard cash, and valuable property, he has systematically raided the larder, consumed the fancy pastry, played havoc with the apple turnovers, and carried off all the “swag” in the way of mince pics, mai Is-of-honour, and Kccles cakes that he could possibly move with the aid of a couple of confederates. The thing had become an unfathomable household mystery. The police, either would not investigate the case or felt incapable of providing a solution. A batch of pastry would be cooked, placed on the larder shelves, and the next day half of it would have mysteriously disappeared. There was only one small window to the larder, six feet above the ground. A man would have had difficulty in squeezing through; rats, birds, and mice were out of the question. The mystery deepened and deepened. CAUGHT IN THE ACT. Tt is a mystery no longer. The burglar has been caught in (be act. One day there was a scuffling sound in the pantry. An amateur jotective who had long been watching and waiting advanced on tiptoe and flung open the door suddenly. He was face to face with the burglar, and it was difficult to toll who was the more surprised. , _ For. sitting on his haunches, a great muff tail spreading up his back, a jam tart clutched between his fore paws, was the handsomest, porkicst young squirrel in the south of England. Not one of your common grey foreigners that crowd Bcgent s Dark, but a real British squirrel, rufus coloured, and with a pair of bright, sparkling eyes. He dropped his tart and stared at the man, but, ns nothing happened, he picked up the dainty again and brazenly continued "'“Wolf of all the cheek!” said the amateur detective. His hand gently slid along the wall, and the window was closed. The burglar was a prisoner. “Bushy E,i to the floor, was cornered, and an attempt was made to capture him. It was illadvised. fpr the burglar, practised in nut cracking, promptly nipped the man s finger. VANISHED. Investigation showed the method of_ the burglary Not far from the house is a treef and when Bushy was released by the window he had entered, he sprang from the sill to a projecting bough, scrambled down the hole of the tree, and was qinoklj lost Was he deterred by his detection. Not a bit. He was there again next day Careful watching revealed him endeavpur incr to make off with a cake about th, size of°a Bath bun. It was too much for one. but not for two. . . Tbishv vanished for a minute or two, then he returned with his mother and a young brother. While Brother Boy kept watch, mother and Bushy, between them, raised the bun with their joint fore P aw ®- ca " St in the way human people move a table, dropped it outside the window, ""“mbled down after it, and made off the Bushy, and Erothet; Boy we no loncer regarded as cat burglars. y are guests of the household, and whenei .r ?hey come there is rich store of nuts waiting. _