Ten Italian Folktales [antikvár]

Crack and Crook In a distant town there was a famous thief known as Crack, whom nobody had ever been able to catch. The main ambition of this Crack was to meet Crook, another notorious thief, and form a partnership with him. One day as Crack was eating lunch at the tavern across the table from a stranger, he went to look at his watch and found it missing. The only person in the world who could have taken it without my knowing, he thought, is Crook. So what did Crack do but turn right around and steal Crook's purse. When the stranger got ready to pay for his lunch, he found his purse gone and said to his table companion, 'Well, well, you must be Crack.' 'And you must be Crook.' 'Right.' 'Fine, we'll work together.' They went to the city and made for the king's treasury, which was completely surrounded by guards. The thieves therefore dug an underground tunnel into the treasury and stole everything. Surveying his loss, the king had no idea how he might catch the robbers. He went to a man named Snare, who had been put in prison for stealing.