My son has become a thief. Not an ordinary thief, mind you, but a master-thief. Oh, I wept when I first found out, but then he said that he never steals from the poor. He gives to the poor, and he only takes superfluous things from the rich. Nor will he steal anything that doesn’t take a considerable amount of cunning and skill.

We were having supper when he told us about his ‘profession’. By the end of the meal, I felt better about our crooked son. He had certainly made himself rich. My husband wasn’t convinced, though. He hardly touched his potatoes. “It still does not please me,” he said. “A thief is still a thief. I tell you; it will end badly.”

Mother of a Thief in The Master-Thief, Grimms