b y D O N H IL L IS
This article may be obtained in attractive leaflet form for $1.00 per hundred from H. M. Hillis, 600 Fairmont, Glendale 3, Calif.
ARTIST: Jim McNutt
sit there all the while, ill at ease. His impudent way had taken all serious thinking from her mind and heart. I was sick about it. Finally I just had to say a word to the girl’s mother about this lack of courtesy and tact. “ Oh,” she exclaimed, “ It’s that way all the time.’ I found also that she had a five-year-old boy who was emotionally maladjusted from loss of sleep, all from this fellow’s visits. I walked home deeply concerned about what I might do. At long last I realized my man was afflicted with kleptomania. Like an inveterate thief, he had taken my books and magazines and money, not to mention other things. The chief things missing were my close fellow ship with Christ and the evenings spent in talking with my friends and family. I know that others are drifting in this same boat. Some have lost things of real value, not trifles, but precious family things they once enjoyed together. Spiritual, social and intellectual experiences have been stolen from them, replaced by only a moment’s crackpot amusement. This fellow is not at our home now. If I could keep him in his place, he would be quite harmless to have around. Kleptomaniacs are not always deliberately bad. Even this one might profitably drop in with his tidbits of news and a light word or two. You must keep your eyes open though, or such a person will continually steal things from you. I still see him now and then at my neighbor’s. And he still keeps them laughing or excited hour after hour. I’ve been trying to recall his name so you will be alerted about him and his many subtle methods. It escapes me, and I’m not sure now that he gave it. But I will never forget his initials. They were “ T.V.”
allowed it. All this distraction was hurting their studies and did their health little good. These things made me worry about this fellow’s presence in our home. And then it came. The “ straw that broke the camel’s back.” One day several of my best books turned up miss ing. I searched in vain for them. “ This fellow may be something of a thief,” I concluded. “ If he is,” I contin ued, “who can tell what else he’s taken from us?” It all looked very suspicious. The next day I was so wrought up about it I decided to check on him next door. Sure enough, he had taken things there too. I was amazed by his subtle maneuvers. They surely con firmed my wife’s original point of view. In one home he had entered as a sound religious teacher. “He had revealed the truth of our modem cults,” they said. They were all but won to his point of view. Another neighbor, a salesman down the block, knew him as an efficiency expert. “ He’s showing me the latest gimmicks,” he called after me. “ The sort of thing a successful salesman can put to use.” “ He certainly has a lot of ways of getting in,” I concluded. To all of these people I suggested a check of their belongings. Nearly all found something missing. At one friend’s home I noticed no more late Christian maga zines. In another the Bible had disappeared. I was sur prised to hear their Sunday and Midweek church service time was spent with this fellow. As I left this house the husband said their family altar was missing too. A few days later I met this fellow entertaining at a neighbor’s. He paid scant attention to me and I was glad for it. I had come to talk with their teen-age daughter about her faith in Christ. Well, this fellow stole the whole evening’s conversation. I was forced to
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MARCH, 1960
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