EDITORIAL & OPINION — ODDS ‘N’ SODS — Pack of trouble

Anyone around during the Texasgulf boom in Ontario has tales to tell, some of which are more colourful than others. It was the summer of 1964, and the town of Timmins was a beehive of activity, with all sorts of strange characters coming out of the woodwork. But none was as weird as Adolf. He weighed maybe a hundred and twenty-five pounds and stood about five feet, two inches, but what a pack of trouble.

Adolf wasn’t his real name. Everyone called him that because he never stopped boasting about being a member of the Hitler Youth movement. “I am a Nazi,” he would say. In Toronto, he tried to taunt an elderly Jewish promoter, who defended himself ably by cracking his cane over Adolf’s head.

One afternoon, Adolf roared up to my motel in a van, almost crashing through the window of my room. A few minutes later, he was in the doorway, clicking his heels and giving the German salute. I had a few friends over, including John, a lawyer, and this was the last person I wanted to see.

“Get out of here,” I shouted.

“Let him in,” my partner said. “He’s always good for a few laughs. He’s a friend of mine.”

“Why, I’ll never know. But I’m not giving him a drink and I don’t want him around for long.”

Just then the phone rang. It was the motel owner. “Did a van just pull up to your room?”

“Yes, why?” I could smell trouble.

“He just knocked a board from my marquee. I told him his van was too high. But no! He just kept going. I’m calling the police.”

“I’ll see what I can do.” After all, I had been staying at this motel for years and wanted to stay there again.

“What the hell did you do?” I asked Adolf.

“I yust heet it a leetle beet. It fall because it were loose. Not my fault,” he said.

Every time Adolf was around, bad things happened. We didn’t have long to wait. Two police cruisers and an unmarked car pulled up, and four uniformed and two plainclothes cops started to walk toward the room. Everyone looked at Adolf. “Six cops,” someone said. “What did you do? Kill somebody?”

Just then the biggest cop, who must have been six feet tall and about three hundred pounds, stood in the open door, one hand on his holster. I could see the other cops reaching into their coats.

“Let me outta here,” someone in the room shouted. But the only exit was where the big cop was standing.

“Hold it,” my friend, John, said. “I’m a lawyer and you’d better have a warrant before you cross that threshold.” His voice was shaking. He was only a corporate lawyer, and this was probably his first experience with the police. The cop stopped.

“All this over a board over a marquee?” I asked the cop.

“Hell, no. We’ve been looking for this guy for over three weeks,” said the cop. He rented the van with a stolen credit card, and has been charging

all kinds of things all over town with other stolen cards.

“Just give me the keys, son,” he said, looking straight at Adolf.

“Give him the keys!” I yelled. “Before the shooting starts.” “Will you defend me?” Adolf asked John.

“No way. Get your own lawyer.” He knew Adolf’s track record. I kept yelling at Adolf to give the cop the keys.

He looked as if he was about to do so, but just as he got to the door, he threw the keys as hard as he could, barely missing the cop’s ear. As the cop turned to see where the keys were headed, Adolf kicked him where it hurts a man most. The poor cop went white and collapsed. Adolf jumped over him and out the door, but the other cops grabbed him. Fists were flying, just like in the movies.

“You’re going to kill him!” my partner yelled.

The cops pulled Adolf up and took him away. I was glad to see him go, but my partner wanted to check up on him later that evening.

“Come to see your buddy?” the policeman at the station asked.

“Not my buddy, his,” I replied, pointing to my partner.

We went down a flight of stairs, into a darkly lit corridor. Adolf was in the first cell, venom in his eyes. Even though I didn’t like him, I felt sorry for him. The cell was only slightly larger than the cot, which had a very old and dirty mattress on it.

Adolf was in rough shape, but defiant. When my partner asked how he was doing, he began cursing a blue streak. His eyes were black and his lips were swollen.

“Fell down the stairs?” I asked the cop.

“Yep,” he said, smiling. “Twice.”

— The author, a retired prospector and broker, resides in Pierrefonds, Que.