DEATH THREAT – Autumn 1980

(This is a true story.)

Andy sat across from me, between me and the door.  A Doberman Pincer sat on his haunches to his left.  Behind the dog was the door to the hallway, which led out to the front porch.

My naïve zeal had gotten me into this, but now it was all clear to me.  I would be lucky to leave this place alive.  He had a wicked smirk on his face as he said, “You know I talked to my priest and he told me you were a heretic and I should quit talking to you and have nothing more to do with you.”

The electricity of danger was live in the air.  My skin prickled and every sense was heightened.  I needed to be careful about every word I said and even the expression on my face.  I should have known better and read the signs earlier that this “relationship”, if such it could even be called, was a mere ploy for this “con” – a world which described both his actual status in society and his criminal personality – to use me until he could safely drop me or perhaps even get rid of me in a more literal way.

Now he was a man on the run, having skipped his parole, and supposedly hiding across the Quebec border in a girl-friend’s apartment.  I’d fallen for his line that he desperately needed help just to get over a bad spot and if he could just stay free for a couple more weeks he’d turn himself back in to the authorities and appeal to keep his parole.

Talking on the phone with him at home before I’d left the house, I had made it clear to him that this was the last time I could do anything for him.  I would bring him food, which he claimed he’d run out of, but would have no money on me.

When I’d arrived, I’d taken the food to the fridge in the kitchen, and discovered that there was plenty of food in the fridge.  “Why did you tell me you needed food?” I asked. 

He readily replied, “Oh, that’s Sylvie’s food and I can’t eat it.  I’m supposed to supply my own, but I can’t leave the apartment, you know.”

“No, I guess not if you’re on the lam,” said I.

“So I thought of you, and how you’ve always said you were ready to help me out if I needed anything,” he added.

“So I did,” I admitted, realizing how deep a hole I’d now dug myself into.

“But I also said that I’d help you if you really wanted to go straight and abide by your parole, and not if you decided to skip out on it.”

“Yeah, but I know you Christians are softies because you feel guilty if you don’t help the poor lost souls in prison, like me.  Isn’t that how you see me – like a project rather than a friend or a person who just wants to live his own way?  Let’s sit down for a few minutes to talk,” he said, gesturing to the love-seat and then taking the arm-chair opposite.  “I’ve got some things I wanna say to you before you leave.”

“I think I should just leave now,” I said.  “My wife will start to worry about me.”

“Oh come on, you’ve only been gone half-an-hour or so, right?  Sit down!”

This last was not a request.  I reluctantly moved to the love-seat.

He told the dog, who had been quiet the whole time but never left his side, to sit down beside him.  And so we found ourselves as described in the opening of this episode.

“You know, this dog is very obedient.  He does everything I say.  He’s really smart.  So if you make a sudden move he doesn’t like, or I don’t like, I could tell him to stop you and he would.”

“Are you threatening me, Andy?”

“Don’t take it that way,” he smirked.  “Just protecting you from the dog,”

I began to look at him very steadily, straight in the eyes.  I had been threatened in my life enough times by bullies to know that demonstrating fear stimulated them, gave them the rush they sought.  I must show no fear.

“So what did you want to tell me before I leave?”

He chuckled.  “You know, you religious types are all so predictable, so naïve.  You come to see the poor dumb cons in jail and think you’re gonna save them all from the devil and hell by prattling on about Jesus and repentance and living like you.  What you don’t understand is that a lot of us, guys like me, like to do the things we do.  It’s exciting!  It’s a rush to do a job and pull something off and get away with it.  To give the man the finger, yeah, even to give God the finger.  But there in jail, you know, it’s all a game.  We play you types like a fiddler plays the fiddle.  Press the right buttons, say the right things and string you along.  And when you leave, we get together and laugh at how stupid you are.”

I continued to stare at him.  “Anything else you want to get off your chest?”

This is where he spun his line about his priest.  I knew it was complete bull-shit, that he was as likely to have talked to a priest as he was to have phoned the Pope.  But I just dead-panned, “Well, I’m not going to contradict your priest.  You should do what he says and we should have nothing more to do with each other.  Are we done?”

A hard-glint and tightening of his jaw, while his left hand brushed the dog’s collar, warning me I could be well breathing my last few breaths.  He had already committed violent crimes and had been sentenced to fifteen years for almost killing a man, as well as armed robbery.  He was over six-feet and two hundred pounds in comparison to my slight frame.  And he had a deadly dog at his command.

He stared back at me, a smoldering fuse on the edge of doing what he clearly wanted to do.  His voice was deadly quiet as he said, “You know, I could just kill you right now.  I could order this dog to rip out your throat and not lay a finger on you myself.”

I’m sure he expected panic and fearful pleading from me, which he would then play to a crescendo before he made up his mind to do the actual deed.  Instead, I uttered a silent prayer to Jesus to show me the way out.  Complete calm came over me, and I said with total quiet conviction, “You could, and I couldn’t stop you or the dog….  But you won’t.”

He just looked back at me with frank astonishment – the last kind of answer he expected.  “And why won’t I?”

I looked at my watch and then straight into his eyes, calm and brave.  “Because my wife knows exactly where I am and when I said I would be home, and if I’m not home in twenty minutes, the cops will be here.  I told her to call them and if I don’t leave now you’ve got maybe half an hour of freedom left.”

He looked back at me with an expression I could not read.  I looked back at him and got up from my seat, saying, “So I’m leaving now and you and your dog are not going to stop me.” 

I went out the door, with him now following me and adopting a much more conciliatory tone.  “Hey man, you know I was only kidding, right?”

I glanced back at him over my shoulder and shot, “No you weren’t, so let’s just cut the bull-shit.  Good-bye Andy.”

An Unorthodox Way to Make a Friend

(copyright) Vincent J. Marquis

In my Grade Seven Year, two new boys appeared at Our Lady’s school – Ronnie and Roy, two tough French kids who lived just down the block from me on Elm Street.  Ronnie and Roy thought they needed to establish themselves by having a few victorious tangles with recognized residents of some stature in the pecking order.

Somehow or other, I was one of those.  I guess it was because I was known to be a pretty ferocious little scrapper once I got mad, and I had had a few successful encounters.  Brother Frank had taken some boxing lessons at the Boys’ club and showed me a few stances and protective moves and punches.  If you knew a bit, it could go a good way with someone who knew nothing.

In the second week of school that year, Ronnie and Roy decided to take on me and my half-Chinese, half-Algonquin Indian (not then a politically incorrect term) friend, Dan.  One day they followed us when school got out, taunting us and daring us to fight two-on-two.  We said we had no interest in fighting them; we didn’t know them and had nothing against them.  A little group of interested onlookers gathered to see what would happen. 

Dan finally consented to fight Roy, and Ronnie was incensed when I still refused to fight him.  He was smaller than I, a rarity, so I felt I couldn’t do it.  Besides, in Grade Seven I was trying to be serious about my Catholic faith and remembered that Jesus said to turn the other cheek.  I decided I would try that in this case. 

Don and Roy fought and wrestled for about fifteen minutes right on the sidewalk on Lebreton Street near Somerset and called it a draw.  The whole time Ronnie told me I was a coward, a ‘chicken-shit’, and pushed me from time to time, waving his fist near my nose.  I just stood my ground but didn’t raise ‘my dukes’.  He finally even slapped me in the face, but I just stood there looking at him. 

I was not afraid, and that was plain.  I told him that he didn’t scare me but I had no interest in fighting him and we had no reason to quarrel.  I preferred to be friends.  He couldn’t understand.  Roy told him to lay off; it was over and he wanted to go home.  Ronnie felt he needed to get in one more insult so he threatened that the next time he saw me he would punch my face in.  I told him that if he tried that he would have to really fight me and that wouldn’t go well for him.  I told him that the only reason I hadn’t fought him was that Jesus said to turn the other cheek, and that was what I was doing.  He scoffed and gave me a little kick in the rear and walked off with his brother.

Our little group of spectators stood there astonished.  One of the guys who knew me said, “Vince!  Why did you let that punk get away with that?  You could beat him with one hand tied behind your back!”  I repeated about turning the other cheek.  He said, “I could never do that.”

After that, Roy and Ronnie seemed to avoid me whenever we saw one another in the street.  I avoided them too, passing on the other side.  I was worried they would both gang up on me.  Don, my Algonquin-Chinese buddy, said Roy had apologized to him and they had agreed to be friends.

 One Saturday, I encountered Ronnie on Elm Street alone.  He walked up to me bold as anything, smiled and offered to shake my hand.  He said, “I want to say I’m sorry for what happened a while ago.  I shouldn’t have done that.  I appreciate what you did in refusing to fight me.  Some people told me that it was a really dumb idea and that I got off pretty lucky.  So I’d like to be friends, if that’s OK.” 

I was pretty shocked, but relieved.  I shook his hand and said, “OK, sure, Ronnie.  Let’s be friends.  No hard feelings, OK?”

“Good!” he answered.  “And if you ever need someone to back you up, don’t hesitate to ask, OK?”

“OK, thanks,” I said.

Ronnie and Roy were around in the neighbourhood for about two years, and we remained on friendly terms.