The day had been rather uneventful, work had gone well and I expected the rest of my day to do so. The hour for shutting the business office down and going home had arrived, the secretary had left for the evening and I sat at my desk in the radio station visiting with a friend who happened to be the local mortician. John was a nice fellow, indeed.

The phone rang. I answered it. A gruff voice spiced with a bit of a slur from an intoxicant asked if I was me. I said I was. He stated flatly he was going to shoot me, a statement which actually caused me a great deal of alarm. After I asked if he was serious and he assured me he was, I asked from where he was calling and he told me he was in a local motel lobby. I told him to stay there and I would be there quickly. I described the call to John explaining I had to leave. John insisted on going with me. The fact that he was a mortician was not lost on me.

The sheriff was only a block away. I called him on my car phone and asked him to meet me immediately in front of his office. He did. I told him of the threat and where the caller was. He instructed me to drive five miles per hour and keep the appointment. I drove three miles and hour. I walked into the lobby of the motel and confronted the man who, though unshaven and slightly tipsy, was fully aware of what he was saying. I told him who I was and asked if he had just threatened to kill me. He said yes. At precisely that instant the sheriff stepped from behind a curtain concealing the apartment of the owner of the motel and made the arrest. The man, it turned out, had been hired to kill some else, a case of mistaken identity.

Later that night the sheriff called me at home and excitedly told me, "We got a big one, Roy!" He was a man with a history. Frankly, I had a rather difficult time sharing in the excitement.

Many years have gone by, but I well remember the day. And the unshaven man. And the sheriff. And my friend, the mortician.

. Copyright 2014 Roy Faubion