Column Chronicles: Riff Shattersmith finds peril in the safest countries of the world; episode 1

Riff Shattersmith finds peril in the safest countries of the world; episode 1

Frank Cotolo
April 21, 2022

Yes, you read correctly, the headline more than implies that in cities claimed to be the safest on Earth, I, Riff Shattersmith, have bumped into adventures unexpected. These are testimonies to such events.

The Netherlands is rife with reputation about its history of crime-free territory. Yet, one night in Numbeo I saw a body hanging from the wing of a windmill, a clear sign of murder. Being a worldly citizen, I cut the body down and reported a crime. The local authorities rendered suspicion, praised my sense of dignity and I was on my way.

I sensed I was being stalked, for in the next few days I found a torch beneath my bed at the hotel and a bouquet of lilies stuffed in my saddlebag and the delivery of a dead trout with my name carved in its skin.

Talking with a Numbeo resident, I mentioned the foreboding danger. The resident told me nothing like that every happened to any visitor of the city. I said that does not mean it has not happened to me and the resident said of course it does.

The local police agreed with the resident (the police were also residents). I demanded protection and insinuated that my situation must have had something to do with the hanging man I cut down from the wing of the windmill. The resident police disagreed. They said I was being silly and they all laughed.

One night I took a walk back to the windmill and I could near footsteps behind me all the way there. When they sounded very close I turned around and stood in a defensive position, looking at three thick men, twice my weight, half my age and nowhere near as handsome.

"What do you, you and you want from me?" I said.

"We mean to hang you," one said.

"And mean that would be," I said. "But my demise won't come as a hanging from the wing of a windmill in The Netherlands. It will be the end of the three of you, though, if you try to hang me."

They rushed me. I slammed their heads together, kicked them hard in their groins, broke their fingers, bruised their kidneys and spat in their eyes with gooey phlegm. Then I hanged them each from a wing off the windmill and before I left town I told the police chief that murderers were afoot in The Netherlands, so I was leaving.

Frank Cotolo can be found hosting the talk and interview programme Cotolo Chronicles. You can send him an e-mail at this address: frank@148.ca.