The Minnesota Toad
(The Rich Landlord)
I was told, in so many words, that the wisest if not slickest (perhaps cleverest) Landlords in the State of Minnesota was this man they called “The Toad”, bred and lived in the city of St. Paul, nearby where I lived. Not sure how that came about, but I’m still here to say I heard it: and that fellow said, “You can take your pick of fellow Landlords anyplace in the State, and bring him here and we’ll talk wisdom, and money, and I’ll back The Toad up, he’ll come out number one every time. This old Caretaker said—“I’ve told everyone who wants to become rich and have wisdom, to come here, this is where it’s at, he owns several places in town, he’ll tell you how he did it.”
He then, introduced me to this wise and rich Landlord, his first name was Oscar, I can’t tell you his last name, and it would be telling a secret. When I had met him, he pulled up in a big white automobile, and I asked, “Oscar how is it you’ve become so rich (I left out the wise part), in all your dealings here in Minnesota?”
And this is what he told me, “Friend,” he said in a mellow tone, his arm over my shoulder, as if I was his son (he was about sixty-five years old, white short hair, small man, round form, perhaps too round and too small, and he had a girl hanging on his shoulder as he pulled up, and told her to get lost and she went someplace, and that was that), “Friend, the secret of being wise and making money out of the Landlord business is: you bend all you can, let the whores have a room in the basement for the male tenants, and pay off the inspectors when they come around, and make false claims to the insurance company, and then you rent all your rooms to whomever you can, the niggers, and wops, and Mexicans, and Asians, and what you don’t rent, you rent out to the whores or drug users, and what they don’t rent, you live in! It has nothing to do with sweating, boy; you hire the people you rent to, and take them to bed when you can, or if they can’t pay, and in-between you make them dependent on you.” Then he started laughing, as I was looking at his gold rings and thick gold chain around his neck.
This was an old timer; I was the young buck back then. I don’t recall how long it took him to stop laughing and settle down, but it was a while, and I waited. He took a liking for me he said, and asked me to buy him a drink at the local saloon. And I did. Figuring he was a penny pincher, but only to find out he was broke. I asked the bartender, “What is it with this old coot, he’s rich, driving a big car, and I got to buy the drinks?” Oscar had gone to the bathroom.
“It’s those young fillies,” he said, “He wants every young thing he sees, wanting all the time, he only collects half his rent, he takes the rest out in trade.” I had noticed he was taking his good old time about going to the bathroom, and then I noticed he came out with two young fillies, one black and one Vietnamese. He left them at the end of the bar, and joined me at the other end. Then on his cellphone he called at this one woman’s house who was married, saying to me on the side, “She’s married, but suited for me, a young filly first-rate,” and he gave me that laugh, and put his funny looking hat on, it was gray but reminded me of those 1920s, Laurel and Hardy movies.
No: 700/ 10-29-2010)
(More truth than fiction)
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