His name was Curtis Loew, but everybody called him Rats. He was born in Famagusta to a local teenage prostitute and a captain in the Soviet Army. He was of medium height and slim build, with a round head and a pointed nose; his hair and sparse mustache were an undefined sandy color. He used to hang out with us at the coffee shop and tell stories of his many girlfriends, how much money he won at www.betterbets.com, and his various schemes (all of them unethical, some of them illegal). Rats was mostly ignored.
One day, he told us that he bought a toaster that stopped working after about two months. When he went back to the store, they told him that Walmart was happy to refund or exchange within thirty days with the original sales bill, but since it was past the date, he could call the 1-800 number on the product box for the one year manufacturer's warranty. There was nothing he could do, so he bought another toaster of the same make and model (on sale for $19.99). He got home, inserted two slices of bread into the new toaster, and another of his schemes suddenly coagulated in his devious mind. He put the old toaster in the new box, taped the sale bill to the box, and marked the calendar three weeks from the current date.
Three weeks later Rats went to customer service and said that the toaster stopped working. The agent checked the bill, looked into the box, and asked if he wanted another toaster or a cash refund. Rats took the money. In the next year and a half, due to the dubious quality of toasters made in that large, industrialized, far-away republic where most toasters come from these days Rats repeated the scheme three times: free toasters, yey! He looked to us for comments. Only George reacted: “They'll catch you, Rats, and they'll punish you bad.”
Rats stopped coming to the coffee shop—not that anybody missed him much. One day, George found a news item on the back pages of The Star and read it to us: “Police were called to 313 Duckworth to find the body of Curtis Loew, 48. The cause of death was determined to be strangulation. It appeared that the power cord of a cheap toaster was used as a weapon. Anybody with information is asked to contact 52 Division.” George said “Didn’t I tell you? They always catch the Rats.”
