Division when our radio lit up and we received an urgent call. “Officer
down! Officer down!” the anxious sounding dispatcher repeated. “Any unit
in the vicinity of Bloor and Bathurst please report.” Maloney picked up the
microphone, pressed the speak button and drawled “Scout 523, we’re near
scene.” The dispatcher immediately replied, “523, proceed as fast as you
can to the corner of Shaw and Barton. A woman is reporting that a mounted
policeman has fallen off his horse and is lying unconscious on her front
lawn. She thinks he has had a heart attack.” I pushed the siren button and hit
the accelerator and in matter of minutes we arrived at the scene.
I saw the horse first. He was busy grazing on the lawn and flowerbeds
in front of the house and there, almost under him, lay a very still policeman.
I threw my car door open and as I was about to leap out, I noticed that
Maloney once again had the microphone in his hand. “Dispatcher, this is
Scout 523. We’re at the scene. Cancel all other units. We’ll handle this,” he
said. He seemed unusually calm about what seemed to be a very serious
situation. I hurried over to the house where a woman who was obviously
very upset, stood on her doorstep nervously twisting her apron. “He’s dead,
I know he’s dead,” she kept repeating.
I started towards the downed cop but I felt Maloney’s big hand on my
shoulder as he pushed by me and knelt beside the prostrate figure. The man
on the ground was an older looking policeman in dirty breeches and scruffy
riding boots. His hair was long and matted and it had been a while since his
face had seen a razor. Maloney felt for the man’s pulse and leaned in closer
to smell his breath. “Phew!” he whispered “He’s dead all right, dead drunk.”
Then he turned toward the woman on the porch and announced in a loud
voice, “You were quite right, Madame, this constable has had a heart attack
but he is still alive. In cases like this,” he continued, “Time is of the essence,
so we better take him to the hospital in our patrol car. If we wait for an
ambulance it might be too late.”
With that he unceremoniously scooped the old guy up and while I
held the door open, threw him into the back seat of our scout car. “The
stables ain't far away,” he said. “I’ll take him there. Do you think you can
lead that nag that far without getting trampled?” “I’ll try,” I said as I made
my way over to the big gelding and watched with pleasure the look of
astonishment on Maloney’s face as he watched me grab the reins, vault into
the saddle and take off down the street ahead of him.
I took a short cut through a park, Christie Pits, and, putting the horse
into a canter, I beat Maloney to the stables on London St. I had just put the
horse into a vacant stall when he came through the door with the very limp
cop cradled in his arms. “Climb up that loft ladder and I’ll pass him up to
you,” he said. So I made my way up, dragged the drunk through the loft hole
then made him comfortable on pile of loose hay and left him to sleep it off.
As I descended the ladder I heard Maloney on the phone arranging for
somebody to come and take him home.
“So you’re quite the cowboy,” Maloney joked as we drove away.
“Why don’t you join the Mounted Unit?” “That guy up in the loft is the
reason I’m not interested,” I replied. “I’ve heard that half the guys in the
Unit are losers like him. Besides, I’m having a lot of fun doing what I’m
doing.” I explained to Maloney that I had been messing around with horses
for as long as I could remember. I told him how I had spent my summers
breaking and training horses and ponies for the summer camps and about the
little riding school I ran while attending high school. “I have two horses of
my own at my parents’ farm in Meaford and I’m up there every time I get a
day off,” I said. “Hell, I get all the riding I need as it is.”
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