How To End Unwanted Telephone Calls

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I'm not writing about calls from call centres in which young men with smooth voices try to talk you into buying shares for copper mines in Chile or wheat in Canada. We got some of these several years ago but they stopped. Maybe there is a worldwide network and our stubbornness to part with our money to support fishy enterprises is known now. No. I'm writing about calls you get from people you know but don't want to talk to for one reason or another. I'm thinking of a man my husband got to know because he's from the same part of the world and they even have common acquaintances. My husband doesn't like him particularly and is glad if he doesn't hear from him. Unfortunately, the last times he called it was me who picked up the phone. My feelings are stronger. I actively dislike him. He was a car salesman and is used to sweet-talking to customers. This is not the problem. The problem is that he walks the tightrope between apparently harmless and swinish. His insinuations are subtle. My dilemma is: If I don't react, I'm cross with myself. I'm quick at repartee and usually know a good answer if someone talks nonsense. Yet, if I do react and give him an appropriate answer, I show him that I've understood the insinuation and fall into his trap. I lower myself to his level and become - if not swinish - at least indecent myself. Now I do this: Our (landline) telephone is in the corridor. I quietly open the door to the staircase and ring our own bell beside the door to the flat/apartment. I tell the caller that someone has just rung (which he has heard, too) and that, unfortunately, I have to end our conversation because a visitor has arrived. Of course, one can't get away with the same trick again and again. So I've invented the variety to call down into the staircase as if our neighbours from downstairs have rung in order to ask me something. The next time I won't do the doorbell ringing gimmick. I'll already have one foot out of the door on my way to an urgent doctor's appointment or something similar according to the time of day. White lies? Oh, yes. But no qualms of conscience.