More guards stormed into the courtyard outside the Arrivederci vault, but it was too late. Epiglottis and the brutes were already off the ground. The guards opened fire, but their bullets only ricocheted harmlessly off the basket’s bulletproof bottom.
The bottom of the zeppelin’s cabin opened, reeling the basket safely inside. The hatch shut, and the second brute finally loosened his grip on Epiglottis, dropping him to the floor. Epiglottis gasped for air. His ribs hurt.
“A pity,” said the man with the pencil-thin tie. He took the silver platter out of the first brute’s giant hands and peered at it over his spectacles. “It seems the Arrivedercis never reckoned on invaders totally incapable of smelling their treasure.” He nodded to the giant brutes who, now that they’d done their job, were stowing the basket at the rear of the cabin, completely disinterested in the prize. “We’ve plucked their precious gem right out from under them!” he laughed.
Miserable Scavenger, thought Epiglottis. He held such extraordinary taste in his hands — the work of the masters over the centuries. Did it mean nothing to him?
“Full speed ahead,” the man with the pencil-thin tie barked to the pilot behind the controls. “I’ve got to get this back to my employer before the night is through.”
Epiglottis boiled with anger, but he knew his duty. This was all part of the Arch-Gourmand’s plan.
The man with the pencil-thin tie saw his pain, “Don’t look so glum, old fellow. You elitist gourmets will get your way. After so many centuries, your time has finally come…”
Chapter 2 — The Stranger in Red
Eleven-year-old Guster Johnsonville was about to hold the fate of humanity on the end of his spoon. It never would have happened that way if he hadn’t been such a picky eater, nor would he have left the farmhouse in Louisiana and set out across the world if it weren’t for that wretched Ham Chowder Casserole.
No one likes to eat this stuff, thought Guster, even though his two brothers and sister didn’t seem to mind. But if Mom ever made that mishmash of pig, peas, and potato again, he would be doomed.
To think! They called him picky. “You’re a remarkable child,” was all Mom would say to him when he told her that the potatoes in her Chowder were grown so far north, they tasted like gravel. Never mind that he was on the verge of starvation.
“Not picky! Just careful,” Guster always said. How often he went hungry! How badly he needed something to eat! The way food burned or ached as it passed across his tongue — it was like eating day-old road kill. Hot dogs were like the sweaty vinyl back seat of a station wagon with its windows rolled up in the sun. Frozen burritos were like buttery squirrels infected with the flu.
And ever since the hot summer had smoldered up out of the ground that year, it had been getting worse. So bad, in fact, that he hadn’t put anything in his empty beanpole stomach for three whole days. If he didn’t find something — anything he could eat soon — he was going to starve.
“Guster, come down to the table,” Mom cried from the kitchen on the night the Ham Chowder changed everything forever. He smelled it — that familiar smell of cheesy, potato-soaked socks — all the way up the stairs in his room.
He could make for the window and lower himself to the ground from the roof. He could bolt down the stairs, past the kitchen, and into the night, then run through the fields. But no matter what he did, no matter where he went, he could not escape it: the pain that came with eating.
“Hungry, Capital P?” Zeke jeered as Guster entered the kitchen. Zeke was fifteen, pimply and plump as a horse. He thought that calling Guster ‘Capital P’ was the funniest thing in the world. He said that Guster was so skinny that, from the side, his head looked like a lump on a stick.
Guster hated that name. “I served you up a real good helping,” Zeke said and pushed a heaping plate full of Ham Chowder in Guster’s direction.
Why does he always have to pick on me? thought Guster. He tried not to cough at the smell.
Mom — who never seemed to care what she was putting Guster through — prayed, “Lord, thanks for this Ham Chowder, and bless Henry Senior that he will come home safely from his business trip. And bless this…”
A roll bounced off Guster’s head. He opened one eye. Zeke was staring at him, a grin spread across his pimply face.
“…bless this family that it will STOP FIGHTING! AMEN!” Mom finished. She scowled. Zeke had soured her mood, which was going to make it even harder for Guster to get through dinner without touching that Chowder.
“When we go camping, do you think there will be bears there?” asked Mariah, Guster’s older sister. Guster loved his sister. She was much smarter than him, and she didn’t tease him like Zeke did.
“Mom, why do we have to go to Camp Cucamunga again this year? Betsy’s family went to Mexico!” Zeke hollered.
“You mean your girlfriend?” Mariah asked.
“I didn’t say she was my girlfriend!” cried Zeke.
“Neither did I,” Mariah said, smiling mischievously. It was enough to turn the rest of Zeke’s face as red as his pimples.
“Mexico would be nice someday,” said Mom without even looking up as she spoon fed Guster’s toddler brother, Henry Junior. She always talked about going to far-off places, but she never actually went.
“Anyway,” said Zeke, “in Mexico Betsy’s brother saw these ancient stone temples with stairs leading all the way up to the top. And there were these passages that went down underground to secret chambers where they sacrificed people and ate their —”
“Zeke, that is not dinner table talk,” said Mom. What it was was another one of Zeke’s wild stories.
“Well, you’ll notice that Betsy’s brother hasn’t been around ever since they got back,” Zeke said.
“He’s in the Army, Zeke,” said Mariah. “Next you’ll be telling us about the red-robed stranger again.”
Zeke turned white and dropped his fork. Guster had not heard about this one. Something about the way Zeke’s chubby cheeks went limp told Guster this story was different.
“Betsy’s mom saw him on a trip into the city,” Zeke said in a low voice, “He was lurking around down near the waterfront dressed in some kind of tall hat, red jacket and pants and apron. No one there had ever seen anyone like him before, until this week.” He did not laugh or smile this time. He just stared across the room at nothing at all.
“It sounds like a chef,” said Guster. There were plenty of chefs in New Orleans.
“But how many chefs come out only at night, dressed as red as the devil himself, with teeth like a gator’s and a belt full of razor-sharp knives dripping with blood?” asked Zeke.
“He’s probably just making some deliveries or something,” said Mariah.
“Then how do you explain the disappearances?” whispered Zeke. “The way Betsy’s mom tells it, people go into the city, then poof! They’re gone. You could be walking down the street, sitting in a café — it doesn’t matter, because the Chef in Red has got his eye on you, and everybody in the whole city, maybe even the state,” he said. He was serious, and he looked more scared than Guster had ever seen him. “I know it’s real. I saw it on the news. Or at least Betsy did.”
Guster couldn’t say if that were true or not. It’s not like he watched the news.
“Who knows,” Zeke said, pulling his ample cheeks down his face until you could see the red pulp around his eyes. “Maybe he’s looking for something…” Zeke stood up and crept over to Mariah. “Something to eat!” he cried, and bit down gently on the top of her head.
She screamed. “Rarr!” growled Henry Junior. He banged his spoon on the table and chomped at the air, just like Zeke had.
“Enough!” said Mom. She put her round moon face in her hands and sighed. “All of you will eat your dinner now,” she said, her voice quivering.
Guster froze. They were on thin ice. At times like this it was best to avoid Mom’s attention so she didn’t raise her voice at him. He was never sure why she got so angr
y. Sometimes it started with Zeke. Sometimes it started when she came into his room and he’d left his clothes all over the floor. Sometimes it started for no reason at all.
Betsy’s Mom wasn’t like that. Betsy’s Mom let them do whatever they wanted when they went to her house. Why is Mom always coming down on us? he wondered. He spread the Chowder across his plate to buy him some time.
“Dinner was delicious, Mom,” said Mariah, clearing her plate. In a matter of seconds Zeke was finished too, and Mom took Henry Junior out of his high-chair and into the living room, leaving Guster alone with the vomitous mass.
“Don’t get up until you’re finished,” called Mom as she turned on the TV. She started to fold a pile of laundry. Once again she’d forgotten to remove her baby blue apron. She’d probably leave it on all night, just like every other time.
He was so hungry! If only he could get his hands on something good enough to eat! There had been a lemon meringue pie once from the bakery down the street — he could tell the sea wind had blown across the lemons as they’d ripened. There was the honeyed pork from Mac Murray’s two years ago, or the mint ice cream straight from the dairy just last summer — the cows that gave the milk in the ice cream had eaten only clover. There was something special about those flavors. Something that only Guster could understand. Something that drove Guster to the fridge on those moonlit nights, when the farmhouse was asleep, to lick up the last of the crumbs. Those were the nights he was alive with taste.
Sadly, as good as those flavors were, it wasn’t long before they too turned sour and lost their appeal. It didn’t have to be that way! There had to be something out there that could quench his burning hunger, something that could save him. Like a dish, waiting to be discovered, that beckoned to him from far away. A dish so delicious beyond belief that once he tasted it, he would never want to eat anything else again.
The TV crackled, “And we’re back with more amazing homemaking tips straight from the Queen Bee of the American Household, the Duchess of Decorating, the Czarina of Cuisine… celebrity homemaker Felicity Casa!” There was applause. Mom was watching Roofs, the only TV show she ever made time for. It was a silly program. The host, Felicity Casa, was always showing viewers how to make their own curtains out of grocery bags or grow the perfect gardenias in a milk bottle. Very boring stuff, even if Felicity was richer than the President and had houses all over the world. Mom practically idolized her. There was nothing she wanted more than to visit Felicity’s secret, state-of-the-art kitchen hidden somewhere in France.
“Tonight I’m going to show you how to make a sumptuous, herb crusted leg of lamb,” said Felicity, her middle-aged face outlined so picture-perfect with makeup, she looked like a painting. Now why couldn’t our dinner be like that? thought Guster. The cooking demonstration was the part of Roofs he did love. Felicity described roasting the lamb from start to finish step by step, in perfect detail. If only he could taste it! “Because, after all, it is the sworn duty of the chef to provide her guests with a taste experience,” she said when she finished.
Was that what he’d been longing for? He was certain that if he could just get his hands on it, he would eat that. Instead, he was stuck with Ham Chowder.
He stabbed his fork at it. And then there was Zeke’s story about the stranger in red. What if it were true? What if that chef had caused the disappearances?
“Guster!” cried Mom as she came into the kitchen. “You haven’t eaten a thing!”
He shook his head. “I can’t —”
Mom insisted. “You are far too old for this. Now eat,” she said, her hands on her tubby hips.
He shook his head again. He just couldn’t. Ham Chowder was slime; it was ooze; it was a dirty, pig-filled sack of nasty eyeballs, and it tasted like poo.
“Eat,” she said again, with a voice like a megaphone.
He touched the fork to his tiny lips. Eww. The sour cream had not soured enough. The ham was too moist. It was like eating paint.
“Swallow,” she said.
He tried. He really tried. He wrapped his lips around the slime, then forced it with his tongue to the back of his throat until he couldn’t stand it anymore and — plllbbbttt! — he spewed it all over Mom’s baby blue apron.
“Guster Stephen Johnsonville!” She picked him up from his chair and pulled him over to the sink. “Look what a mess you’ve made! I thought you were eleven!” she screamed, and began scrubbing his shirt.
Guster spit into the sink — he had to get rid of the taste — while Mom wrestled to clean off his shirt. The stairs pounded as Zeke and Mariah came thumping down from their rooms and into the kitchen.
“What’s the matter with him?” Zeke hollered.
“Ezekiel, get back up to your room,” Mom shouted. He scrambled for cover.
“But Mom, all I want is a taste experience!” cried Guster through tears of pain. Why couldn’t they eat things like Felicity made? He stuck his mouth under the running tap water.
Suddenly, Mom stopped wrestling. She let him down, dried off his shirt as best as she could, then pressed her hand to his back. It almost looked like concern on her face. “I know honey, I know,” she whispered.
He just hoped she wouldn’t hug him. If she did, he might run away and hide himself under the couch. He sniffed. He hadn’t meant for his tears to break free.
Mom closed her eyes, as if resting herself for a minute. “Guster, go change your clothes. We’re going into the city,” she said.
Chapter 3 — The Master Pastry Chef
The city of New Orleans was an hour’s drive away from the farm. Guster stared out the window at the cloudy night sky as the family’s old rusty Suburban tumbled down the road, with Zeke behind the wheel. Maybe the city would provide something to eat — if Zeke’s driving didn’t kill them first.
“Eh? Eh?” Zeke turned around to make sure Guster noticed the learner’s permit he’d folded and placed prominently on the dash. Zeke had shown it to Guster at least once a day since he got it. Guster smiled weakly.
“Eyes on the road Zeke,” said Mom. Guster couldn’t believe she was letting that maniac drive.
Sometimes Guster wondered if Zeke liked being his brother. Zeke was always throwing acorns or cow pies at him. He’d even pushed Guster out of a tree house once.
As for Mom, it was about time she got with the program. If it wasn’t Ham Chowder today, it was Cantaloupe Omelets yesterday, or Toasted Lasagna Sandwiches with butter the day before. That’s the way it had always been, ever since Guster could chew, his own mother shoving a scum-juice tube down his throat and cranking it on while there was nothing he could do.
Zeke steered the Suburban over the yellow dots in the middle of the road, bouncing Guster in his seat and bobbing the bun Mom wore on top of her head up and down like an apple. “Sorry,” Zeke said. The country road turned into highway, and the highway turned to freeway as the bright lights of New Orleans came into view.
They rarely went into the city. The family had moved to Louisiana only three years before.
“We’ll go into the French Quarter,” said Mom. Guster had heard of the French Quarter — it was a neighborhood older than America itself.
“This place was built by pirates,” Zeke said. “And there’s voodoo magic everywhere.”
Yeah, right, thought Guster. Zeke was probably making it up, just like everything else he ever said.
“Exit the freeway here,” Mom told Zeke. “There are a lot of tricky streets in the French Quarter, so you will have to be very careful to follow my directions,” she said in her sternest Mom-voice. She pointed to a street on their right. “Turn here.”
Zeke turned down the street, then stopped at a red light. Guster rolled down the window so he could get a better look outside. There were lights everywhere. Crowds of people walked back and forth across the sidewalks or sat outside at little tables eating and drinking. It smelled of fresh gumbo in one direction, which was decent, and banana bread pudding in the other direction, which ruin
ed everything else. Bananas aren’t ripe enough, he thought. But there were so many choices. So many opportunities. If they were to find that perfect something, it was bound to be here — if it was anywhere at all.
The light turned green. Zeke turned the Suburban left, just as a crowd of people stepped out into the crosswalk in front of the car.
“Zeke!” Mom cried. Guster lurched forward in his seatbelt as Zeke slammed on the brakes.
“Freakazoids! What are they doing?!” Zeke cried. Guster looked up just in time to see two headlights approaching from the right. A horn blasted. Zeke threw the Suburban into reverse, turned it around and drove the opposite direction as the car zoomed past.
“This is a one-way street!” Mom cried as a green car came speeding toward them head on.
Zeke turned the Suburban a hard left down another street as Guster braced himself on the seat in front of him. Zeke was going to kill them. More car horns blared as they passed another ‘One-way’ arrow pointing in the opposite direction.
“Right! Turn right!” screamed Mom. The car lurched again, throwing Guster into the seat next to him as a truck zoomed past.
“Why don’t we park here?” Mom said, her voice quivering. Zeke pulled the car next to the curb and screeched to a halt. Mom yanked the keys out of the ignition. Guster caught his breath.
“Did you see those guys?” Zeke asked. “Walked right out in front of me!”
Mom shook her head. “They were in the crosswalk dear,” she said, and got out of the car. “You’re going to have to re-read that safe driver’s handbook. Let’s walk.”
Anything to be out of a car with Zeke behind the wheel. Guster unclicked his safety belt and hopped out.
Unlike the other streets, this one was dark and quiet. Most of the shops were closed for the night, except for a Bistro one block ahead. Mom pulled Guster toward it. It was nearly empty. The smell of cooking meat hung like a fog on the street. “How about this one?” said Mom.
Too greasy, thought Guster. There had to be something better than this. He shook his head.
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