by Alan Russell
“After getting his hat,” said Ted, “Marcel left his office door open, so I decided to close it. I don't know, Am, maybe I went to snoop, too. The place was a mess, littered with all of Marcel's prep work. But in the corner was his mystery bag. It was clearly not as full as it had been. And there was a smell, a reek, I wasn't familiar with. I couldn't help myself; I went over and peeked inside.
“At first I wasn't sure what was in there. You know how Marcel is about cleanliness; by this time the bag was mostly a refuse container. I had to do some sifting, and that wasn't pretty. But it beat what was at the bottom of the bag. There were still a few relatively whole specimens. They were possum.”
“Opossum?”
Ted nodded. “And these weren't the kind of possum raised on some ranch,” he said. “It was clear these possum hadn't died at the hands of a butcher, or even a hunter. They were sort of squashed….”
“Oh, my God,” Am said. “Road kill.”
An idling Annette was suddenly floored. Am's driving and her response might have qualified both of them for the Cajon Speedway. He took the back way and parked with squealing brakes at the delivery entrance behind the Hotel.
“Why didn't you stop him?” asked Am.
“You know what he’s like,” Ted said. “I figured you were the only one he might listen to.”
Meurtre de la Route. And one of the most important food critics in the country.
“It might not be too late,” Ted said. “It’s a five-course meal, Marcel’s creations from salad to dessert.”
Instead of finishing with mousse, thought Am, he’d probably conclude with Meurtre de la Mouse. He sprinted ahead of Ted, took the back stairs three at a time, threw open the service door, and sidestepped a room service waiter with a tray. It wasn’t an open field, but he was able to weave through servers and dishwashers before taking a shortcut through all the cooks working the line. There he gained the passageway to the Hotel’s showpiece restaurant, the Trident. And Marcel.
The chef had claimed a vantage point that allowed him to look out to the dining area without being seen. Apparently Marcel was gauging the reactions to his repast.
“Has it gone out?” Am asked.
“Haz wut gun owt?” spat Marcel.
“Your Meurtre de la Route.”
“Yez,” said Marcel with a wide smile, his eyes defiantly triumphant.
Ted pointed out the table. The epicure was about sixty and looked like a professional critic. His white hair was immaculately combed and parted, his necktie knotted carefully, his pencil mustache perfectly groomed. His companion, a younger man of around forty, also had a persnickety look and air.
“Do they know what they’re eating?”
“If zay asked, I told ze server to tell zem zay were eatin’ gibier.”
Ted translated while Am wiped Marcel’s spit off his face. “Wild game,” he said.
“Road kill,” said Marcel. “That’s what everyone say, no? So I make road kill.”
San Diego has no “Deer Crossing” signs, and you don’t have to watch out for cattle. Few exotic animals, with the exception of migrating birds, are seen within its city limits. Along its roads can be found dead cats, dogs, and skunks. And opossums. Given the alternatives, Am supposed Marcel had chosen his road kill well. The marsupials had made themselves at home all over San Diego. They had few predators, liked trash cans more than sanitation workers, and enjoyed the balmy climate. They were also about as smart as a fur ball. Sometimes they played possum when threatened by cars.
Am thought about playing possum himself but instead found himself walking over to the road kill table. Even when standing in front of the critic and his companion, Am wasn’t sure what to say. For a moment he eyed their plates. The papillote had just been opened, and the steam was rising from the dish. From what he could see, the opossum had been carved up and looked like some unidentifiable meat. Maybe the critic didn’t know French and had no idea what was in front of him.
“Novel,” said the older man to the younger. “How do you think Marcel got the idea to serve possum?”
“Meurtre de la Route,” said the other, pronouncing the words as if he had attended the Sorbonne. “Marcel has a sly sense of humor.”
“Gentlemen,” said Am.
They took their eyes from their plates and looked up. “I’m Am Caulfield,” he said, “the assistant general manager of the Hotel California.”
They said something back, but Am wasn’t listening. He was still desperately in search of some plan. “We are honored to have you,” he said.
It was evident they were used to the royal treatment, but that usually came with the after-dinner drinks. Their forks had been raised in the air long enough. They tried to dismiss Am with a few mumbled words of reciprocal thanks.
“As you know,” Am said, “our entrée selection is vast. We are proud of all our dishes, and I was thinking that it might be better if you ordered off the menu so that you can feast on the succulent fare of a representational meal. It hardly seems fair to partake of a dish that our chef so rarely creates.”
“The nightly specials,” lectured the critic, waving a knife at Am, “are the signature, the trademark, of any quality restaurant.”
Am thought about grabbing their dishes and running off with them, or of faking a seizure and falling on the table, but the knife wielder had studied under a basilisk. The critic froze his every intention.
Retreating, beaten, Am said, “Bon appétit.
XXXIV
“The specials—they are my per-og-a-teeve, no?” PerFrogative, maybe, thought Am.
“What do you think the county health department would say about your per-og-a-teeve?” Am asked. “How many ordinances do you think we violated by serving up your Caltrans special?”
“Ham. How do you zay it? You are ovaryacting.”
Twenty minutes earlier, when Am and Marcel had been exchanging screams, each might have been overreacting. Now they were in Marcel's office, and Am was just trying to get the chef to admit he had done something terribly wrong. Marcel's vocabulary was quite limited in that area, and Am was beginning to suspect that the French language didn't include the words I am sorry.
“What you have done, Marcel,” said Am, “goes beyond a prank. You have put the Hotel's reputation on the line just because your pride was tweaked.”
“Tweaked? What is zis tweaked?”
“Upset. Nettled. Bothered.”
Marcel shook his head. He was still wearing his ridiculously large chef’s hat. “Zis talk of road kill was a very bad thing. In zis kitchen we create wonderful food.”
“But just because you perceived an insult,” said Am, trying to move in for the kill like Perry Mason, “did that give you the right to serve road kill to one of the most eminent food critics in the country?”
Gastronomic virtue, evidently, was the highest of all courts. “When Marcel Charvet make a meal,” he said, taking a deep breath as a buildup to an indignant spit, “any meal, it is somethin’ to be remembered.”
“And you see nothing wrong with what you did?”
“Have you heard any complanetz yet?”
That was the rub. They say it’s not bragging if you can do it. Marcel insisted nothing was wrong with serving opossum. Wasn’t it considered a delicacy in some parts of the country? The “spezals” were his domain, and he could serve whatever he wanted. He said he had decided opossum was just the thing, and since his purveyors didn’t stock opossum, he quite fortuitously had just managed to—stumble, yes, stumble, that was the word—upon some.
A loud rapping at the office window put an end to their arguing. A busboy was motioning feverishly to Am. “Gunther needs you right away in the dining room, Mr. Caulfield,” he said.
Gunther Schneider was the maître d’ of the Trident. He resented any intervention by hotel management unless there was a problem, at which point he readily delegated complete responsibility.
“What’s up?” Am asked the busboy.
“Older man is down,” he said. “He’s probably had a heart attack or something.”
The stricken man had drawn a standing room only crowd. Am caught a glimpse of the victim’s face, which was enough to make him think the man wasn’t experiencing coronary problems. One of the servers had decided the same thing. He had already moved behind the man and was applying the Heimlich maneuver.
The blue face had thrown Am off. But after the victim disgorged a chewed piece of meat, and his coloring began to return to normal, Am realized the choking victim was none other than Stanley “Whiner” Weintraub. With some regrets, Am realized it was he who had insisted that all Hotel personnel be versed in lifesaving techniques.
Whiner had been a thorn in the Hotel’s side for years, or at least half a thorn. Estelle “Whiney” Weintraub was the other half. She had the shriller voice. The restaurant was getting the opportunity to hear it.
“Stanley,” she said, “Stanley! Are you all right?”
Whiner tried to say something, then gave up the effort. He raised his hand weakly, showed the world he was still alive. Dammit, was Am’s unspoken reaction.
No one could figure out why Whiner and Whiney always returned to the Hotel California. According to them, their room was always totally unacceptable, the food was awful, and the service was abominable. Every year the Weintraubs called on Am several times during their stay to report that the Hotel was far, far worse than it had ever been before. They pulled out laundry lists of litanies and woes, and invariably Whiner would end the conversation by saying, “I should pay you for staying here? You should pay me!”
“Murderers!”
It wasn’t a good day to hear that ringing announcement. With her husband’s voice temporarily impaired, Whiney had the whole floor to herself. Her bony finger was pointed Am’s way, drawn, no doubt, to a familiar face to wag it under.
Nils Olsen looked puzzled. He wasn’t getting the hero’s reception he expected for saving Mr. Weintraub’s life. Nils had been in the United States for half a dozen years, had come from Sweden as a student, and had not wanted to return to his country’s cold winters. Then again, he hadn’t bargained for this much warmth.
“You didn’t warn us about the bones! Are you operating with a license to kill?”
While Whiney’s attack was heating up, Nils motioned Am over and whispered in his ear. In the middle of her ranting, Am made so bold as to interrupt.
“There were no bones, Mrs. Weintraub. Your husband had the veal marsala….”
Whiney raised her voice a few decibels. It was an old tactic of the Weintraubs. If they ever looked as though they were losing an argument, the hysterics started. “My husband almost dies of food poisoning, and you have to make like a wiseguy. Is that right? Is that decent?”
“Your husband was choking on a piece of veal,” Am insisted. “That hardly qualifies as food poisoning….”
“It was dry. He told me that, said it before his throat was land mined. Stanley! Are you all right?”
He waved again, motioned that he was ready to rise to his feet. Nils started to assist him, but that wasn’t to Whiney’s liking.
“I’ll help him,” she said. “Stanley! Are you all right?”
He was flapping his whole arm now. Soon, Am knew, too soon, he’d be flapping his mouth.
“Mrs. Weintraub, will you be needing any assistance up to your room?”
“Why do you ask? Do most of your restaurant guests need to be carried out on stretchers?”
“Perhaps Mr. Weintraub would like to sit for a minute, have a glass of water….”
“We’ll need a taster before we ever sit here again.”
Am shut his mouth. It was either that or bite off his tongue. But rather than having to endure future accountings of how the uncaring staff had left her dying husband to crawl to his room, and instead of delegating the unpleasant chore of accompanying the Weintraubs to another employee, Am decided that he should escort the couple to their room.
Whiney’s diatribe never stopped. She was surprised that the Hotel was still in business; why, when they had checked in, they were forced to wait two hours for their room (“But didn’t you check in at ten in the morning, Mrs. Weintraub?”) and even then hadn’t gotten the room they wanted (“As I understand it, Mrs. Weintraub, the room you wanted was a suite, but when it was offered, you wanted it for the same rate as a studio guest room”). And now her husband had been poisoned. Poisoned. Am decided not to argue that point. He wasn’t certain he could sincerely object to the idea.
“It isn’t enough that people jump from their balconies,” she said, “and get murdered in their rooms. No. Now you’re trying to kill people in your restaurants. Is this a war zone or a hotel? What? Do you give people the choice of doggie bags or body bags?”
Whiney was still complaining on her doorstep when Am announced, “Thankyouandgoodnight.” He suspected Whiner’s voice was already back, but even he couldn’t get a word in when his wife was on a roll.
Common sense dictated to Am that he should cut his losses and leave, but there was still the matter of making Marcel see that his actions could not be condoned. It would have been nice if a contrite Marcel had been waiting in the kitchen, but the chef had been called to a table. Wonderful. Whenever praise was heaped on Marcel, he was twice as insufferable.
“Am?”
Nils Olsen had an expectant look on his face.
“Mr. Weintraub’s fine, Nils,” he said.
He nodded. But that wasn’t his question. There was another priority. “They didn’t sign their guest check, Am. Gunther said I should ask you about it.”
Translation: Is it all right if I add the gratuity to their check?
Servers always try to be mind readers. When stiffed, they invariably imagine that the patron meant to leave a gratuity but somehow forgot—that, or they assumed it was part of the guest check. The rule in the Hotel California’s restaurants was never to assume a guest’s intentions. If they didn’t include a gratuity, that was that. Of course that was an edict that had been handed down by nontipped management, and this was an out-of-the-ordinary situation.
“Had the Weintraubs pretty much finished their dinners?” Am asked.
“There wasn’t a thing left on their plates,” said Nils. “He choked on his last bite of veal.”
Am debated for a moment. “Put yourself down for fifteen percent, Nils,” he said, “and close it out to their room number.”
“Thank you, Am.”
He started walking away, but Am called him back. “If you save his life again, Nils,” he said, “you’re fired.”
Nils searched Am’s face. Even after years in the country, he still wasn’t sure of American humor. “That’s a joke, yes?”
“Ask me next week.”
There are worse places to wait than in a cavernous hotel kitchen. Rather than go home and open a can of beans and a can of beer and contemplate the longest day of his life, Am decided to take advantage of one of the great perquisites of hotel management and eat a fine meal. Of course, a condemned prisoner gets that same privilege. Am didn’t feel like waiting for food, so he wrote out a slip for prime rib. Staff always takes care of staff very well. He was cut off the better part of a cow and given enough potatoes and vegetables du jour to feed three people. As he walked by with his bounty, the pantry chef told him to save room for some fresh puff pastries smothered in chocolate-dipped strawberries “that anyone would die for.”
The aromas in a great kitchen are almost meals in themselves. The scents primed Am’s appetite even before he sat down. He hadn’t known how hungry he was and in short order did the impossible: finished his plate and even had room enough for one of those decadent puff pastries.
Marcel still hadn’t returned, and once again Am considered just leaving, but his stubbornness wouldn’t let him do that. He decided to go out to the restaurant and look for him. That proved to be a tactical mistake. The chef was sitting at the critic’s table. From his rapturous expression, he might
as well have been in bed with him. All he needed was a pillow and a cigarette. Am tried to retreat, but it was too late.
“Ham! Ham!”
Reluctantly he walked over to the table. The critic and his friend might have had to eat opossum, but no doubt that was a tastier dish than crow.
“Ham,” Marcel said, “zis gentleman zink I am a genus, and I zay, who am I to argue?”
Three people laughed.
“A genus, yes,” said Am. “But we’re still not sure of the species.”
No one smiled, and the critic went so far as to decide Am needed another lecture. “A great chef always innovates, is never complacent. Chef Marcel tells us he never attempted this dish before.”
“He gambled,” Am admitted.
“He won,” said the younger man. “It was delicious. Gamey yet tempered.”
Temper did have something to do with it, Am thought. “I could listen to zis all night,” said Marcel.
“Marcel is fond of telling us what he served at the Last Supper,” said Am.
Marcel's possum was apparently much better loved than Am's quips. He excused himself, afraid if he watched much longer, Marcel might bloat up to the point of exploding.
Only management was allowed to use the kitchen as a shortcut, probably because management knew that it was rarely a shortcut at all. On his intended way to the parking lot, Am was waylaid by the sight of one of his favorite desserts: double chocolate amaretto mousse. He paused to ask the pantry cook if there was a spoon to lick, and his inquiry resulted in a parfait glass chock full of the mousse. It took Am a few minutes to work through his rapture. He probably shouldn't have stopped by his office, but there was a note he remembered he should write.
He felt oddly content. Having a full stomach might have had something to do with that. For most of the day the world had seemed to be collapsing under his feet, but now that his maw was filled he felt the cosmos had somehow become aright.
Just as Am entered his office, the phone rang. He saw that the call was originating from Gunther's extension. With each ring the phone seemed to ring louder, but Am resisted the temptation to pick it up. It was late, and he didn't have it in him to fight any more dragons. The ringing stopped, and Am praised the Almighty. The note he had thought it necessary to write was becoming less important by the moment. Then the phone started ringing again. This time it was the front desk calling, and again Am wouldn't answer. I can sneak out, he thought. But he had neglected to lock his office door. The Weintraubs had visited him countless times before and knew only too well where to find him. They en
