Another Snippit for Luna City 11 – Liquid Treasure

18. May 2022 · Comments Off on Another Snippit for Luna City 11 – Liquid Treasure · Categories: Chapters From the Latest Book, Luna City

(Richard has finally accepted the offer from Lew Dubois to begin as executive chef for the renewed Cattleman Hotel, having put the Cafe on the map, gastronomically speaking – but aware that he is becoming bored with the limitations. And for him – being bored professionally could have near-fatal consequences.)

Richard could not readily shed his established habit of rising well before sunrise – with the chickens, as Judy Grant cheerfully said it – or at least with their several roosters, all of whom were given to serenade the setting of the moon with an acapella chorus of cock-a-doodle-dos at five-thirty AM. He secretly rather enjoyed the brisk pedal along the darkened country road, as sunrise paled the eastern sky, the quietness of the streets, and the dimming gold of the old-fashioned gas lamps which lit the margins of Town Square and the area around the bandstand, which was the ornate center of the Square, as the sun rose in a glory of apricot and rose – very occasionally trimmed with crimson and purple clouds.

There was a van parked around the side of the Cattleman, with the logo of a national security firm emblazoned on the side. Richard paid it hardly any attention, save for noticing that there were a pair of genial gentlemen in overalls, messing about with drills, rolls of cable and some really impressive tool-kits, in and out of Lew’s office, the larger joint office and in the splendidly ornate and paneled bar, which was almost the crown jewel of the Cattlemen. He did a tour of the kitchen – mildly busy with breakfast for a scattering of hotel clients – and then retreated to the office to continue his research of the previous day. He pondered Lew’s advice, and considered it good … but still, the obsessive habits of a lifetime thus far niggled at him. Was it entirely cricket to spend less than eighty hours a week, in the object of his employment … or was that taking devotion to duty just a little too far in the pursuit of what Lew called a well-balanced life…

He was interrupted shortly before eleven by one of the overalled technicians, lurking hesitantly in the doorway of the office.

“’Scuse me, Chef,” the technician ventured. “D’you know where the big boss is … we got a bit of a problem with running the new line.”

“Mr. Dubois is around here somewhere,” Richard ventured, just as the great man himself appeared. That Lew was also wearing a groundskeeper’s Carhart jacket and a pair of heavy leather work gloves went without mentioning.

“Hey, Lew,” the technician confessed with relief. “There’s a problem with running the new cable … it just goes and goes and goes into the wall. Doesn’t come out where it’s supposed to. Stevo and I think there is a void, between the office and the bar. Can we have a squint at the blueprints again, just to make certain.”

“Of course,” Lew went to a tall, old-fashioned wooden cabinet, one fitted out with a series of shallow but large drawers. He pulled out several, before finding the one oversized envelope containing the diagrams of the ground floor offices of the Cattleman. They were done on outsized sheets of heavy paper in ink which had faded to a sepia shade – all heavily-detailed plans of each room, some adorned with sketches of the architectural adornments. Which, as far as Richard could see from a cursory glance over the shoulders of Lew and the tech, had been faithfully carried out, more than a hundred years ago. All three of them studied the linked plans for the various spaces on the Cattleman’s ground floor, joined presently by Stevo, the other security install tech.

“Hmm,” Remarked Lew thoughtfully. “I am not an architect – just someone who has had to become familiar with old buildings and their peculiarities – but it seems to me that there might be something anomalous, just there. Your cable should come from my office and emerge in that wall to the left of the back-bar … but it seems to me that there might be a space unaccounted for.”

Both technicians agreed, solemnly and with a degree of puzzlement.

“A secret compartment,” Richard ventured, with an air of insouciance. “Hardly an old mansion or listed pile in England is without a secret passage, staircase, or priest’s hole. They usually hide the door catch somewhere in the woodwork.”

“I wonder if you can find it, cher,” Lew ventured, “As you appear to be the expert in these matters.” There was nothing for it, but that all but to agree with Lew, and all – followed by an increasingly intrigued Bianca, trooped after Richard into the hotel bar room.

The bar in the old hotel had been kept open, maintained, and functioning long after most of the other facilities had been closed up and allowed to molder away. So the renovations in that area, performed by Roman Gonzalez’ construction crew under contract from Venue Properties had not been nearly as extensive as they had on the upper floors, to the offices, kitchen and ballroom. The barroom itself was a wonder of elaborate woodwork, with a long bar of Circassian tiger-striped walnut, the whole place adored with every possible ornate wood and brass frill that the late 19th century Beaux-Arts designers hired at great expense by the Italian hotelier who hoped to make another small fortune in catering to the guests visiting the hot-water spa on the outskirts of Luna City. (He did end up with a small fortune, but alas, he had started with a large one.)

Richard, seeing that all were watching him consigned his credibility to the gods, and began feeling his way around the carved panels to the left of the stupendously ornate bar. The woodwork was certainly comprehensive; God only knew how many secret catches and all could have been hidden in all the curlicues, whorls and flourishes. Richard ran his fingers over the edges of all the panels, paying particular attention to those where the carving was most ornate, feeling for anything that might move, just a bit, under light pressure. To his utter astonishment, as well as that of those watching – including Lew, both the security technicians, Mr. Georges, Bianca, and a couple of waiters drawn by the unusual nature of the proceedings, on a boring morning after the breakfast rush – a particularly ornate bit of carving at the upper left corner of the panel just to the right of the back-bar, gave under slight pressure.

A small crack appeared in the floor-to-head-height paneling. To the astonishment of all, a segment the size of an ordinary door swung open, with a faint metal groan of protest, revealing a closet-sized space behind – a space lined with shelves and row on row of bottles, and several small barrels on the bottom row, all covered in a generous layer of gray dust, dust so thick that it looked for all the world like grotesque fur. Through a small hole at the back of the closet, a long length of clean cable coiled like a snake on the dusty floor.

“Holy cow!” breathed Stevo the tech. “A no-sh*t Sherlock secret compartment! He fumbled out his cellphone and snapped a picture. “I gotta share this with the boss, Lew! We’ve never found something like this before! What’s in it? Looks like the secret booze store, back in the day!”

“Those are quarter-casks,” Intoned Mr. Georges, casting a professional eye upon them. “Used to age various brandies, fine whiskeys, and other liquors in bulk. Depending on how long they have been aging, that is – if they have not leaked or evaporated.”

“My friends, there might be a fortune, concealed for how long…” Lew mused. “And did no one, not even our cher Roman, who oversaw all the renovations of this place … ever detect the presence of this secret cellar?”

“I guess not,” Bianca was already dialing on her cellphone, “As far as I know – he did most of the work on the ballroom, the restaurant, and the upper floors. There was no need to do much more than paint the plaster and polish up the paneling in the barroom.”

“Indeed,” Richard agreed. “As far as I recall, the bar was the one space in the Cattleman that was kept in pretty good nick, all the way along. There was no need to do anything more than a lick and a promise and dust the lights as far as the renovations went.”

Lew was nodding in agreement. “Yes, this is a most unexpected bonus … Cherie, my dear Mademoiselle Bianco, would you be so good as to dial …”

“Mademoiselle Stephanie,” Bianca replied smartly. “Already on it, boss … Hello, Steph? You should come to the Cattleman, tout suite … we have just made the most amazing discovery!”

Lew, with a smile of beatific pleasure, turned to Richard and Mr. Georges and remarked,

“Ah … I have the most expert staff, do I not? They do what I want done before I can even voice the orders.”

Meanwhile, Mr. Georges had already stepped gingerly into the closet, carefully avoiding the coil of cable on the floor, and gently pulled out one of the bottles, handling it as carefully as if were a particularly fragile infant. He blew the remaining dust from the bottle, and the faded sepia-tinted label. He adjusted his glasses and read carefully from the label.

“San Pedro Five-Star Gold Brandy … Luna City, USA … vintage 1924. Sacre bleu …” and he went off in a long babble of agitated French to Lew.

“What is it?” Richard whispered to Bianca, who had finished the call on her cellie, and put it away, meanwhile looking into the dusty compartment as if the door to the sacred tomb had just had the rock rolled away from the opening.

Bianca murmured in holy awe, “It’s a cache of Carolina San Pedro’s brandy, Chef. The last bottle of it to come on the open market sold at auction for $25,000. A single bottle! It was distilled from a brew of local grapes, just after Prohibition went into effect. It’s almost a hundred years old. How many bottles are there, Mr. Georges?”

“At least a hundred,” Mr. Georges reverently considered the dark bottle in his hands. “And six quarter-casks, which should hold approximately fifty liters each. That is, assuming that much has not evaporated over time. The profit for the hotel and VPI will be incalculable.”

“An amazing find,” Richard mused, already considering how a very small quantity of such an amazing distillation could be made to serve the cause of haute cuisine, although some experts felt that using a rare liquor in cooking was a blasphemy.

“The matter of ownership will be a question of the most complicated to unravel,” Lew conceded. “For Venue Properties has only leased the hotel from the municipality, which is the owner of record. Ownership of this cache must be adjudicated, since it’s existence predates our agreement to lease, renovate and manage. I have always conducted business with the highest of ethical consideration …” he turned to Bianca, who was already dialing her cellphone.

“Mayor Bodie,” Bianca said into it. “Bianca Gonzalez, at the Cattleman… Good morning – are you sitting down? We have just made the most interesting discovery … and Mr. Dubois thinks that you should come and see it, right away…”

Lew smiled again, and whispered to Richard, “See, mona mi? Before I might even say the words, my staff knows what should be done.”

 

 

HVAC Woes

13. May 2022 · 2 comments · Categories: Domestic

It has been almost a year since the day after Wee Jamie was born, a day that I spent at home because the AC ceiling unit had overflowed the drip pan, saturating and collapsing part of the den ceiling. The trusty local company which installed the whole HVAC system in the first place almost ten years ago had to reinstall a new evaporator coil as the existing one was ruined, a new line connecting the outside condenser, compressor and fan, the coolant line had been dinged somehow during the siding install, and a drain to the nearest outside flower bed. At that time, a year ago, they suggested making a full sweep and replacing everything, including the outside condenser, etc., but I winced at the cost and opted for the minimal fix. And the darned outside condenser/compressor/fan gave out entirely over the Mother’s Day weekend, in the face of an expected heat wave. Sigh. You’d think that something like an HVAC system maintained by the installing company could have lasted longer than a decade, but this is Texas; great for men and dogs but hell on women, horses and, apparently, HVAC systems. We had no HVAC drama for the whole year until last weekend. (The condensation drain used to get plugged pretty regularly, until it was re-routed – to our exasperation, and that of the techs, who used to have to show up every couple of months.)

The good thing is that my credit rating is recovered to the point where I can get favorable terms for a better-quality system – quieter, smaller, and more efficient … plus they promised to fix an ongoing problem with the front bedroom, which has always been either hotter or cooler than the rest of the house. The other good thing is that I had finally paid off two loans for previous work, which gave my budget some (fleeting) elasticity. The third good thing is that we got several hefty discounts – one for having been loyal customers for a decade, another for referring a good friend who bought a system from the company based on our good word, still another for senior citizen (hah!) and veteran, and a fourth hefty rebate from the energy company. It is my profound hope that with the new system – and taking into consideration the new siding and the windows – that I really will see a substantially lower energy bill this summer. The bill for April was the pits; we only ran the air conditioning for half the time, or two days out of three, but the kilowatt hours consumed were nearly as much as the hottest month around here, which is August. Possibly the condenser/compressor/fan failing had a lot to do with this. I hope so. They topped up the blown-in insulation, which ought to help with the bills.

Another very promising thing is that the outside unit is about a third the size of the previous one. It mounts to the side of the house, rather than on the ground on a small pad, which keeps it above the dirt and all, and allows a bit more of my yard to be used, without that big hulking square thing taking up precious garden real estate.

And the final bit of good fortune? About a year ago, I scored a deLonghi portable AC unit for the price of a customer review, knowing that we might have a need of it someday. It didn’t have enough oomph to keep the house cool, but it did chill one 15 x 11-foot room quite nicely, It turned out well that we had that portable, for there was a problem with the new smart system, in that it didn’t actually work, at first. As my daughter remarked, ‘never mind about a smart system that doesn’t work, what about a moron system that does?!’ We’ve been miserable all week, waiting first for the installation, and then for the last in a series of expert techs on Friday to sort out why the brand new out-of-the-box modules – apparently some connection came unconnected in transit from the factory, such a rare occurrence that the regular install technicians didn’t expect to see, and the factory support functions are in another time zone entirely, so someone working on our unit in the late afternoon or early evening was SOL when it came to expert human tech support. Praise be, the installation supervisor arrived first thing this morning, and went over the inside and outside units, reprogrammed the whole system, and for the first time in a week, it’s comfortably cool in the house.

And the contractor who promised to do the back fence actually arrived first thing this morning – so although my bank account will be cleaned out for the next week to pay for work done – the back fence and gate is under construction even as I write. At long last; we’ve been waiting on that since early in March!

Wee Jamie, The Wonder Grandson

11. May 2022 · 1 comment · Categories: Domestic

My grandson, the child of my only child, will be a year old next week, and if there is a more loveable, adored and indulged baby-almost-toddler around, I would like to meet him or her. (See, I’m not a biologist but I can tell the difference. My father, who was a biologist trained us all well in that sciencey sort of thing.)

He is close to weighing twenty pounds, and when standing on his flat, tender little baby feet – and he wants most urgently to stand – the top of his head comes to my daughter’s mid-thigh. When he was delivered three weeks early by emergency c-section, I was a bit concerned because his arms and legs were so thin, the flesh on them rather flaccid. He was just large enough and scored high enough on the APGAR test that he wasn’t consigned to NICU (neo-natal intensive care) and so could home with us two days later. In the year since, Jamie has firmly plumped out, with little dimples on the back of his hands where his knuckles are, and dear indented little rings around his wrists, elbows, and knees. He will lose that baby fat when he begins to walk, though. My daughter remained roughly the same approximate size and weight from the age of 18 months to four years – she just lengthened out, grew lean and tall.

He is going to be tall, when he is grown to man’s estate and shall be very proud and great. He has a head of feathery light-brown hair; sometimes we see blond highlights in it, sometimes rather more auburn, and it curls very slightly back of his ears. He has rather strongly marked eyebrows and ridiculously long eyelashes, but the color of his eyes themselves is hard to judge – blue-green, blue-green-hazel? It depends on the day and the lighting. His nose gives promise of eventually being rather a beak, but as to the mouth, everyone says that he has lips like mine and my daughters. Otherwise, not very much of a family resemblance at all; a gamine face, which likely will change when he is an adult. He is not one of those children who keeps basically the same face for their life, like Granny Jessie or my brother JP, both of whom are recognizable from earliest childhood through to middle or advanced age. He smiles now, openly and at practically everyone, and of late has begun to giggle and laugh.

Wee Jamie is not one of those timid, hard-to-approach small children. When we take him shopping, he is ready to smile at anyone who smiles at him, although he has been known to stare at some strangers with direct and unsettling intensity. Otherwise, a very placid, confident, and happy baby, who rarely cries full-on, unless in pain (rare) or fright (rarer still. His godmother speculates that it is likely he is that way because my daughter and I readily comfort him and attend to his needs. One year, under our belts – now for the next twenty…

After Words

09. May 2022 · 2 comments · Categories: Random Book and Media Musings

A writer friend put a promo link to one of my books on one of the major news aggregator sites last week, with the refreshing result that sales of the book skyrocketed – this was my first historical, To Truckee’s Trail, and the one which was almost the most fun and the fastest to write. I was a bit downcast when I finished it, because it meant that I was done with the story and had to say goodbye to all the characters, especially the one or two which had been created for the story out of whole cloth. Truckee must have been such a fast write for me because the whole plot was already there: the first wagon train party to make it over the mountains into California with their wagons, and not having lost a single person to the emergency of being stuck in the deep winter snow with slowly diminishing food supplies. The participants in that great adventure were all real, historic people, with the exception of the little boy Eddie Patterson, and the noble mastiff Dog; it was more a matter of teasing out what little could be deduced about what they had been like, and then and fleshing them out to become real, breathing, sympathetic characters. There had only been one diarist among that party, and that diary was later lost, and only one member of the party left a memoir later on … so I had a little bit to work with and was sorry when it was all done. I couldn’t write a sequel – the story was whole and perfect the way it was, and in any case two of the central characters, John and Liz only lived for a few years after – I still think that is why the story of the Stephens-Townsend-Greenwood-Murphy wagon train party was so little known, otherwise. John Townsend would have been an important and influential person in California, historically, and how he helped lead the party to safety from the jaws of icy death in the mountains would have been part of it.

There were three interesting connections between the Stephens-Townsend Party, and the tragic Donner-Reed Party, aside from the circumstance of both being trapped in nearly the same place in the pass over the Sierra Nevada. The first was that elements of the Donner-Reed survivors took shelter in the same little cabin by Truckee Lake which Moses Schallenberger, Allen Montgomery and Joseph Foster had built to winter over, hoping to guard the wagons which their party had to leave behind for lack of oxen to pull them. The second was that Martin Murphy’s youngest son, John, later courted and married Virginia Reed, who is usually cast as one of the heroines of the tragedy. And finally, the old mountain man and trail-guide, Caleb Greenwood, was a volunteer – in spite of his great age – in one of the organized relief efforts to rescue the survivors of the party. I did consider, when I came around to writing the Gold Rush adventure of Fredi Steinmetz in California a decade later, of having him meet briefly with Moses Schallenberger, and John and Liz’s little son, or maybe even some of the Murphy family just to complete the circle – but the plot just didn’t allow for that.

Other “after words” to my books – it was suggested that following Willi Richter’s life and adventures with the Comanche in the late 1860s, and his return to his birth family ten years later would make a ripping good yarn. But that would make necessary a really deep dive into Comanche history, life and culture, and I just didn’t feel it. Another reader suggested maybe exploring the anti-German lurch on the part of the general public around the time of World War 1, but I just didn’t feel that, either. So much came crashing down in that war and immediately afterwards – empires, optimism about the future and society generally – I just couldn’t feel that, either. Although I did reference in passing in My Dear Cousin, that Steinmetz’s family legally changed their name, because of the anti-German animus of the time; which is why Fredi and Sophia’s granddaughter went by the surname of Stoneman.

I wonder if I should have added a bit more to that book, mapping out how the post-war world treated the two cousins and their husbands. The couple that I based part of Peg and Tommy’s lives in Malaya on, eventually had to leave their rubber plantation for their own safety because of the Communist insurgency. They had children by that time, and the constant threat against all of their lives – threats carried out to the point where they had to fortify their main residence – forced them to leave. I rather think that Peg and Tommy, with the children that they had after Tom and Olivia (and they would have had more children) would have eventually relocated to Australia and rebuilt a secure life there.

For Vennie and Burt, I have a feeling that they would have had a rockier road. I couldn’t see Vennie settling down to be the perfect wife of an up and coming academic at a moderately snooty west coast private college. I think that they would have separated – but not divorced — after a couple of years. I could picture Vennie going back into nursing, serving as a military nurse in Korea. She had a rather overdeveloped sense of duty. And eventually, Burt would have taken up another position, somewhere in the intermountain West, and he and Vennie would reconcile, perhaps adopt a couple of war orphaned Korean children, before having a couple of their own. So that’s how that ‘after word’ might have gone – but I don’t believe I’ll be writing it out – the story was complete as it was.

Now, to finish the Civil War novel, which is half-done, and leaving Miss Minnie Vining as an established lecturer on feminist and abolitionist causes … a writer’s work is never done.

A Bit From the Next Luna City Installment…

01. May 2022 · Comments Off on A Bit From the Next Luna City Installment… · Categories: Chapters From the Latest Book

(A Liquid Treasure is the title of this segment …)

Richard was in two minds, at accepting a management position from Lew Dubois, to be the executive chef of the Cattleman Hotel. He regretted, but in a minor way, handing over management of Luna Café and Coffee to Araceli, since the Café had been his life and reason for living for five years. But on the other hand, he was experiencing twinges of acute boredom, having turned it into a profitable, popular enterprise, renown for the in-house cinnamon rolls, and the line of gourmet edibles, sauces and condiments which had been developed by his junior staff. In any case, management of the Café was now in the frighteningly capable hands of Araceli – who had been a reliable constant in the front of the house since coming to work at the Café when she was a teenage waitress nearly two decades previously.

“You may wish to make use of a staff suite in the Cattleman,” Lew had waved an airy hand in the direction of the grand staircase, “Until the private enclave at Mills Farm for senior staff and visiting management is complete – you and your intended are entitled to one of the cottages there. It’s part of your compensation package.” This was on Richard’s first official day of employment as an upper-level minion of Venue Properties, International. They were sitting in the manager’s office; one of a pair of adjoining wood-paneled 19th century marvels of fine paneling and plasterwork, wedged into the space adjoining the gloriously ornate main bar, and accessed by a small, discrete door adjacent to the monumental front desk. Richard had been given to understand that the larger of the two would be his, shared with the hotel’s duty concierge, and Mr. Georges, the maître d, who boasted a Gallic mustache to rival Poirot’s, and greeted Richard in the slangy French patois which Richard remembered from his days training in Paris. A short hallway behind the second office connected with the kitchen, which made it handy for chef and maître d.

“Oh, really?” Richard confessed to being somewhat gob smacked. He hadn’t read that far into the sheaf of documents which Lew had conveyed to him for signature, Jess would surely have administered the gob smacking, for signing documents without closely perusing every line. “In that case … Miss Heisel and I will be thrilled at having a residence as part of the deal. For myself, though – I shall continue living at the Age until the marriage. I’ve become very fond of the place, you see. Sefton has agreed to continue renting it to me as a pied-à-terre, a kind of get-away refuge.”

“As you wish, mon cher Richard,” Lew acknowledged by way of dismissal. “You may wish now to conduct your own review of facilities and staff. In the meantime, welcome to the family of Venue Properties … oh, tomorrow there will be some slight disruption. The workmen from the security firm will be installing certain additional devices and connecting cables… They will need to work in this office, and in mine, for about a day, but I am assured that the mess and disruption will be minimal.”

“Thanks for the warning,” Richard replied, and withdrew to his own shared office, where Bianca Gonzalez – one of the numerous Luna City Gonzales-Gonzalez clan – was already on the phone at her side of the antique partner desk which dominated the windowless room. Bianca was a rising star in the Venue Properties firmament, an elegant young woman who had obviously taken Audrey Hepburn as her sartorial role model: she wore a simple black dress, pearl earrings and had her dark hair rolled into a simple chignon.

“Of course,” Bianca was saying into the receiver. “White orchids in the suite, and a reservation for four at eight o’clock that evening. The guide for the kayaking excursion will call for you promptly at seven the next morning … he will have your number, in case of a delay… thank you, Mrs. Sheldon. I’m certain that you and the family will enjoy your excursion… see you next weekend, then … ‘byeeee…Good morning, Chef!” Bianca beamed at him. “Welcome to the Cattleman. Let me know if you have any questions, ‘k, or can’t find anything.”

“Thanks, Miss Gonzalez,” Richard replied. “Mr. Dubois was very thorough in briefing me…”

“Isn’t he the total sweetheart?” Bianca twinkled at him. “He knows everything about everything, and gosh, you’d best stay on your toes, if you work for him!”

“I know,” Richard replied. There was a small closet next to the door to the kitchen – he opened it, to find there were ten or a dozen identical chef’s jacket already hanging in dry-cleaning bags, all with the logo of the Cattleman Hotel embroidered over the breast pocket, and his own name – Chef Richard Astor-Hall below the logo. A stack of flawlessly-starched and fluted toques sat on the shelf above the hanger rod – no, there was no detail too small for Lew Dubois to overlook. He shrugged one on, donned the toque and went to survey his new domain.

An absorbing business, as it turned out to be: he commanded a sous-chef, a dozen junior chefs and apprentices, a pastry and bread baker, and a pantry supervisor, plus several kitchen porter-cum-dishwashers; the front house staff fell under the stern but kindly rule of Mr. Georges. Most of them were young, hired from local schools and training institutions; they had not had time to acquire bad habits, and Richard could barely recall all their names, serially introduced as they went about their duties in a pleasingly professional manner. Fortunately, with Lew Dubois’ customary attention to detail, every one of the kitchen staff wore proper kitchen garb with the Cattleman logo and – most importantly – their name and office embroidered over the left front pocket. Richard had not had such a large staff since his abortive glory days in London, launching Carême, the towering failure of which had sent him first on a blackout drunken bender, then on to Texas. The Cattleman was not going to be a similar disaster. In any case, he was a hireling, not an independent, frantically juggling a dozen flaming balls while tap-dancing on a tightrope. Richard had only to oversee the restaurant and catering functions and do it to the satisfaction of customers and of Lew Dubois. He was part of a team, not the one whose neck was a hundred percent on the line.

He passed the remainder of the morning, reviewing the menus, considering prospective menus, his personal well-thumbed copy of Larousse Gastronomique, the availability at a reasonable price of those commodities which might eventually be turned into amazing and appealing menu selections which would turn a tidy profit for the Cattleman’s restaurant. Such research absorbed his interest for the remainder of the day, only interrupted around mid-day by one of the junior female kitchen minions bringing him a tray with a beautifully composed Salad Niçoise upon it. Barely recalling his manners, he complimented the minion, who fled with the empty tray, blushing beet-red.

“Nomi’s very new,” remarked Bianca, with some amusement. “At least you didn’t make her cry or piss her underpants. She is so very thrilled to be working here, and she worships you. For Captain Kitten in the Kitchen, mostly. That’s why she decided that she wanted to be a chef and work in a real restaurant.”

“A cousin of yours?” Richard replied glumly. Of course – one couldn’t throw a brick in any direction in Luna City without hitting a round dozen of Gonzalezes and Gonzaleses. Bianca giggled and flapped an airy hand in the direction of the kitchen. She had her own plate, with a small salad upon it, arrayed with exacting precision

“Of course. Our family has Luna City in the palm of our hands, Chef.”

The remainder of the day passed in the same absorbing fashion – Richard engrossed in plans, cost estimations, and Larousse. When he lifted his head from the various piles on the desk, he was amazed to discover that it was nearly dark outside; well past sunset. The pleasant clatter of plates and silverware, and the low hum of conversation trickled out from the hotel dining room. Feeling that his day had been sufficiently full and tomorrow he would do serious work in the kitchen, he did the rounds of the dining room, briefly exchanged remarks with Mr. Georges, another of the kitchen, which hummed along like a well-oiled machine, and stuck his head into Lew’s office. That gentleman was just closing up his desk – or more importantly, the computer which sat upon that graceful example of the 19th century office furniture – for the day.

“Tomorrow, mon cher? I thought you had gone already.” Lew remarked.

“Ah well, we in the trade commonly work long hours,” Richard replied. “All part and parcel of the game.”

“Indeed,” and Lew bent a look of near-to-fatherly concern upon Richard. “But one must set limits, cher Ricard, especially as one intending to marry and commit to a family. Work, if one is not careful, will expand to consume all of one’s time and energy, and that is not conducive to a contented marriage or a happy family life. There is no one, ever, who has on their deathbed confessed that they wished they had spent more time at the office … if you would walk with me, Richard, I will impart some of my hard-won knowledge of management … successful management of an enterprise such as this; you must not think that it requires your presence all the hours of the day and the weeks. That way lies madness and despair, if not for yourself, then for your loved ones. No. The way to success is to carefully select your subordinates and train them up in the manner in which you wish things to be done. Once accomplished, allow them the authority do to conduct matters in your absence. And then,” Lew added, in a practical manner, as they walked out of the staff entrance, where Richard’s trusty trail bicycle was chained to a handy railing. Lew, who had the advantage of a staff suite in the hotel, had no convenient transport waiting for him. “One might live what they call a balanced life. It is the secret to success in management, as I have found – train and encourage your subordinates in the way that one might wish – and then when that is done, one might take the time to have a full life… I should write a book, do you think? Management Secrets of the Lazy Manager. It is then a matter of the quality of time spent, not the quantity of time. Good night, cher Richard. Tomorrow, dedicate your time in acquainting your kitchen staff to the standards and principles which you wish them to achieve and maintain. And then,” Lew bestowed a beatific smile upon Richard, “Allow them to go forth, dedicating themselves to achieving your standard, while you pick daisies in the field with your estimable and delectable Miss Heisel.”

“I don’t know if I am up to that, Lew,” Richard confessed glumly, “I just don’t know if I am that kind of good management materiel. I boobed the job pretty catastrophically, the first time out of the gate… you knew about the Carême disaster? I think everyone does by now, what with all the videos, although it was five years ago. A century in internet time.”

“Ah,” Lew replied. “But you had a second chance with the little Café, you see. Which was that which inspired my interest in you, Richard. You had the management of a tiny café – and what with one thing and another, you brought in or encouraged a splendid team. You brought in new customers, recruited a solid team …Made the little Café famous and popular … and profitable.”

“It was more chance and good luck than good management on my part,” Richard confessed, and Lew smiled.

“Ah, but didn’t Napoleon himself ask of a prospective marshal for his Grand Armee – is he lucky? I myself are not Napoleon,” Lew laid a finger along his nose and looked wisely at his latest recruit. “But I have a sense of who is able … and lucky.”

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