The Belle Hotel

by Craig Melvin

  The bunch of carrots, still muddy from the allotment, caught his eye. As good a place to start as any. Charlie scrubbed them in the sink, topped and tailed them and cut them into batons for later. He flipped a Marlboro out of the crumpled packet in his chef’s trouser pocket, last one left, and leaned in to light it from the gas. No gas. Bugger, time to make a list. Charlie brought Franco’s book down again, grabbed a pencil from the pot by the hob and wrote on the back of the letter from Hookes that had just been delivered by courier.

  Hookes Bank

  SENT BY COURIER

  FIVE DAYS REPRIEVE

  Charlie Sheridan

  Belle Hotel

  Ship Street

  Brighton

  14 October 2008

  Dear Charlie,

  Further to our ‘meeting’ at Belle Hotel yesterday, I hereby give you final notice that you have five days to produce the balance £5000 needed to be able to service your overdraft and additional loans.

  Yours,

  Paul Peters

  *

  1. Fags

  2. Get Lulu to abort

  3. Pay the gas bill

  4. Cook the carrots

  5. Haddon and The Belle Hotel Cookbook

  6. Get £5,000 and keep Belle Hotel

  7. Be a better son

  8. Give Fish a day off

  9. Make peace with Roger

  10. Get Michelin star back

  Lulu pushed gently on the door to Belle Hotel’s pub. Through the crack she could see Janet polishing the taps and no sign of Charlie. Good.

  ‘Hello, love. You come to make up with Charlie. No good you two squabbling over Belle Hotel.’

  Janet looked up when she got no reply and clocked Lulu standing there with tears running down her cheeks. She put down the tin of Brasso, went round the bar and took Lulu in her arms.

  ‘There, there, love. Whatever it is, we’ll be able to fix it.’

  Lulu blurted it out.

  Janet froze.

  ‘Charlie’s, you say? And he said what?’

  ‘Get rid of it. Horrible, Jan, it was horrible.’

  ‘But, I don’t understand. Getting back with you was all he’s ever wanted. So that you could run Belle Hotel together. Charlie needs someone to kick him up the bum. Not me, I’m too soft. Someone’s got to run the place. Someone with Franco’s rod of iron. It’s funny, but the two of you work so well together, you’re like brother and sis—’ Janet gripped Lulu’s arms, ‘Oh my God. The stupid sod thinks he’s Roger’s son. Charlie…’

  Janet dashed from the pub and into the hotel.

  *

  Charlie was standing at his cold hob, unlit fag in mouth, looking at his list. Janet came in through the portholes to put Charlie right.

  ‘You idiot. You’re such a hothead. Why didn’t you let me finish? The bloody birth certificate can say what it likes. A mother knows the truth. Think you’re Roger’s son, do you? Grant me some taste. Get Franco’s book down. I only had to change one word. Did it last night.’

  Janet turned on her heel and went off to get Lulu.

  Charlie flicked through Franco’s book. This was getting to be a habit. He put the fag behind his ear for later and stuck his tongue out of the corner of his mouth until he found what he was looking for.

  BIRTH CERTIFICATE

  BRIGHTON REGISTRY OFFICE

  NAME: Charlie Sheridan

  MOTHER’S NAME: Janet Sheridan

  FATHER’S NAME: Franco Sheridan

  DATE OF BIRTH: 22 September 1973

  Charlie was still standing there, tongue lolling from his mouth when Janet frog-marched Lulu into the kitchen. It was like she’d been when they were kids. It was like she’d been hiding in the pub for two decades buried under lager, peanuts and shame and, now, with her guilty secret out she could be back in her power. Take her rightful place at the head the family. Karma.

  ‘Now, Charlie. What have you got to say to Lulu?’

  ‘Er, Lu, I’m really fucking sorry. I got it wrong. Thought you were… never mind. I’ll tell you later. It’s just, I thought we couldn’t be together and now I know I’m Franco’s son and not… it just makes sense. I feel, I dunno, whole. And this, with you having our baby. I was wrong yesterday. Got it all wrong. You’ll see. I love you, Lu. Want to do this together. Can we?’

  Stunned by this new man Charlie, Lulu simply nodded her head. Then shook her head. Then laughed a bit. Then cried a bit.

  Janet left them to it. Somebody’d banged for her from the pub.

  ‘So, now what, Lu?’

  Charlie, turned his attention back to his list.

  ‘Don’t think this is it, Charlie. You’ve got a lot of making up to do. The money, the relationships. OUR relationship. I can’t trust you, yet, Charlie. But I’m willing to try to trust you. OK?’

  ‘OK, Lu.’

  He’s beaming. Gold-ringed ear to ear.

  ‘Let’s see how these five days go. I’ve still got to decide what to do with Belle Hotel. If you fuck it up, it’ll be down to me and Graeme to save it from the vultures. I’ve got to protect our child, Charlie. And you, from this mess you’ve put yourself in. Maybe knowing the truth about Franco will help. He always felt more like a father to you than a grandfather. And now we know he is. Was. Oh, I don’t know, Charlie. Let’s take this a day at a time.’

  Charlie nodded furiously, did a little dance and then remembered something pressing.

  ‘Can you pay the gas bill for me? If I don’t stump up three hundred quid, they won’t turn us back on in time for lunch.’

  Charlie went back to work, smarting from the slap, relieved that the gas would be back on soon. His head was spinning with the paternity news. He’d got number three on his list sorted, and number two, getting Lulu back, rather than convincing her to have an abortion, was well under way. Charlie high-fived his reversal of fortune and then grimaced at the pain in his wrist. He needed to get that fixed, another thing on the list.

  Charlie popped into Ship Street Newsagent’s and blagged a pack of fags off Fizal Moondi for an update on Parvez’s mental health.

  Charlie stood in the lobby with his back to the rest of Belle Hotel and sparked up. Janet, four floors up, deaf to what happened below. Unless anyone rang her bell.

  Charlie sniffed to clear his nose. A month of paternity shocks was turning him into a wreck. He backed to the entrance from where he could see most of the ground floor. He could hear his grandfather-father bragging.

  ‘A beautiful bit of Brighton Belle Epoque.’

  His spattered kitchen clogs were on the welcome mat. He looked down and saw BELLE HOTEL, a sight that still caught him out. Beauty, innovation, peace. Wood, stained glass, sunshine. The rose window beamed onto the floor in front of the reception desk. When Charlie was a boy he thought he could catch it, put the dusty shaft and red projected stem in his bag and take it off to school.

  From the door he could see both sides of the business, the bar arching away to his left. Stools, legs up on tables, waiting for Janet’s pre-lunch sweep before the first pint was poured. Sussex ale, Rhône wine and Scotch whisky. Franco had stocked what he drank and drank what he stocked. If you didn’t like it, he’d say, take it to The Cricketers. Franco’s pictures nicked from the train and Larry’s review from Kenneth Tynan still had pride of place on the shelf behind the bar, along with all the nautical knick-knacks that Janet had added along the way.

  Charlie turned right and took in his life. The Belle Hotel Restaurant. Brighton’s only Michelin-starred restaurant. OK, so it was only one star and he only held it for a few years. But, he held it. He could hold it again, taste it. Couldn’t he?

  Charlie took a seat on the green leather banquette. Beeswax creaked up to his nostrils as he leant back as far as the panel behind it could take. His eyes were closed, no need to look in the dining room, Charlie knew it like the back of his hand. Twelve tables; three twos, four threes, four fours and a twelve. Forty covers à la carte, sixty set menu. Tonight they’d be lucky to s
erve ten. Double that and they broke even. Full house and they pay the potato man. Let alone getting the five K for Hookes.

  He’d written a list. Ten steps back to success. Five days to do it in and he’d already ticked three things off it. Probably. Time to go to work. Charlie slipped behind the bar, turned down the copper boiler a notch en route, and out of the side door that clicked him into the twitten.

  Lulu sat in bed on her houseboat. She felt completely alone at sea. Charlie’s behaviour had been terrible. Cruel. Heartless. What was wrong with him? Maybe he was a psychopath, as Graeme regularly suggested. Graeme had a book on the subject and was always happy to profile Charlie’s antics against its ‘Are you a psycho?’ checklist. She’d done sobbing for now and was due at work for the late shift. Whatever Charlie had been wrongly thinking about her and the baby had now changed. That was good. He was the father of her child, after all. But he was still Charlie. That was bad. He was going to have to do a hell of a lot of proving himself over the next five days to win her back.

  Eleven thirty going on twelve. Belle Hotel silent without Franco’s clock. Charlie had gone out. Janet sensed it and, for the first time in weeks, felt calm. Her boy who refused to grow up. Belle Hotel. All she’d ever known, all her adult life. The two men in her life, both pushing up daisies in the caterers’ graveyard on the hill behind the station. Brighton. The town of cooks and crooks. Not much of a choice when it came to love interest. Sure, she had her diversions, the salty shanty singers, hell, she’d even shagged Sinker one dark and stormy night, but they weren’t love. Just a bit of comfort to pass the time between services.

  Janet wondered for the umpteenth time that decade, what would become of her if Charlie lost the hotel? Who’d say, eh, Janet love, how about that cuppa? How about that pint? How about that bedknob, broomstick, butter knife and beer mat? Daily life as a hotel wife. Thirty years of struggle and strife… for what?

  Janet shifted in her little worn chair and tutted the chat show shut.

  ‘Half an hour of morning telly.’

  As if saying it out loud made her daily play sound better. Janet ate, slept and rested Belle Hotel. Always had done, always would. Unless…

  She put the copy of the Hookes letter that Paul Peters had sent her back in her pocket and went to see her chambermaid.

  ‘That the lot, Jean?’

  ‘Yes thank you Mrs S. You doing the third?’

  ‘What? Oh, I guess so. Thank you, Jean. See you tomorrow.’

  ‘Can I have that advance we was talking about?’

  ‘Oh, yes. No. I’ll have it. Tomorrow.’

  Janet felt the sweat. That prickle of money worries that struck with almost every new conversation she had. My God, she wished Franco were still alive. He’d never have let things get this bad. Still, at least the secrets were all out now. Maybe things would get better now because of that.

  She wandered down to the ground floor, picking up fluff and litter as she went. She had about half an hour to opening. What’s left for the specials? Janet worked the pub lunch shift, swinging between the kitchen and the pumps. It has been like this since Charlie lost it. Hard to hold onto a mother’s love when it meant you had to do their share of the work too.

  That fight yesterday. Awful. A new low point. Good that she’d forced them to make up today.

  She unlocked the kitchen, pulled the keys from the bulge in her apron and slopped in. At least he’d left it clean. Now she glanced in the walk-in and checked up on the specials. That was it, shepherd’s pie. Janet had made them herself at two o’clock on Sunday morning. She’d pulled down Franco’s cookbook and measured out the ingredients with scientific precision. Not much of a cook, herself, but Janet placed herself in Franco’s hands.

  Shepherd’s Pie

  (Makes 20)

  5 lbs lean minced lamb

  3 small onions, finely chopped

  ½ pint olive oil, not extra virgin

  ½ pint water

  2 pints lamb stock

  4 large carrots, peeled and finely diced

  Bunch of thyme, leaves only and finely chopped

  Salt and freshly ground black pepper

  HP sauce

  Worcestershire sauce

  3 lbs Desiree potatoes (red skins)

  ‘Heat a large roasting tray on top of the hob. That’s it, Janet, one of those. Now sweat down the finely chopped onion in the olive oil. See, now make sure it don’t stick. Add the lamb and fry for a few minutes. Now then, break up any big lumps. Add the water and bung the tray in a gas seven oven. You want yer fat to render out, Janet, love. Cook it until it’s golden brown. That’s it. Now bung it in that big sieve, here we are, I’ll pass it to yer. Drain off all that grease. No, not down the sink, we don’t want another bloody block. Bung it back in the tray and cover with the stock.’

  It was two thirty in the morning, yet working to his recipe revived her. Thank God Charlie had made a tank of stock. She yanked a couple of ice-cream tubs full of stock from the back of the freezer and lumped the frozen broth into the mince. Ten minutes on the hob should sort that lot out.

  ‘Slowly bring the whole lot to the boil and add yer diced carrots. See how much easier it is to blanch them before. Now we’ll add our seasoning, love. It’s all according to taste. Mine. I’ll throw in the thyme and sauces, you salt ’n’ pepper for me. Righto. That should be it. Here, have a lick.’

  She pulled the warm spoon from between her lips, savouring the flavour just as she’d done decades before. Janet would never be a chef, but she could cook. Franco had made sure of that. The clock crept up to three. If she finished much later she would be too tired for the dawn start. She piped the last of the mashed potato onto the trays of pie dishes.

  ‘That’s it, a large star nozzle. I always keep them up here so they don’t get lost. Now fridge ’em on the racks at the back and blast ’em for fifteen minutes at full heat when you need them. If your meat was fresh when you cooked it, a batch of shepherd’s pie should last you a week.’

  She stood on the bar and chalked ‘Shep…’ – now how did you spell it? Got her every time and she hated the way some of her educated punters sneered over their literary lunches at her elementary spelling. Charlie was no better. Herd, that’s it. They herd their flock. Fuckers. She chalked it up and jumped down as a crusty face appeared at the door.

  ‘Won’t be a mo, Jack.’

  Another lunchtime service at the Belle Hotel Pub had begun. Lunchtime service twelve thousand and two, but who was counting. Janet stepped to the door and pulled back the frosted glass to let Jack in.

  Jack was half her age, but he’d seen her right for years. Why Charlie hadn’t found out was beyond her. Too wrapped up in his fallen Michelin star, she supposed. Janet’s talent for nurturing the talents of Belle Hotel’s many pot washers was the stuff of legend. Legend for everyone in the pub, bar Charlie. Jack had been under her wing for, what, a good five years or so. Not that long after Franco died, anyway.

  ‘Hi, I got you something.’

  He held out his oily hand and turned it over to reveal that day’s pharmaceutical treat. A blue V. Nice one, especially as she’d given her last two 10mg Valium to Charlie the day before. She assumed he’d wolfed them both, he’d certainly been banging about less before he went out. Jack had tried them both on the other blue V, too. It’d certainly turned him into Captain Endurance. Janet had enjoyed herself, too. The tiny rhomboid pill had taken thirty years off her.

  An hour later and the specials were going well. Luckily the gas had come on just before service, so Charlie must have done something right that morning. Eight specials so far out of the raging oven and putting in the ninth.

  ‘Ouch.’

  She’d burnt her arm. Cook’s curse. An angry bar of flesh raised above her watch line. Check any chef, if they are working, the hot flecks of contact were their stripes of honour. Charlie barely noticed his. But Janet’s always hurt.

  A few hours later, hard to tell without Franco’s clock, Charlie returne
d refreshed from The Cricketers. He’d spent the fifty he’d slipped back into his pocket when he’d paid Paul Peters yesterday. Charlie was back at the Belle with a cast on his wrist, the pain in his heart from all the stress with Lulu dulled by the pints, to find the pub in enemy hands.

  ‘Hey, Jack. Where’s Janet?’

  ‘Upstairs having a disco nap, she was feeling a bit dizzy.’

  Charlie gazed around the bar, one literary lunch coming to a close and two of the Brighton barflies left at the counter, swaying by their beer bellies against the pumps. Charlie hated Janet letting the locals mind the bar for her, but it beat paying one extra. What the hell was Janet doing having a nap? There was work to be done.

  Someone had left the lights blazing in the kitchen. No doubt the stoves were raging at full blast in sympathy. Charlie promptly forgot his mother and swung through to his life’s work.

  The stoves were on and, worse still, someone had left one of the oven doors open.

  ‘Fuckin’ hell, Lulu’s only just paid for that.’

  Day Two: –£5,000

  Charlie took the train directly to St Pancras and then walked along the Euston Road. He stopped at the newsagent’s where banging bhangra and the heady scent of nag champa assaulted his senses as he split a tenner into twenty Marlborough red, a can of Coke and some shrapnel. He set off down the Euston Road looking for somewhere to sit outside and smoke, and lighted upon a Caffè Nero with outdoor seats that were chock-a-block with smokers from the offices above.

  Charlie made an effort to tune out the chattering around him. He looked down at the first thousand words Lulu had typed out for him weeks earlier before his aborted trip. Charlie avoided looking in the direction of the pub.

  He reread the text. Not bad, you had to start somewhere. Charlie had always enjoyed telling stories at school, not as much as home ec, mind, but he had the same way with words that he had with food. Problem was his terrible spelling. And grammar. And command of the English language. But Haddon didn’t need to know about that yet. The stuff Lulu had hacked out for him read well. Light yet bold. The Kipper Wars. Hardly Elizabeth David, but they had to start somewhere. He stubbed out fag number four and went up for another espresso shot.