“The things I taught you?” Quartey said, plating a crapaudine.
“Yes, you. Who else taught me?”
“I taught you to cut a chicken like so, to make people comfortable. To pour wine without pretence,” Chef Quartey said. “What then can be forgotten? Although it is, I think, very North American to forget like this, no? I forget nothing.”
“Where is Patrice?” Jeremy asked Chef Quartey.
Quartey evaporated in steam, shooting skyward with a screech.
“Claude,” Jeremy said. They were standing outdoors, on the hillside below the forest. The small sous chef held a Sabatier paring knife in one hand and a leek in the other.
“Ger-ah-mee,” Claude said, seeing him for the first time and repeating Quartey’s admonition. “Very North American to forget like this, no? Go to her. Go to Patrice, see how she lives.”
“I don’t know where she is,” Jeremy said. And, unexpectedly, he began to weep.
Claude held the knife up now, the blade resting across his Adam’s apple. Tears flowed from his eyes too. “Go to her and make up with her,” Claude said, the Sabatier beginning to cut his flesh. Jeremy saw the blood bead and spill. “Do you still remember her?”
“I remember,” Jeremy said, gasping out the words. “I remember everything. I remember the source de la Seine. We took a picture. I gave it to my father. I remember the source d’Ignon. I haven’t forgotten any of it.”
Claude stopped cutting his own throat and straightened up. As if he had just caught himself daydreaming when a great many things still needed to be done. “Ah, well then,” he said. The leek and the knife were gone and he pulled sharply downward with both hands on the front of his white jacket, as he always did before entering the dining room. “It’s not all your fault.”
And at his feet the stones bled water. The flow sounded like wind chimes.
Jeremy breathed deeply upon waking, breathed the cold air of his own room. Breathed in Vancouver. Around him the sense of the bed grew firm, the sheets knotted under him.
At Christmas dinner in Stanley Park they had over twenty people in the small clearing. He roasted geese and mashed a cauldron of potatoes, a ring of apples baked in foil around the fire. At first he was self-conscious about the noise they made—no singing and dancing, just the sound that two dozen people will make shuffling and eating in the otherwise quiet forest—but after a few slugs of Chladek’s Becherovka he forgot about it entirely. He fed everybody that came, and when he remembered the thought later, he shook his head. It was too wet to be self-conscious. Those who had not returned to their various places to huddle out of the rain were hugging the bases of trees for the little shelter they afforded. Full of geese and potatoes and apples and, for some, a little wine. But cold and still out of doors on Christmas. The rest of the city, the world, was not even looking this direction.
He hugged Chladek before leaving. “Máme holé ruce,” Chladek said to him.
He walked with his father through the forest afterwards, the Professor’s pace slower than Jeremy remembered. He told his father about a magnificent kitchen coming together.
“Well, this is not so bad then,” the Professor said.
No, not entirely. “But come right down to it,” Jeremy said, “I’d rather cook here.”
He then spoke of his dreams. Chef Quartey with his advice. Claude with his Sabatier. He took a breath and told his father how he had lost his own, lost that special gift.
The Professor looked concerned, but did not reproach.
“And meanwhile I have a Crip menu to write.”
To which his father said only: “Something will come up to inspire you.”
And he was right. Something did come up to inspire him, namely Jules’s three Fenton Sooner sculptures at auction. His guilt at letting Heckle, Jeckle and Hide get out of his hands in the first place was compounded by the fact that he hadn’t thought about them in several months. Then, in the mail, he received his auction list from Charmin’s Auctioneers (whose speciality was used office and restaurant supplies), and lot number 247 turned out to be Three Art Sculptures by Fenton Sonar. He might have missed it entirely had not item 245 caught his eye: Vulcan-Hart 8-burner, like new.
“I blew a buffer,” Philip said after making some calls of his own to find out. “I just spaced. Had no idea of the value.”
“How can you just sell stuff without asking me?” Jeremy said, his voice rising. “I mean, the stove, sure. But art?”
“Jeremy, we bought the hardware,” Philip said simply. “You signed a schedule at the time of sale. I’m not saying anything critical here, but you signed.”
Jeremy shook his head silently. He considered calling her but, ashamed to see her, he ended up going to the auction alone.
Charmin’s Auctioneers was in a warehouse on Terminal Avenue underneath the SkyTrain tracks. The warehouse was stacked with product, an incomprehensible hive of mostly worthless petrified junk, but which was nevertheless auctioned steadily according to the master plan of one Nick Charmin.
Normally, Jeremy knew from experience, it was difficult to get good value at one of Charmin’s auctions. Pre-auction viewings were all but useless since Nick only knew for certain where each lot was when it was about to go on the block. The auction list, on the other hand, could only be trusted to give you the most overarching sense of what function an item might once in its history have been able to perform. As a result, you were best advised to wait until a likely sounding item came up for auction, then inspect it hurriedly while making your bids at the same time.
He was glad, in a way. Three Art Sculptures by Fenton Sonar was not something anyone would have had the chance to inspect, although collectors would no doubt recognize even the misspelled name.
He scanned down the list of lots, noting that below Vulcan-Hart 8-burner, like new came Prep counters (two metal frame), black aluminum commercial cookware. A long familiar list. Had he not thought to remove these items himself, Jeremy was quite sure Charmin would have listed One black chef’s knife and One chef’s jacket, marked Capelli as well.
He paid his $1.25 cover charge, which gave him a numbered plastic bidding paddle. He confirmed that they accepted all major credit cards and entered the warehouse. It was more crowded than usual and, scanning the room, his confidence flagging slightly, Jeremy saw Jules. She was wearing a long skirt and boots, a loose sweater that hung over her hips. Her head was bowed in front of a side counter, above which hung a crooked piece of plywood with the word ART painted in red letters. With one hand she held her hair back from falling in her eyes. Jeremy could see that the art counter was stacked with dusty oil paintings, costume jewellery in glass-topped boxes, and what appeared to be a series of heads carved out of coconuts. The Sooners were also there, Heckle, Jeckle and Hide, but Jules was studiously not looking at them.
“I’m bidding on the coconut heads, myself,” he whispered, standing just behind her.
She spun around, hand on her throat, eyes widened. They stared at each other for a few seconds before she said: “I hope you’re not planning to bid against me.”
“I was planning to bid for you,” he said.
She had recovered by now and turned back to the table. “Not necessary, my dear.”
He stood next to her, resisting the urge to put his hand along her waist, as he could have so easily just a few months before. They sifted costume jewellery through their fingers as the first items came up for bid. Finally Jeremy said: “We have an hour.”
Over coffee, she made him promise. “I want to buy them myself.”
“How much can you spend?” he asked her.
She made a face and looked away. “Fifteen hundred bucks maybe, if I’m nuts.”
“They’re worth much more,” he said gently. “I made some calls. We’re talking about something like three thousand dollars a piece.”
“As much as ten thousand for the three of them,” Jules said. “Like I didn’t check.”
“So, basically there are colle
ctors here or not.”
“I need a miracle,” Jules said.
And she did all right for the first half-dozen bids. Fifty dollars to the man in the black soccer warm-ups. Seventy-five dollars to Jules. Three hundred dollars to the man in the soccer gear. Five hundred dollars to the woman in the long camel coat (bad sign, thought Jeremy). One thousand dollars to Jules. (“Easy now,” he whispered.) Fifteen hundred dollars to the woman in the camel coat. Twenty-five hundred dollars to the man in the black cashmere topcoat with the paisley scarf.
It took less than a minute. He thought she might cry for the first time in his memory, and he finally put an arm around her. “Sorry,” he said. “I am breaking another promise to you.”
The woman in the camel coat dropped when the man with the paisley scarf took her from six thousand to seven thousand dollars.
“You’re sure they’re not fake,” Jeremy whispered to Jules.
“I won’t help you do it,” she responded.
Sold for eighty-five hundred dollars to Jeremy Papier. The Charmin’s crowd, not used to prices rising above two hundred and fifty dollars, applauded wildly. He made Jules take the bow.
Amex came through again. His feelings for the card were beginning to change. Jules asked: “What will you tell them?”
He had no idea.
They looked good in her place, not far from the auction house in east Vancouver. They carried them from the car together and lined them up on the dining-room table.
She thanked him, held each of his hands in hers. She put her next words together carefully before speaking. “You let him take a lot from both of us. Permanently. Not like these.”
“I’m trying to make things right.”
Her eyes showed a trace of pain. “You’ll have to return to your own vision eventually. The one from the very beginning. You all angsty at the Save On Meats, bursting with that one really good idea.”
He grew serious remembering their many hours together. Their many cups of drinkable diner coffee. “When we first met in the market,” he said, “how did you know that I cooked?”
Jules smiled a half smile. She hadn’t thought of their meeting in a long time. “You looked tired,” she said.
“Lots of people look tired,” Jeremy answered.
“No, no. You looked tired like beat-to-hell tired. Cook-tired. Also, you had a little piece of Elastoplast on your finger right there.” She picked up his hand and examined the first knuckle of his left index finger. She remembered exactly where it had been and found the tracing of a tiny scar.
“That’s it?” Jeremy asked.
Not quite. “Plus, you were staring at me,” Jules said. “I look up and catch this nice-looking young man staring at me. He looks away. Then I realize he was looking at my celery root.”
It was nice to hold each other again, even if it was a goodbye hug. And neither of them knew if it was really reassuring, if it really made anything right that Jeremy had made wrong, but they held on to each other for a few extra seconds anyway.
He had the kitchen right by the middle of January. All the hardware had been assembled and installed, the wiring, fibre optics and water lines were in. The RapidAir control system had been tested and retested. The dish pit worked. The prep counters had been levelled and the pass-throughs installed. The eight burners arrived from Germany and were lowered into the bridge. The grill module and the deep fryer came in the following week from Belgium and were slotted into place.
When it was complete and everything had been minutely scoured, the kitchen had a combat-ready gleam. Jeremy was down to a couple hours’ sleep a night but still, standing in the middle of it all and listening to the hum of central processors in the dish pit and the RapidAir, he felt pretty much invincible.
He had only a draft menu to worry about, to which Philip had been delegated. They met in the kitchen, sat in Jeremy’s office, near the alley doors, and talked about a range of issues: front staff, hosts, servers, bussers.
“And for the back?” Philip asked.
“Six or seven of us for the opening,” Jeremy said. “I think we can run thereafter on five.”
He didn’t have names yet, but he told Philip they would be apprentices. Trained and ready by the day in question. “Be assured.”
“Why apprentices?”
“I want kids,” Jeremy answered. “Fresh talent, trainable.”
“No aging veterans,” Philip said with a smirk. “Fine with me.”
Jeremy pulled a sheet of paper out of his pocket, unfolded it flat on the desk between them and turned it around to face Philip.
“Kebab of Loch Lommand-farmed salmon on a kimchi bed, with seaweed and smoked oysters.” Philip read aloud the first of the appetizers. “Very nice.”
Then, the first main. “Beet-marinated, grilled Alaskan goose breast with spiced Turkish couscous.” And here he closed his eyes, trying to visualize this plate.
“It’s purple and gold, Philly,” Jeremy stage-whispered.
“Clever,” Philip said, eyes on the menu again. “What’s boutifar?”
“A North African boudin. Served split and grilled on a thin crostini with caramelized peppered apple.”
“Boudin.” Philip thought how to phrase the question. “Is that hip?”
“It’s bruschetta. A Dante must-have.”
“I see,” Philip said, grimacing. “But boudin, that’s black pudding, isn’t it?”
Jeremy nodded.
“Black pudding as in blood?”
“Pigs’ blood, normally,” Jeremy said, adding in his most reassuring tone: “Blood is perfect for us.”
Philip was prepared to be convinced, but dubious.
Jeremy had his speech ready. “Asia, Europe, Africa, the Americas …,” he began. There were versions of boudin, literally, around the world. And yet, strangely, pork blood was as close to the pan-cultural forbidden food as you could get, short of cannibalism. Islam, Judaism and Hinduism forbid the use of pork products, of course, but even the Christian Bible outlaws blood.
Philip’s expression suggested this was news to him.
“Oh yeah,” Jeremy said. “The only food ban in the entire New Testament. And here we show it to reference all of these cultures. Named and seasoned for North Africa, garnished for France, presented for Spain. Our tribute to the polyglot, post-national, transgressive dish.”
Philip finally smiled a little, liking the semiotics. “Provocative,” he said.
“Millennial,” Jeremy answered. “Teotwawki.”
After Philip left, Jeremy went to wait in the completed front room. Benny and Albertini had managed to create something that inspired in him thoughts of what gazillionaire rock stars might build, people whose long exposure to the very largest amounts of money had made them acutely aware of how quality might be procured.
Gerriamo’s wasn’t even a room, really; it had moved beyond that to become what designers called a space. Golden hardwood floors were covered with thick ivory runners and area carpets. The walls were pale gold, the ceiling the creamy blue of summer sky. The drapes that framed the two vaulting front windows were heavy royal purple velvet, tied back with thick gold rope. The tables were square and blond with thick surfaces and thin, sturdy legs. Heavy white linen covered each. In the raised rear section and against the right wall, the bar glowed with mahogany warmth. Bottles had not yet been put onto the mirrored shelving, but the central decoration had been installed, a deco nude trolling one hand downward as if in the coolness of a stream. Her hair streamed around her breasts. On the lower, round bar tables, there were tiny shaded lamps. Jeremy turned each of them on, then returned to the main dining room and sat in one of the $750 yellow mohair chairs, admiring the effect. Admiring the view of his own kitchen doors, the quilted aluminum and the classic round porthole window.
He felt rich. More than that. He thought he knew, for a moment, what wealth would have felt like in the nineteenth century. Aristocratic wealth. Wealth beyond dreams of wealth. Wealth that liberated you from al
l human constraints but the final one, and possibly even that if you made the right deal.
Today was Art Day. Spaced evenly around the room were paintings waiting to be hung, face to the wall. And as he sat there, he watched Dante and Benny cross the street together, Inferno Hastings coffees in hand. Dante in crisp black, as he often was these days. Benny in a grey flannel suit, with many small buttons running up to a closed collar, and narrow-legged pants with large cuffs.
“Well, well, well,” Dante said after they had entered and seen him sitting still in the middle of the room. “Everybody loves Art Day.”
Benny looked apprehensive.
“What’s this?” Jeremy asked her, indicating her suit.
“Front staff uniform,” she said. “I’m road-testing it. There’s a miniskirt version too.”
They’d achieved the effect on purpose, he assumed. From the cut of the suit Benny’s shape was overtly presented, but the sexiness was balanced by the austerity of the collar. It was the same straight-funky mix that underscored their thinking of the entire space.
“Is there one for me?” Jeremy asked Dante.
“For the kitchen, classic white,” Dante said, but then his expression changed as he looked very distinctly at Jeremy’s chin. He moved away towards one of the paintings.
“Right then, give us a hand.”
They spent a few minutes turning them all face out from the wall. Each painting was framed in heavy gold. There were twelve in total, all still lifes but one, which was a grainy portrait of a naked skinhead.
“Four local artists,” Dante said. “Are we not loyal?”
“Well …,” Benny said. “Bishop and Nygoyen are actually from Seattle. Kreschkov is Toronto.”
“Attila Richard Lukacs is Vancouver, sort of,” Jeremy said, motioning to the skinhead. “How much?”
“Jeremy,” Dante said, mock disappointed. Then: “Twenty-five thou. I like it at the very back, between the kitchen doors. Thoughts?”
“People will think it’s the chef,” Jeremy said. “Like a warning.”
Stanley Park Page 30