Dinner with Andrew

by Martha Williamson

  The man looked her square in the eye. It was obvious to Monica that he had been faced with this particular gambit before. “Do I have a reservation, you ask? No, I don’t. I do not have a reservation. No, sorry about that.”

  Monica felt relief flood through her. “Well, sir,” she said, “without a reservation I’m afraid we couldn’t possibly seat you. Not this evening, anyway. So sorry about that, sir.” Monica shrugged as if there were nothing more to say.

  The man surveyed the restaurant. There were a dozen tables, and only one was occupied, the best table, the one in the corner where an attractive couple was sitting.

  “May I ask you a question?” the man said.

  “Of course. You may ask me anything.”

  “You seem to have a very strict policy about reservations,” said the man, looking down at the lectern Monica stood behind.

  “Oh, yes we do,” Monica replied. “The chef insists on it.”

  “Well,” the man asked, “do you have such a thing as a reservation list?”

  Monica blanched and did her best to avoid the man’s gaze. Well, she was forced to admit he had her there, they had made no provision for a reservation book or list.

  “A list,” she said. “Um . . . no. There is no list. I mean, we don’t have a list now . . . but we are sure to get one sometime in the future. I should think . . .”

  “But you choose not to admit me now?” the man asked, sounding quite irate about the state of things. He looked like the type of man who might file a lawsuit if he didn’t get exactly what he wanted.

  “Well, you know,” said Monica, “we’ve just opened, and we don’t want to tax the kitchen all that much. Surely you can see the point of that, sir.”

  The man surveyed the room, his eyes fixing on Kate and Andrew.

  “There are only two diners in this entire restaurant,” he protested vehemently. “Preparing dinner for one more will not, I’m sure, overwhelm your chef. And if it does then he has no business in a commercial kitchen.”

  “That would be she, actually,” said Monica.

  “She, he, what difference does it make?” the man said with a dismissive shrug. “She should be able to manage one more diner, I should think.”

  Monica could see that this rather demanding patron might have a point. To put him off any more would only create a commotion. Neither Andrew nor Monica wanted that.

  “Seat me, please,” said the man.

  “But of course,” Monica replied. “Please follow me, sir.”

  Monica walked into the dining room, the man following in her wake. She tried to seat him as far away from Andrew and Kate as she dared, but he would have none of it. Without prompting, he chose a table quite close to that of Kate and Andrew. He settled in his chair, grabbed the thick linen napkin, fluffed it, and placed it on his lap.

  Andrew looked up in disbelief as he saw Monica lead the elderly man across the restaurant, and she responded to his inquiring glance with a look of helplessness. But all she could do was act as if nothing out of the ordinary were going on. She seated her new customer and handed him the menu, hoping against hope that he would find nothing he wanted to eat written out there.

  “Here we go, sir,” she said. “We have a fixed menu. This is what our chef will be serving this evening.” The elderly man paid little attention to her but scanned the menu intently, like a scholar studying some newly discovered ancient text.

  “And may I interest you in something to drink, sir?” Monica asked quietly.

  He did not look up from the menu. “I would like to see the wine list,” the man said. “And quickly, if you please.”

  “Of course, sir,” Monica replied.

  But the elderly man still did not look up, which was just as well, because the look on Monica’s face suggested that the wine list at Chez Tess was just as tangible as its reservation list.

  “The wine list,” said Monica. “Ah . . . of course . . .” She backed away from this lordly old man as if leaving the presence of royalty. The evening was getting out of hand, but only Monica knew just how irregular things had become. And to top it off, Kate was about to throw a very volatile ingredient into the pot.

  As Monica passed, Kate waved, summoning her to the table. She gestured that Monica lower her head so she could whisper in her ear. Kate looked excited—excited the way New Yorkers can be when they have some inside information.

  “You do know who that is, don’t you?” Kate murmured, pointing at the newly arrived diner. She need not have been so discreet—the man was paying no attention to anything or anyone— in fact, his eyes had still not left the menu.

  Monica exchanged a quick glance with Andrew. “No, I don’t,” she said. “He didn’t have a reservation, so I don’t know his name. Should I know him?”

  “Well, he wouldn’t have given his real name anyway,” said Kate. “The critics never do. And yes, you should know who he is. He’s a star in New York food circles.”

  “The critics?” asked Monica.

  “That man is Norman Delmonico,” Kate announced triumphantly, as if this piece of information would definitely get a rise out of Monica.

  “And who is Norman Delmonico?” Monica asked.

  “You have a restaurant in New York and you’ve never heard of Norman Delmonico?” said Kate. “He is the food critic.”

  “He is?” said Monica, feeling a little foolish.

  “That’s right,” said Kate urgently. “And you had better let your chef know that he’s here.”

  “Why?” Monica asked.

  Kate looked at Monica as if she had lost her mind. “Why? Because a good review from him and you’re made—a bad review and you are out of business. Everybody reads him, and there aren’t a lot of people who dare to disagree with him. That’s why.”

  Monica did not know that a certain level of New York City society followed the opening and closing of first-class restaurants, tracked which restaurants were in and which were out, the way sports fans lived and died with their teams.

  Certain chefs at certain New York restaurants were celebrities. Food critics wielded immense power. Some of them worked hard to preserve their anonymity and insisted that they never be photographed—certain restaurants were known to pay bounties for tips on forthcoming visits by influential critics. But Norman Delmonico was far from anonymous. Quite the contrary, he was something of a New York fixture, a well-known member of the culture corps, one of the opinion makers who wrote the influential columns in newspapers and magazines, telling New Yorkers exactly what to think.

  His face was well-known to just about everybody. Delmonico did not mind being photographed for the society columns; he could be seen on television pontificating about food and wine, and he and his photograph sat atop his column.

  “I see,” said Monica. As far as she knew, Chez Tess was going to be in business for one night only and serve exactly three meals—one more than planned—so reviews were not something she had given any thought to. On the other hand, she did have to keep up the facade.

  “Oh, yes. I’ll take care of that, and I know the chef will be so grateful. Thanks for spotting him, Dr. Calder.” Monica hurried away as if anxious to give the chef all the good news.

  Tess was happy in the kitchen. She was dressed in chef’s whites with a giant toque perched on her head, and she sang as she moved from pot to pot as they bubbled on top of a big, professional range.

  “I’m cooking, I’m cooking,” she sang, “with a blessing, with a blessing for evvvverrry-one! ”

  The pheasant was slow-roasting in the oven, the salade nicoise with ahi had already been arranged in the vertical heap that a lot of New York restaurants affected with appetizers. The reduction was reducing. All in all, considering the haste with which Chez Tess had been assembled, things could not have been going better in the kitchen.

  As Monica swept into the kitchen, Tess handed her a basket of crusty, fragrant, fresh-baked bread that had just come out of the oven.

  “How’s it goi
ng out there?” Tess asked as she put curls of sweet butter on a small plate. She paused a moment and looked at the butter. “Should we serve butter or be really chic and trendy and send out a dish of extra virgin olive oil instead?”

  “How about both?” suggested Monica.

  “Sure, why not?” said Tess. “They’re both good. So, how is it going out there? Angel Boy doing his job?”

  “Andrew is doing fine,” Monica replied evenly. Then she took a deep breath, finally able to give Tess the bad news. “However, . . .”

  Tess looked up. “However? However, what? I never like sentences that begin with ‘however.’”

  “However, there have been a couple of substitution requests,” Monica said, hoping she sounded nonchalant. “Nothing to be worried about, really.”

  Tess’ eyebrows arched, and she gazed balefully at Monica. “Oh, really,” she said. “Substitutions? And who, may I ask, told Kate and Andrew that substitutions were allowed?” The question was purely rhetorical, of course; Tess knew that Monica was prone to giving in to her own enthusiasm in the excitement of the moment.

  “Well,” said Monica gingerly, “purely in the spirit of hospitality . . . I did. It seemed like the right thing to do. And that Dr. Calder knows her own mind.”

  “You did?” said Tess, a little miffed that her well-run kitchen was being disturbed. “And just how hospitable are we going to be?”

  Consulting her order pad, Monica replied, “They would like veal instead of the pheasant, no sage in the lemon reduction,” she announced. “And tea instead of coffee.” She held up two fingers. “And that would be twice.”

  “I haven’t added the sage to the reduction yet,” grumbled Tess. “And tea instead of coffee is easy. But no pheasant? The pheasant is . . . it’s a masterpiece, Monica. A masterpiece. I do all this cooking, and no one is going to have it?”

  Monica shook her head slowly. “No pheasant, Tess. Well, at least, not at table one . . .” She took the basket of bread and made her escape, returning to the relative peace of the dining room. Monica was very relieved. Tess had handled the news of the substitutions much better than she had expected.

  Tess gaped as Monica swept out. “Table one? If there’s a table one,” she said, “that would suggest that there is a table two . . .”

  There was no champagne or rich food on the menu for Beth Popik that evening. She had worked as late as she could, then left the lab to go home. Since she did not live in the city, she could not stay as late at Nichols BioTech as she would have liked, but was ruled, instead, by the tyranny of the train schedule. The last train to her suburban home north of the city left Grand Central Station at 7:06, and Beth knew from experience that she had to leave work at least twenty minutes before that to catch the train, arriving at the station just as the doors of the train were about to close. She never got there in time to get a seat.

  Chapter Seven

  There was no champagne or rich food on the menu for Beth Popik that evening. She had worked as late as she could, then left the lab to go home. Since she did not live in the city, she could not stay as late at Nichols BioTech as she would have liked, but was ruled, instead, by the tyranny of the train schedule. The last train to her suburban home north of the city left Grand Central Station at 7:06, and Beth knew from experience that she had to leave work at least twenty minutes before that to catch the train, arriving at the station just as the doors of the train were about to close. She never got there in time to get a seat.

  Just over an hour after leaving Grand Central Station she arrived at her modest little house. It had been built before the suburb grew up around it, so Beth’s home had a little more character than the suburban split-levels that surrounded it. She always loved getting home, closing her front door on the pressures and tribulations of the day. Most soothing of all, though, was the warm welcome she got from her dog—a big, shaggy mongrel called Bruno. He was an old dog, so when she came home Bruno didn’t go into a frenzy of barking as a puppy might, but he would lick her hand and look genuinely glad to have her back.

  From that moment on Beth could more or less predict every minute of the rest of the evening; her routine rarely varied. She would prepare dinner for herself and her dog, she would bathe, and then, dressed for bed, she would settle on the couch, a pile of reading material in her lap— mostly articles from scientific journals. She would have the television set on, but more to break the silence than anything else.

  That evening there were two slight variations in her regular procedure. She lit a fire in the fireplace against the unseasonable spring chill, and she found herself thinking about Kate Calder and her date with Dr. Andrew Friend. The image of the handsome young man was in her mind’s eye when she began to feel unaccountably sleepy . . .

  Kate had let her guard down, just about as low as it would go. She and Andrew were deep in conversation—and for once she wasn’t analyzing and testing every word he said; she wasn’t suspicious. She was relaxed, and she was having a good time, so much so that she hadn’t even noticed Andrew’s subtle approach. She appeared to be at ease—an unusual state for Dr. Katherine Calder.

  Monica had served their first course, the pile of salad with the grilled ahi tuna, crusted on the outside, pink on the inside, and dribbled with a touch of ginger and wasabi. They continued to drink champagne, a perfect companion to the sharp Japanese mustard and the delicate flavor of the fish and greens. The food was delicious, but as sometimes happens, the conversation became more interesting than the food. They ate, but they hardly noticed the delectable creations on their plates.

  “So tell me what it is you do,” Andrew said. “Now that you’ve heard what I do.”

  “You wouldn’t understand,” she said bluntly.

  Andrew refused to be offended. “Try me.”

  Kate put down her fork. “Do you know anything about DNA polymorphism and genetic maps?”

  “Absolutely nothing,” said Andrew, laughing.

  “How about the phenotypic diversity of mutations occurring in a single gene? Or how about oligonucleotide probing for hybridization of chromosome specificity?”

  “You want to put that in layperson’s terms, Doctor?” said Andrew.

  Kate laughed. “I’m doing genetic research,” she said simply. “I’m looking for the structure in a gene that might suggest what diseases a person may be susceptible to.”

  “Wait a minute,” said Andrew, puzzled. “I’m not sure I follow you, Kate.”

  “It’s the hot topic in medicine now,” Kate said. “And make no mistake, every doctor engaged in research wants to discover one of these genes.”

  “You are looking for a susceptibility gene?” he said. “Some kind of signpost that’s going to point the way to disease?” It sounded to him like science fiction, but it was plainly something that Kate took very seriously.

  Kate nodded. “Sure . . . Imagine being able to take a test and find out that you’ve got a gene in your chromosomes that says you have got a really good chance of getting breast cancer or Alzheimer’s or Lou Gehrig’s disease—” Kate looked at Andrew with a very steady gaze. “What if science could tell you how you’re going to die? Think of what a difference that would make to life. ”

  Of course, Kate could not know that she was talking to someone who was very familiar with death. And, needless to say, Andrew chose not to enlighten her—not just yet, anyway.

  “You could also turn it around,” he said. “Knowing of a gene like that could give you a chance of avoiding that disease, and staving off death for a while.”

  Kate nodded. “That’s right. That’s the point exactly. Genetic counseling is going to change the world. Knowledge will be power—the power to control death.”

  “You can never control death,” said Andrew quietly. “Not completely, anyway.”

  “Well then, to be able to manage it in a way that it has never been managed before,” said Kate passionately. “Death may be inevitable, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t put up the best fi
ght we can. That is the knowledge that we’re searching for in this project. And we’re getting there.”

  Andrew had no trouble envisioning the downside of Kate’s research. “That knowledge . . .” he said. “Something like that could be pretty scary if the wrong people got hold of it.”

  Kate shrugged off the remark. The implications of the work she did interested her only as they regarded science and research. Sociological consequences were none of her business. When she said she believed in science she meant it. Anything beyond the realm of her research was of little interest to her.

  “I’m a scientist,” she said simply. “Not a politician, thank goodness.”

  Then she paused and stopped chewing as if aware for the first time of what she was putting in her mouth. “The food here is fabulous,” she said. “Really incredible.” She glanced over at Norman Delmonico. “I wonder if he’s having as good a meal as we are. If he is, it’s going to be quite a glowing review. A real rave.”

  Andrew was enjoying the food, too, but he was more concerned with Kate and her work. “So,” he asked, “what disease are you looking for?”

  Kate shook her head, a curt little gesture. “That’s not how it works. You see, all the major medical centers have divided up the different chromosomes. We at Nichols have been assigned to study Chromosome Twelve.”

  “How do you go about doing something like that?” Andrew asked. “And what are you looking for exactly?”

  “Everything,” said Kate simply. “We examine everything we can about that one chromosome. We’re trying to find a pattern—we call it a ‘gene sequence’—something that could indicate a tendency toward disease. But we don’t know what disease we’re looking for, and we don’t know where to look. It’s like trying to break the combination on a lock, and we don’t even know what the safe looks like.”

  “Speaking of safes,” asked Andrew, “what’s that big one in your office for? It looked pretty serious.”