As I cut through the lobby on my way to the Boardwalk Café, I grabbed a few of the hotel’s monogrammed coffee mugs that had been left abandoned on several end tables sprinkled around the lobby. Guests never seemed to consider beforehand where they’d put their coffee mugs once they’d brought them down from their rooms. They were a constant presence for hotel employees. Pick up two; four magically replaced those moments later. Pick up those four, and by the time you’d returned from dumping them in a back-of-house kitchen area or putting them on a lobby attendant’s cart, there would be a dozen more scattered about. Like soldiers in battle, they would just keep popping up to replace their fallen comrades and fill gaps in the ranks. At night it was the same thing but with beer bottles and cocktail glasses from Carlisle’s Whiskey Lounge.
The lobby was starting to fill with people trickling down from their rooms. They settled into the cushioned armchairs and sofas that adorned the spacious white-marble lobby floor that had become one of the Lanigan’s trademarks. The floor had been imported from Italy, taken from a monstrous villa high in the Italian Alps during the late 1920s.
It was rumored that the stone had initially been quarried from the same marble pit that Michelangelo had used to form his masterpiece, David. The Lanigan had even hired and trained its own in-house marble care team to ensure the floor was cleaned, honed, and polished on a continual basis.
As I entered the Boardwalk Café, it didn’t appear that Tom had arrived yet, so I cut around to the back of restaurant and used my shoulder to nudge open the swinging employee door to the kitchen/prep area. There, I dumped my coffee mug collection into a dish tub, dodged a server hurrying by with a tray of outgoing food, and circled around to a pastry tray waiting to be delivered to the buffet station. I took a furtive glance around to ensure no one was looking and then popped a miniature éclair into my mouth. Its creamy sweetness melted away so quickly that I hardly had time to enjoy it before I shoved back out into the din of the morning breakfast rush.
The Boardwalk Café was an oceanfront themed restaurant. For some reason that I still had yet to completely comprehend, all of the Lanigan’s restaurants had some sort of ocean motif or nautical theme even though we were in downtown Chicago. There was the Boardwalk Café on our lobby level that came complete with faux boardwalk-style planking around the buffet area. Every Sunday, the Boardwalk featured the Lanigan Hotel’s famed “Sunday Brunch” a buffet that ran $29.95 per person and included live piano music by the hotel’s resident player, Francesco Rivali.
The Navigator Club was found on the street level and offered more casual dining for both guests and passer-bys. On the weekend, this outlet became the hotel’s default “party place” for the younger, hipper crowd, and was a favorite spot of mine for taking in televised sporting events.
Meanwhile, the Polynesian Restaurant was located on the Lanigan’s sub-street level (also known as the “1st Basement Level” or “1B” for short). It was a long time tenant of the hotel, beginning its run in 1948. It was a good mid-priced restaurant option, and came complete with tiki bar and dancing hula girls and fire twirlers during a Friday and Saturday night stage show.
As I made my way back through the restaurant, I could see that Tom had arrived and had gotten us a table at which he now sat impatiently awaiting my arrival.
I was guessing he was hungry.
* * *
“I’ll have three eggs over hard, rye bread lightly toasted with lots of butter, five pieces of bacon, three sausage links, a piece of ham or two…keep the fat on…orange juice, and coffee,” Tom paused a moment to take a breath. “Oh, and one of those big cinnamon rolls I like…for later,” he snickered, giving me a wink.
Then he paused, looking at me contentedly. “You eating, Robert?” he asked.
I waited for the server to finish scribbling the litany of food items on her pad and flip the page.
“Just coffee, thanks,” I smiled.
“Have to keep up energy levels in this business, Bobby my boy. Gotta keep ‘em up to deal with a property this size. Can’t be asleep at the wheel. No sir. Eyes in the back of your head for the staff trying to catch a wink or steal you blind every chance they get. Then you’ve got the guests moaning about this, that, and the other. Never happy, never satisfied, never want to pay for anything.”
He heaved a deep breath in which I though he might inhale his tie.
“What’s our world coming to?” he pondered, half to himself.
I shook my head. “Not sure, sir.”
“Well, Bobby boy, let me tell you this. I can’t beat ‘em, but I sure as hell ain’t gonna join ‘em.”
This bit of advice was followed by a hearty fit of laughter from my wondrously wise general manager, during which I thought he might just pop a button off the ill-fitting, pinstriped suit that he’d somehow managed to squeeze himself into this morning.
I just smiled, nodded, and prayed for the food to come soon.
“So how’s the day looking?”
Somehow I didn’t think the response, “You’re the GM, why don’t you tell me,” would go over too well, so I said, “Should be pretty smooth. About 400 coming in. Almost the same going out. Mostly transient business. Acorn and R & T are still in house, so I don’t foresee any major issues during the day. A couple weddings tonight. You never know what you’ll get there, but I’m sure we’ll be fine.”
“Good, good,” he said, pulling out a handkerchief from his coat pocket and wiping his forehead – now beaded with sweat – then dabbing at his jowls. “Don’t like any trouble…no, not at all.” Then he paused and looked over at me, putting the sodden handkerchief on the empty plate before him and reaching a hand out to grab hold of my shoulder. “Course that’s why I have you isn’t it, Bobby old boy?”
This was followed by another bout of boisterous laughter that managed to draw the attention of the other fifty percent of the restaurant that Tom had failed to disturb with the first outburst.
Again, I just smiled, nodded, and tried to ignore the stares.
“Now where’s the goddamn food?” he frowned.
Tom Hanson loved utilizing any and every version of my given name other than Robert. I’m not sure exactly where they had found old Tom. And I certainly can’t imagine who down at the corporate office had thought him a good choice for the Lanigan…or really a good choice for any hotel.
Maybe he was a different man in his prime, although I couldn’t imagine that either. Whoever had made the decision and for whatever reason, it was yours truly who now had the honor of being Lanigan Hotel general manager Tom Hanson’s right-hand man and underling extraordinaire…at least in his beady little eyes.
“Bob,” he went on, “you need to get on top of this restaurant. Service is always so damn slow. I want you to drill down on this one, find out why it takes so doggone long to whip up some eggs and toast. I wouldn’t think it should take more than a minute or two.”
“Drill down on this one,” was one of Tom’s famed catch phrases. Others included, “Steel pole this” or “Break off that”, “Push it through” or “Grind it out” or “Bump this one up the list.”
I don’t know if he came from some sort of oil exploration background or maybe had been married to a stripper in his younger days, but his catch phrases all seemed to have the same general theme to them…poles, pushing, drilling, bumping, grinding…you get the gist.
Thankfully, the food arrived, and with it, all thoughts of the aforementioned restaurant project vanished as Tom Hanson attacked the menagerie on his plate with all the vigor he would have likely enjoyed imposing upon one of those guests he so despised, but whose bills kept him fed so well.
After a stint of several minutes in which Tom inhaled the majority of his sprawling culinary spread – and while I sipped my coffee and did my best not to watch – he got to the heart of the meeting.
“Robbie my boy, I think it’s time for a change.”
He eyed me closely for a moment, watching for some sort of reaction.<
br />
He didn’t get one.
It took a lot more than that to make me sweat.
“You’ve been living here for some time now, and I think you’ve had plenty of time to get the lay of the land.”
“I think so,” I agreed.
“I have a special assignment for you,” he mumbled through a crust of toast that jutted halfway from his mouth. Crumbs fell all over the suit jacket that rumpled its way around his flab.
“I know that you’ve been working the day shift, but I’d like to switch you over to nights. We’ve got this place covered during the day, and frankly, during the day I’m up to my ears in managers. I’ve got more of them than I need or really even want. But at night we’re short. I’ve got a decent supervisor in housekeeping, the restaurants are well covered, but the front desk is tight on well-trained staff and I need someone to buffer the inexperience in that area during the third shift.”
He used a chubby thumb to cram the remainder of the toast into his mouth before continuing.
“I need someone to be the general manager when I’m not around, and to be frank, the night front desk supervisor just isn’t cutting it. She’s good; she can check people in and out, get them to other hotels when we’re overbooked, and handle her own staff, but I need more than that.”
I knew what was coming because Tom had been blind copying me during the last few weeks on the emails he’d been sending the front office management regarding guest complaints at night. One thing Tom hated was dealing with guest issues and complaints. Employee issues he could handle. He didn’t care about playing hardball with them – especially when it came to the labor unions – but guests were another story.
“If a guest gets to me, I’ll give them whatever they want,” was what he told his department managers. In his mind, an angry guest should never get to him in the first place. That’s why he had department managers. And if a guest did get to him, he indeed gave them about anything they wanted…then took it out of whoever’s hide it was that allowed the problem to find its way into his office in the first place. This was part of the reason Tom rarely walked the hotel alone. He needed a management buffer with him in case a needy guest approached him.
“How do you feel about that?” he eyed me, a small glob of butter and crust lodged in one corner of his mouth.
I wanted to reach over and flip it away and ask him if he realized that he was the general manager of one of the world’s most famed hotels.
Instead, I shrugged, “Sounds fine to me. What hours did you have in mind?”
Personally, I really didn’t care. One 12-hour stretch was just the same as another to me. It didn’t matter when I started or stopped. Day or night, the issues were pretty much the same; it was just the position of the sun that changed – that, and of course the parties and the weddings at night, but I could handle those. With no family, and since I lived at the hotel, my time was pretty much up for grabs, and old Tom knew it. I couldn’t complain about missing the kids, the daily commute, or make excuses for this or that. I was at the hotel’s – as well as Tom’s – beck and call.
“I was thinking maybe 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. How’s that sound?”
So really, 8 p.m. to 8 a.m.
“Fine with me,” I agreed. “I’ll make the switch tomorrow if that’s all right with you.”
He was beaming through his cinnamon roll.
I knew when he ordered the thing that it would never make it “for later” as he put it.
“Good, good,” he nodded merrily. “Well, I guess now that we’ve had our fill, we should get to it then.” He shoved back from the table, brushing crumbs and food bits from his suit. Then he stood and shook himself free of the rest of the debris as neighboring diners took cover, shielding plates with arms and napkins, returning fire with glares, wary stares, and softly muttered comments.
I knocked back the last gulp of my coffee and watched with the rest of the restaurant as Tom waddled his way over to the buffet, fished a couple pieces of bacon from their chaffing dish and headed on his way, chomping away, oblivious to everyone and everything around him but the food.
***
After spending several minutes in my office flicking crumbs from my jacket and using a tissue to tackle a grease smear Tom’s touch had left, I sat down to form and then review my personal list of guest issues to handle from the previous night. The list – and my response to each – looked something like this:
Room 8-167 (Ms. Swain) – Guest would like to find out why her sheets were not changed yesterday.
** This was likely due to a misunderstanding regarding our “green” linen reuse program for stay-over rooms. Unless guests requested the changing of linens by hanging a sign on the room’s door handle, the bed would be remade daily, but existing sheets would remain. I therefore forwarded an email regarding the issue on to housekeeping. They could figure out if there was an actual issue or not quicker than I could by checking with the floor manager and the room attendant who was assigned to clean that particular guest room. **
Room 10-153 (Mr. Sathers) – Room reported noise due to elevators running throughout the night.
** Our 150-160 area rooms were near an individual bank of two elevators that ran from the 11th floor down to the street level arcade. Property operations typically shut these elevators down at 11 p.m. to reduce noise complaints. The security department was supposed to double check to ensure that they were off. That obviously didn’t happen last night. I emailed both departments to let them know of the failure and resulting complaint, and then I contacted the guest. Mr. Sathers was upset because he needed to get up early for a presentation and had been awakened continuously throughout the night. I therefore apologized on behalf of the hotel and comped him 10,000 reward points. I also assured him that I would personally ensure the elevators would be off tonight. **
Room 19-117 (Mr. Eberson) – Wanted to know why the restaurant didn’t open at 6 a.m. to accommodate guests with early meetings.
** I contacted the guest, and after a 10-minute conversation, which entailed a discussion regarding the cost of opening and operating a full-service restaurant to accommodate what equated to an average of five paying tables (yes, the hotel had tried it here before), I explained that the hotel hoped that guests awake at that time of the morning might make use of Vitantonio’s Café – our street level coffee shop – that opened at 6 a.m. Mr. Eberson explained that he wasn’t aware of this option, so I sent him several coupons for complimentary coffee and pastries at the cafe, along with a hand-written note expressing my deepest apologies for the inconvenience. **
(Andrew Shopmeyer) – Guest checked out from a room last week and had a billing question regarding several charges on his credit card.
** This one I forwarded on to our finance department along with the guest’s contact information. **
Room 23-224 (Mr. Ingram) – Guest called at 2:30 a.m. reporting bugs in his room. Housekeeping inspected room but they found nothing. Guest was highly irate and claimed he was knowingly put in a room with bed bugs. Wants to speak with a manager.
This was the type of issue where I really earned my money. Bed bugs had been a hot topic of conversation and consternation at hotels nationwide over the last few years, and even the Lanigan had not been immune. There had been several reports of the nasty little critters on the 8th floor when I had first taken over as M.O.D., but no direct evidence had been found to confirm their presence. Nonetheless, no chances were being taken. The rooms had been sealed, all the contents of the rooms – including the carpet – had been removed and disposed of, and a professional exterminator trained in dealing specifically with bed bug infestations had been called in to inspect and clear the room. He had also not reported any indications of bugs.
Reports of bed bugs were not to be taken lightly, not only for the sake of the guest who reported them, but for the hotel as a whole. The nasty little critters could spread from room to room like a virus, and they could travel on bags, room linen, and even clothing, inf
esting an entire hotel if not dealt with immediately. Plus, the 23rd floor where this particular guest was staying was one of our Towers VIP floors, so I decided that a case like this required a personal touch. Therefore, I called Mr. Ingram and let him know that I was on my way up to personally inspect his room.
He met me at the door, red-faced and seething. The shouting started before I had even entered the room. He just could not believe that a hotel of the Lanigan’s stature – or in his word’s, “a dump like this” – would dare put him in a room infested with bed bugs, or again, in his words, “stick me in a hell hole full of nasty bugs.”
Mr. Ingram was a computer analyst from Los Angeles and was in town for a citywide convention. Since housekeeping “hadn’t believed” him he said, he had saved a few of the bugs to prove that the price his company was paying for him to stay at the Lanigan was “exorbitant, ridiculous, and unacceptable.”
He grabbed one of the guest room drinking glasses with a paper glass cap on top – the room service department’s way of denoting that the glass had been cleaned and was ready for use – and held it up for me to see.
“I trapped these last night after the person from housekeeping left!” he yelled.
Inside, there were indeed a few tiny bug carcasses.
As he continued his tirade about the cleanliness level that he expected in a hotel of the Lanigan’s stature, I walked over to an open window where the curtains were flapping wildly in the 30 mph Chicago breeze we tended to get quite regularly up on the 23rd floor.
“Has this window been open all night?” I asked calmly, interrupting his complaints.
The Case of the Guest Who Stayed Over (The M.O.D. Files Book 1) Page 2