For this Friday night the waitresses were wearing purple. Purple was the third color Bill had seen. Deep, rich, velvety purple with black sheer nylons, lacy black aprons with black ribbon ties.
He saw Jo Ann first and like always, she was all business. That she had to wear this uniform, for her, was neither here nor there. She wore her top less low-cut and her skirt a bit longer so she wasn’t showing much.
“You like the color?” she asked Bill when she walked by the kitchen entrance.
Bill was unloading the truck. He’d only brought the regular staples, things they needed every day. He was moving in and out, back and forth, taking things from the truck and stowing them away.
“I like the color,” Bill said. “It’s pretty.”
“White apron and leggings would be better,” Jo Ann said.
“This is hot,” Bill said.
“Just what I need,” Jo Ann said. “Know what I mean?” She smiled at Bill. “I’m no spring chicken. I’m only looking to make a living.”
“You’re a good waitress,” Bill said. “You handle your business.”
“Caesar would get rid of me in a flash if he could. He’d get someone younger and hotter than Rosie. Nevertheless, it is what it is and here we are, me in purple and black with black leggings. I’m so thrilled I can’t begin to tell you.”
“I’ll do my best to make sure the food all comes out as it’s supposed to,” Bill said. “I appreciate your being a good waitress.”
“Well thank you sir,” Jo Ann said. She did a little curtsy and went on about her work.
Bill went on about his too. He finished unloading and stowing and was readying himself to head back to the main kitchen. Mostly what was left of the set-up was to get the food. He had some garnish to cut and other garnish to pick out from the store room, and of course Jimmy was making the Hollandaise which went with the salmon. Then he would sit, once everything was done, with Jimmy G and Kalista and Victor and maybe the banquet chef to have dinner over by Kalista. That was the routine; it happened every day The Falstaff Room was open, and it was open every day. In his whole tenure there, it would only close once and that was the day they did a Grand Ballroom Banquet for Spiro Agnew, a big fundraiser, five thousand people.
He pushed the truck happily, having fun with it while it was empty. In the second corridor he passed Caesar. Caesar looked sharp in the tux that Millie had hand ironed. If Bill was not on probation he would have given Caesar a good dressing down, just a man to man thing for the way he had treated Millie. Caesar was building up points, enmity points, dislike points. He wasn’t much different than the tough in the workhouse. He was a bully, plain and simple, and only one way to deal with a bully.
Bill parked the truck outside where he could see through the glass window and stepped inside the chef’s office. This chef, as most executive chefs — Bill would discover this when he’d worked for other hotel executive chefs — did little cooking. He spent a good deal of his time in his office doing paperwork, but he was always overseeing what was happening out in the kitchen. If you spent time observing him, you would see that every so often he got up from his desk and stood by the glass window watching what his kitchen staff was doing. If he saw something he didn’t like or that needed attention, he did one of two things, either he picked up the phone and dialed Jimmy Banquet Chef or he took his big chef’s hat from his desk, set it up on his head and stepped out into his kitchen to take care of business.
“Don’t tell me,” the chef said without looking up. “Caesar.”
“He’s bullying everyone I deal with.”
“I already spoke to him.” The chef looked Bill up and down. “You’re not here a week yet. Let me handle it,” he said.
