Through the Valley of the Nest of Spiders

  Barb stood up beside the car. “Well, Ron had a reservation for seven thirty. I don’t think we’re more than ten minutes late—”

  Ron said: “I guess it’s about seven-thirty, maybe seven-forty…seven-forty CPT. Your mamma tells me your daddy—your legal daddy, I mean, is a black man. A hard workin’ black man, like me. So I guess you know all about CPT: ‘Colored People’s Time.’”

  “Oh,” Eric said. “Yeah.” Though the first he’d ever heard the phrase was from Scott, who had told him about “Puerto Rican Time.” When he’d asked Mike about it, Mike had laughed and told him about what a bougie black girlfriend of his had told him about CPT, before he’d even met Barbara. “Mom!” Eric looked at his mother. “I’m supposed to be in bed and asleep by now.” He tried not to sound querulous. “I have to be up at four—” And realized he’d failed.

  “I know, sweetheart. But I thought you could have one late night. You don’t have a lot of chances to go out somewhere really nice.” She brushed her skirt forward. “And I don’t either.” Turning, she said to him, “Instead of hanging out at Dynamite’s after you guys get off—” though it had only been three days since he’d started working for Haskell, she had taken to calling him Dynamite, the way Eric did—“tomorrow you can come right home and go to bed an hour earlier. That way you can catch up.”

  “I don’t wanna go to bed an hour early.” Eric knew he was irritable because he was tired. Still, it was all he could do not to say, I wanna stay in the Dump and fuck and suck myself silly! “I don’t wanna go to bed three hours late!”

  “Oh, try to have a nice time, sweetheart! Really, I’m sorry—”

  “Are you two arguin’?” Ron stepped around the front of the car. “Come on—we can’t have no arguin’ tonight! This is gonna be too nice a dinner!”

  Someone came out to move the car while they walked up to the porch under the portico and climbed the steps. Summer thunder rumbled.

  It was a nice place.

  After three awkward seconds within the ivory vestibule, a young Asian woman in a black high-collared dress hurried up. “I’m sorry. Yall want to follow me?” She led them through a lounge, where people sat on puffy ottomans and wall seats, waiting for others in their party. The place was as heavily air conditioned as Turpens. Through one arch Eric saw a dozen people eating at white-clothed tables. At a podium the hostess checked Ron’s name. “Yes, Mr. Bodin. We have you upstairs—the way you asked. Is that all right?”

  “That’s fine, honeybunch. You can have us any way you want. I been tellin’ them about this place all evening. See—” he turned to Barb and Eric—“this is about my fifth time here. But I ain’t been here before with nobody as pretty as your mama.”

  The young woman said, “We’re glad you like it, Mr. Bodin.”

  “And I’m glad yall like me. Come on, take us upstairs, now.”

  Bending behind the podium and standing with a sheaf of black-backed menus, the young woman started through the room. They followed, up a narrow stairway rising beside the wall.

  “When this was a private house,” Ron said, looking around, “it musta been quite a place!”

  First Barbara, then Ron, then Eric went up the steps, holding the banister.

  “See, the kitchen’s upstairs,” Ron announced. “We’re closer to it, where we’re gonna be sittin’. That’s why I asked to be up there, when I made the reservation.”

  Over the rail, Eric saw three black couples among the whites, eating in the lower room.

  Another couple—a big bearded white man in a denim shirt, orange work shoes and plaster-splotched jeans (he looked like a heavier relative of Jay MacAmon’s) and a small, nervous woman in a polka-dotted, scoop-necked dress—were seated against the wall. Both looked out of place among the sports shirts, the slacks, the ties and jackets and jeans with creases, the pastel shirts, the dark dresses and pants suits—as if he had been a carpenter or a workman treated by the management to a meal. Looking up, the bearded man glanced at Ron—and Eric realized that, despite the black couples, Ron and Barbara were the only interracial pair.

  On the second level—the walls were dark wood. Eric tried to hold in a yawn—and failed. Ron glanced at him, grinning.

  “We have you right over here,” the hostess said. “Marvin will be yalls server tonight. He’ll be over for the drink order in a few moments. This is the spot you asked for…?” Under a creamily white cloth, the round-cornered table stood beside a floor to ceiling window, some sort of balcony beyond it. The panes were open. The hostess said, “If it turns chilly, we’ll close it.”

  “You wanna sit inside, beautiful?” Ron asked Barbara, as the young woman moved the table to the side. “Or out?” With its orange bulb, the brass lamp in the middle softened the surrounding shadows. “Yeah, you get in. Me and sleepyhead here—” he grinned at Eric again—“will sit on the outside, so we can look at how pretty you are. You know, your mama is one pretty, pretty woman.” Ron waited till Barbara got seated—although he didn’t help her with the chair—before he sat. So Eric waited, too.

  “Now—” Ron pushed out his arms as he sat, another way (Eric thought) to take up more space than seemed his due—“what are we all drinking? I’m gonna stick with your mama’s good bourbon. I always liked a woman what could handle a man’s drink. Come on—sit down. Sit down!” So Eric sat. “How old are you, anyway, son?”

  Barb said, “Eric’s going to be sixteen tomorrow—”

  “Barb!” Eric said. “I’m gonna be seventeen!”

  “I meant seventeen,” she said. “Put your napkin in your lap, honey.”

  “Why?” Eric asked. “There’s nothin’ to eat, yet.”

  “Because we’re in a restaurant. That’s always the first thing you do— now put your napkin over your lap.”

  “See,” Ron said. “That’s the way to let the waiter know you’re ready to tell him what you wanna drink. Or get started on stuff.” (The definiteness with which he explained it convinced Eric that Ron was making that up.) “You’re only seventeen—?”

  “Tomorrow.” Barb picked up her menu. “Saturday.”

  “Then I guess this is kind of a celebration.” Looking very happy, Ron beamed over the top of his own.

  Eric looked down at his. There were two poulets, three poissons, three viands, three pastes, and—at the bottom—a collection of legumes, which included a corn soufflé, an artichoke mousse, and bok choy in white sauce. Most of the menu was empty space.

  “You ain’t even drinking age,” Ron said. “So, what was Clem so upset about? I thought you was twenty-one, twenty-two, boy. I was gonna tell you, if you wasn’t twenty-one yet, as soon as you hit it, you run get you one of Johnston’s Business Incentive Loans—you could figure out somethin’ you wanted to do, and that way get the money to do it. That’s what I done with my computer consulting business. See, Johnston, he wants to build this whole part of Georgia up. Bring in hotels, bed-and-breakfasts—more restaurants. Businesses. I know that’s how the Demming brothers financed this place. That’s what Clem ought to do—figure out what the Lighthouse really needs in order to thrive. Air conditioning. A new kitchen. Some ovens that can handle some real food—she could make that little place as popular as this one here.” He looked around. “Almost, anyway. Then, soon as you got it planned out, go do it—that man is just dying to give away money. And people down here too scared—or too country dumb—to take it. Unless it comes along from some crazy no-account like Robert Kyle—”

  In a black shirt and white tie a curly-haired waiter stepped up. “Good evenin’. My name is Marvin. I’m yalls server tonight. How yall doin’?”

  “Fine, thank you. But we’ll be doin’ a lot better when you bring us two bourbon-and-branch.” Ron looked at Eric. “What kinda pop you want?” Eric felt as if the three or four years Ron had learned separated him from a bank loan had also truncated most of his humanity.

  “What kind they got?” Eric asked. “You got orange? That’s my favorite.”

 
“I’m sorry.” The waiter smiled. “We have Pepsi—regular and diet. And we have Fresca.”

  Barb said, “Take the Pepsi—Eric. That’s got some caffeine in it. It’ll wake you up.”

  Eric didn’t want to wake up. “I’ll have some Fresca.” He wanted to fold his arms on the tablecloth, put his head down, and sleep.

  Ron looked at the menu, frowning. “Would you do me a favor, Marvin?”

  “Certainly, Mr. Bodin.”

  Here Ron looked up, sudden pleasure on his face. “See, Marvin here knows my name. That’s ’cause I been here before.”

  “You were here the second night we opened,” Marvin said. (Clipped to his black pocket was a copper pin with “Marvin” in black letters.) “And you’ve been several times since.”

  “I certainly have,” Ron said. “See, they remember me here. Hey—I want you to run back into the kitchen and see if Ron has got a minute to come out and meet these very nice people I’m here with tonight. I know he’s busy—” He looked at Barb, at Eric—“but he’ll come out if that boy says it’s me…I told you, Ron is the cook here.”

  “Certainly,” Marvin said. “I’ll tell him Mr. Bodin would like to see him for a—”

  “No!” Ron insisted. “Don’t you go tellin’ him no ‘Mr. Bodin’ wants to see nobody! You tell Ron that Ron wants to see him!” Ron’s eyebrows rose mightily. “That’s what you say. Okay? He’ll know who I am.”

  “Certainly, sir.”

  “Is the chef part owner of the restaurant?” Barb asked, as Marvin turned and strode away toward what, as it swung in and out with its circular nautical port ringed with brass studs in the dark wood, was the kitchen door.

  “Naw—Frank Demmings put up most of the money. Marvin’s his cousin or nephew or something. Ron ain’t the owner of nothin’.” Ron frowned back at the menu. (Eric had figured out “legumes” meant vegetables, from a memory of some science teacher who had once told a class about leguminous plants.) “But that’s a nigger—’scuse my French, there—a man what can cook up a storm. I mean, fancy stuff. Parisian dishes, and Aye-talian. See, I was born in nineteen seventy, in California. My mama was a big fan of Governor Reagan, ’cause he was always one of her favorite movie stars. So that’s what she named me—Ronald Reagan Bodin. Then, in ’80, when he got to be president, she figured that was a pretty good sign—she always told me that maybe I could be president, too. Now, of course, they got this other black feller, talkin’ about runnin’ him. I tell you, if my mama was alive today, she’d probably write the Democrats a letter sayin’ to get him out of there and run Ronald Reagan Bodin, instead of that crazy African Arab or whatever he is, ’cause I’d have a damned chance.” He laughed. “But that was my mama, God rest her soul. Course, that black feller ain’t never gonna get in—white people in this country would shit a brick. If they really let ’im run, somebody’s gonna shoot his head off anyway. And if he gets in, you know they ain’t gonna let ’im do nothin’. And runnin’ Mrs. Clinton against him sure ain’t the answer. A woman and a black man? I’m afraid the Republican’s gonna get this next one, ’cause the Democrats don’t got sense enough to—” he chuckled—“run somebody like Ronald Reagan Bodin. Hey? The Republicans is better anyway, since at least they know somethin’ about money. That’s what my mama would tell you. You see anything you want for a starter? That’s all the stuff down the side, there. Clams, snails, calamari—that’s like octopus or something. They fry it up—real light, too. It’s good.”

  Marvin returned with a tray on which was a glass of Fresca for Eric, two shot glasses of bourbon, a bowl of ice, two glasses of water…As he put them down in front of Barb and Bodin, he said, “I spoke to Ron. He said as soon as he gets a moment, he’ll be out—” at which point a black man in a white short-sleeved jacket and a chef’s cap stepped up behind the white waiter and smiled.

  While Barbara spooned two cubes into her glass, Ron said, “Well, here he is now! Hey, there, Ronny! How’s it all goin’ this evenin’? Looks like yall got a good crowd at the place tonight.”

  Marvin looked up, and practically jumped back.

  Whether because of heat or politeness, the chef removed his cap and held it before him. “We’re doin’ all right.” Gaunt and with a shaved head, Chef Ron looked at them with what seemed to Eric friendly patience. “Not quite as many as last weekend, but that’s probably ’cause of the weather we’re havin’.” In response, a splatter like buckshot tinkled the pane. Another thunderclap; the curtains billowed into the room. Then a gust slammed shut the window—the curtains fell. Marvin turned to grab and fasten the frame. In her chair, Barb started, and said, “Oh…!” and Chef Ron looked over, chuckling. “So how yall doin’ tonight?” He smiled around the table, dark chin and cheekbones taking bronze highlights from the table lamp. “Yall havin’ a good time?”

  “Sure am,” Ron said. “Hey, Ron, was you named after Ronald Reagan—like me?”

  “Huh?” The cook smiled. “Naw—my aunt raised me in Tuscaloosa. I didn’t even get a name from my parents, ’fore they got killed in a car wreck. If they named me, nobody knew what it was. So when my aunt took me in, they named me after my mama, Ronny Francis. They said Ronny could be a boy’s or a girl’s name.”

  “Oh,” Ron said. “So you ain’t Ronny Reagan. You Ronny Francis.”

  “No,” the chef said. “I’m just Ron—or Ronny. Two girls’ names was a little much for a boy to carry around, at least in Tuscaloosa.”

  “There you go. But we still got pretty much the same handle. You think you could tell us what’s really tasty?” Bodin nodded to Barb. “I always like to get the word from the man who knows!” He looked at Barb and Eric. “And that’s Ron here. He won’t let us go wrong—will you, Ron?”

  “Everything,” Chef Ron said, thoughtfully (as Eric wondered where the introductions had gone, though he was glad to dispense with them), “that we got here is good—otherwise we wouldn’t be servin’ it at Shells. But maybe yall can tell me what you’re in the mood for. Fish—we got bass, tilapia, bluefish. For fowl, we got some real nice game hens—and some duck. Or for meat, we got osso buco; that’s a lamb shank braised for hours in a real tasty stock, tomato, and green pepper stew; we got center cut pork chops, stuffed with some prosciutto, or a very nice sirloin, with a red wine reduction. Do one thing sound more to your likin’ than another?”

  Barb decided on the fish—“I really think you’ll like the tilapia, ma’am—” and Ron on the osso buco—“Now, that’s a hearty dish. You get a lot of food with that. Be ready to take some home”—and Eric, who’d asked for chicken, got the game hen. “That’s like a little tender chicken, but you get it all. It’s very moist, and it comes on a bed of spicy risotto, with a little pot of tomatoes, onion, and garlic pureed up all together. Say—” here Chef Ron frowned at Eric—“ain’t I seen you around the Dump, helping out Dynamite Haskell and…Morgan Haskell, the boy who works with him?”

  “Huh?” Eric brightened. “Yeah,” although he had no memory of the man.

  “That’s his summer job.” Putting down his menu, Ron laughed. “Don’t think that’s his career or nothin’.” (Eric saw Barbara smile.) “This is his mother, my friend Mrs. Barbara Jeffers.”

  “I thought that was you.” Chef Ron nodded, still looking at Eric. “Nice to meet you, Mrs. Jeffers. And it’s nice to see you—” he said to Eric, still smiling, still nodding—“at Shells. Good evening to yall. I’m afraid I got to get back to work, now.” He stepped away.

  “Hey—!” Ron called after him.

  Chef Ron looked back, questioning.

  “You think they gonna let that black man be president? They done had black mayors in New York and Washington and New Orleans—”

  “Who?” he asked. “Obama?”

  “Yeah,” Ron said.

  “With all these crazy white folks around in this country?” The chef turned back and walked away. “Not a chance!”

  “What did I tell you?” Ron said, chuckling.

  “You kno
w,” Barb said, “this place is so small down here.” With the lights outside, rain made a sparkly backing behind the white curtains.

  Marvin and Chef Ron retreated.

  “He’s already seen you, Eric,” Barbara said. “Clem keeps tellin’ me. But I guess it’s true. Everybody around here does know everybody.”

  “That’s why you gotta watch yourself, boy.” Ron looked seriously at Eric. “You can’t get away with nothin’ down here like you can up in Atlanta. So don’t you go trying no drugs or marijuana cigarettes or crack cocaine or nothin’.” Again, lifting his bourbon, he smiled at the absurdity. “Now we’re gonna really have us a good dinner—see, ’cause the chef knows who I am. Like I guess he already…knows you, too, Eric.” He took a deep breath. “But I guess a chef has got to know who his garbage man is. Ain’t I right?” He seemed to think this was very funny. “Ain’t I right, now? Go on—tell me I ain’t right!”

  *

  Marvin had already brought them dessert menus—cardboard cards with blue seashells across the top and bottom—then gone again into the kitchen. They looked down—both Eric and Barb had said they probably wouldn’t have any, but Bodin had insisted—when again Marvin came out the swinging doors, carrying a small chocolate cake, a yellow candle burning in its center. Several waiters fell in line behind him, singing, “Happy Birthday to you…!” while Ron declared: “Why…? It must be somebody’s birthday around here! Yeah, somebody or other must be havin’ a birthday!”

  “Oh, Ron,” Barbara said. “You didn’t have to go and do all this!”

  Marvin put the cake on the table, in front of Eric.

  “Well—” Ron put his hands on the cloth’s edge and leaned back—“You said somebody just might be havin’ a birthday around now.” Ron’s nails were notably cleaner than Eric, shower or no. “So, I figured a little birthday cake couldn’t hurt nothin’—now, could it?”