Bloodless (Aloysius Pendergast #20)(38)
But it hadn’t worked out that way. The sommelier, after uncorking the wine, immediately decanted it. So much for taking home the rest of the bottle. But the wine was excellent: earthy, almost leathery. As he was looking over the menu, Wellstone found that not only had he finished the glass, but a second had been poured for him. What the heck—he could take an afternoon off. He ordered an appetizer of escargots à la Bordelaise and then, feeling expansive, Lafitte’s famous oysters Rockefeller. But by the time he’d finished the two courses, and three glasses of wine, an uncomfortable satiety, combined with a dismaying lunchtime buzz, made him feel both guilty and discomposed. Not a good idea, after all.
What was he doing here, anyway? The book was almost finished, and it was an excellent piece of reportage. He had more than enough extra material to put together a prologue and an epilogue. Christ, the book was already a scathing indictment of paranormal charlatanism, and he really didn’t need a final exposé to cap it.
He’d spent—wasted—nearly five days already. Even this unexpected vampire story, which had materialized out of the blue, wasn’t worth the candle. He might be deluding himself that this was a good investment of his time. Learning that his old nemesis Barclay Betts would be filming a documentary here had no doubt goaded him on—that, and Betts’s damnable libel suit against him. He shouldn’t have allowed that to cloud his judgment. He was meeting with Daisy later this afternoon; he would find out if she had anything solid and incriminating on Betts, and if not, he might just wrap this up, call it quits, and head north to Boston to put the final touches on the manuscript before turning it in to his publisher.
As he’d been musing, he noticed the sommelier had crept up and refilled his glass. Well, he didn’t have to drink it.
At that moment, the restaurant’s front door opened and he saw none other than Barclay Betts stroll in, followed by his cinematographer and half a dozen or so hangers-on. Bloody hell. Wellstone reached for the dessert menu as a shield, but realized it had already been taken away when he’d ordered an espresso. He’d drain that and be gone.
He raised the fresh glass of wine to his lips.
Betts’s loud voice and braying laugh were disturbing the restrained atmosphere of the restaurant. Heads turned as the party made its progress. As it did so, Wellstone realized that the only tables capable of supporting such a large group were the banquettes along the back wall—and the only free one was directly next to his.
He half stood, preparing to raise his hand and ask a waiter to forget the espresso and bring his check instead, but at that moment—just as one waiter was seating Betts & Co. with a cacophony of scraping and tinkling—his own waiter, accompanied by the ma?tre d’, approached, carrying something on a platter beneath a domed silver lid.
They slipped it in front of him and, before Wellstone could protest, the ma?tre d’ whisked off the lid to reveal a white ramekin with a jiggly yellow mass spreading out above it like a miniature mushroom cloud.
“Et voilà!” the ma?tre d’ said as he slipped a sauce boat onto the table beside the plate. “Since Monsieur Wellstone will not order dessert, we have taken the liberty to prepare one for him. Soufflé a l’orange, with the compliments of Lafitte’s!” And again, before Wellstone could protest, the man took two serving spoons, dug out a large mound of soufflé—the remainder quickly sinking back below the edges of the ramekin—placed it on the dessert plate, and drizzled some of the warm sauce artfully over it, putting the sauce boat to one side.
Both the waiter and the ma?tre d’ now stood back proudly, and there was nothing Wellstone could do but murmur thanks.
“Smells good!” said one of the goons from Betts’s table. They were now all seated, whipping open napkins and picking up the oversize menus.
Wellstone ignored them. He’d eat the soufflé as quickly as decorum allowed, then leave before the laughter and conversation arising from the next table spoiled his lunch. The afternoon was shot. This whole trip was a waste of time. If he chose, he might be back in Boston as early as tomorrow, ending his book with another, more elegant flourish. But first things first—he always carried a book or two of his in his briefcase, and he made a mental note to sign one to the ma?tre d’ with an especially thoughtful inscription.
Just as he was raising a spoonful of the dessert to his mouth, the bray of Betts’s nasal laugher sounded from the adjoining banquette. “Well, well!” he said. “Look who it is. Horace Greeley himself. Trip over any lawsuits recently, Frankie?”
The resulting laughter washed over Wellstone, his table, and his dessert. He put the spoon down and picked up his wineglass instead. “Barclay Betts,” he said, the wine making his voice strangely attenuated in his own ears. “That explains the smell. And here I thought someone had tracked in dog shit from the street.”
Betts laughed good-humoredly. “What are you down here for, anyway? Have New York and Boston run out of creeps and perverts with law degrees for you to blackmail?”
This, of course, was a snarky reference to his first book, Malice Aforethought. Wellstone took another, deeper sip of wine. Swearing at Betts had felt good. He had no reason to be polite to the man. Encouraged by the wine, he said, “Thanks, but there are quite enough creeps right here at the next table,” he replied.
Betts laughed again, with a little less humor this time. “Is it possible I’m speaking to a new Francis Wellstone? I thought you saved all the tough talk for your books and were only timid in person. Don’t tell me you’ve grown a pair.”