GOLD FEVER Part Three. Ken Salter
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won’t be room for all who may want to enroll, you must make a non-refundable deposit of $150 which is equal to a month’s tuition to assure your child’s place. Our barman, Georges, will handle deposits and write receipts and our two professors will help you with the registration forms for children 4 to 5 years old.” I gave a little bow and waved in the direction of Georges, Nelly and Monique.
Later when the last guests departed, we compared notes on our evening’s accomplishment. We had 12 American kids signed up and 7 French ones as well. Georges broke out a vintage fine champagne cognac and we toasted our success. Nelly, Georges’ American wife who’d studied in private American and French schools, and Monique, our children’s minder and housekeeper whose ideas for the bilingual school had set the whole plan in motion, were beaming with pleasure that their dream was to become a reality in a few short months. The evening’s success was to get the 12 American and 7 French parents committed. With our contacts with the French Consulate and our successful French restaurant, we’d have no problem rounding out the French enrollment.
The next issue we had to deal with concerned Teri Rios, Manon’s Chilean partner along with Giselle Gaillard in our wine and food bar on the Long Wharf next to our brig, the “Eliza.” We had encouraged Teri to sue her ex-boyfriend, Raoul Mendosa, for civil damages for having fired his Derringer at her in Judge Roberts’ courtroom after the judge awarded her damages for stealing her wages when they lived together on our ship. She levied her judgment on Raoul’s shipment of quality Chilean wine which we bought from her and which she served in our wharf-side wine bar.
I had counseled Teri to get a judgment she could levy against Raoul’s newly rebuilt wine store his new mistress, Señora Batista, financed with earnings from her bagnio stocked with Chilean prostitutes who serviced sailors on lower Broadway. From jail, Mendosa signed over his interest in his now empty wine store to Señora Batista, hoping she could get his sentence reduced. Rather than going to court and risking being assigned a judge who shared the prevailing attitude among most civil authorities and Anglos that all Chileans and Mexicans were “greasers” and who would be unsympathetic to a cat fight between Chilenas, Teri chose to have Attorney Hawthorne try to negotiate a settlement with Batista.
Hawthorne threatened to file a lawsuit naming both Mendosa and Batista as co-defendants and co-conspirators who tried to steal Teri’s money to use rebuilding the wine store destroyed in the fire of May 3, 1851. Mendosa had testified in Judge Roberts’ court that was the reason he took Teri’s money and it was a matter of record the rest of the money to rebuild came from Batista. Hawthorne sought to link the fact that the day Mendosa stole Teri’s earnings of over $600, he left our ship with his belongings and moved in with Batista. Hawthorne at my suggestion bluffed that he had “inside” contacts with members of the Executive Committee of Vigilance who would be happy to shut down Batista’s bagnio. Both the threat of losing an expensive, drawn-out legal action that might also affect her very profitable whorehouse brought her to the bargaining table. She agreed to accept $5,000 from Teri in exchange for the deed to the store in Teri’s name. We knew she’d spent more than triple that amount to rebuild the store and evict the squatters who camped on the premises, so Teri had a measure of satisfaction that her rival lost money and face and her ex-boyfriend would have to stew in prison over losing everything because he lost his temper in court and tried to shoot her.
With title to the former wine store in the heart of the downtown commercial district, Teri indicated to Manon that she would like permission to leave the partnership for the wine bar and canteen on the wharf. She wanted to open a bodega to sell foodstuffs and Chilean wine in her new premises. Manon asked for my input on what her response should be.
“So, Chéri, since we encouraged Teri to sue to get the store we have to let her run it, no?” Manon said matter-of-factly.
“Yes, but we should impose some conditions for leaving the partnership early. She agreed to work in the partnership for three years and it’s been not quite 2 years. We have to replace her if the wine bar on the wharf is to continue to be a money maker. And you know that won’t be easy. Half of her customers were regulars and in love with her and her feisty ways. It takes an attractive, single woman with a lot of personality, character and perseverance to ward off all the Lotharios seeking to bed her and Giselle on the wharf. It won’t surprise me if Giselle won’t want to run the canteen if Teri is not there to keep the hustlers at bay,” I said.
“You got it right, Big Boy. Giselle, too, no longer wants to work on the wharf. So, we got big problems, yes?”
“Oh boy. When did you learn about Giselle? Our wharf business is a big money maker. We can’t afford to just close it,” I spit out in frustration. While our restaurant was making money, we still needed the profits from our wharf concessions to build the bilingual school.
“Well, it may not be all bad. Giselle prefers to work in the restaurant where there’s a better class of diners and she feels more protected with Georges and Nelly working with her. She’s also seriously considering Hawthorne’s marriage proposal. His law practice is making money and she feels it is time she starts a family. So, they are considering renting a small house together and how you say it? Tying the knot?” Manon said with a sheepish grin followed by seductive laughter.
I had to laugh at her antics which helped lighten the discussion. “Well, I guess all this talk of schools for kids has sparked maternal instincts all around. Nelly’s pregnant; Monique has her son; we have our twins and now Giselle wants to hop on the maternity wagon.” Manon was giving me a funny look. “Oh boy. Not you too!” I shouted. We had been careless in our love-making on a couple of occasions recently.
Manon shook her finger at me to say it would be my fault if she were with child. “Not yet, Big Boy, but it might happen if you’re not more careful, no? Little Jules and Fanny wouldn’t be happy at first, but they’d grow to like younger brothers and sisters, yes? Maybe it will be triplets next time, huh?” She said with a devilish grin.
I masked my relief that she wasn’t pregnant. The threat of triplets was real. Twins were common in her family in France and she bore twins with me. “Does that mean that Giselle will be moving out of her cabin on the “Eliza” soon?”
“No, she says she won’t make a move until we find a replacement for her on the wharf. She suggests that we find a married couple to run the wharf business and have them live on our ship.”
“That’s not a bad suggestion. What about Teri? Will she also continue to work on the wharf until we can find suitable replacements?”
“I didn’t ask her but I’m sure she will. She will need our help to set up her bodega. We bought all her Chilean wine, so she needs us to sell some back to her. Also, she is so good with handling a bar, why not have her do a Chilean wine bar in her store and serve lunch snacks we make? That way we continue to work together, no?” Manon said in all seriousness.
“You’re right as usual. We want to keep her working with us, She’ll need our help with setting up and provisioning her bodega. We have established credit with grocers, bakers and wine merchants which we can use in her behalf. She’s known as one of most attractive waitresses both on the wharf and in our restaurant. So our continued association can’t help but benefit both of us. Further, by renouncing their partnership interest with you which was based on their running the concession, we won’t have to share the profits. We’ll hire an experienced couple to run the wine bar and canteen. We pay them a good wage and provide lodging on the ship but don’t make them partners. What we lose in custom we had with two attractive single women running the concession, we’ll make up by not having to share profits. We’ll just have to find a couple with the right personality for the job. What do you think?” I asked Manon whose head was bobbing affirmatively.
“I like the idea we continue to work together with Teri. She is grateful that you testified in her behalf at her trial and suggested how to get Raoul’s store for her. It was always her dream to have her own bodega and now she has it, she will work to promote our and her interests. So in a new way we are still partners, no?”
“Yes, and I’m sure my clever cookie wife will figure out more interesting