Louise smiled to herself ruefully at the philosophical near-debate which the Maitre-de had won handily. “I need to remember not to underestimate people because of their jobs,” she admonished herself as she looked down at the menu before her. The edges of the covers had been guarded with a quarter-inch wide channel of varnished brass while filigreed brass protective corners had been mounted on the outside corners to keep the menu cover from becoming dog-eared. On the binding side of the covers on both front and back, there were ornamental triangles of brass that had been acid-etched through the metal with short praises and prayers to Allah in Arabic which matched the protective caps on the outside ears of the cover. When Louise opened her menu, she was pleased with the understated elegance of the Café; not only had the outside covers of the menu been professionally bound with fine-grained, heirloom quality, red Moroccan kidskin, but the menu itself had been hand-calligraphed with an intense midnight black India ink onto yellow-gold parchment paper. The calligraphic hand was a modernized medieval style that she had never seen before, but was easy to read and attractively artistic; the style lay somewhere between a modernized Chancery script and an Irish Unctual. It seemed to flow naturally across the page in straight lines without straining the reader’s ability to comprehend the odd lettering in an almost magickal way.

Louise noted that the filigreed corners served a second purpose; the inside of the cover had a flat diagonal bar of brass that ran from corner-to-corner across the hypotenuse of the brass piece and was riveted in place. On the other side of the menu, there were similar bars riveted to what she had thought were ornamental pieces on the binding side of the covers. The two pages of parchment which constituted the menu had been carefully tucked beneath the brass bars and had a separate sheet of stiff, thin acrylic placed over each piece of parchment and slide under the restraining bars. The result was a menu that was incredibly rich in appearance and immanently practical. Louise was impressed. She had been to many Five-Star restaurants that didn’t take the time or expend the money to use the opportunity of using their menu to influence their patrons to impress with the first glimpse of what the restaurant offered. Obviously, her friend who had recommended this small restaurant had been right; this establishment was a cut above any of the other restaurants in town.

When Louise opened the menu, she discovered that quality and tastefulness of the meals listed on the menu mirrored the binding and ornamentation of the menu itself; the dishes were elegant and of gourmet quality, without being outrageously expensive. Certainly, the Beef Wellington surrounded by Baby New Potatoes and tiny Baking Onions, the Veal Oscar with Dilled Baby Carrots and the Prime Rib with Garliced Mashed Russet potatoes and Asparagus with Hollandaise sauce was expensive, but that was to be expected. The Dilled Salmon steak looked good, as did the New York Strip with mushrooms marinated in Port served with a baked Russet potato with all the trimmings and a small house salad. Strangely, there wasn’t a single entrée that included either pork or bacon on the menu. Baked potatoes could have sour cream, green onions or shallots, aged cheddar cheese, butter, and duxelles as a topping, but the popular topping of bacon was conspicuous by its absence.

A relatively inexpensive Caesar Salad was on the menu, which according to the menu’s description, was prepared in the traditional fashion with soft-boiled eggs and freshly grated parmesan cheese at the diner’s table. The Chicken in Brochette was reasonably priced as well. Fresh baked french bread or a rounded whole wheat loaf was available as a side accompanied by sweet cream butter and Aged Cheddar cheese. Louise debated about whether to change the entree she had ordered for herself when she made the reservations to the butterflied Giant Gulf shrimp dinner accompanied by seafood sides of Blue Shell Crap, Scallops, Fried Oysters and Clams with an okra and corn medley and potato puffs, but she decided against it. She had business to conduct and it would take her an hour to eat the massive plate. She didn’t want to be tied down to a large dinner when she was discussing her husband’s waywardness with him. The entrée that she had ordered over the phone was sufficient for her tastes and needs. In any case, her nipples had become sensitive and sore when her breasts had begun swelling a week before. She wanted the meeting to be over with as soon as possible. In short, she wanted to have the meeting she had planned to take place with her husband and take him home with her as soon as humanly possible.