“Why? You like it? It’s pretty good, isn’t it?” Gary relaxed and even grinned. “I make it for the other guys in the village. . . . Well, not a village, really . . . You know, the park where we pitch our tents. Well, I don’t make it often, only when we can get the right ingredients.”

This was the exact phrase Neil was waiting for. “That’s what I mean, Gary. These ingredients are all local and regulated! It’s illegal to buy and sell them! You’re a criminal!”

“No, I’m not,” Gary said nervously.

“Then I guess you won’t mind if I give my friend Inspector Sean Nakamura a call?” Neil pulled out his cell phone and flipped it open.

“NO!” Gary said. “Don’t. I don’t need him digging around, you know?”

Neil stopped dialing. “Then tell me where you got these ingredients. Salmon roe, sturgeon, angelwing clams . . .”

“Okay, let me explain. I’m not a criminal. At least, I didn’t steal any fish, okay?”

“Okay . . . OKAY?!” Neil said, raising his eyebrow and his voice. Larry, from experience, stuck his fingers in his ears. “WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?”

Gary waited for the pots to stop clanking and continued. “Well, you see . . . it’s a bit complicated. I’m not stealing the fish. Well, I sort of stole the clams, but not really, because they were on the shore next to my uncle’s boat. But don’t call the cops because, well, because there are some people looking for me. Um, not because of the clams, unless Uncle Fred called the cops. I guess he might have, but probably not. We keep the locations of our fishing grounds really secret. Anyway, don’t call the cops, because . . . where was I? Oh yeah, I didn’t steal any fish. . . .”

Neil turned toward Larry. “This replacement sous-chef you found makes you sound coherent.”

Larry just shrugged and smiled. “But boy, can he cook! I picked a winner and you know it.”

“How did that ‘picking a winner’ happen again?”

“Well, I said, ‘Gary, how would you like to get paid next to nothing and get yelled at by a cocky teenager?’ He said, ‘sure.’ I said, ‘When can you start?’ Simple.”

“Yes, you are,” Neil gave an annoyed sigh and turned his attention back to Gary, who was still talking.

“ . . . You see, then when I was in Europe, well, not just Europe, anyway I learned some really good recipes and just kind of brought them home with me. . . . Well, I did steal a few of the recipes from the General. Boy, was that a bad few months. . . .”

“STOP!” Neil yelled. The pans over the stove rattled again. Neil rubbed his temples. Gary was rambling and Neil wasn’t getting any real information. “Let’s try this a different way.”

Gary nodded silently.

“Gary. Where did you get the fish?”

“My family.”

“Are they fish poachers?”

“Um, no. They’re part of one of the coastal first nations bands. We’ve got the right to fish these species, and we are VERY careful.”

A lightbulb went off over Neil’s head. Of course! Gary was aboriginal. He was using traditional ingredients his people had been using for centuries. They had the right to fish for personal use. Okay, answer to question number one made sense. Now to the other questions swirling around Neil’s head.

“Okay, but this is bouillabaisse, NOT a traditional coastal dish, the last time I checked. It’s French. Gary, where did you learn to cook French food?”

“I just told you: I was in Europe, and Asia, and lots of places. I just wasn’t supposed to be . . . I was kind of hanging around.”

Neil grabbed Gary by his shoulders and stared at him. “How does one ‘hang around’ Europe? Were you there or weren’t you?”

“Yes . . .”

“When?”

“After I bolted the army.”

“Wait, what?” Neil was struggling to keep track. Larry was finding the whole thing kind of funny and was chuckling away behind Neil.

Gary let out a deep sigh. “Okay, man, here’s the whole story. I was in the army. You know, young guy, got into a little trouble. I thought some discipline would be good for me. I was always pretty good with food, especially fish. . . .”

Neil could tell this was true. The fish stew was obviously amazing, and he hadn’t even tasted it yet.

“ . . . So they made me a cook. It was kind of funny, really. The food they had was awful, all canned fish, milk, even the herbs. But, I don’t know, somehow I could kind of tell what spices to throw in to make it taste okay. Eventually this visiting general came through the mess hall one day. He was from some little country I’d never even heard of, but he was working with us on some battle or something. I dunno, I didn’t see much fighting from the mess hall. Anyway, this visiting general tried the food I was making. It was a really interesting lamb kebab, made with canned yogurt sauce and some quinoa and—”

“FOCUS!” Larry yelled from the back of the kitchen, grinning. Neil was constantly yelling this at Larry. Larry chuckled. “Hey, it’s way more fun to say that than to hear it!”

Neil rolled his eyes but had to agree Gary was losing the thread, and dinner service was inching closer. “Gary, is there a shorter version of this story?”

“Long story short. The general scooped me up as his personal chef. I’m not even sure how that happened: He was from a completely different army but my superior said I’d been seconded, or transferred. He was wearing a really nice new gold watch, now that I think of it. Anyway, I got sent to work for the general and ended up traveling all over the place meeting interesting people, learning new recipes.”

“So that explains the bouillabaisse. Why didn’t you just tell me all this five minutes ago?”

“Well, the general, it turns out, was a real . . . dictator. And I mean that literally. He was bad news. After touring around Europe, we stopped off in his own country. He had this compound that was packed with stuff—gold and weapons. It turned out he was stealing stuff from our army and selling it to pay for his own. He had these really scary bodyguards. Those guys were roughing up the locals, shaking down people for money they didn’t have. Not my scene, if you follow. So as soon as I could, I bolted.”

“You resigned?”

“I wish! Nah, I went AWOL, absent without official leave. If the army ever finds me, they’ll throw me in the clink.”

“Why didn’t you tell them about this general?”

“I tried to, but let’s just say a guy like me doesn’t have a lot of . . . credibility in the army. So, rather than keep working for the guy, I jumped a wall and wandered around. I’d made a lot of friends in the cooking world so they just hid me until I could smuggle myself on a boat back home.”

Neil considered the story. He wasn’t sure what to do. He was tempted to fire Gary on the spot, for any number of reasons—lying, going AWOL, stealing clams. There was one huge reason not to fire him—Gary could cook. Neil leaned against the counter and pondered his options.

Just then there was a loud bang as the kitchen doors swung open violently. The Soba twins, Chez Flambé’s waitstaff, came rushing into the kitchen. “Neil!” Zoe huffed and puffed. “That rock band is on the way here, like NOW.”

Neil stood bolt upright. “I thought that party was next week!”

“I just checked the messages. They called this morning and changed it to today.” Outside, Neil could hear the sound of the tour buses pulling up. The band “The Tintinitus Orchestra” was a thirty-member thrash metal and Italian Opera ensemble. They were also incredibly demanding gourmands who were notorious for searching out the best pre-gig meal in every city. Fans who couldn’t stand their music would still follow them on tour to see where they ate. Just a rumor that they’d dined in your restaurant could justify raising prices for a year.

Not only that, but Neil had already been paid up front for the food. There was no getting out of this now. In about two minutes there would be thirty tattooed, pierced, and leather-clad violent violinists sitting in his dining room.

“Gary, I’m not sure what to do with you tomorrow, but tonight you’re working, and working a LOT.”

“Okay, chef,” Gary said.

“Can you make more of that bouillabaisse in the next thirty minutes?”

Gary nodded. “You got any more fish?”

Neil was about to launch into a tirade about how a restaurant works, but Larry (sensing the urgency of the situation) headed him off.

“There’s plenty in the fridge,” Larry said, leading Gary over to the gleaming steel doors. “And it’s all legal.”

Neil heard them chatter as he started prepping the grill.

“Wow, ditching the general . . . Big step, Gary!” Larry said, slapping him on the back. “And you gave up months of army pay!”

“Well, not really. I only had one day left before they were going to discharge me.”

Larry gave out a huge laugh. “Cool! One day! There’s gotta be a medal for that!”

Neil fired up the burners and shook his head. “You are such an idiot,” he said under his breath. He didn’t specify whether he was talking about Larry, Gary . . . or himself.