“You all set for the big weddin'?” Mac asked me. “The guy call me yesterday and said he having the party at Blanchard's. He ask me if I could line up all the taxis.”
“You mean for those people from Washington, D.C.?” I asked.
“Yeah, what the guy's name again?”
“H. P. Goldfield. He called me this morning, and I told him we'd work on a price. He wants to squeeze seventy-five people into our little restaurant. That's pretty tight for us.”
“Mel,” Mac said, “this is May. We gotta do the business while we can. Give the man a good price. We need people like he in Anguillaâespecially in May.”
“I'll call him first thing in the morning,” I promised. Roxana gave me a squeeze goodbye, and I told her to have Uncle Mac bring her down for another drink at the restaurant. She loved Blanchard's frozen banana cabanas, and if we weren't too busy, she'd help Bob deliver checks to the tables. The guests adored her.
As soon as I got home Bob and I discussed H. P. Goldfield's wedding. Actually, it was the rehearsal dinner he wanted to have at Blanchard's. Mac was right. We were crazy to pass up an opportunity to do a private party for seventy-five people, even if it would be a little crowded. I came up with several menu options and called that night to discuss it further.
“Please call me H.P.,” he insisted. “Melinda, don't worry about the space. We can set up tables in the bar, and it will be just fine. The most important thing is the food.” He paused. “And, of course, the wine. My old roommate from college is a wine buyer at Christie's, and I'd like him to talk with Bob about the choices, if that's okay.”
“No problem,” I said. “What do you think about the menu? Shall I fax you pricing for the various options?”
“That's fine, but it's not so much the price I'm concerned about as the quality of the whole party. I've got important people from the White House coming down, and all the partners in my law firm here in Washington. Everything has to be perfect.” He continued, “I have some friends who say you're going to be the next Martha Stewart. You did a special dinner party for them last month. And they said Bob's wine list is fantastic. I'm forty-five, and this is my first and only wedding; that's why I
need
you to make this work.”
“As long as you don't mind a few tables in the bar, everything should be fine,” I said. “Here's our home number just in case you have questions along the way and we're not at the restaurant.”
At eight the next morning the phone rang at home. “H.P. here. How's everything down there in paradise? Listen, I have a little problem. My fiancée says I'm making a mistake not inviting certain people to the rehearsal dinner. After all,” he said, “they're coming a long way for the wedding. What would it take to add another twenty people?”
“Another twenty people! H.P., our restaurant has sixty seats. We can't possibly fit in ninety-five. It just won't work.”
“I knew you'd say that, but I had an idea. Why can't we rent extra tables and put them outside?”
“Because this is Anguilla,” I explained. “We don't have a place to rent tables, chairs, or anything else for that matter. I'd really like to help, but I think you'd be much happier at a bigger restaurant. Why don't you call one of the hotels? They have much more space.”
“You're kidding. You really won't do this? I can't believe it. We were counting on you.”
I bowed out as gracefully as possible and gave H.P. the names of several people to speak with who might be better equipped to handle a large group. I wished him luck and said we hoped to see him when he arrived on the island. We knew it was the right thing to do, but we had some feeling of regret at passing up the business.
Three days later, eight o'clock in the morning again, the phone rang. “H.P. here. Listen, I know this is an unusual request, but I came up with another idea. First of all, we've decided to invite everyone who's coming to the wedding to join us at the rehearsal dinner. It's the right thing to do. How can we ask people to fly to Anguilla and then leave them out of such an important event? We still have a few weeks to go, so why don't we rent a big tent, tables, chairs, and whatever else you need, and we can set everything up on the beach in front of Blanchard's? There
must
be a rental company somewhere that would ship everything to Anguilla by boat.”
Bob caught bits and pieces of the conversation and couldn't believe I was even considering such an option. He kept shaking his head and telling me to hang up the phone.
“How many people are you up to now?” I asked.
“Two hundred,” H.P. whispered. I didn't dare repeat the number, afraid that Bob would grab the phone out of my hand. “Okay,” I said. “Let me look into it.”
I liked H.P. He was a real charmerâbut sincere. He said he understood our situation but refused to take no for an answer. I told Bob to calm down and let me make some calls.
“Do you think we can handle a wedding for two hundred people?” Bob asked. “Lawyers and politicians from Washington?”
“Yeah. I think with some guidance and a lot of organization we could pull it off. I'd really love to do it.”
With less effort than I'd anticipated, I located two brand-new white tents in St. Martin and a place that rented china, silver, glasses, tables, and chairs. Bob and I brought the staff together for a meeting and announced that we had committed to do a rehearsal dinner for two hundred people.
“It ain' no problem. Leff them come,” said Bug. “Blanchard's can do anything.”
Miguel was excited but a little worried. “You think we gonna need some extra help?” he asked.
“We've already asked Wayne and Jackie from Cap Juluca to wait tables, and we've lined up two extra bartenders and a couple of people to help in the kitchen.”
“That cool,” Miguel said. “We gonna be okay.”
H.P. agreed to a fixed menu and chose items from our regular selections. His friend from Christie's called Bob, and they settled on Veuve Clicquot as we passed hors d'oeuvres, and Kistler chardonnay and Heitz cabernet with dinner. He added a 1950 rum from Martinique and Monte Cristo cigars to end the evening.
About two weeks before the wedding, our phone rang again at eight in the morning. “H.P. here. How are things progressing?”
“Everything is going smoothly,” I said. “I think you'll be very happy.”
“That's great. I just have another
little
favor to ask.” There was silence on both ends. He finally continued. “I'm having trouble with the wedding reception. I've been working with a hotel on the island and just don't feel confident that it's going to be what we want. I think the problem is that the manager spent fifteen years organizing banquets in Las Vegas. He told me the chairs will be avocado green vinyl with a gold frameâmore like a convention center than a wedding, don't you think? He said the lobster would have to be frozen, and it sounds like baked potato is about as interesting as the menu gets, and they insist it's unheard of to make the rum punch with fresh juice. Melinda, please, can you help me out here?”
Planning a wedding anywhere is a big job; planning a wedding of this magnitude in Anguilla was a huge challenge. But now H.P. had put us in charge of the entire weekend.
We had a staff meeting to announce the new plan, and everyone took it on without missing a beat.
Ozzie said, “Mel, me and Lowell, we get the tents and stuff from the port. No problem.”
“Miguel,” I said, “we've got two hundred white plastic chairs arriving next Wednesday on Tropical Shipping. Can you get them in your pickup?”
“Cool,” Miguel answered.
“I talk to my friends about the music,” Ozzie said. “Don' worry. We get Happy Hits for the first night and Dumpa's Steel Band for the next. It gonna be cool.”
Bug knew we'd need things from St. Martin and said, “I goin' south on Saturday. Gimme a list a whatever ya need over there.”
I reviewed the menu and explained that the reception would be more casual than the rehearsal dinnerâbarbecued free-range chicken and lobster.
Garrilin raised her hand with a question. “Wha free-range chicken is?”
Bob described the merits of birds that haven't been penned up or fed chemically treated grain and hormones.
Garrilin said, “We call them kinda birds yard fowl. They's all over Anguilla.” She paused for a minute. “I don' think they wha you lookin' for, though. Our birds kinda scrawny.”
Supplies began arriving daily, by boat and air. Since every single thing was imported, we had to anticipate each detail. If anything was forgotten, there would be no running to a local store at the last minute. H.P. told us what kind of flowers his bride preferred, and as she requested, we used as many local blossoms as possible. White frangipani and pink bougainvillea were the most readily available, and we worked with a local florist to fly in baby white roses as well. We collected sea grape leaves and more bougainvillea to decorate the hors d'oeuvre platters, and draped sea-bean vines over the top of the huppah and down the sides. H.P. was flying in his own rabbi, and we arranged for a local minister to be present as well, since for the ceremony to be legal in Anguilla, an off-island rabbi alone was not enough. We even bought extra gas for the generator just in case the power failed during dinner.
Three days before the event I received a phone call from our food supplier in Miami. “I have bad news, Mel,” he said. “The plane with your food is in Puerto Rico.”
“What exactly are you saying?” I asked.
“Well, if you want to know the whole storyâ”
I couldn't tell if panic was in order. “Joel,” I interrupted impatiently, “what's going on?”
“The plane left Miami and landed on schedule a few hours ago in St. Martin. But the officials there wouldn't let your food be off-loaded.”
“Why on earth not?”
“It turns out there were horses on the plane. I don't know exactly what happened, but the pilot was told he couldn't unload anythingâsomething about immigration and papers for the horses, I think. So he flew to Puerto Rico.”
“Joel, I have free-range chickens, smoked salmon, oysters, baby squash, and tons of fresh herbs on that plane; and two hundred people are arriving in forty-eight hours expecting us to provide a storybook wedding on the beach. I need that food today or I won't be able to pull it off. Plus, what about the ice? There's no way everything will stay cold enough.”
“I'm afraid the food can't get there until tomorrow afternoon,” he said.
Bug and Ozzie were standing next to me and could see I needed help. “Tell he to get a next plane,” Bug said. “There be plenty planes in Puerto Rico.”
Ozzie motioned for me to give him the phone. “Hi. This Ozzie. We gotta have that food. You ain' gotta next plane you could send? These weddin' people important, ya know.” With that, he passed me back the phone.
Garrilin piped up and said, “Mel, all our vegetables swibbly. Tell 'em we needs new ones. These all swibble up. Looka these tomatoes. They got more wrinkles than my grandmother.”
“Hi, Joel, it's me again. As you can see, we're
all
a little upset here. What about the idea of another plane? Is that possible?”
“Let me make some calls,” he said.
For $1,800 we chartered a private plane small enough to land directly in Anguilla that afternoon. When the shipment arrived at the restaurant, it became clear that several items had gotten “lost” in Puerto Rico. Fifteen cases of raspberries, eight cases of plum tomatoes, and all the smoked salmon had vanished, never to be seen again.
The next day Lowell called Bob from Blowing Point, where he and Ozzie were picking up the tents and other rented items. “Bob,” he said, “we gotta problem.”
“What now?” Bob asked.
“Customs say everything gotta go in the warehouse till we do special paperwork, unless we wanna pay duty on it all.”
“Lowell, we can't pay a twenty-five percent duty on things we're just going to return to St. Martin in a couple of days.”
“I know. That what I
tell
he. He say we gotta do somethin' call an export entry if we wanna skip payin' duty. I tell he that we must have this stuff now or the whole weddin' gonna get mess up, but he won' leave us go with the stuff.”
“Lowell, do whatever you have to do, for God's sake, but don't let them put everything in the warehouse. We'll never get it out in time! Find out who can do an export entry immediately, and just tell him you'll be right back.”
“Okay, boss. No problem.”
Lowell went to Christine's shop, knowing that the girls there worked on entries all the time. They managed to finish our paperwork in record time, and in two hours Lowell arrived at the restaurant with all our rental equipment.
“From now on,” he announced, “we gotta use the girls at Christine's to do
all
our entries. They quick, man.”
Ozzie squeezed eight cases of oranges for the rum punch, Bug made a quick trip to St. Martin for Monte Cristo cigars, and Bob organized a crew to build a dance platform under the tents. In the kitchen, Clinton, Hughes, and I worked on the food. We marinated the chicken in giant tubs of pineapple juice with rum and spices, cleaned two hundred pounds of lobsters, and tied countless bunches of herbs with satin ribbon to decorate the platters.
The morning before the rehearsal dinner, a man came to the back door of the kitchen. “Hi, I'm Craig Fuller, the best man,” he said. “I've chartered a boat for the weekend and wondered if you could cater lunch for twenty. I'd like to take some of H.P.'s friends out for a sail every day.”
Ozzie spoke up. “No problem. We take care a everything.” I was standing next to Ozzie and had to grin at his unshakable enthusiasm. Bob thought we had lost our minds, but we were on a roll and couldn't say no. We spent a few minutes discussing menus that would stand up to a day at sea.