Galaxy's Edge Magazine: Issue 7: March 2014 by Mike Resnick;C. J. Cherryh;Steve Cameron;Robert Sheckley;Martin L. Shoemaker;Mercedes Lackey;Lou J. Berger;Elizabeth Bear;Brad R. Torgersen;Robert T. Jeschonek;Alexei Panshin;Gregory Benford;Barry Malzberg;Paul Cook;L. Sprague de Camp Read Free Book Online Page B

Mildred,” he said, and they hurried out.
    “There goes sixty francs plus five percent tip,” Cordle said, coolly.
    “Leave here at once!” the waiter snarled.
    “I like it here,” Cordle said, folding his arms. “I like the ambiance , the sense of intimacy—”
    “You are not permitted to stay without eating.”
    “I shall eat. From the ten-franc menu.”
    The waiters looked at one another, nodded in unison and began to advance in a threatening phalanx. Cordle called to the other diners, “I ask you all to bear witness! These men are going to attack me, four against one, contrary to French law and universal human ethics, simply because I want to order from the ten-franc menu, which they have falsely advertised.”
    It was a long speech, but this was clearly the time for grandiloquence. Cordle repeated it in English.
    The English girls gasped. The old Frenchman went on eating his soup. The Scandinavians nodded grimly and began to take off their jackets.
    The waiters held another conference. The one who looked like Belmondo said, “ M’sieu, you are forcing us to call the police.”
    “That will save me the trouble,” Cordle said, “of calling them myself .”
    “Surely, m’sieu does not want to spend his holiday in court?”
    “That is how m’sieu spends most of his holidays,” Cordle said.
    The waiters conferred again. Then Belmondo stalked over with the 30-franc menu. “The cost of the prix fixe will be ten francs, since evidently that is all m’sieu can afford.”
    Cordle let that pass. “Bring me onion soup, green salad and the boeuf bourguignon .”
    The waiter went to put in the order. While he was waiting, Cordle sang “Waltzing Matilda” in a mo d erately loud voice. He suspected it might speed up the service. He got his food by the time he reached “You’ll never catch me alive, said he” for the second time. Cordle pulled the tureen of stew toward him and lifted a spoon.
    It was a breathless moment. Not one diner had left the restaurant. And Cordle was prepared. He leaned forward, soupspoon in shoveling position, and sniffed delicately. A hush fell over the room.
    “It lacks a certain something,” Cordle said aloud. Frowning, he poured the onion soup into the boeuf bourguignon. He sniffed, shook his head and added a half loaf of bread, in slices. He sniffed again and added the salad and the contents of a saltcellar.
    Cordle pursed his lips. “No,” he said, “it simply will not do.”
    He overturned the entire contents of the tureen onto the table. It was an act comparable, perhaps, to throwing gentian violet on the Mona Lisa. All of France and most of western Switzerland went into a state of shock.
    Unhurriedly, but keeping the frozen waiters under surveillance, Cordle rose and dropped ten francs into the mess. He walked to the door, turned and said, “My compliments to the chef, who might better be e m ployed as a cement mixer. And this, mon vieux , is for you.”
    He threw his crumpled linen napkin onto the floor.
    As the matador, after a fine series of passes, turns his back contemptuously on the bull and strolls away, so went Cordle. For some unknown reason, the waiters did not rush out after him, shoot him dead and hang his corpse from the nearest lamppost. So Cordle walked for ten or fifteen blocks, taking rights and lefts at random. He came to the Promenade des Anglais and sat down on a bench. He was trembling and his shirt was drenched with perspiration.
    “But I did it,” he said. “I did it! I was unspeakably vile and I got away with it!”
    Now he really knew why carrots acted that way. Dear God in heaven, what joy, what delectable bliss!
    ***
    Cordle then reverted to his mild-mannered self, smoothly and without regrets. He stayed that way until his second day in Rome.
    He was in his rented car. He and seven other drivers were lined up at a traffic light on the Corso Vittorio Emanuele II. There were perhaps twenty cars behind them. All of the drivers were revving