§ 53 The Tools Were Lacking
Two traveling men sat at breakfast in the hotel dining room of a South Carolina mill town. To them came a polite negro, soliciting their orders.
Said the first:
“Bring me grape fruit, coffee with hot milk, corn muffins, bacon and eggs.”
“Yassuh,” confirmed the waiter. He addressed the second patron:
“Whut’s yourn goin’ be, Cap’n?”
“I’ll take the same as my friend here, except that the eggs should be eliminated.”
At the sound of that last mysterious word the darky stiffened.
“’Scuse me, suh—how’d you say you wanted ’em aigs?” he asked.
The white man caught the point. He was by way of being something of a practical joker anyhow. He raised his voice slightly for added emphasis:
“I said I wanted them eliminated.”
The waiter blinked hard but recovered gallantly.
“Yas suh,” he said, and departed for the kitchen. Almost immediately there floated in through the swinging doors which separated kitchen from dining room, a medley of sounds betokening a violent debate between two persons of African antecedents. And then on the heels of this the waiter reappeared, perspiring freely, and returned to where the two white men sat.
“Cap’n,” he said, “wouldn’t you des’ ez soon have yore aigs fried? Or mebbe scrambled? We also meks a mouty tasty om’let yere. Folks w’ich tries our om’lets speaks mos’ highly of ’em. Or I mout——”
The joker broke in on him:
“Say,” he demanded, “what’s the matter with you? I gave you my order once—told you what I wanted. Now, I’m on a diet. Under the doctor’s orders I must always have my eggs eliminated. And I’m going to have them that way here or else some nigger’s going to be looking for a job.”
“’Tain’t my fault, suh,” pleaded the waiter. “Hit’s de cook. I tells him jes’ ez plain. I sez, ‘’Liminate a couple of fresh aigs fur a Naw’the’n genelman,’ I sez, an’ ’en he starts argufyin’. An’ he tell me to come on back yere an’ suggest to you——”
“Never mind that,” snapped the humorist, now seemingly in a highly indignant state. “You go tell that cook that I want him to fill my order according to instructions or there’ll be trouble.”
Once more the waiter sped away. Half a minute later he came through the swinging doors. With him was a large, coal black person in a greasy apron, and with a look of grave concern upon his face.
“Whar’s de gen’elman?” asked the newcomer.
“Thar he set,” said the waiter, pointing.
The cook presented himself at the table and bowed low.
“Boss,” he said, “I’se de cook yere an’ I strives to please. But you’ll please, suh, haf’ to ’scuse me reguardin’ yore desires ’is mawnin’ fur ’liminated aigs—an’ tha’s a fact.”
“Don’t you know how to eliminate an egg?” demanded the joker.
The cook favored him with a winning smile.
“Who, me?—w’y to be suttinly, I does. Any other time dem ’liminated aigs’d be settin’ right dar in front of you now, smokin’ hot. But to tell you de truth, boss, dey wuz a flighty nigger gal come foolin’ round de kitchen yistiddy w’ich she rightly didn’t have no business to be there neither; an’ she drapped the ’liminator an’ bruk de handle off of it.”