Losing Joe's Place by Gordon Korman

Author:Gordon Korman [Korman, Gordon]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781443124508
Publisher: Scholastic Canada
Published: 1990-11-22T16:00:00+00:00

NINE

Gourmet Week at the Pop Bistro was a resounding success. Suddenly our seedy little neighborhood was the hottest place in town, just as we’d envisioned in the pre-summer buildup. Cars, even a few limos, were double-parked on Bathurst and all the side streets, Pitt included, and customers lined up around the block to get into Hamish’s restaurant. It was wonderful, mostly because it was driving Plotnick insane.

“I can’t stand it! It’s more than a person can bear!” The mere mention of Gourmet Week brought out the veins in our landlord’s bald head. He sat like a stone behind the counter, unable to provide table service. “He charges $6 for a lousy bowl of soup; he charges $20 for a millionth of a chicken, it wouldn’t make a meal for an ant; he charges $10 just to walk in the door and listen to that terrible music! He’s a criminal! He should be put in the electric chair!”

I suspended cooking, just so we wouldn’t miss the sight of our beloved landlord brought to his knees. We ate all our meals in the deli, serving ourselves. And whenever we could, we made sure to remind Plotnick that business was still booming down the street for good old Hamish.

By Wednesday, he could take it no longer. I was pouring myself some more coffee at dinner when I overheard him disguising his voice on the kitchen phone.

“I just had supper at that miserable Pop Bistro, and there was a cockroach in my food as big as a Volkswagen. You’re the Board of Health. Do something about it —” Then in the normal voice, “Go and sit down and mind your own business, Mr. Cardone. And don’t be so generous with my coffee. You think it grows on trees?”

Then he switched to anonymous calls to the police, tipping them off to the many illegally parked vehicles in the neighborhood. Soon tow trucks were everywhere, hauling away the cars of Hamish’s customers. To Plotnick’s dismay, the stream of patrons didn’t falter.

We were really enjoying our landlord’s misery until, on Thursday night, I glanced from his morose face out the window to the crowded street. My eyes fell on the Camaro. It was rising, hind end first, above the row of parked vehicles.

“What the —?”

Then I saw the tow truck. It had the logo of the Metropolitan Toronto Police on it, and it was signaling left to pull out and take away my car!

“Hey!” I was up and out of the booth like a shot. As I rocketed out the door, I caught a lopsided smile from Plotnick, his first all week.

“Was that your car, Mr. Cardone?”

I saved my breath for the road race against the tow truck — fourteen blocks, uphill most of the way. I was fuming. From his spot behind the counter, that rotten Plotnick must have had a perfect view of Joe’s car being cranked up and hauled away. But he’d never said a word of warning.

A last-ditch sprint caught me up with the truck as it waited its turn to enter the expressway.

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