Wechsberg’s profile is a relative rarity: compared with the chef, who has inspired piles of confessionals and biographies, the great restaurant host is an underexamined creature.

The answer appears on the fifty-first page of the book.

But even before he could do so, half-a-dozen black Somanlis, now eager for gain, interposed their strong arms to prevent such culpable waste of good saleworthy slave stuff.

Pending the outcome of the investigation, the police officer is suspended from duty.