RICHES
Catherine had a reservation at the Tuscany Cafe as usual, now that the summer had lifted for a comfortable fall season.  New clothes, new arts and entertainment and a new menu from the chef.

  When she arrived in her wispy blue suit, hat with scarf and gloves, her table was not there.  She then proceeded to march up to the concierge desk to demand of LeMont Garcon where her favorite table was--he apologized.
  'Oh Miss Catherine, we are so sorry but your table has been chipped at the edge, we had to replace it,' Garcon said, with such regret in his voice.
  Catherine was not used to such disappointment.  She thrust her fists on her hips in protest.  Several eyes in the cafe waited to see what she would demand.

  'Well, I...' she heaved, looking around in exasperation.

  Just then an older man, a bit bent, silver haired with thin-veined hands stood from his table, coming to her.
  'Young lady, you can have my table.  I have to be going, anyway,' he said softly.
  A certain pause fell between these two, as others watched.
  Catherine thought he looked pathetic, in his old age.  'I wouldn't take your table, sir, though the gesture is appreciated.'

  He did not answer her, he simply walked out of the cafe, to the applause of a few.
  Garcon then said, 'His table is vacant, Miss Catherine.'

  At this time Ralston strode into the Tuscany to join Catherine.  She didn't want to have him see her without a table, it would not be the thing to do here at the Tuscany.  So she sat at the old man's table.  Ralston did not see her at her usual spot--he stopped.  He looked around, finally spying her out in the corner where she hid beneath her hat.

  Coming to her, he quipped, 'Have you been bad?  Are you being punished here in this corner?  He joked mischievously.
  'Now you just sit down,' she told him with some hurt indignation.  She took her hat off.  'My table has a chip on it, so I was given this one.'
  Ralston sat.  He gazed around at the close walls, the new views, the guests arrayed around them.  'It's different, I'll say that,' he said still in a sarcastic mode.
  'I was given this table by an old man who was leaving.'
  Ralston's eyes perked up.  'You mean Hugh Fortress, the silver haired old man with the soft voice?'
  'How did you know?  Do you know him?'
  'I know who he is.  Gave a few million to the symphony last year when they couldn't  make payroll.  Blessed are the merciful, as they say.'
  'Where did you get that?'
  'Oh I don't know, I heard it somewhere, that's all.'

  Catherine said, 'It was a simple thing.  He was leaving, anyway.'  She wondered when a waiter would arrive.
  'Of course he was.  That's the way he is, the soul of generosity.'
  'Ralston, what makes people like him that way?'

  'In his case, he lost a son in the war.  What he lost resculptured his own soul.  It was what he gave up that made him the may he is.'
  'I see.  I've never heard anything like that,' she said looking down at herself.
  'I once attended a talk he gave about life and values.  He told about how his only son ran away from him, joined the military but was lost in battle.  They never said goodbye so everyone he sees is to him a son.  He has spent his life thanking everyone he meets.'
  'That's amazing.'
  'And so it is.  Have you ordered, yet?'
  'I don't want to, till I've understood what you just said.'

  'Then I will,' Ralston said, and then waived for Garcon, who finally came.

RISING UP
Ralston and Catherine took lunch on the redwood patio of the Tuscany Cafe, their favorite lunch and conversation spot in the Village.  Their table was surrounded by Italian vines, the scent of roses, and lattice work overhead.  The time was cool, comfortable and easy idle.

  'I love this place in the spring, darling,' Catherine said between sips of a red Dordogne wine.
  'You appear to love the wine more so,' Ralston quipped between tastes of beef.
  'This could be true, I won't deny I love red wine from Italy.'
  'You love everything from Italy.  If we were in Rome, you'd say beggars are cute,' he went on smirking.
  'Now hush.  I do love Italy, some time we should go, in the Fall.'

  'Look, Cathy, overhead, an airplane pulling one of those banners,' he said pointing to the bright sky.
  She looked up.  'What does it say?'
  'It says, Never go to Italy.'
  'It does not.  You're just making that up.  Now what does it really say?'
  'It says, You pay the bill.'
  'No it doesn't.  Do you even know what it says, at all?'
  'It's an announcement that says, 'Greatest Man of the Year' dinner is at the Waldorf Hotel.'

  'Oh, is that all?' Catherine was not impressed with men today.
  'Is that all?  You mean you haven't voted for me as Man of the Year?'
  Catherine laughed, which she rarely does.  She says it gives her wrinkles.
  Ralston went on.  'Look, who is more deserving than me?  Or at least who do you know who is more deserving?'
  'Well now, honey, I can't say I know that many men, but Man of the Year should be very gifted and confident.'
  'I disagree.  I say Man of the Year should be humbled by his giftedness.  To make room for others in your life, to learn to receive and not just take.'

  'Well now, listen to you with your platitudes.  Have you been reading those magazines again, Psychology and Self, and the like?'
  'As a matter of fact, I was reading Great Quotations in History.  One of them was, I must decrease so that he can increase.'  I liked that one most of all.'
  'Hmm, I see,' she said putting her wine glass down.
  'To empty yourself to be filled with blessing and giftedness, to put that down for the sake of others, now that's my ticket.'

  'I see,' she said contemplating what he had said.
  'By the way, do you want your potatoes?'
  'Oh go on, darling, you can have them if your paying for all this.'
  'You're being difficult.'
  'And you like me this way, now don't you?'  She had that sly tilt of her eyes, which he loved.
  'I think I rather do,' he said, clipping the bill and his money together as they left with each other.