BEN SHURTLEFF
The Cheapskate

Brian Mitchell, junior executive at Banknorth of Boston, was sitting at a table for one in a high-end bar and grill downtown. It was the kind of establishment that mounted photographs of celebrities shaking hands with the owners and management on a commemorative wall you could point to not matter where you were seated. His credit card had just been returned by the young, smooth-faced waiter who had served him his lunch of steak and mashed potatoes. Presuming the average person to leave somewhere between fifteen and sixteen percent of the meal for gratuity, he, being scrupulous in his generosity, was always sure to leave near 18 percent, which he did now. He wrote his tip on the receipt and stood to leave, thanking the young waiter with a liberal smile as he left the table. But then, as he walked away, he heard a voice over his shoulder mutter “Cheapskate!” with a distinct tone of bitter and cheap disdain.

At first, the comment left him only with a sense of snickering scorn for the waiter, a gawky, sneering imp in his early twenties, and presumably a chronic ingrate. Then he let thought run. How could a boy so young, such a klutz, work up the nerve to curse him with such contempt? For a week the comment dwelt in his mind like an unwanted tenant, squatting among the daily concerns he routinely arranged and tended to with a brisk, thorough, yet breezy air of competence.

“Can you believe it?” he said, having recounted the story to a friend. “After I left eighteen percent for a tip?”

“Eighteen?” replied the friend. “Eighteen’s like the minimum these days.”

“What? Really?” asked Mitchell, stunned. “What about fifteen?”

“Fifteen was average maybe like, five, ten years ago. Now eighteen’s low. Not for a tip—but for a good tip—eighteen’s like the lowest you wanna leave.”

With this knowledge he returned to the restaurant, ordered a more expensive meal than he had his previous visit, and left a tip of twenty percent. Lingering after the meal, he studied the face of the waiter as he collected the receipt with the tip written on it, and seeing the young man grimace and shake his head, mouthing something that could certainly have been that shameful refrain, “Cheapskate”, Brian became anxious and left heated but in a cold sweat.

Unable to focus on his work, he called up another friend, who he knew had worked as a waiter. Appealing to the voice through the phone, he said:

“I don’t know what you’re supposed to leave anymore!”

“Twenty percent is just what you leave to show a waiter you know how hard they work,” came the reply. “It’s like telling them you understand it’s a bad job. They have to live off tips you know. A really good tip is more. Did you tip with a credit card? On the receipt?”

“Yes,” Brian replied, and added: “The entrees are expensive.”

“Oh, that’s it. Always leave a cash tip,” said the voice instructively.

Next week Mitchell returned, leaving a cash tip of twenty five percent. Still, the waiter made no response to his generosity.

Over and over he returned, ordering more expensive meals, more costly drinks, bringing guests for both business and leisure meals, all the while insisting on handling gratuity for the entire table. He became acquainted with the most expensive items on the menu. He even learned to like oysters. Every time he surveyed the restaurant to find what section the young waiter had been assigned, then requested to be seated there. And with every visit, the percentages of the tips grew a little more. Still, the waiter made no sign of thanks to Brian Mitchell, and pocketed every tip with a sneer when he came to clear the table.

One Saturday he met a young woman at a department store and the following week he treated her to a meal at the familiar bar and grill, on him. He left a sixty percent tip, cash.

“Do you always leave so much?” she gasped.

“Of course,” he replied. “You know they have to live off their tips.”

Never had she seen a man act more generously or frivolously with such sums of money. Eventually, after many such meals, all at the same restaurant and served by the same waiter, with all services generously for rewarded, the couple married. The wedding reception was held at the restaurant where they went on their first date and catered decadently. During the meal, before his brother, the best man, made a toast and speech in honor of the newlyweds, Brian waved the young waiter over and slipped a hundred dollar bill in his pocket.

“Hope this covers you for the night,” he said with a quick wink.

On top of that, he tipped nearly seventy percent for the entire feast. But at the end of the night, as he ducked into a limousine bound for the airport and a relaxing tropical honeymoon, he caught a last glimpse of the waiter, clattering plates onto a high stack, his face squinted in smirking disdain. Both Brian and his new wife, Michelle, returned from the honeymoon anxious, having had too much sleep.

Mr. Mitchell returned to work, always ate at the same place, was as charitable as before his marriage, and the waiter just as oblivious.

Time passed. Having assumed her new domestic duties, Mrs. Mitchell noticed a glaring void in their monthly income. Confronting her husband, she urged him to eat out less, and at cheaper restaurants. But the financial problems became only more critical. Ever month she came to Brian with a new fiscal complaint. “I can’t get the necklace,” “We can’t pay the cable bill”, “The rent’s overdue”, “We have to move again”, “You didn’t leave enough in the account for eggs!”. What at first had meant a sacrifice of luxuries—clothing, jewelry, electronics—now meant scrimping just keep a home. They moved often. Each time the apartments were smaller, the neighborhoods less agreeable. Brian sold his car. He had lost his job after selling his suits and wearing the same pair of sweatpants to work for a week.

“If we don’t move in with my parents, we’re going to go bankrupt,” Michelle said to her husband one night.

“But they live in Connecticut?” replied Brian. “We can’t leave the city.” And he thought to himself, “I can’t leave the restaurant.”

After lunch the next day, Brian spoke to the waiter before he brought the check.

“Do you recognize me?” Brian asked the waiter, who now had a rough full beard.

“Of course. You’re in here practically every day.”

“Can I ask you something? Have you ever had such a generous customer?”

“I don’t know,” the waiter scowled. “Any tips we have to split with the other waiters.”

Brian was shocked. All the meals, the growing tips…. How could he not have noticed? He opened his wallet and, to his chagrin, saw he only had enough to leave a twenty percent tip. On his way out, he heard the waiter laugh mockingly, and say “Yeah…really generous!”, then heard a familiar, bitter phrase griped in his wake. He returned home in a dream. Sweeping an eviction notice and letter from his departed wife off the tabletop, he wept.

The next day he went to the restaurant, prepared to confront the waiter, the ungrateful wretch. He was somewhat uneasy, as he knew the only item on the menu he could afford to leave a ninety percent tip for was a fountain soda. But he was filled with resolve.

When he got there, the waiter was nowhere to be seen.

“Where’s the waiter who’s usually here?” he asked. “With the beard?”

“Oh, him?” replied the man, who appeared to be the manager. “I fired him.”

“Fired? Why?” pleaded Brian.

“He was always pissed off at something,” said the man. “ I’ve never had a waiter who was so rude to customers. I only had him on staff so long ‘cause he was my sister-in-law’s nephew, but her and my brother, they just got divorced.”

Mr. Mitchell left. He stopped eating out entirely.

The bar and grill soon went out of business and was replaced by the first Boston installment of an expanding chain of commercial Chinese food restaurants.

Back to Issue 13, 2009