Thanks for waiting for me .....
After a short wait the waitress took orders from those around the table and with a shortened menu list the expectation was that food would appear very soon. After a wait (that was not timed) plates started to come from the kitchen. But when for example 'pork and fries' was offered no one answered, because that had not been the choice of anyone at the table. In between a few correct orders being set down infront of diners, there was the attempt to still offer food that had not been ordered. Some of us thought this was a quaint custom of the area or the waitresses liked carrying full plates back and forwards. The confusion continued with plates coming to the table and going back to the kitchen, until the waitress let it be known that because the restaurant could not serve many of the ordered dishes, from the abbreviated menu, the Chef had been substituting another meat. But no one had bothered to tell the customers. Communication from the staff had broken down but everyone in the ECTA party was calm, even though the description of fast food would no longer be true.
Once the problem was identified it became a case of take what was on offer on a plate if you wanted to eat something. It almost worked ............ but four on the party still had no plates of any food in front of them. This persisted for a period and as one might expect a polite request was made for someone to help get food to four people in our party. The chef appeared from his grill to oblige, as the waitress seemed to have lost the ability to get action from anyone on the staff of the restaurant.
At about the same time that all had (eventually) been served a police officer came up to the table and asked to speak with Brad, who by chance was at the end of the table nearest the door. As a member of the Turk Camaro crew that weekend, Keith also excused himself from the table and outdoors the three went for a chat. For those of us seated at the table this chat seemed to be taking a while and one or two others by now were getting concerned and went to see what was happening.
The story that the cop was relating was that the police had responded to a report that a rowdy bunch in the restaurant had thrown food at the waitress, verbally abused her reducing her to tears and were then refusing to pay for their meals. For those who had the food in front of them, after an hour and more of waiting. it got eaten and not thrown at anyone. With the whole party as polite as the British, no one had even raised their voice, let alone caused any form of rumpus. As to paying, that gets done just before leaving an establishment - and no one in the sixteen had left.
Once word got around to those still seated inside of the seriousness of the 'charges', a number from the table went to tell the police what actually had been going on. The owner was there too and at some point 'back up' was summoned and another patrol car arrived. The roof lights reflecting on the back wall of the diner although I do not recall hearing sirens. Inspite of protestations that nothing untoward had happened, apart from poor service and confusion by the kitchen staff, the policemen took the view that the resolution was for the owner to ask the whole party to pay their bills and to leave his premises, within five minutes. The owner asked everyone still seated at the table including myself to pay and leave. The alternative would have been arrest and jail, An orderly line was made at the till for meals to be paid for and the remainder of the party went outside.
Even then the staff at the till took a $100 bill in payment from Grib, but gave change as if it had been a twenty. With armed officers present nearby discretion was applied to avoid an escalating argument and this loss had to be accepted. Under the watching eyes of the police all meal and drinks bills were paid and all sixteen left the establishment and walked to their cars or to the Pine Acres lodges.
And so the "Laurinburg 16" were to become infamous as the 'Rowdys' at the Maxton race track the following day. The stories reached the internet and for a month or more the tale of the '16' grew more fanciful in the retelling of what had happened.
An anticlimax to this story I feel after nearly eight years. No shots were fired, no one was arrested, no one went to Jail and no one in the 16 could be blamed.
When I returned to Maxton and Laurinburg in 2006 and went to the Pine Acres, it was gratifying that the owner of the BBQ restaurant had long since gone out of business. That was justice.
Malcolm UK.
