Chapter Three Summary

It is Paris in 1937, and Khristo has found work in an elegant restaurant as a waiter. He works for a Bulgarian expatriate named Omaraeff, who is the headwaiter. Khristo's good looks and reserve make him very popular with the restaurant customers. Khristo finds the elegance and decadence a far cry from the life he lived in Bulgaria. The customers in the restaurant are glamorous and wealthy people from America and European countries, and each night they drink heavily, eat sumptuously, and play out intrigues with each other as lovers and friends.

Khristo thinks of his arrival in France, how he and the others were placed in internment camps until the French government could decide what to do with them. Khristo met a man named Vladi Z. who gave Khristo the name of Omaraeff, the head waiter. While in the camp, Khristo...