By Ben Joravsky
“You know that old song”–it’s a Jerry Butler tune–“that goes, ‘You’re gonna see a whole lotta trouble in your life’? Well, I never could have seen nothin’ like this.”
Telling the story of how he moved from one job to another, he takes his time. He’s a big man with a deep voice, a hearty laugh, and an ear for language–“another one of my gifts.” When he starts a story he lets it flow. Every detail has a point; every point’s connected to the one before, if in ways not obvious to his listeners. And he likes to have listeners–so long as they don’t interrupt.
According to Bey, Heiss launched into a complicated story about his convoluted relationship with a baker named Harold who put out a cookie called Doin’s. “Harold used to be Bob’s partner and baked cookies at Bob’s bakery on North Avenue. But Harold split up with Bob and hooked up with Henry. Then Harold disappeared–are you followin’ all of this?–and Henry moved over to the north side, openin’ a bakery on Montrose. So Bob’s tellin’ me, ‘We can put out the cookie, only there’s one thing–this guy Henry’s a total pain in the neck.’ Bob told me that Henry stole his cookie idea and that what we gotta do is, we gotta sue Henry for stealin’ the recipe. Well, I didn’t know. I’m listenin’ to Bob, which was the dumbest thing I ever did, and he’s goin’ on and on about how Henry did this and Henry did that and Henry’s piratin’ the name Doin’s and piratin’ the cookie. And Bob said he was gonna sue Henry, but we have to find a way to serve him with a subpoena. Then he told me I had to be the one to do it. And, well, I’m not proud of this, but I called Henry–a man I didn’t even know–and said I was coachin’ at a high school and we wanted to get his cookies for fund-raisers. So we met at the Rosebud Cafe and Henry showed up with a case of his cookies and we talked and he gave me the case and I gave him an envelope with the subpoena and that’s how he got served.”
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“Pretty good! They’re better than pretty good. They’re great. They’re blessed.”
“‘I didn’t know the Chicago Symphony owned it,’ said Heiss. ‘I’m just a chef. I don’t know these things. I threw it in the closet. For that they locked me up and treated me like a dog.’”
