Sweeter Than Wine (13 page)

His grandfather's distilling room was crowded with relics of the past. A small
hand crusher rusting in the corner under years of dust was attached to the wall by
dark gray spider webs and surrounded by the husks of countless sacrificed
insects. Tools and chemical equipment lay jumbled next to a small still on a long
wooden table. A fourteen-foot ladder leaned protectively over a large-scale still.
Behind the ancient roll-top desk, which held bits and pieces of yellowed
correspondence, a battered wooden swivel chair sat slightly canted.

Siegfried moved toward the desk in a daze. He stroked the cracked dark green
leather on the arm of the chair and bumped his fingers across the brass studs that
held the padded leather in place. For a moment he smelled his grandfather's
scent, mingled Bay Rum and pipe tobacco.

Another breath, and he was reminded of mold, and rotting wood, and blood.
His fingers trailed meaningless marks through seven years of dust. He grabbed a
broom, reining in a surge of outrage, gripping the handle tightly as his hands
remembered the heft and thickness of a rifle balanced by the weight of a
bayonet.

He cleaned out the room. Then he wore blisters into his hands awkwardly
sweeping up piles of old dried leaves and cobwebby dirt from the dark corners and
gutters of the winery. The smell of wine-soaked wood and mildew teased his every
breath.

He pushed the broom against the floor, left-right, left-right. The silence in the
old building unnerved him after a while so that, once, when he heard a sudden
creak, he found himself aiming the broom into the dark. He chided himself for
foolishness. No enemy used the giant tanks as cover to creep up on him. There
was no enemy here, in Sonoma.

Alice never came.

He tried to stop himself from thinking about her, about the beautiful curve of
her neck, the soft roundness of her bosom, her eau-de-cologne.

He decided, after he had thoroughly cleaned out the corner behind the huge
barrel closest to the door, that he had been harsh, and she had, rightfully, reacted
badly. He regretted his stern words to her for an hour, sweeping between the
barrels. Then, when she still did not appear, he began to feel more and more ill-
used. She should be here, helping him! The vastness of the winery multiplied into
infinity. It was far too much work for only one man.

The day drew on toward noon. Siegfried tried to divert his resentment by
imagining how hot the day was, outside the winery's thick stone walls.

"Sig?" Peter called from the entrance.

Siegfried stopped sweeping, and walked from behind the third tank into the
aisle.

"Time for dinner," the foreman announced. "Maria's made pot roast."

Siegfried's stomach growled, demanding its due, and he joined his friend.
Together they walked back toward the house.

The fog had utterly burned away, leaving a pure cloudless sky. It was hot
enough to make his sweat feel cool.

"Spraying's going okay," Peter reported. "Cleanup?"

"It is slow, with only one," Siegfried said.

The field workers were already seated at the long trestle table set up outside
near the kitchen. Maria was setting out just-baked biscuits and pitchers of fresh
milk. Siegfried hardly waited for Peter to mumble grace before smashing one of
the biscuits into the pot roast's brown gravy. He carried it, broken and dripping, to
his mouth.

Siegfried was nearly finished with his dinner before he realized that the only
woman present was Maria.

He looked up at Peter, who said, "Mrs. R. usually shares dinner with us."

Chewing methodically, Siegfried swallowed and cleared his throat. "Where is
she?"

"She went to the City." Maria's voice was heavy with disapproval. "Left about
ten. Dressed," she sniffed, "for shopping."

Siegfried felt the stomach-dropping sensation of betrayal. Like receiving orders
to go over the top with poorly trained, inexperienced recruits. Like finding out the
last horses had been eaten. Like hearing that an unbeaten army was to
surrender...

He put his fork down into gravy gone gelid. He stood, and bowed slightly to
Peter and his wife. "I'll be in the winery, then, if she comes back."

Montclair

Monday, May 19

When the ruddy sunset stole the light in the winery, Siegfried set aside his
broom and had supper in the yellow kitchen with the Verdacchias. He ate in
silence despite Maria's efforts to draw him into conversation, his palms burning
from the unaccustomed manual labor as if he bathed his hands in acid. He had
grown soft since his long hospital stay, and he welcomed the prospect of honest
work to build his strength.

After dinner, he went into Alice's downstairs office, and invaded it, rooting in
the drawers for blank paper and a pencil. To his surprise, as he was rummaging
around, he also found a dusty bottle of tawny port hidden in the bottom drawer of
the filing cabinet.

He sat down at the large rosewood desk and poured himself a glass. He
smiled in appreciation as he swallowed. It was
good
port, the flavors of
raisins and peaches lingering on his palate in a smooth finish. As the sweet liqueur
numbed the back of his throat, he found himself almost ready to let go of his ire
towards Alice.

But not quite. She was not home yet.

He seated himself behind the big, polished-wood desk and started making
projections: how large a harvest? Did they have enough tank capacity for the
whole fermentation? How many man-hours to clean a tank? How many additional
hands were needed? At a dollar a day, what was the cost of labor?

His dismay at the figures grew. He had told Alice she needed a miracle. Not
only that, she needed a rich man for a husband.

Opa Roye had often joked that the best way to make a small fortune in the
wine business was to start with a large fortune. Opa had had one to spend, made
from the lucky purchase of shares in a Nevada silver mine. But Siegfried had no
such luck.

He considered asking Tati for a loan, but he had seen the reduced way she
was living in San Francisco. She lived without ostentation in her own home, her
fortune now in the fact that she was still alive at her age. And still charming and
completely unstoppable. She had wanted Siegfried at Montclair, and here he
was.

He took another sip of the exquisitely aged port and gazed out the window.
Twilight lingered. The air was soft and gently warm, and the sky glowed
preternaturally blue above the mountains.

No sign of Alice.

He bent to his paper, sketching another set of possibilities. What if the harvest
did not reach the quantity he had first estimated?
Not two, but only one and a
half tons per acre...sixty-five acres in white grapes, one hundred acres in
black...

He refused to look at the clock, because then he would only wonder where
Alice might be, and whether she was safe. When would she deign to come
home?

He took another sip of port, swallowing the anger that burned in him. She had
run away.

Only cowards run
.

In the distance, finally, the clattering rumble of a Model T fell to a shallow idle.
Siegfried charted the three-point turn by the rise and fall of noise, and then Alice
started backing the truck up the hill.

Siegfried put away the port, then hurried to the porch, turning the light on and
slipping back inside before the truck came up over the last steep rise of the
driveway. He settled back into the chair in Alice's office, pretending to be absorbed
into his notes. He refused to show any concern for her to her face. He was furious
about her desertion.

He watched her through the window as she climbed wearily out of the truck,
folded her driving coat, and walked toward the house. She carried no shopping
bags.

What had she been doing all day, then?

* * *

Through the half-opened front door, Alice saw Siegfried in the office, behind
her desk. She clutched her heavy purse tightly to her chest, and shifted the coat
she carried over her arm.

Was he waiting for her? She was acutely aware of his disapproval, and
jumped when he spoke.

"Welcome home." His voice was flat.

"I didn't expect--" She paused in the doorway to the office, lies tumbling on the
tip of her tongue. Resolutely, she swallowed them. There was no need to explain
herself to him. "You shouldn't have waited up for me."

"I did not. I am," he waved a much-penciled paper, "making plans for
renovation. Did you enjoy your outing to the City?"

She made herself smile and throw down her coat with casual flair. "I had a
lovely time," she lied, repressing her conscience. "I just love all the flower stalls on
Market Street."

"I swept out the winery today." He did not add,
alone
, but the word
vibrated between them.

Alice pressed her lips firmly together, suppressing an automatic apology. He
was supposed to work. That was why he was here. She clenched her fingers
around the purse handle. "I thought about what you said, about needing more
crew. I'll speak to Peter in the morning. You'll have your cleaning men tomorrow."
Her pearl necklace had been a wedding gift from Bill. Pawning it in the City had felt
like the worst kind of betrayal. But she had nothing else she was willing to sell for
the money they needed.

The silence lengthened. Siegfried said at last, both his tone and his expression
guarded. "That's good then. We'll get an early start."

She nodded. They did not say another word all the way upstairs.

* * *

Siegfried, unwilling to face another night of evil dreams, slept badly and woke
late. He was out of sorts and cross with himself as he hurried downstairs, gobbled
a cooling breakfast from the empty kitchen, and stumbled outside looking for Alice
or Peter.

They were conferring by Alice's truck.

Peter, shaking his head, must have caught sight of Siegfried's approach
because he said, loud enough to be heard, "I thought Sig was going to do the
cleanup all by himself."

"We have decided to renovate extensively. Therefore we need workers. This
morning." Alice said, her words clipped with irritation.

Siegfried suppressed his limp as he closed with them. No weaknesses must
show!

"That right, Sig?" Peter asked him directly, over Alice's glare. "You're the
vintner now. We're hiring?"

"As soon as possible."

"Well, it's all right with me," Peter shrugged and looked inquiringly at Alice. "--if
we can make the payroll?"

She nodded. Her face appeared composed but Siegfried was aware,
somehow, of her tightly controlled anger. Was she angry at Peter, or at him? She
asked Peter, "How soon can you have more workmen here, ready to start?"

Peter looked at the sky, measuring the time. "Oh, by about dinner time."

"Fine. Send them to me in the winery as they arrive," Siegfried ordered, cutting
short anything else Alice might have been about to say.

Peter tugged on his hat in acknowledgment and sauntered toward the
house.

Alice crossed her arms and scowled. It made her look twelve years old, and
Siegfried hastily hid a smile as she turned her wrath on him. "Why didn't you tell
him we wanted the workers here sooner? Don't we have too much to do to waste a
morning?" She started walking up the hill and he went with her.

"We have far too much to do. However, the job will never be finished with the
wrong crew."

"The job will never be finished if we don't start soon," she said grimly, drawing
on cotton gardening gloves. As he reached the winery door he noticed, belatedly,
that she was wearing over-large faded coveralls and a baggy shirt that must once
have belonged to Bill.

"You should not do this work!" he protested. "You will ruin your pretty
hands."

Alice snorted. "I'm the one responsible for the mess in the winery, so I'll help
clean it up. Besides, we'll be short-handed, even with the extra workers."

Siegfried considered. She spoke the truth, and he felt grudging admiration that
she admitted it. "Very well."

He handed her the broom with a brusque nod, and directed her behind a
nearby tank. She began to sweep debris together with long competent
strokes.

Seemingly intent on her task, she never glanced up as he cleaned and
sharpened the flat blades of scrapers, and interviewed the men Peter sent them
sporadically throughout the morning. Siegfried could not tell whether she was
abashed by the ruinous conditions around them, or annoyed at Peter's blatant
deference to Siegfried's opinion. In any case, her efforts were energetic. When he
returned from the tool room with more scrapers, he saw she had swept together
quite a pile already.

By noon there were seven of them at work: skinny Bernard, who wanted to
save up money for his wedding; gruff Tony, who continually mopped his face with
a fine linen handkerchief; apologetic, clumsy Julio; weather-beaten Johnny; giant
Herculio who lived up to his name; Siegfried; and Alice.

Siegfried handed them all brooms, and the building was free of leaves and
cobwebs by the time Maria rang the dinner bell.

They joined the vineyard crew at the long trestle tables set up under the fruit
trees near the kitchen. In contrast to the loud Italian banter of the workers who had
spent their morning in the sun and fresh air, Alice and the new winery crew sat
silently at their end of the table, eating with gloomy concentration. Siegfried
recognized the signs of men intimidated by the magnitude of the task that awaited
them.
Well
, he thought wryly,
It could be worse. At least no one is
shooting at us. And we are not eating the horses.

That thought cheering him, Siegfried tore off a large chunk from one of Maria's
freshly baked loaves, and began to shovel down spoonfuls of beef stew, scalding
his tongue even as he burned with impatience to return to work.