The Vineyards of Champagne

by Juliet Blackwell

  “Then why did you bring it up?” asked Gaspard.

  “Habit,” she said with a smile. “Don’t like being mistaken for something I’m not.”

  “We will eat in an hour or so,” said Blondine as she put the gigot of lamb on to simmer. “We are expecting more guests.”

  Soon Dominique arrived with a rumpled younger man named Dani. They set a large pink bakery box atop the counter, shook the water from their hair, and hung up their raincoats. Dani appeared young enough to be Dominique’s son, but there was something about the intimacy of their interactions that made Rosalyn wonder if theirs was a romantic relationship. None of your business, she chided herself. Staying in a small town seemed to have brought out her inner gossip.

  It was nearly ten o’clock in the evening by the time they sat down to dinner.

  Rosalyn’s mouth watered. The leg of lamb had been simmered to perfection in a silky wine-and-onion sauce. Accompanying the lamb was bouchée à la reine, or “Queen’s morsel,” a puff pastry shell filled with mushrooms in a delectable gravy, and alongside this were simple steamed potatoes—au vapeur—doused in butter and sprinkled with parsley. Hunks of fresh, chewy baguette sat directly on the tablecloth, the crumbs ignored.

  After so much time eating simple meals and snacks, Rosalyn had to admit that the formal dinner was wonderfully satisfying. She relished every bite.

  The conversation was lively, with Dominique talking about visiting family in Provence over the holidays and Gaspard telling stories of partying in Tarragona. To Rosalyn’s ears, Gaspard’s exploits sounded like those of a frat boy on spring break, not a farmer in his sixties. But Gaspard laughed easily and was charming and playful. André, as was his wont, smiled pleasantly and remained almost entirely silent, a quiet but welcome presence.

  When Rosalyn expressed interest in the history of using corks for bottling wine, Raúl spoke passionately about the sacrilege of introducing plastic corks to the market.

  “Corks used to be made of whole hunks of the tree, but now we mash together bits of cork with glue and silicone. But in essence, they have been made the same way for hundreds of years, just like glass bottles,” said Raúl. “Plastic corks have no place near fine wine, just as plastic bottles have no place. Just imagine!”

  “In case you haven’t noticed yet,” said Emma to Rosalyn in a low voice, “the Europeans tend to be rather traditional.”

  “Of course we are traditional,” said Gaspard. “When you make a perfect product, it is a sacrilege to change.”

  “Champagne corks are different from other wine corks, of course,” said Augustín. “King Louis XV issued an edict regarding champagne bottling back in the eighteenth century. Back then, corks were wedged in by hand, with three pieces of twine holding them in place.”

  “Even so, the corks could explode without warning,” said Raúl. “Sometimes taking out an eye of a cellar worker. It earned champagne the nickname ‘devil’s wine.’”

  “Many’s the winemaker who has gone down to the cave to find entire rows popped, a lake of wasted champagne at his feet,” said Gaspard.

  “Or her feet,” Blondine grumbled under her breath.

  Gaspard rolled his eyes. “You start making your own champagne, young lady, and we’ll talk.”

  “Now we use metal caps, like I showed you in the cellars,” Blondine explained to Rosalyn, “until it is time to put in the second dosage, which is when the cork is put in and tied down with the wire hood called a muselet.”

  After the dinner dishes were cleared, a simple green salad was passed around. Rosalyn was more than full by then, and because the galette des Rois was still on its way, she helped herself to only a couple of leaves. It seemed to her the salad was an excuse to rest and pause before the final course.

  “I’m sorry we don’t have a cheese course,” announced Blondine as they finished their salads. “The fromagerie closed early today. Unless anyone would like some local Chaource or Langres? I have both here.”

  They demurred and then everyone—with the exception of Rosalyn and Blondine—brought out their cigarettes and lit up.

  After an interlude, Blondine went to the kitchen and returned with the cake.

  “Do you have these in America?” asked Dominique. “The round shape symbolizes the sun or, some say, the crowns of the kings.”

  “It’s beautiful,” said Rosalyn as she helped Blondine pass out dessert plates.

  “If only we had some children here,” Gaspard said, glaring at Blondine.

  “They usually crawl under the table to distribute the slices,” Emma told Rosalyn. “Tradition is all well and good, but it’s a little disconcerting having children crawling under tables, if you ask me.”

  “Are we expecting anyone else tonight?” Rosalyn asked, noting that Blondine laid out a serving in front of an empty chair.

  “Ça, c’est la part du Bon Dieu,” said Dominique.

  “The piece of a good God?” Rosalyn translated and looked at Emma, who nodded.

  Dominique explained: “It is tradition to put out a piece for a stranger, or a poor person. This is very important. In case they come by, there is a place waiting for them.”

  Rosalyn glanced out the sliding-glass window, imagining there wouldn’t be a lot of people passing by in the storm, asking for cake.

  “That’s a lovely tradition.”

  “This is a celebration of the wise men, Melchior, Caspar, and Balthazar,” said Gaspard as he poured more champagne into their flutes. “This is why we give gifts, because the wise men brought gifts to the baby Jesus.”

  Gaspard stood and raised his glass in a toast. “Pluie des Rois, c’est blé jusqu’au toit et dans les tonneaux, vins à flots!”

  Rosalyn caught most of the words, but not the meaning, and was grateful when Emma leaned over and translated: “‘Rain of Kings’—on Kings’ day, Epiphany—means ‘grain up to the roof and wine overflowing from the barrels.’ Gaspard thinks it’s funny because his last name means ‘grain.’”

  Thunder shook the building, and Emma let out a gasp. Rosalyn turned to see an old man standing at the glass door, umbrella held aloft, like an apparition.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Blé let out a curse under his breath. “Who invited him?”

  “I did,” said Blondine, her chin edging up a notch in a defiant slant. The move earned a fond look from Augustín.

  Blondine hurried to the door and let the man in, handing him a towel.

  “Bonsoir,” he said in a gravelly voice, stashing his umbrella in the stand and thanking Blondine for the towel as he tousled his gray locks. He was a small wrinkled man with sad blue eyes, who appeared shrunken in his too-large clothes.

  “Please let me introduce Monsieur Michel Bonnet,” said Blondine. “Monsieur Bonnet, this is Mesdames Rosalyn Acosta from America and Emma Kinsley from Australia, and Messieurs Augustín and Raúl Santiago from Spain. I believe you know the others. Quite an international party, non?”

  “Bonsoir, messieurs-dames,” he said, with a nod.

  Michel Bonnet, Rosalyn recalled, was the former priest Blondine had told her about the day they walked back from the market, and as she gazed around the room, she felt as if she were in a fairy tale or a joke: “An ex-priest, two Spanish cork makers, and a winemaker walk into an Epiphany party . . .”

  She forced her attention back to the discussion at hand. Gaspard looked disgruntled at having Bonnet at his table, but Dominique and her young man greeted him as a dear friend, and if the Spaniards noticed Gaspard’s attitude, they were too polite to say anything. Monsieur Bonnet took the extra place setting while Emma filled his flute with champagne, Blondine put on a pot of strong coffee, and Dominique served everyone a slice of cake.

  “Actually, Michel and I know each other. Don’t we, Michel?” said Emma. “That’s what comes of investing in Champagne. I tell you, I know everyone at t
his point.”

  “Not everyone,” Blondine pointed out.

  “Quite right,” Emma said. “I still need to get to Jérôme Comtois.”

  “I can get to him,” said Gaspard.

  “So you keep saying,” Emma replied. “But I haven’t seen any evidence of it so far.”

  “What is it you wish to learn from Jérôme?” asked Dominique.

  “I have these letters, correspondence between a great-aunt of mine and a young soldier from World War One named Émile Legrand. I was hoping to find her part of the correspondence in the Comtois collection.”

  “Letters from a hundred years ago?” Dani asked.

  “It’s a long shot, I know, but I want to try,” replied Emma. “I’m also looking for any families by the name of Legrand or Maréchal; I’ve had a few hints, but so far nothing’s panned out. You wouldn’t have any leads for me, would you, Michel?”

  Bonnet smiled, revealing crooked teeth. “I am old, but that was before even my time. World War Two, now, that’s a different story. I was a boy when the Germans invaded, and I remember four years later, when the Allies marched through this valley and kicked them out.”

  They all drank to France’s liberation, and dug into their Kings’ cake. It was flaky and light, with a delicate almond paste at the center, more like a pastry than what Americans considered to be cake, Rosalyn thought, and she enjoyed every bite. The table was quiet as they savored the dessert.

  “There was an orphanage built by one of your type after the Great War, though—this I know,” Bonnet said suddenly to Emma.

  “One of my type? By which you mean what?” Emma asked. “Charming? Intelligent? Endowed with savoir faire?”

  “A wealthy Australian woman.”

  Emma looked surprised. “Is that right? Around here?”

  “Oh yes, of course, not twenty minutes from here. You know, the First World War left more than a million orphans in France. Just imagine.”

  “Terrible,” Dominique said, and Dani nodded.

  “You’re saying an Australian woman founded an orphanage around here?” Emma continued. “What was her name?”

  Bonnet shook his head. “This, I do not know. I assumed you did, and that there was a connection of some kind. It was perhaps why you chose to invest in our region.”

  “No, that wasn’t why,” Emma said, looking nonplussed. “I just like champagne.”

  “Well, Michel,” said Gaspard. “Congratulations: I don’t think I’ve ever seen Emma at a loss for words.”

  “Did I say something wrong?” Bonnet asked.

  “On the contrary,” said Blondine, “I imagine Emma will want to look into this orphanage. Where is it?”

  “The Vieille Ruche, I believe it’s called.”

  “The big old house outside of Vurgren? I love that place!” said Blondine. “Very beautiful, very bourgeois.”

  Rosalyn knew that in French, “bourgeois” was not an insult, as it often was back home—or, at least, in the part of California where she was raised, where it meant having a shallow attachment to worldly goods and conventionality. In France, the word simply referred to individuals of a certain stature and wealth.

  “The Germans occupied Vieille Ruche as a command post during the Second World War,” Bonnet explained. “That’s why I know about it—it was a scandal when the Nazis forced the orphans out. A Madame Bolze lives there now. Her husband’s family made a fortune in glass.”

  “Is she of the Bolze bottle makers?” asked Raúl. “They are well-known.”

  “She is indeed. As you may imagine, bottles are a big item around here,” Gaspard explained to Rosalyn. “They were especially hard to come by during the war years.”

  “Does anyone know this Madame Bolze?” Emma asked. “I’d love to contact her, see if she might know anything about this ‘wealthy Australian woman,’ or have any records dating back to the orphanage.”

  “Why would she keep such old stuff?” Blondine asked.

  “Many people find history interesting,” Bonnet said, looking amused. “As we grow older, we tend to appreciate the past more. Perhaps you will as well.”

  “Hmph,” Blondine replied, clearly unconvinced.

  “I will introduce you to her,” said Gaspard.

  Emma’s head whipped around. “You will?”

  “You see? What did I tell you?” Gaspard said to no one in particular. “Emma always underestimates me. But I am an official with the Archiconfrérie de Saint Vincent now, and I sit on the comité. Madame Bolze will take my call.”

  Emma raised her champagne flute and gave him a warm smile. “A mistake I will be sure not to make again.”

  “There is one little problem with your plan, ma chère Emma,” Gaspard said.

  “What’s that?”

  “The Vieille Ruche is a four-story manor,” he pointed out. “Unless André is willing to cart you up and down the stairs, this will not be possible.”

  “I value André much too highly to subject him to anything quite as dangerous as toting my not-insubstantial self up four flights of stairs,” Emma said. “But fortunately, there’s a work-around—my good friend Rosalyn. What say you, Rosalyn? Care to explore with me?”

  Rosalyn smiled. “I’d be happy to.”

  “It’s settled, then,” Emma said. “More champagne!”

  As Rosalyn was about to take another bite of her cake, she noticed something nestled within the layers of pastry. It took her a moment to realize: She had been served the piece with la fève.

  “Look what I found,” she said, holding up a little figure of a baby.

  “Voilà, you are king for the day!” said Gaspard.

  “And you must bring the cake next year,” said Dominique.

  “Do you have any royal edicts, as king?” asked Bonnet.

  “As a matter of fact, I do,” said Rosalyn. “Tonight, the men do the dishes, and no more smoking indoors.”

  The group dissolved into laughter as Rosalyn stood to help Blondine clear the table, and the others lit their cigarettes.

  Rosalyn teased that as king, she would have their heads cut off for their impertinence.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  By the time Emma, André, and Rosalyn headed back to their bedrooms at the gîte, the storm had passed, but the fallen rain had frozen. The courtyard looked like something out of a movie: icicles hanging like Christmas ornaments from branches and eaves, a thick sheet of ice frosting every surface. Gaspard threw handfuls of rock salt on the walkway, but they still practically skated all the way back, arriving intact only with André’s considerable help.

  After several effusive bonne nuits at her door, Rosalyn slipped into Chambre Chardonnay. She caught a whiff of evergreen from the sprigs she had placed on the table, in the little nest for the shattered ornament. She leaned down and put her nose to the branches, inhaling deeply. The scent reminded her of Dash. Or, more precisely, of Dash’s cologne, which she had noticed the very first time she got close to him. It was subtle but intoxicating.

  When she came home from the hospital that last time, after running from his room, Rosalyn had thrown the bottle against the wall, where it shattered, spewing glass shards and its fragrant contents on the carpet.

  More than two years later, the cottage still smelled of him.

  Rosalyn positioned a chair in front of her one big window and looked out over the sparkling scene outside, an enchanted landscape painting come to life. As a native Californian, she was fascinated by the winter weather—especially since she was safe and warm, inside looking out.

  Wind buffeted the window, stirring frozen branches that tinked together, sending icicles crashing to the ground. What would a storm of this intensity have meant for the soldiers in the trenches? Would they have been exposed to all the elements, desperate for new wool socks? At least those living in the caves under Reims were
protected from changes in the weather; it was a constant, cool temperature down in the bowels of the earth, hovering around fifty-five to sixty degrees Fahrenheit. Perfect for champagne. Chilly for humans, though nothing a good wool sweater couldn’t fix.

  Rosalyn fiddled with the fève she had found in her slice of Kings’ cake. She had experienced a childish surge of giddiness upon discovering the tiny baby figure nestled in the layers of pastry. It was just a silly tradition, but Rosalyn had never won anything. No Girl Scout lottery, no premovie drawing, rarely even a card game. Dash used to tease her that she was “unlucky at cards, lucky at love.”

  Not so much, in the end.

  She stared at the tiny baby, thinking of what Lucie had said about the youngest refugees carrying their dolls. Feeling the familiar pang, deep down. Rosalyn had wanted to start a family. Dash’s response was “someday, all in due time,” but Rosalyn had known that “someday” meant “never.” She’d briefly considered allowing herself to get pregnant “by accident,” but decided that would be unfair and underhanded, a thorny premise on which to invite a new life into this world.

  Dash liked children—but he enjoyed other things more. He wanted to go out to dinner and dance, to remain unencumbered by the needs of little ones. It was the same reason he didn’t want Rosalyn to get a full-time job; she taught a few art classes to children, but mostly she painted and played house during the day, remaining free to join Dash at the drop of a hat. He wanted to hold impromptu parties, to hop into the car and drive wherever, whenever the whim struck. Up the coast to Timber Cove, down the coast to Santa Barbara. One weekend he and Rosalyn took off to London, just for fun; other times, they flew to Mexico or Hawaii. Theirs was a life others had envied: a whirlwind of fine dining, four-star hotels, the best wines, and the liveliest company.