A Tainted Finish: A Sydney McGrath Mystery

by Horn, Rachael

  “You’ve watched way too many sitcoms in your life,” Syd said, flashing a grin. Charlie's hyperbole was never lost on her. At the moment, Syd felt like everything about Charlie was fabulous, especially the tacos. Charlie hammed up the role. She put her hands on her hips, still holding onto the tongs.

  “So, I wake up..”

  “…after noon…”“and the damsel in distress I am supposed to protect…”“…whilst in a drunken stupor…”“Is missing! M.I.A.! Vanished without a note!”

  “Sorry about that. I really planned on writing a note and then I just left. I forgot.”

  “Sure.” Charlie feigned a lovely pout.

  “You looked so peaceful. Reminded me of a dead spider, limbs all curled up on the couch. Shelob in repose. You could have gone downstairs to bed.” Syd moved into the kitchen for some decongestant. Charlie followed her.

  “Yeah, well, Alejandro took the bed downstairs.”

  “The way you two were last night I expected to find you both in the same bed,” Syd said. She swigged the terrible purple syrup from a bottle she pulled from the cupboard.

  “Gross! Now no one else can use that medicine. You’re a pig, Sydney McGrath.” She returned to her taco shells at the stove. “Besides,” she muttered low, “Alejandro has a girlfriend.” She spoke the last in her best snotty five year old voice.

  “What?” Syd wheedled, shuffling close to Charlie.

  “Turned me down flat,” Charlie answered, all joking aside. “Tell me, Syd. Have I lost my mojo?”

  “He has a girlfriend. And I think he's happy. Pretty serious, too, from the looks of it. But he always had a thing for you, Charlie.” Syd consoled her with real affection. Charlie was a goddess and she wasn't used to being turned down. Especially not by someone who has had an obvious crush on her for decades. Syd put her arm around Charlie and squeezed her shoulder.

  “Seriously. Where did you go with Olivier, Syd? Dad and I were worried.” Charlie changed the subject.

  “We went to look at the plane. It was Olivier's idea. He's pretty hell-bent to avoid jail time. I think he thinks that I can't handle the winery alone.” Syd half joked.

  “Dad already talked to the mechanic yesterday. There was no evidence of the plane being sabotaged.”

  “Frank lied. He checked the plane after the accident and there was a stop on the cables for pulling up out of a stall. Clarence could have maneuvered the plane fine until he tried to pull up hard out of a stall.”

  “Frank’s the mechanic?” Charlie asked slowly. “Did Clarence know someone had sabotaged his plane?”

  “Yup,” Syd answered. Charlie looked at Syd thoughtfully. “So Clarence was aware that someone was trying to kill him and he didn't tell the police.”

  “Yup.”

  “Why?” Charlie's face fell into sad confusion.

  “I don't know. But maybe he discovered that he had cancer at the same time he discovered that someone tried to kill him and he didn't feel such a terrible threat. But he did change everything about the winery takeover. He changed his will and he changed his attitude about me making wine.”

  “But maybe the same person who tried to kill him in June ended up doing it right the second time,” Charlie nearly shouted in exasperation.

  “Yeah, but we’re talking about my uncle here, Charlie. Besides, Frank told me that Clarence told him to keep it all quiet because the culprit would get theirs in the end.”

  “Like putting a stop to the buyout? Hardly seems like punishment for attempted murder.”

  “Or losing a lucrative position as a winemaker in a prestigious winery. Someone who has the ambition to bribe a wine critic might be unscrupulous enough to try to kill someone.” Syd wrapped the quilt around her tighter, still shivering.

  “Francois Bertrand killed your uncle? Hmm. A possibility. Dad went to see him at the Hood River Jail today. He attacked Hans Feldman at a restaurant last night.” Charlie raised her eyebrows as she delivered her juicy news. Her voice had a certain tone when she had important information, and Syd could hear the controlled excitement in the pace of her words.

  “I know,” Syd said, feigning boredom.

  “What? How could you know? Damn it!” Charlie whined.

  “Alejandro told me. His uncle told him. He's a foreman on a harvest crew in Hood River. The workers always know what's going on. They picked some grapes for him this morning and he never showed. I'm not sure if the grapes were for him or another winery he does custom crush for, but his no-show caused a ruckus. Anyway, word spread fast, and the pickers don't like Bertrand so the gossip isn't pretty.” Syd explained.

  “Do you think it could have been him?” Charlie asked.

  “I don't know. Maybe. He certainly was weird at the memorial service. Jumpy. And he had an argument with Feldman at the memorial. Your dad and I watched it. So maybe the two of them worked together? He was at the meeting up at Ted's the day my uncle was killed, you know.” Syd stood in the middle of the kitchen wrapped tight in the quilt. She felt numb and emotionally detached talking about her uncle's murder in blasé hypotheticals. The buoyancy she had felt when she came into the house faded and she felt adrift again.

  “Dad’s coming for dinner,” Charlie said, changing the subject. She sensed Syd growing distant. “He'll be here at eight.”

  “Did you make enough for Alejandro and Olivier? We should ask them. Have you seen Rosa today?”

  “Nope. She didn't come at all today. Day off? Maybe she's spending a little of that money, huh? Yeah, let’s ask the guys. I want to see Alejandro squirm anyhow. I might run my hand up his thigh under the table.” Charlie meant to put Syd at ease about her failed tryst from the night before. She was a genius at self-deprecation to assuage tension. Good old Charlie, Syd thought. She wrapped her blanket around her and held her in a long embrace.

  They set the table for five, busily placing plates and flatware. Syd was hunting for the variety of hot sauces in the fridge and pantry when Charlie suddenly left without a word, slamming the kitchen door and setting off into the dark. Syd was seized by a sudden panic. She rushed to the window to watch Charlie's ascent to the winery. The darkness swallowed her twenty feet up the drive. Syd knew she had gone up to talk to the men about dinner, but she was seized by terror nonetheless. Syd stood alone at the window, wrapped tightly in the quilt but shivering. Her heart beat hard in her chest and she felt her breathing constrict. Her knees turned to jelly and she nearly collapsed. She grabbed the counter to steady herself, staring transfixed on the blackness outside. Her hands were slippery and wet with sweat. She searched for meaning in the surprisingly visceral response of her body to an unseen threat. It's all in my head, she reassured herself. She had just walked the same path herself not fifteen minutes before. Her fear was irrational.

  She had not yet come to terms with the danger she faced; not until this very moment. Her best friend walked stoically into the dark night, while she stood trembling and frozen in place. Her ears filled with the swooshing of her own blood, in a pulsing dread. She hardly heard the car drive up or the distant voices of her friends outside. She wasn't sure if she was terrified more for herself or for Charlie.

  Jim strode into the house first. If he was alarmed to find Syd alone he didn't show it. But Syd was so grateful to see him that she bounded across the room from her post at kitchen window and gave him a desperate hug, dropping the quilt on the floor. She battled to keep her legs steady.

  “Hey, Siddy-biddy,” he said, squeezing her back and lifting her off the floor. She felt extraordinarily safe in his embrace and didn't want to let go, but she didn't want him to know how frightened she was either. She recoiled slowly and walked across the kitchen, feeling her shivering subside. She took a deep breath and feigned a level of strength she could only imagine.

  “So no bogey man last night,” Syd said, forcing herself to walk to the fridge to find a beer for Jim. She opened it on a mounted bottle opener on the side of the cupboard and handed it to him. Jim's face was implacable, but
his eyes narrowed.

  “This isn’t a joke, Syd. This man is dangerous.” He tipped the bottle back and downed the beer in a few gulps. He placed the empty bottle back on the counter. The strain of the last week was wearing on him. Everything about him seemed to sag a little. Syd felt a stab of guilt in her chest.

  “I know, Jim. I'm just a little scared.”

  “Well, that's the first sensible thing I've heard in this house for days.” He smiled and walked toward her. He tussled her hair before reaching into the fridge for another beer.

  “Smells so good in here,” he said, nosing his way around the foil-covered dishes warming on the stove. “Charlie make tacos? She promised me tacos.”

  The door opened a moment later and Alejandro appeared in a gust of cool air, carrying with him the scent of fall. Charlie and Olivier followed closely. They huffed and blustered their way into the crowded kitchen, rubbing their hands together.

  “Cold.. Soo cooold,” Charlie crooned, holding up her long fingers like the stiff hands of an old crone.

  “Well, you shouldn't have left without a jacket,” Syd chided her. She was irrationally hurt that she took off without a word, leaving her alone to battle her inner terror.

  “You were outside for ten minutes,” said Alejandro, teasing Charlie. “We've been out there for the whole day.” He obviously didn't feel awkward about the previous night.

  “Do you want a beer or something warm?” Syd asked, feeling the paralysis creep out of her stiff body.

  “Beer...tea,” the men chimed in at the same time.

  “Tea with whiskey?” Syd asked, turning to face Olivier. He nodded silently. Syd noted that he had a flush in his olive skin cheeks that bordered on a feminine shade but for his dark stubble. Charlie looked between them and grabbed a beer for Alejandro.

  Syd busied herself with preparing tea, while the rest of them carried pots and plates to the table in the other room. Their breezy banter steadied her, and the cold dark fear slowly loosened its grip. Still, she stood for several minutes in the kitchen, breathing deeply with her eyes closed to gather her thoughts. She opened her eyes to find Olivier standing in the doorway, watching her.

  “You okay?” he asked. He took the tea from her hands. Her nerves melted and she averted her eyes.

  “Mmm-hmm,” she said, nodding. But she was struggling to keep tears from surfacing. As the numbness of her fear subsided she felt a flood of emotion and fought it with everything in her.

  “I'm going to lie down for a minute,” she said thickly. She turned and bounded for the safety of her bedroom.

  Syd hardly made it to the door of her room before she burst into tears. She ran to her bed and buried her face in her pillow, sobbing. Somewhere in her mind she thought her body was expelling the pent-up fear in some kind of emotional emetic. She needed to cry out the stress of it all. Her sobbing continued violently for nearly five minutes and then stopped as suddenly as it had started. She felt loose and exhausted, but much better, like she had just gone for a long run or enjoed a night of unbridled dancing.

  She sat up and pensively worked her way through the last half hour. She was frightened; perhaps more frightened than she had ever been. She kept thinking that there was no eminent threat. It was just the thought of a threat that brought on irrational fear. Oh my god! she thought to herself, shuddering at the memory that just that morning she had sat outside at dawn alone. She made a promise to herself to heed Jim's warnings and take precautions.

  She emerged from the bathroom after splashing cold water on her face. She found the group engaged in a raucous conversation and realized she hadn’t been missed. Charlie was doing her usual shtick, depicting a drunken Francois Bertrand in a bar fight, challenging Hans Feldman to a duel. Her slurred French accent was remarkable, Syd noted. Jim was clearly struggling to keep the brevity of his investigation in tact, while he succumbed to his daughter's antics. Syd moved over to rub his shoulders fondly. He patted her hand absently while engaging the debate.

  “Yes! He admits to attacking Feldman, and he admits to bribing a writer to give scores he didn't deserve,” Jim bellowed over the noisy group.

  “He said that?” Charlie asked loudly. She had two empty beer bottles in front of her.

  “Well, not the didn't-deserve part,” Jim said. “He went on about the unfairness and arbitrary nature of scores. He seems to be fine with bribing the writer. He said it's no worse than the countless dinners and long visits to wineries that these critics partake in. He seems to think that wine scores are chockfull of nepotism.”

  “Well he’s right,” Charlie said.

  “Not entirely,” Syd piped in, taking her seat next to Olivier. She loaded her plate with four taco shells and filled them with fixings. “Most critics have decent palates and give scores that indicate some kind of quality.” She stopped to take a bite of a delicious greasy taco.

  “But they are not consistent and are biased to varietal wines and a particular style of wine,” Olivier said. “Your uncle said this to me not a few weeks ago even after he got some excellent scores. They are biased to regions too. In the Uco Valley we had to struggle to get noticed, and after a few good reviews, and the incessant pursuit of friendship with a few critics we are now the premiere region in Mendoza. But, of course, the wine hasn't changed at all.”

  “Mmm,” Syd said, nodding, but squinting her eyes incredulously. She went in for another bite.

  “And Clarence said that old and tired palates of the all-male critic inner circle were driving the industry to make hot, jammy high pH wines,” Charlie said, “which are totally imbalanced and terrible with food.” Charlie was clearly enjoying herself. She reached for another beer in the center of the table. Alejandro grabbed it from her, opened it with his keys and slid it back across the table to her waiting hand.

  “Not all male,” Syd muttered with food in her mouth, stating the facts with grease sliding down her chin.

  “And hardly any of them are trained somms,” Charlie said.

  “Snob!” said Syd.

  “Or winemakers, or trained at all in sensory evaluation,” said Charlie. “And Clarence had me read some articles on the arbitrary nature of critics a few years back. In one blind study a group of critics were tricked and rated the same wine differently. The same wine! With scores as different as five points. A five-point variance!” Charlie was on a roll.

  Syd polished off her first taco and licked her fingers unabashedly, letting Charlie finish her rant unchecked. Olivier, stoney faced, offered her a napkin.

  “And scores can vary up to five points in a tasting in front of the winemaker at the winery compared to samples sent in or blind tasted,” Charlie said, tapering off. She searched her mind for more facts on the deeds of plotting critics.

  “In Argentina, the system’s far more openly understood as a network of influence instead of an objective review,” said Olivier. “Americans somehow expect critics to hold some kind of scientific level of objectivity and analysis. These are just people. Men, mostly,” Olivier nodded to Charlie, “who feel important enough to write about wine. The critics get to know the big players in the business and they pander to them. Yes, it is nepotism. Yes, it is highly unfair to small producers who don't buy ads in a magazine. And everyone hates a critic. But imagine making wine without them?”

  Syd swallowed her first swig of cold beer. “Look, no one says the system is perfect,” she said. “It's a tool, that's all. We send in wine for review to assure the public that the wine is good. But a loyal public knows and trusts you if your wine is consistently good. Score or no score.”

  “Then why would Francois bribe a critic?” Jim asked.

  “Credibility, maybe?” Syd said. “He hasn't garnered excellent scores ever. Good scores, yes. The high 80's for almost everything that he made. You know, he started out making wines like my uncle. European-style, less extraction, low oak, lower alcohol. And blends. But then he gave way to prevailing ideas in the industry and started making only varietal wines
. He played to the Robert Parker-style palate and then he made over ripe monsters better found down south. Elegance and balance were gone in favor of pursuing scores. He's not a bad wine maker. He’s just pandering to critics.”

  “The scores matter for cash, Dad,” Charlie touted.

  “How so?” he asked.

  “Wines that score big can raise the price,” said Charlie. “It’s simple; A 95 score equals double in price.”

  “Did Clarence ever do that?” Jim asked.

  “Nope. He never got a 95 either,” said Alejandro, clearly proud of Clarence. “American blends don't get really high scores. Industry bias. And he used cost-based pricing anyway. He wanted people – real people – to drink his wine. He didn’t want them to collect it.”

  “But I don't think Francois was trying to garner scores for the profit margin,” Syd said. “I think he was trying to gain credibility as a winemaker. Didn't he have a contract with Feldman to be the winemaker of Blackwell's once my uncle was out of the picture?”

  “Yup. He said something about that in our interview this afternoon.”

  “If the big guys were going to buy out Blackwell's they would want a heavy-hitter winemaker on the ticket,” said Charlie, bouncing in her chair with excitement. “To take Clarence's place.”