by Harvey, JM
“His name was Sotis Saleas, and he was very handsome and blond like a northern Italian. He was sick with leukemia, but I did not care. He was very sweet. And he played the guitar…” she lifted her hands toward the ceiling and waggled her fingers. “He was beautiful, so pale and thin, like an angel. We were married and I left Agia Varvara with him and his family.” Her smile faltered and she took another sip of wine, then blotted her lips with a paper napkin.
From the end of the bar came a loud eruption of laughter from Tim and Goodwin.
“I swear it’s true!” Shaky said. “They were out to here!” I didn’t turn to see what was out to where and Alexandra didn’t even seem to hear them.
“The best year of my life was with Sotis. We had a child,” she said, and her eyes met mine again, but it was a fleeting glance. “He was perfect, a beautiful little boy who looked just like his father. We named him Sotis as well. Life was good. Not perfect but good. His family never accepted me or the baby. They were good, honest people, but I was a Gadjo to them. An outsider. But Sotis and I were happy…” she stopped and her smile disappeared. Tears glimmered in her eyes. “And then Sotis was killed.”
Her story was holding me so raptly that a startled, “My God, how awful!” leapt out of my mouth and the laughter of the three men at the end of the bar died. I lowered my voice and asked, “How?”
“It was an accident. We were the last wagon in the caravan. We should not have been on such a large road, but we were anxious to make the next town and set up the show for that night. A lorry hit us at an intersection,” she said, her words coming slowly. A single tear scrolled down her face, streaking her makeup.
“Sotis died there on that highway and I was taken to the hospital in the next town.” She stopped there for a moment and dabbed her eyes. “With his leukemia, we both knew our time together might be brief, but I had hoped for years, and got little more than months.”
“What about you? And your son? Were you badly injured?”
“Our baby was unharmed, but both my legs were broken and one of my lungs had collapsed. I was in a coma for three weeks. When I awoke Sotis’ people had moved on. They were probably happy to be rid of me. But my father, Samson, was there by my bedside.”
“And your son?” I asked a little breathlessly.
Another tear, and then another, slid down her face and her chin trembled. “The hospital said the other gypsies had taken him with them. No one really cared. Not for a gypsy baby.”
I said nothing; I was incapable of words. As a mother myself I could imagine how devastating that would be.
“I returned to Greece, but I never gave up hope I would be reunited with Sotis. We hired a detective, Samson and I, but the Saleas moved often and left little trace. It was almost five years later the detective found the clan in a little village in Italy, outside Palermo.
“Samson and I flew to Palermo and raced to the camp ground where the detectives had located them. We caught them as they were leaving. And my child was there, with them. Six years old by then, but I recognized him.” She paused, her gaze focused on the bartop again, but I knew her mind was focused thirty years in the past.
The silence lasted so long, and I was so caught up in the story, I had to prompt her. “You took him home? To Greece?”
“Yes,” she whispered, her complexion suddenly waxy-gray. She had aged ten years in as many seconds. “Dimitri and I were dating by then. I had hoped for a happy family, the three of us, but I was a fool. My son believed I had abandoned him. I had thrown him away. And he would not believe otherwise, no matter how much I explained.” She paused again. “He was hard and angry. Six years old and he never cried or laughed. If I tried to hug him he would curse and punch and kick. He hated me. And he hated Dimitri even more. The two of them fought endlessly.”
“What about Samson?”
She thought about that for a moment. “Perhaps he cared for Samson in some strange way,” she said as if she had never considered the possibility before. “He would sometimes be quiet when he was with Samson. But just as often he was not.” She sighed and shook her head. “I think, maybe, he just hated Samson less.”
“My God,” I murmured. I’m sure my jaw was hanging to my breastbone.
Heavy tears broke free of her lashes and spilled down her face. Shaky looked our way, saw the tears and turned away fast. Typical male in the face of female tears, but I was happy for it at that moment.
Alexandra dug in her purse for more tissue. “I loved him anyway. I took him to doctors and I put him in a special school. Year after year I tried to show him I loved him. None of it did any good. He stole and he fought and he cursed everyone. He was arrested many times. When he was twelve, he spent a year in a reform school, but it only made him worse. And then he began to set fires.” She took a deep, shuddering breath. “He died in a fire he set. At a theatre in town. The roof collapsed and twenty-seven people died, including my son. The survivors said he was laughing as the roof came down on top of him. The bodies were so badly burned they were never identified. We buried them together in a single grave.”
If my jaw had been on my breastbone before, it was at my knees by then. I could only imagine where this was leading. The story left me stunned, but I hadn’t lost focus. I had come here to find out about Dimitri and Samson. I sympathized with her ordeal, and the bitterness of such a loss, but I still needed to have the answers I had come for. I needed to know why Samson had shot Dimitri, and why Alexandra seemed so certain Samson had finished the job, thirty-two years later, in my wine cellar.
She continued, “Dimitri and I were married three months after my child was buried. I sometimes wonder if he would have married me if my son had lived.”
“Is that why Samson shot Dimitri?” I asked.
She shook her head. “No. It was about money. Samson and I were the only Xenos left by then; his mother and father were long dead. They were what we called ‘land poor’ in Greece, if that makes sense to you?”
I nodded. Of course it did. Half the farmers and wine makers in the valley were land poor, meaning we owned valuable property while our bank accounts were pitiful. “Yes, it makes a lot of sense.”
“Dimitri wanted my part of the estate, but Samson refused.” She reached for her wine glass, lifted it with an unsteady hand and took a gulp. After that story, she needed a drink. “He said the money was for the people of Naousa. To make up for what my son had done. He gave money to the families of the dead. And he built a hospital. Every year he sends money to the local priest. To the people there, Samson is a kind of saint.”
Samson a saint? My bitter, tight-fisted old man a benefactor? Shockingly, I could believe it very easily. Samson was a man of honor at his core.
Alexandra continued. “After he shot Dimitri, Samson sold all of the Xenos property and left our village. I never saw him again, until Saturday at your party.”
“Why did you come to the Valley after all these years?” I asked, though it seemed like an inappropriate question.
“Dimitri has always spent more than we could afford on his wine collection,” she said and I detected bitterness in her tone. “We needed money. I wanted to sell some of the wine, but Dimitri was obsessed with the inheritance he thought should be mine. It was a point of honor with him. He had filed suit in Greece, but the courts there are slow and they have no jurisdiction here. And then Blake Becker contacted him and offered him a partnership.” She shrugged. “I fought against coming here, but Dimitri would not listen. We came. And then Samson started making threats…” she trailed off again. “And now Dimitri is dead.” Alexandra wiped her eyes and looked up at me. She took a deep breath, gave me a brave smile and changed the subject.
“Your daughter, Jessica, is a beautiful and kind young woman,” she complimented me, though her voice held an undercurrent of infinite sadness. “She loves you very much, that is obvious.”
I smiled. “Believe me, we had our moments when she was younger,” I said. “We still have those moments o
ccasionally.”
“But the love never changes,” Alexandra said. “There is no stronger bond than a parent and a child.”
I nodded. What she said was true. When it came right down to it, Jessica was the one thing in my life I could never part with.
She looked at her watch and suddenly stood.
“I must go. I told Samson I was going to buy groceries, so I have to stop on the way back. He will be worried.”
“He’ll be angry,” I replied.
“He will barely notice that I am gone. He is too busy thinking about Blake Becker and the wine.” She gathered her purse.
“Tell him it’s only fifty cases,” I said, and then I swallowed my pride and added, “And he was right. I shouldn’t have signed the auction agreement with Blake.” That was hard to say - and it would be harder still when Samson gloated - but the truth was the truth.
Alexandra looked confused.
“The wine I consigned with Blake,” I said and she shook her head.
“He is angry about that,” she conceded, “but that’s not what I was referring to. All I want is to settle Dimitri’s estate and go home, but Mr. Becker will not release Dimitri’s personal collection of wine.”
“It’s stored at Star Crossed?’ I asked, and she nodded.
“Two hundred bottles, most of it Premiere Cru Bordeaux reds from the 1840s and ‘50s. Samson believes we should consign it for auction in New York, but Mr. Becker is insisting he has a contract to sell it at his auctions. That Dimitri decided to sell it just a few weeks before he was murdered. I do not believe this. Dimitri would never have agreed to sell his collection. We have hired an attorney.”
The Premiere Cru Classé - meaning First Growth - wines are produced at only five Châteaux: Latour, Lafite Rothschild, Haut-Brion, and Mouton Rothschild, all in the Médoc region of France, and Margaux in Graves. These five wines are generally accepted to be the greatest ever produced, and vintages in the mid 1800s are some of the most expensive wines in the world. I could certainly see why Blake would want to auction those bottles - the commissions would be incredible - but it didn’t make me think much better of Blake. Sometimes business has to take a back seat to common decency, and bilking a widow was about as low as you could go.
And then I remembered the burly blond giant at Star Crossed who had been loading a truck with cases of old Latour that morning. Had they been Dimitri’s?
Alexandra interrupted my train of thought, “I am willing to go along with it to avoid trouble, but Samson insists the prices would be double in New York. He flies into a rage whenever we discuss it. And the way he cursed Blake on the phone!” She shrugged helplessly. “He is threatening to rent a truck and break into the cellar to collect the bottles.” She pulled her wallet from her purse, but I waved her off.
“I’ll get the check.”
“Thank you, Claire,” she said as she closed her bag. She gave me another brave smile, but her eyes were dewy. I felt guilty for forcing her to dredge up the past, but I did not apologize for it. “It was good to talk of all of this. I feel better.”
She stood, clasped my hand briefly and left, pausing at the end of the bar to say goodbye to Shaky, who actually kissed her hand in farewell, the old lech. I watched her through the dirty front windows as she climbed into the Mercedes and pulled away.
I had no way of knowing that by the next time I saw Alexandra, two more people would have been murdered.
Chapter 20
Victor got his pizza, and I was happy for the company despite the fact that the last thing I felt like doing was cooking. I made him promise to punch down the wine in the morning as penance. As we ate, I told him Alexandra’s story.
When I finished he said, “I feel sorry for the kid. Her son. It must have been really bad with her in-laws.”
I nodded. “Alexandra said they never really accepted her or the boy.”
“Everybody is a racist,” he said with a personal bitterness I had heard before. I didn’t argue the point, though I like to think most of us are essentially good people. But, too often, I have been proven wrong.
Victor left at 10:00PM. I was cleaning the dishes, rehashing Alexandra’s story, and feeling horrible for her and her dead son when a knock on the kitchen door startled me so badly I dropped one of my favorite serving dishes - shaped like a purple grape leaf – to shatter on the floor.
“It’s me!” Hunter Drake yelled through the closed door, but my heart was still pounding as I crossed to the kitchen door, flipped on the patio light, and opened the door.
“You scared me,” I said accusingly. “I have a cell phone. And a front door,” I reminded him.
“I should have called,” Hunter said, “but I was hoping to catch Samson here.” He looked tired, his face etched with deep lines, but he wasn’t going to get sympathy from me.
“Catch?” I said as I crossed my arms, blocking the stoop. “And if you had called and told me you were coming, you were afraid I would have yelled ‘It’s the coppers!’ and we would have roared off into the night blazing away with our machine guns?”
He squeezed his eyes closed tight then blinked them open. “Sorry. Catch was a poor choice of words. I just wanted to ask him, and you, a question about something we found in Dimitri’s pocket,” he said, but he didn’t sound apologetic, he sounded annoyed. “Are you going to invite me in or not?”
I was tempted to say ‘Not!’ and slam the door in his face, but my curiosity got the better of me. I stepped aside, brusquely waved him in, and pointed at a kitchen chair. He took a seat. I did not offer him coffee, though I did stop to pour myself a cup of decaf.
“Can I get some of that?” he asked.
“Sorry,” I said, my tone making it clear I was not at all sorry. “Last cup.”
Hunter’s teeth ground as he glared at me. “This doesn’t make me happy, Claire,” he said. “Arresting Samson.”
“But you did it anyway,” I pointed out.
“I had no choice. The evidence…” he trailed off with a shrug.
“Right,” I said, unconvinced and unwilling to let him off the hook. I sipped my coffee as the silence stretched between us.
“But that’s not why I’m here,” he said as he reached into his coat pocket. He pulled out a sheet of folded over paper, unfolded it, and slid it across the table to me. It was a photocopy of a pair of wine labels. They weren’t just any labels; they were the labels from two bottles of Domaine de la Romanée-Conti, vintage 1947, one of the most expensive wines in the world, grown and bottled at the Château Cheval Blanc in Burgundy.
I looked up at him. “The photocopy was in his pocket?” I asked.
“No, the labels were. Have you heard of it?”
I laughed at that and Hunter flushed. For a man who had grown up in Napa where wine was practically a religion, he knew next to nothing about it. And way too much about whiskey. That was mean of me to think, but I was feeling mean at that moment.
“Everyone’s heard of it,” I said. “It’s one of the most famous wineries in Burgundy, and this is probably its most famous vintage. As much for its rarity and the price it commands at auction as its quality.”
“Expensive?” he asked.
I couldn’t resist showing off a little bit. “Somewhere in the neighborhood of sixty thousand dollars a bottle,” I said. His eyes widened a fraction. I added, “Only six hundred bottles were produced. Even today, Château Cheval Blanc makes only a few hundred cases of this a year.”
“Sixty thousand for a bottle?”
“A magnum of it sold for a hundred and fifty thousand very recently,” I said. When he looked confused, I added, “A magnum is one and a half liters. That’s the equivalent of two normal-sized bottles.”
“Why not just open two bottles?” he asked. “I mean, why make bigger bottles?”
I shrugged. “Ostentation. Maybe a wedding or an important tasting event. They make double magnums, too. Some wineries even make imperial-sized bottles, which hold three–quarters of a case of
wine.” I shrugged again. “Like they say, bigger is better.”
“How much would a bottle that size sell for? An Imperial?”
“Of the ‘47?” Once again I shrugged. “I don’t know if they even made bottles that large back then. If they did, probably three or four hundred thousand,” I replied.
Hunt whistled and shook his head. “Who can afford to drink that?”
“Only a fool would drink it,” I told him, though I’d love to crack open a bottle or two. I was willing to bet it would be heavenly. Or it might be vinegar, if it had been mishandled or stored incorrectly. “It’s an investment wine. The labels alone are probably worth a couple of hundred to a collector.”
“People collect the labels?”
“People collect everything,” I said.
He smiled and said, “Like purple stuff?” He cut his eyes around the kitchen. Normally I’d laugh politely at that kind of joke, pretending I hadn’t heard it a million times before, but I wasn’t feeling like being polite to Hunter.
He lost the smile.
I asked a question of my own. “What was Dimitri doing with them?” I doubted he would collect labels. He didn’t seem the sentimental type.
“I was going to ask you that.”
I shrugged. I had no idea, but it certainly made me curious.
“Who owns this stuff?” he asked. “Where would you even buy it?”
“Millionaires own it,” I said. “And you wouldn’t find it in a store. It would be auctioned. That’s where the highest prices are paid.”
“Millionaires,” he said thoughtfully, then asked, “Anyone in the valley?”
