Bordeaux: The Bitter Finish

by Janet Hubbard

  “I’m going to interview an importer, and Olivier is off to Paula Goodwin’s wine auction,” Max answered.

  They were heading to the exit door. “That takes care of the wine part of things,” Hank said. “Who’s going after the murderer?”

  “I am, if you tell me who it is,” Max said, matching his sarcasm.

  “You can come with me if you’d like to see the auction house,” Olivier said to Hank.

  “I thought I’d tag along with Max,” he said, smiling at her eye roll. “Actually, her new partner is going.”

  “Where? I’m taking him with me now?” The look on Hank’s face was her answer. “He’s blown his first day by being a no-show.”

  Hank put up his hand and Carlos Vasquez, wearing a baseball hat backwards, and slouchy jeans, ambled over. He looked like a boy, Olivier thought, reminding him of Abdel when he first tried to help him. Max glanced up at Hank, who was smiling. The new detective walked up to her, all five feet six inches of him, shook her hand, and said, “Carlos.” Max introduced him to Olivier.

  “Why don’t you and Olivier come for dinner this evening?” Juliette said. “I’ll ask Walt, too.”

  “Okay,” Max said. Hank had gone off to get the car and Juliette told Max she needed to meet him out front. Olivier and Max followed her out. It was a cool, breezy April day, the sky cloudy. Max hugged her mother and said, “Maman, très bien. Where did you come up with your little scenario about Ellen giving someone a chance?”

  “She told me.”

  “What?” Max exclaimed.

  “She told me before she left. She was to meet with that person in Bordeaux. I have no idea who it was, Max.”

  Max and Olivier exchanged glances.

  “I’m going to head to the importer’s office,” Max said. She turned to her mother, “I’m undercover, in case anybody asks who I am. Most of the wine people here think I was Ellen’s assistant.”

  “Max, you have too many roles,” Juliette said. She smiled up at Olivier, “Max has been play-acting almost constantly since she was two.”

  Max and Olivier agreed to meet up at her apartment no later than six. She kissed her mother and began walking south, her new partner practically skipping beside her. Olivier tried not to think about the red thong and lacy red bra she left the house in that morning as he watched her until she was out of sight. She fluttered her fingers behind her, and he knew she was aware of him watching her.

  He turned to see Paula bearing down on him. “There you are,” she said. “A metal case was taken from my car last night. Bill Casey said to ask you if you saw anyone as you were wandering the grounds after the tasting.”

  “True. I was admiring the architecture of the horse barn, and wondering who rode the horses.”

  “That’s not what I’m asking. He could see that her patience was barely holding. “Did you see anyone suspicious out there? Anyone looking in cars?”

  “No.”

  “Your driver? Did he mention anything? Bill is going to talk to him.”

  “No, he and I talked about how poetic a summer evening can be. It was after…”

  “Jesus, Pierre!” She strode to a waiting limousine, an impressive sight in short skirt and stiletto boots. Hank pulled up to the curb and hopped out. He handed Olivier a cell phone and explained that he had recorded all of their phone numbers in it. “Tonight we’ll create a game plan,” he said. “We’ll see you and Max at seven.” He paused, “Max isn’t up to any hijinks, is she?”

  Olivier thought it was time to invest in a new American dictionary. He would guess what it meant. “This afternoon is about both of us introducing ourselves to people who might have some clues. No Wild West stuff.”

  “She complains that Ellen ignored warnings, but she does the same.” Olivier had a hint of what Max had been complaining about when she called Hank and Juliette umbrella parents.

  Bill joined Olivier as they watched Max’s parents drive away, then the two walked a half block to Bill’s waiting car. Tim jumped out and opened the back door, and said, “Hello, sir,” to Olivier. Bill told him to drive to the restaurant Vin on Madison Avenue. “Paula claims some magnum she had for another customer went missing from the back of her car after the tasting. I told her to ask you,” Bill said.

  “Oh?”

  “You were out getting air for a while. I thought maybe you saw something.” His eyes were accusatory.

  “I’d get her to tell you what precise bottle she had.”

  “Do you know?”

  “I’d wager a bet on a ’45 Mouton-Rothschild.”

  “How much?”

  “My career.”

  Casey looked shocked, but Olivier could tell that he didn’t want to know any more about Olivier’s snooping. Not now, anyhow. A quick eye exchange with Tim linked them in the little conspiracy.

  “I thought the French were known for being rational,” Bill said as his driver pulled up in front of the restaurant.

  “We are. I am probably the most rational man you are acquainted with.” Or was, he thought.

  ***

  Bill led the way into Vin, where they were greeted by a gentleman who whisked them to the auction room. Every attendee held a glass of wine. “Have a glass of the ’81 Billecart-Salmon Blanc de Blancs,” the restaurant host said, pouring a glass from the magnum in his hand, and giving it to Olivier. Paula, holding a glass of wine, motioned him over to the podium. She spoke over the crowd, “Did you ask your driver if he saw anything?” she demanded of Bill.

  “Not yet. I had a funeral, remember?”

  His tone stopped her from asking any more questions. Focusing now on the crowd that continued to grow, Olivier felt as though he was at a party that was about to veer out of control, which, oddly, felt like a metaphor for his investigation. There was no evidence of genteel tasting, but of reckless imbibing, followed by crass remarks. Olivier overheard one of the men say, “This wine has the bouquet of the pussy of a fifteen-year-old virgin,” an assessment that was followed by raucous laughter. He had to be one of the group wine collectors referred to as the Dozen Dirty Dudes, who had scads of money to play with, and who turned auctions into drunken parties. He was disgusted.

  Paula banged her gavel on the podium and the noise subsided. The consumption of wine, though, continued to pick up. The vintages poured were impressive. Paula began announcing cases of wine at hyper-speed, and paddles were raised all over the room. Bill Casey bid on twelve bottles of Chave’s 1995 Hermitage Cuvée Cathelin, a Rhône wine, taking the lot for $8,000. She needs Casey, Olivier thought, far more than he needs her.

  Paula announced a brief break. She and Casey walked over to Olivier. Paula didn’t mention the wine again, but she asked Olivier if he had heard that Vincent Barthes was in trouble.

  “I’ve been too busy to follow the news over there,” he said. “What kind of trouble?”

  “He hasn’t been responding to any texts or phone calls. Someone told me this morning that his business is being investigated.” Good, Olivier thought. Abdel has let Vincent know that his calls are being monitored.

  He waited. Bill stepped away to speak to a friend, and Paula kept her focus on him, and he knew she was deciding if she should bring up the bottle again or not.

  Bill turned back to them. “You have a bottle of 1990 Romanée Conti, I hear.”

  “The last one sold for $47,000,” Paula replied.

  “I’m interested,” he said. Olivier thought Casey’s addiction plain to see. He had to have the latest.

  Olivier said, “I told Madame Goodwin when we were at a dinner in Saint-Émilion that I would like to add to my collection. After tasting the wine at your home last night, I knew that this was why I had come. I want the last magnum of this lot that has caused you so much trouble.”

  Bill’s eyes bulged, as if he were asking, “What now?”

  Pau
la said, “It’s not for sale.”

  Olivier interrupted him before he went on another harangue about the money thrown into a hole. “I’ll start at $50,000.”

  Bill stared at him, and a tiny gasp came from Paula. “You’re going to put it out of range for Paula,” Bill said, his face flushed, his brown eyes flashing.

  “Isn’t this the trend these days?” Olivier asked in a serene voice.

  “The bottle that was stolen from my car was a ’45 Mouton,” Paula said. “If you can find it, it’s yours.” She went back to the podium.

  “Can you let me in on what the hell you’re doing now?” Bill asked Olivier.

  “I’m muddying the water,” Olivier said, and smiled at Bill Casey’s expression of consternation. “Actually, I might be drowning.”

  They stopped to see what everyone was bidding on. Bill said, “Do you know that in 2002 a bottle of 1945 Romanée-Conti of Burgundy sold for $2,600, and last year a bottle went for $124,000. Blame Kurniawan.”

  “It’s sad,” Olivier said. “These rare bottles are only for the very rich.”

  “Which will lead to more counterfeiting,” Bill said. “More retailers are buying directly from the châteaux because of it.”

  Olivier said, “The truth is that no one knows much about what happened with wine before World War II, no matter what they say. Even the châteaux don’t have records of the amounts of stellar wines that were produced, or the format, or packaging. They sent vast barrels of wine to the traders who bottled it.”

  “It definitely makes it harder to catch these guys. In the case of Kurniawan, they went after him for being in the country illegally since 2003 and happened to find the counterfeiting operation. Suspicion was growing, but no one wanted to speak out.”

  Olivier glanced down at his phone and wondered why he hadn’t heard from Max. “I must go,” he said. “Thank you for your help.”

  “Olivier. Enough of the game-playing. Tell me if you took the case from Paula’s car before I have to go fire my driver.”

  “Don’t fire him before the end of the day tomorrow.”

  “You’re picking on the wrong person. I’ll pay whatever it takes to make you drop this ridiculous investigation. I’m the only one who has been robbed, and I’m willing to let it go.”

  “But this ridiculous investigation is about a lot more than you, Monsieur Casey. If Madame Goodwin has committed a theft, or gotten involved in something criminal, then Max’s and my job is to make sure justice is served.”

  “Okay, then, end of the day tomorrow.”

  Olivier turned to see him hold up his paddle for yet another lot of wine.

  ***

  Olivier walked out into the drizzle and on an impulse walked up two doors and entered Blakely’s Auction House, following the sign to the office area. A young secretary smiled as he introduced himself as Pierre, a friend of Paula’s. There was a slight lull between phone calls. “I’m Anna, by the way,” the young woman said. They were operating American-style, already on a first-name basis.

  “I’m coming from the auction,” he said.

  “Oh, are you going back? I wonder if you’ll drop off Paula’s phone.”

  Gifts are raining down, thought Olivier. “Of course.”

  “Wait just a minute.” She disappeared into an adjoining office. A smartphone was on her desk, vibrating against the wood, indicating there was a text message. Glancing around, and seeing no one, Olivier picked it up and saw the text was from Vincent: Everything unraveling here. On friend’s phone. Pierre Guyot not who he says. Name Olivier Chaumont. Investigating Ellen’s death. It was signed, V. Olivier deleted the text, and quickly put the phone down.

  Anna returned, almost bumping into him at the door. She reached down and handed him the phone. “Paula needs her keys, too. The auction is ending and she has to be somewhere immediately.”

  She handed him a set of keys, and as he took them, he almost dropped them. His heart started pounding. Four charms dangled from the circle—a wine glass, a martini glass, a miniature bottle of wine Bordeaux, and a disc that had a word on each side. He turned it over and read the engraving: Soon. Bientôt. It was identical to the one Alain Seurat had handed him in Bordeaux. The rational side of his brain offered up that Paula wasn’t in Bordeaux when Ellen died, but then, someone who had been in Ellen’s room had a matching keychain.

  Paula swept in through the door. “It was easier for me to rush over and get these,” she said, picking up the cell phone and glancing at it to see if she had any messages before dumping it into her Hermès Birkin bag. “Pierre, I’ll tell you what. You want a bottle of the ’45 Mouton so much, I’ll let you keep the one you stole for half of what you offered for Bill’s. I’m sure you’ve opened the case.”

  “Why aren’t you going to law enforcement?”

  “Because it will drag on forever. I don’t have the time or the inclination. Yes or no?”

  Olivier couldn’t believe he was negotiating with a killer about anything, for he knew without a doubt that Paula was responsible for Ellen’s death. “I want the papers on it,” he said. “The provenance. Where you purchased it.”

  “You have some nerve,” she said. Her phone was buzzing and she looked down, “I have to go. Everything is off.”

  Her phone jangled and she reached into her bag, “I’m on my way!” she shouted. She rushed out the door. Olivier went out behind her, and watched her climb behind the wheel of an SUV. He tried Max’s cell again, and then put up his hand to hail a taxi. He had to get in touch with Max and tell her that Paula should be arrested immediately.

  Chapter Thirty-two

  April 9

  Max sat in the Manhattan office of Anson Richards, a slightly built man who sported a trim moustache, and black, horn-rimmed eyeglasses. He was a garruluous conversationalist, happy to explain the three-tier wine system set up after Prohibition. Carlos Vasquez sat listening intently in the chair beside her, a distraction she didn’t need.

  “Once the wine arrives on American shores,” Richards said, “the importer notifies the wholesaler, or distributor, who in turn moves it to their customers, primarily wine stores and restaurants. That’s the simplified version. On the European side, the freight forwarders, who are brokers, truck the wine to the steamship company.”

  “So if the papers are in order when the wine arrives at the port, then U.S. Customs generally doesn’t interfere?” Vasquez asked. Max couldn’t believe it. The least he could do was keep his mouth shut.

  “Good question, Officer Vasquez,” Richards said, and Vasquez smiled. It was the small, narrow patch of hair just below his bottom lip that turned Max off. When he glanced over at her, she kept her face immobile. She remembered now that this was his first assignment as a detective. Richards continued talking. “Customs will receive a document called an acquis from the French exporter, and if that looks okay, the wine is picked up by the importers’ licensed trucks. They might spot check, but we are talking millions of cases. American wine consumption has increased every year for the past fifteen. A few years ago, we became the biggest consumers of Bordeaux.”

  “A French judge initiated a sting operation months ago,” Max explained when Richards finally drew a breath, “because two things were occurring simultaneously in that country: extraordinary wines were being lifted from grand cru châteaux, and as prices skyrocketed, counterfeiting was on the rise. A very recent example is the 1945 Mouton-Rothschild…”

  Richards stopped her by putting up his hand. “Everyone knows the story now of Bill Casey opening a bottle for Ellen’s birthday and her declaring it a fake. Max, this counterfeit conversation could go on all day. Let’s discuss the pallet of wine that customs singled me out for.”

  With him being so dismissive of Ellen, Max thought maybe Ellen had broken an unspoken protocol by being so vocal about her suspicions. Either that, or people in the wine world were alre
ady bored by the case, and had moved on to some other heinous crime. “Cases of wine that were marked as suspicious at Barthes Négociants were sent to you. They have the initials OM on the bottom of the case,” Max said.

  “I saw that, and I’m incensed that they showed up here.”

  “What’s the final destination?”

  “Wexler’s Importers is my distributor. I can’t afford a warehouse, and I use them. Excellent company.”

  “What wines were in the cases?”

  “I deal with high-end wines. Some old vintages of the premieur cru wines. Haut-Brion and Cheval Blanc are two. I’d have to check the others. I hope they don’t get held up because they’ve already been sold and buyers are impatient.” He removed his glasses and began rubbing them with a tissue. “Barthes is a traditional firm that wouldn’t be involved in something this scandalous. Are you sure someone isn’t planting the suspicious wines there and they are innocently shipping them out?”

  “I suppose that’s possible. The son is running things.”

  Richards made a face. “Oh, him. He doesn’t have half the character of his father. He started making wine for the masses, certain that he would create a sensation. It hasn’t taken off.”

  “Is Wexler’s your only distributor?”

  “I have a couple of others for lesser wines. I’ll have my secretary bring their addresses. He put his glasses back on and looked at her. She thought him innocent. “So what are the fraud police doing in France?” he asked. “Is this under the Direction Centrale de la Police Judiciaire? If so, they are probably the best.”

  “They’re involved.”

  Richards sighed, “Wine is on par with other high-end goods, and with the economic downturn we are attracting more counterfeiters. It’s easier for them because there are more collectors out there, who think wine a stronger investment than the stock market.” Angus’ eyes narrowed behind his glasses. “You aren’t accusing me of being in on this dirty little operation, are you?”

  “We haven’t tagged anyone yet. I’m doing the legwork and the French investigator will join me tomorrow.”