Late Harvest Havoc Read Free Page A

illiterate—it’s all the same. As my grandfather used to say, no matter how brilliant you are, you can’t outsmart death. It must have been her time, boss. And maybe it was fitting that she died in the cathedral that was so much a part of her life.”
    â€œYour grandfather—I’m sorry I didn’t have the opportunity to meet him before he passed away.”
    â€œYou would have liked him. I’m glad he was with us for so long and was spry enough to avoid going into a retirement home. He wouldn’t set a foot in a church either. He was stubborn, and he insisted on doing things his own way. I think he just willed himself to live longer than most people.”
    â€œâ€˜A life well spent brings happy death.’”
    â€œHe did live a good life, that’s for sure. Maybe his sense of humor had something to do with his longevity. When I visited him once, he put on a woebegone face and said, ‘Did you know that my old school chum Pierre left us?’ ‘No, I didn’t,’ I said. ‘What did he die of?’ My grandfather looked at me and said, ‘He didn’t stick around to tell me.’”
    Benjamin smiled. Virgile’s company was helping him recover his usual cheerfulness. It wasn’t so much the tour guide’s sudden death that was dragging him down. It was the prospect of vinifying Fritz Loewenberg’s Moselle wines. Goldtröpfchen was certainly a beautiful German village set in sloping and magnificently maintained vineyards, but the wine that came from its stocks was too sweet. Making honey from grapes was not Benjamin’s cup of tea. He had been clear with Loewenberg and had only accepted the assignment because the man had set his sights on a Saint-Emilion grand cru. The deal was making headway, and Benjamin was lending support to an operation that would cause a stir in Bordeaux. For the German businessman, having a Bordeaux vineyard was a way to restore his image in his Moselle homeland. Bad yeast during vinification had marred his wine the previous year.
    It was a matter of spending a week across the Rhine in Germany. Benjamin had used the assignment as an opportunity to visit the hills of Alsace with his assistant, because Virgile was almost completely unfamiliar with its extraordinary wines.
    â€œTomorrow we’ll drive to Colmar. And from there we’ll start exploring,” Benjamin said before biting into a slice of bread coated with a thick layer of foie gras. “Maybe we’ll even go all the way to Ammerschwihr. This matter of the vines cut down with a chainsaw is perplexing, to say the least.”
    â€œWhat happened again?” Virgile asked. “How many plants were cut?”
    â€œOne hundred and twenty. All destroyed in a single night.”
    â€œSacrilege! And the papers say the investigators have no leads.”
    â€œReporters are like pathetic winemakers churning out plonk,” grumbled Benjamin. “We’re lucky if we get half the story.”
    â€œWell, it does seem that the cops are having a hard time with this, boss. What are your thoughts?”
    Benjamin Cooker wiped his mouth and took two sips of his riesling.
    â€œClearly, this is an act of vengeance that dates to some deep-rooted rancor.”
    Virgile, trying to imitate his employer, took one sip of his wine, then a second, and then a third. “This is Alsace,” he finally said. “Revenge is bound to be slow in coming, like the late-harvest wines made in this region—and that would certainly wreak havoc. Right, boss?”
    â€œâ€˜Late Harvest Havoc.’ Sounds like the title of a mystery. Virgile, I think you’ve inherited your grandfather’s wit.”

3
    On the smooth surface of the Lauch River, a small flat-bottom boat was gliding past the timber-frame houses and cafés without creating so much as a ripple. The boatman, a teenager with curly blond hair and a tanned face, was cheerfully