A Bordeaux Dynasty: A Novel (7 page)

“The stuff about different types of grapes is hard to figure out,” Jules added. “We graft vines, we hire nurserymen … It’s a big, complicated ordeal.”

They kept on walking and Jules, talkative as ever, told Pauline all about the history of the Médoc region. Speaking about the Margaux, he became almost lyrical. Pauline knew that the Laverzacs’ pride and joy resided in their grands crus—their best wines—and she remained attentive, surprised that she took so much pleasure listening to her brother-in-law. She wanted to know about the difference between one plot and another, and he told her about the various types of soils, about gravel and sand and so forth. His enthusiasm was infectious, and Pauline caught herself regretting that Louis-Marie wasn’t able to communicate such passion.

“… perfect drainage,” he continued. “You know, wine is mostly about water.”

They hopped back in the Jeep and crossed a wooded valley. Jules didn’t stop talking, and Pauline kept on listening to him.

They reached a plateau, where Jules brought the Jeep to a stop. He was in the middle of describing the various types and sizes of vines, when thunder interrupted him. He raised his head to the sky, worried.

“This time …” he said.

A long rumbling enveloped them. Jules tried to start the engine, but it wouldn’t turn. He tried again, twice, a third time, never losing his cool.

“Damn,” he muttered, still calm.

He turned toward Pauline and said, “You won’t be able to make it back on foot, and the rain is going to come down in a minute, hard. It’s my fault. I should’ve taken the Jeep in for repairs a long time ago. … As soon as it starts raining, Aurélien is going to start looking for me everywhere. …”

He looked at his watch.

Pauline, very determined, jumped out of the Jeep.

“I can run just as fast as you, Jules!”

He shrugged.

“Maybe,” he said, “but for how long? Listen, let’s go take refuge at Lucas’s. It’s not very far from here.”

He took her by the hand and they started running. Pauline, though petite and light, had a good stride, and she managed to keep up with him. As they finally exited the woods, the storm broke. The torrential downpour drenched them in just a few moments. Pauline tripped on a tree trunk and Jules caught her. A thunderclap stunned them, and Pauline clasped Jules’s hand even harder. They ran some more until Jules pointed at a small house not far from them. The front door was open and Lucas was waving at them. They dove inside the house. Pauline leaned against a wall, trying to catch her breath. They looked like castaways and Jules started to laugh.

“My God! Look at you two!”

Fernande was handing towels to them. She’d come from Fonteyne on a moped fifteen minutes earlier. She’d lived in this house for the past thirty years, ever since she married Lucas.

“Call your father, Mister Jules,” she said. “He’s going to be so anxious about this storm!”

Lucas was nodding, looking disturbed.

Calmly, Jules said, “Even though it’s coming down pretty hard, I think the grapes are going to be okay.”

He picked up the phone on the dresser. Pauline was drying her hair by rubbing it vigorously with the towel. Her wet T-shirt and shorts were clinging to her skin. Fernande watched Pauline, feeling bad for her, not daring to offer her dry clothing. But Pauline was laughing, glancing at Jules. He’d turned to the wall to talk to Aurélien, and everyone in the room could hear his voice booming out of the phone.

“Yes, at Lucas’s …” Jules said. “The Jeep broke down. … I know, Aurélien. Yes. …”

Pauline burst into laughter, startling Fernande.

“Don’t worry about the rain. …” Jules said. “Everything’s okay. … No, I … Whatever you want. … Yes, I’m coming. …”

He hung up and sighed.

“Let me guess, he’s angry?” Pauline asked in a mocking tone.

“Oh yeah. At me, the rain, the Jeep. And even at you.”

“Of course. …”

Jules looked outside at the rain steadily coming down, lost in his thoughts.

“More or less,” he muttered to himself.

As he was heading for the door, Pauline got up.

“You’re not going out there, are you?”

She seemed outraged, but Jules raised a hand.

“You just stay here and get dry. I’ll send Louis-Marie to pick you up. I’m not on vacation, you know.”

Then he darted out, and Pauline watched him run toward Fonteyne.

She turned to Fernande and asked, “Is he crazy?”

The old lady was making a pot of coffee.

“You know,” she said, “Mister Aurélien … He was always a bit …”

“Tyrannical!” Pauline said. “He treats everyone like dogs.”

Fernande let out a timid laugh.

“No, no … You should’ve seen him twenty years ago.”

Pauline sat back down, thinking.

“Things must’ve been rough for Louis-Marie,” she said.

Lucas, lowering his paper, threw an unamused glance her way.

“It’s not easy running an estate like this,” he said under his breath.

Pauline gave him an icy stare. Under the contempt and insistence of her gaze, Lucas finally folded his paper and got up. He grabbed his raincoat from the hook on the entrance wall, silently put it on, and walked out of the house. Pauline turned toward Fernande.

“But …” she said. “Men around here are awful.”

Fernande laughed out loud this time and said, “Mrs. Pauline, you like to stir things up, don’t you?”

She set down two mugs on the kitchen table and poured some coffee. Pauline looked around and thought the house seemed pretty ordinary. The room was clean and tidy, but devoid of charm. Fernande spent most of her time at Fonteyne and obviously didn’t give her own house much attention.

“Mister Aurélien isn’t trying to be mean,” Fernande told Pauline. “He really does need Mister Jules.”

Pauline stared at Fernande. She knew how much the old lady loved the Laverzac family. How devoted she was. She thought this was a good time to make the woman talk.

“You said Aurélien was worse before?”

“Oh, yes! But you have to understand … raising four sons on your own, that isn’t easy.”

“And how were the children?” Pauline asked in a soft voice.

“Pests!”

Fernande laughed heartily, sentimental and delighted to revisit those days.

“Your husband and Jules were terrible, always getting into trouble! Robert and Alexandre were smarter … Or, at least, they were more careful.”

She’d stopped using the word Mister with their names, carried away as she was by her memories.

“Without a woman to iron things out, there were lots of tough moments. As a matter of fact, Louis-Marie wound up as a boarder at one point.”

“That was the way, back then.”

“It was his way, that’s all. If he thought that his sons missed having a mother, he never said so, and he did nothing to replace her.”

“How old was Jules when she died?”

“Three. He was an adorable little thing, and he was crazy about his father. At first, it bothered him to have him on his heels all the time, but Jules was irresistible and everybody fell in love with him. Beyond that …”

Fernande had become solemn all of a sudden.

Avoiding setting her eyes on her, Pauline asked, “Why did Aurélien adopt Jules? Where did he come from?”

Fernande recoiled, stupefied by the enormity of the question.

“I have no idea!” she said. “I don’t know anything about it! And if you want some good advice, Mrs. Pauline, don’t you ask him either. It’s a taboo in the family. Jules is his son, and that’s that. …”

Fernande retreated within herself, and Pauline realized she’d made a mistake by asking her directly about Jules. Still interested in Fernande’s openness, she rushed to ask a more benign question.

“What about the other boys? I can’t imagine they were too pleased when Jules arrived out of the blue like that.”

“They weren’t at first. But Jules was too little to realize it. And the Mrs. was there, making sure everything was okay.”

“And she was happy to have another son just like that?”

“Everything that he wanted, she accepted. … She was such a sweet woman. … I was heartbroken when she passed away. …”

“And Aurélien?”

“No doubt. … Well, I’m not sure. … You can never be certain with him. He was less strict with his sons for a while after her death, but it didn’t last! It was out of the question for them to miss the school semester because of it.”

It was Pauline’s turn to be taken aback, and she didn’t try to hide it.

“It? Their mother’s death?”

Fernande gave a sad smile.

“There was nothing to be done about it, you know? And he’s always been like that, be it with his sons, business, the harvest—everything has to be just so. He had so much pride in himself, his household, his wine … You don’t get to where he is with a soft heart, I can tell you that.”

Fernande poured some more coffee in the mugs. Pauline had forgotten all about her wet clothes. The sun was now out, but she didn’t notice it, engrossed in the stories Fernande was telling her. Louis-Marie rarely spoke of his childhood, and Pauline had never shown much interest in it. Until now. …

“So for softness,” she said, “the boys had you. …”

Embarrassed, Fernande lowered her eyes.

“I often consoled them when they were little. He was too strict with them, it’s true. … But I had to cuddle the children in secret because he wouldn’t have appreciated that kind of familiarity.”

With every sentence that came out of Fernande’s mouth, Pauline recognized Aurélien, while discovering something different.

“Is he liked around here?”

“Is he liked? I don’t think he cares one bit about that. What he wants … well, it’s to remain on the top rung, of course! People living in the other houses and castles around here, other, smaller wine producers, it’s like a different world, you have no idea. …”

The ring of the doorbell startled both women. Fernande jumped to her feet as though she’d been caught doing something wrong. She went to open the door for Louis-Marie, whose arrival annoyed Pauline. He’d brought his wife some dry clothing and she changed, reluctantly, but with no sense of modesty, in the middle of the room.

Furious, Aurélien was pacing. He now regretted having sent Alexandre to Bordeaux and imposing Pauline on Jules—she must’ve been such a burden. He cast frequent glances out the window, cursing the weather. As soon as the sky cleared up a bit, more clouds started to gather.

He came to a sudden stop, holding his breath. A dull pain, which he knew all too well, was slowly irradiating from his chest to his shoulder. He slowly went over to a chair. He just sat there for a minute or two, concentrating on his body, while the pain slowly lessened before disappearing.

Not yet
, he thought, forcing himself to remain calm.
Not now …

There was something terrifying about this harsh reminder. Aurélien felt like running to Robert’s room. And yet he remained seated, still, struggling against panic. He couldn’t picture himself seeking help from his son. He shut his eyes and realized that the pain was completely gone.

I have to go back to that cardiologist. … I need to know if this is a false alarm or if I’m on borrowed time.

He opened his eyes again, relieved to be feeling okay, and to find his son standing in front of his desk.

“You could knock!” he barked.

Jules was scrutinizing him, obviously worried.

“I did knock,” he said, in a soft voice.

His concern annoyed Aurélien.

“All right,” he said sarcasticly, “so I’m senile. And what about you? If you can’t handle the monitoring of the machinery, tell Lucas and he can take care of it. I can’t have everything breaking down all over the place. … The tractor, the Jeep—that’s an awful lot. Or maybe you’re just becoming irresponsible. Did you at least check out the lower vineyards?”

“Yes.”

“And what about the barrels?”

“I’m on it.”

Aurélien eyed his son.

“To what extent?” he asked.

Jules planted his eyes on his father’s and said, in a low voice, “I’m taking care of the barrels. There’s not going to be any problem.”

Still in a foul mood, Aurélien shrugged and said, “If you say so.”

Jules gave a heavy sigh and sat in front of his father.

“What’s wrong, Aurélien?” he asked.

“Everything is wrong!”

He’d belted out his answer, and he continued on with the same tone, “Nobody cares about anything since the Parisians got here. It’s like you all caught the slacker virus from them or something. Look at the way Clothilde is sweeping the terrace right now. It’s like she’s about to fall asleep. And Dominique still isn’t back from running errands. As for Laurène, God knows where she is! Not behind her desk, that’s for sure. So tell me why the work around here is never done properly or on time? We’ve got enough personnel, that much I know.”

Jules took the time to light a cigarette and, as Aurélien’s diatribe had come to an end, he said, “What the others are doing is no concern of mine. I’m sorry about the Jeep. That was my fault. I had it towed, and the mechanic is working on it. As for the cellar, everything is in order, as I told you. If you have something to say to me, don’t blame the entire world. … And if what’s making you nervous is the weather, there’s not a damn thing you or I can do about it.”

“Don’t talk to me like that, Jules!”

Aurélien slammed the top of his desk, but he wasn’t really angry. Jules was still staring at him, with his usual air of frankness.

“You don’t look so good, you know. …” Jules said.

Aurélien couldn’t repress a smile.

“You ready to bury me, son?”

“God forbid,” Jules muttered. “Not before the harvest.”

Aurélien sat back in his chair, smiling at his son’s wisecrack.

“Listen, since we’re on that topic, I want you to call the notary. I want him to come over as soon as possible. Tell him it’s important.”

Jules jumped to his feet and nodded, not asking for an explanation. Aurélien watched him step out of the office, knowing the request had troubled him. He chuckled to himself. If he was certain of one thing, it was his affection for Jules.

He only had to wait a few minutes before someone was knocking at the door. He knew who Jules would have talked to about his worries, and he called out, “Come in, Robert!”