Sweeter Than Wine (42 page)

For the first time since her father took her away from her mother's house when
she was thirteen, Alice let herself remember warm white arms, a beautiful voice
singing along with a ragtime piano, lullaby lyrics she was ashamed to recall. Air
redolent of perfume and cigar smoke. Playing dress-up in her mother's diamonds
and silks. Being very good and quiet in her room late at night, when the jangling,
syncopated music sounded loudest. Feeding Mama coffee and orange juice when
she woke up in the early afternoon and began to put herself together for another
evening's work.

"Love you, baby girl," Mama always said, before she said good night, wafting
away in a cloud of perfume so strong Alice had to sneeze. And then on the day her
father came to take her away: "You be good. Do everything your Da tells you,"

Da had put her into school with nuns and little girls who didn't know anything
about the life that women had to lead when they didn't have a man of their own.
Da had instructed her not to talk about her past, not to ever
ever
mention
her mother, not to say 'boo' to a goose.

He had tried his very best to secure a respectable future for her. And Bill, to
give him credit, had also tried his best, burdened with a too-young wife and the
loss of her dowry from a supposedly secure bank.

She had done her best, too, but Siegfried hadn't found her good enough. She
gave a strangled laugh. She had never forgiven herself for her mothers' sins. How
could she expect Siegfried to?

The kitchen door squealed and slammed, startling her. Angry footsteps
clumped down the hallway.

"Do you know what he's done?" Peter shouted, before he even entered the
office. "That goddamned Hun! I don't know why you married him, Alice. He's
ruined Montclair! You can't let him do this to me! Thinks he's God in a wine barrel,
but I'll show him!"

"W-what's going on?" Alice rocked back, buffeted by his raving.

"He
won't
get away with this! A man's gotta make a living! I only want a
place of my own, and he's trying to take that away. You can't let him do this to
me!"

He paused with an audible sob, and Alice realized with disgust that he was
drunk, some powerful spirit on his breath, staining his work clothes. "Peter, you'd
better sit down and tell me what happened."

The sound of the front door opening roused Peter to new belligerence.

"It's all his fault, the son of a bitch. Do you know what he
did
?" Peter
leaned over the desk, wrinkling her papers, leering owl-eyed at her. "You don't
know, 'cause he didn't want me to tell you." A malicious chuckle escaped as he
stood up and flung his arm out, pointing melodramatically toward Siegfried, who
was now standing in the doorway. "Now you'll see."

"Peter. You will remove yourself from this office immediately!" Siegfried
ordered.

"Or what?" Peter scoffed. "You'll fire me? You can't do that. I work for your
wife." He turned to her again. "Did I tell you what he jus' did? He
fired
me,
the bastard. Tell him he can't do that! I've worked here all my life! My father
worked here, and my sons--my sons--" He snatched off the hat perching
precariously on the back of his head and kneaded it like dough.

Alice glanced questioningly at Siegfried, who offered as evidence a dark green
bottle. "I caught him making
marc schnaps--
he calls it
grappa--
from
the pomace. That is illegal, and he knows it. There is no legal market for such
alcohol, even if they lift the Wartime Prohibition--"

"No legal market," Peter sneered, back in tenuous control. "Why don't you tell
your wife about
your
market? You can't look down on me! You're lower than
dirt!" Peter rested one haunch on the desk and addressed Alice. "He told you he
had a deal with La Fontaine, didn't he? That he could
sell
all that wine he's
making now?" He laughed scornfully. "And you
believed
him!" His laughter
degenerated into snorts. "Tell her yourself, Sig. You got
nothin'
!"

One glance at Siegfried's face told Alice that Peter's tirade held at least a grain
of truth. Possibly a whole wheat field, but she would deal with that next.

First, Peter. She recoiled from the passionate spectacle he was making of
himself. In all the years she had lived at Montclair, he had always been decent,
hardworking, conscientious. What had happened to him to break him down like
this?

She knew the answer to that question before she finished asking herself. She
had seen him cracking piece by piece this disastrous year, until he was nothing
but a fractured shell held together by weekend binges.

Siegfried said quietly, "Peter never told you that the aging wine must be
topped off, or that mold would contaminate the vats and dryness ruin the barrels.
He conspired to bankrupt you, so that Hugh could buy Montclair cheaply."

"You're a liar!" Peter roared. "You think you know so much about wine? My
father knew twice what you know!" He stepped forward heavily and threw a wild
punch at Siegfried.

Siegfried sidestepped and grabbed Peter's wrist, spinning him around. The
foreman flailed with his free arm, shouting incomprehensibly. His body arched and
he gave a choking gurgle of surrender as Siegfried forced his forearm high against
his spine.

Alice herself felt choked on too much truth. Suddenly the whole pattern of her
life at Montclair since Bill's departure took on a different color. All the incidents that
made no sense, all the failures that she had claimed for her own had been--

Sabotage.

Cold rage erupted from the pit of her stomach. She hated to side with
Siegfried, but the scope of Peter's treachery, however imperfectly revealed, left her
no choice.

"Peter, I must agree with Mr. Rodernwiller. You
are
fired." She stopped
to take a breath. Her heart was hammering hard enough to shake her voice.

"You can't!" Peter, held perfectly immobile, could only roll his eyes. "You can't
fire
me
! I run this place! I grow the best damn grapes in the county! You
can't--
!"

"We can," Siegfried contradicted him. "We have. Go."

Peter tried to struggle, but Siegfried's biceps tightened and swelled, preventing
his escape until he conceded defeat. "Okay, okay! I'll--go."

Siegfried loosened his grip, but did not relax his vigilance.

Peter, unsteady on his feet, glaring balefully, shook his arm vigorously at them,
not quite making a fist, before stomping down the corridor.

In a swift motion, like a ruffled dog settling his fur, Siegfried shook himself. The
spell between them, composed from unity of purpose, broke.

"I can't believe what Peter said about La Fontaine, about your contract!" Alice
did believe, but she needed to deny the awful possibility. She was just beginning
to come to grips with the potential consequences. No deal. No money. Useless
harvest. Montclair lost...

"Unfortunately, it is true," Siegfried said, his face an expressionless soldier's
mask.

Her voice caught. "A--all of it?"

He gave a tiny nod, regret, guilt, and heartbreak plain. Then he mastered his
face to impassivity again.

"You
lied
to me!" Rage ignited, ice burning in the wasteland of her
hopes, and she began to laugh.

Hysteria
a voice whispered, but it was drowned by the wildness that
consumed her, transforming her from respectable matron to elemental fury. She
pushed back from the desk, leaned back in her chair, and lifted both arms,
knowing that she raised her breasts as well. She brought her hands to the knot of
her hair, yanking the pins from the tight bun, loosening the penitential pressure on
her scalp. She ran her fingers through the wavy strands, and fanned the hair out
before letting it drop where it willed, along her arms, down her shirtwaist, a few
locks coiling in her lap. For good measure, she unbuttoned her collar, and took a
deep breath.

I worked so hard to be a lady, and for what?

"Ah-lees, I am sorry--"

"You are," she agreed. "You're the sorriest man on God's green earth."

Siegfried was startled out of his incipient justifications.

"Or, since we're in California, I guess it's God's
brown
earth." She
clenched her teeth lest she give in to the urge to bite him. "You accused me of--of-
-" Even in this wild remorseless state, she couldn't say it out loud. "And all the time
you
knew
we couldn't sell our crop, you miserable, traitorous, lying
bastard
."

He stood, stiffly at attention, but he flinched the merest fraction, as if her words
were bullets.

She leaned forward, picked up a scrap of paper from the desk and tossed it
into the air. It swooped and swirled, and settled at an angle against his shoes, half
on the braided rug. "You lied about our future. About your baby's future." She
leaned back once more, raising her arms again, clutching the sides of the high-
backed chair by her head, relishing the sight of his eyes, helplessly tracking the
motion of her bosom.

Siegfried recoiled, and half turned away. "I--I did not mean it as a lie, Ah-lees. I
swear to you. I meant it to be true!"

"Bullshit," she said, deliberately using the most vulgar word she knew. It was
amazing how easily it passed her formerly pristine lips. "You just wanted to look
good, so I'd take you to bed." She smiled at him, showing off her teeth. "Well,
guess what?"

He shook his head. Shock had turned his face the color of paper.

"Your days of feather-bed soldiering are over." She stood up, and leaned over
the desk, mirroring Peter's stance of only a few minutes ago. "You have been
found unfit for this woman's army."

She laughed again, at Siegfried's uncomprehending expression. "You're
usually faster off the mark. You. Are.
Fired
. You are hereby required to
vacate the premises. Remove all your belongings--" she paused, and drew her
hand caressingly along her abdomen, "except for this little one. You've forfeited
that right." She looked directly at him, and saw reflected in his face the terrible
creature she had become: no longer good, or kind, or sweet. She was no lady
now. She was far, far stronger, possessed of her mother's spirit. "I never want to
see your face again."

"But, Ah-lees. We are married!"

"I don't give a bright blue damn.
Get the hell off my land
!" she shrieked,
surprising them both. Her hands seized the papers littering her desk, and she
threw them at him, for lack of anything heavier. They swooped in the air like white
crows, the tangible expression of her rage. She took one stamping step around the
desk. "
Get out! Go away! You LIAR! GO AWAY
!"

He broke and fled.

She stood at the doorway, panting, feeling the strain in her throat, the restless
energy coursing through her. Soul-deep satisfaction filled her. She had routed him.
She had sent him packing.

She held on to her triumph as she listened to the muffled sounds of his valise
opening and closing. She watched him as he stumbled down the stairs, out the
door into the cool evening air, until his dark form was a wavering spot against the
night. She locked the front door against his improbable return, and sagged against
the door frame. He was gone!

Then the blaze burned out.

Her back slipped against painted wood. Her feet skidded out from under her,
wrinkling the hall runner, and she was sitting in the entryway. The flooring was
cool. An edge of the door jamb poked into her back. Her body was heavy, so
heavy that the air held her down.

After a while she coughed, because her throat was sore. She swallowed dryly.
Thirsty. She was thirsty.

She clambered up, and wavered in search of the
grappa
bottle left
behind by...left in her office. She was thirsty. She would drink.

The aroma from the open bottle seemed to her the essence of Montclair:
potent, fascinating. She thought of drinking straight from the bottle, and found her
training wasn't overthrown so easily. She drifted to the kitchen and found a coffee
cup, and poured. She took a sip.

It burned on the way down.

It did not taste like wine, thank God.

She took another, bigger sip, then another, and managed to finish the cup.
Then, wearily cradling the bottle, she took herself up to her bedroom.

Gulping down burning mouthfuls of the
grappa
, Alice took off all her
clothes, and left them strewn about the floor. Naked in front of her mirror, she plied
her brush, until her auburn hair crackled and sparkled, and the fine strands drifted
onto her face. She smiled lopsidedly, feeling her mouth twice its normal size.

She didn't want to feel anything. She finished off another mug of
grappa
, and refilled it. This time, she spilled more than went into her cup.
She shrugged, testing if her shoulders were numb yet.

They were.

"Goo' riddnnce," she mumbled, and poured two more shots of
grappa
in
rapid succession. The room began to spin slowly. She felt as if she were riding a
merry-go-round
around and round and round
...She giggled, spilling more
liquor before it reached her mouth, and the cooling effect as it splashed against
her skin made her resolve to put on a nightgown. She lurched to her dresser,
bracing herself against the momentum of the room, and jerked open a drawer.
Pulling the clean white cotton over her head, she flailed a while before she found
the arms and settled the garment. Then she grabbed cup and bottle, staggering
toward the bed, and oblivion.

* * *

His battered suitcase grew heavier by the step as Siegfried trudged slowly
down the dark road. The ruts and stones were treacherous under the soles of his
shoes. He paid little heed, aware only that every step carried him farther from
Montclair, and Alice.