Tainted Tokay (13 page)

35

R
eaching the French ambassador was no easy feat. Benjamin had tried the entire morning, but the ambassador had not deigned to answer his calls. The winemaker took this as a bad omen. Elisabeth was very worried, but Benjamin, grumpy and distracted, reminded her of the many obligations of a diplomat in charge of guaranteeing France's cul
tural prestige.

“Benjamin, stop patronizing me. I know very well what an am
bassador does.”

The winemaker knew better than to bicker. It would only make
matters worse.

It was noon when the ambassador finally responded. The winemaker related the pro
blem in detail.

“You've been having rotten luck, Mr. Cooker. It seems that you're the favored target of traffickers in identity papers, or else your naïveté attracts crooks like wasps to o
verripe fruit.”

“So it appears,” Benjamin r
eplied tersely.

For honesty's sake, Benjamin felt obliged to tell the ambassador about the new problems his friend Claude was facing, the same Claude Nithard whose passport had found its way into questionable hands. The ambassador was both poli
te and curious.

“Mr. Ambassador. Would you be able to
do me a favor?”

“Mr. Cooker, considering what you've been through, I would
be delighted.”

“Would you please find out if Consuela Chavez was truly born in La Plata, Argentina? I'm having some doubts about
her identity.”

“I'll check it out. In the meantime, I suggest that you inform the Tokaj police of all your troubles. Several identity-theft rings have been disbanded in Budapest, but it's clear that the crime is still flourishing. I'm going to request that an honorary consul from Zemplén help you. He'll do the interpreting and will be sure to get your version of th
e facts heard.”

“Thank you, Mr. Ambassador. We were planning to contact the police, but I was concerned about getting our story across i
n full detail.”

“I'm truly sorry, Mr. Cooker, that you've had all these troubles. But is it not true that rot sometimes gives rise to the best wines, lik
e the Tokajis?”

“You have a point. Maybe some good can come of this. I can only hope,” Benjamin said, thanking the d
iplomat again.

Claude Nithard had shut himself up in his hotel room. Benjamin suspected that he had considered taking a taxi to Sárospatak and demanding an accounting from Consuela. But that would have been fruitless. She wouldn't have talked. To deal with his humiliation and pain in private, he had given the winemaker the excuse of having to finish his manuscript. Sooty clouds were clinging to the Carpathian Mountains, and a few drops of rain were possible, but the h
eat had let up.

The honorary consul sent by the French ambassador, a Breton from Telgruc-sur-Mer, was meeting them at two thirty
sharp in Tokaj.

“We can't be late,” insisted Elisabeth, who was growing increasingly apprehensive. Although she didn't say anything, Benjamin knew she feared the police would detain them, the same way they had held Claude. Benjamin had to admit that he was a littl
e nervous too.

At the appointed time and spot, the couple from Bordeaux made the acquaintance of Padrig Legarrec, a fiftyish man with graying temples. The honorary consul was sitting on the edge of a fountain that was in rather poor taste, a contemporary-looking Bacchus slumping over a wine barrel. He had lived in this part of Hungary for twenty-five years and had married a girl from Szegi. But he still
missed France.

“Well, the ocean, in partic
ular,” he said.

At any rate, he was quite proud to be in the company of the author of the famous
Cooker Guide
. Legarrec claimed to be a layman, but his knowledge of Burgundy wines was considerable. Apparently, this Breto
n favored them.

Before they went to the police station, Benjamin related their epic once again, from Budapest to Tokaj. The man looked sympathetic, but didn't seem ready to believe that Elisabeth's passport had wound up in the hands of a gang trafficking in i
dentity papers.

“These petty thefts—most of the time it's kids who just want the money,” he said. “You know how they like their bra
nd-name shoes.”

The police station was shabby retro: a laminate desk, a tinplate lamp, an ancient computer with a tiny screen, and photographs of the Danube tacked to the whitewashed walls. Three officers were waiting for them, one of them the man who had placed Benjamin under house arrest the previous day. The officer gave the honorary counsel an icy greeting. The two exchanged a few comments in Magyar, and then the officer sat down at hi
s old computer.

The winemaker carefully reconstructed his Hungarian adventure, his status as a man of the arts, his longstanding friendship with Claude Nithard, and his desire to know everything about aszú wines, which he placed in the panthe
on of liqueurs.

Then he related their seemingly fortuitous meeting with Zoltán. The boy's eagerness to please had impressed his wife, and they had hired him to be their guide. But then the trip began to fall apart. There was the episode at the Gellért Baths, followed by Claude's misadventure, the bizarre tasting in the Tokaj cellar belonging to a winemaker whose name he read on some labels but whose real son he was no longer sure he had met. As Legarrec methodically interpreted Benjamin's saga, the officer stopped the winemaker from time to time to ask questions and have him repeat certain facts. Elisabeth, meanwhile, was nodding to reinforce her h
usband's words.

The officer quit tapping on the keyboard and turned to the Breto
n intermediary.

“Please ask Mr. Cooker if he would be able to recognize the men who took him to th
e wine cellar.”

“Certainly,” the Cookers answered in unison when the interpreter finished askin
g the question.

The investigator opened his desk drawer and took out a dog-eared folder. He removed some black-and-white photos and slid them across the desk. Benjamin and Elisabeth studied the pictures for several minutes but didn't recognize anyone. The officer took another handful of pictures out of the folder and passed them over. Still, none of the faces looked familiar. Then Benjamin leaped
from his chair.

“
Th
at
one I know!”

Elisabeth looked at her husband
with wide eyes.

“It's Viktor! He was on the ship with us, a crewmember, the one who plied us with beer the night Claude was in the doldrums. I recognize him perfectly. He even gave Claude his number. Too bad Claude threw it away. He was grilling us about our trip, the bastard. Now I understand. He was mapp
ing his plans!”

For the first time, the Hungarian police officer broke into a smile. He handed Benjamin
another photo.

“And this one was his sidekick,” Benjamin said. “There's no doubt about it. His name was Attila. He was quieter than the other one. I should have known better. I didn't l
ike his looks.”

At the behest of the police officer, Legarrec asked Benjamin
if he was sure.

“Absolutely sure,” the win
emaker replied.

The officer looked to Elisabeth for confirmation. She couldn't respond with the same certitude as her husband, but now she remembered the two men in the photos. They were definitely on the ship. To that sh
e could attest.

The officer turned back to the computer and tapped away. With a satisfied expression, he finished typing and lit a cigarette. He exhaled the smoke and asked if Claude would confirm what the winemaker
had just said.

“Yes, I'm sure he can,” Ben
jamin answered.

The Hungarian officer and Legarrec then launched into a discussion that Benjamin couldn't follow. But the tone sounded full of innuendo, and Legarrec's face had suddenl
y clouded over.

“Mr. Legarrec, can you tell me what the officer jus
t said to you?”

The Breton looked carefully at the officer and then turne
d to Benjamin.

“The two individuals you've just identified are precisely the ones who came to your hotel yesterday afternoon and asked for Mr. Nithar
d's companion.”

“Oh, no,” Elis
abeth murmured.

Benjamin felt his throat tighten. He reached for his wife's hand and squeezed it. Then he withdrew a Bolivar cigar from his
sharkskin case.

“May I?” he asked the officer, who was crushing his cigarette in an ashtray that was, in fact, a repurpose
d shell casing.

“Be my guest,” the of
ficer answered.

The winemaker lit up his Cuban and took a long drag. He let the smoke calm him while he assimi
lated the news.

After a few moments Benjamin gave the Trabant keys to the guarantor of Hungarian security, whose demeanor had become relaxed. The officer asked the two French citizens to initial their statement. Then he leaned over to examine the ring of Be
njamin's cigar.

“Imensas from Bolivar, seventeen centimeters long, impeccable draw,” explained the
Cooker Guide
author, as he pulled another one out and offered it to the officer. “Hints of coffee and honey. Please translate, Mr. Legarrec. Cigar smokers are always good company. It's true throughout old Europe. Sp
read the word.”

After they filed their complaint, the Cookers, relieved but still perplexed, invited Padrig Legarrec to their inn for a glass of aszú. The Breton needed no convincing. Benjamin autographed the latest edition of his guide and gave it to him. Legarrec was flattered. As the discussion of the cost of aszú grapes wore on, Elisabeth e
xcused herself.

“I'm going to check on Claude,” she told Benjamin, who nodded and kissed he
r on the cheek.

Padrig Legarrec finally took his leave after a third glass of Tokaji, a lovely concentration of sweetness from a young winemaker named Zoltán Demeter. The two men praised the excellent aszú, but Benjamin found himself thinking about the treachery of his own Zoltán. Surely the young man had returned to Budapest, where, in urban anonymity, he was pursuing naïve tourists on some church steps or in markets rife with the ar
oma of paprika.

Benjamin returned to his room and found Elisabeth r
eading a book.

“I knocked on Claude's door, but he didn't answer. Then I checked with the innkeeper, and she said he had taken the taxi to Sárospatak. Maybe he'll be back
by dinnertime.”

Evening fell, and Claude Nithard did not materialize. Benjamin stayed up part of the night, waiting for him with an open cedar box of cigars and his notepad, where he jotted down some thoughts on the Tokajis he had tasted during the trip. Still, Claude didn't show up. The shutters in his room were closed and latched. And yet Benjamin could make out his friend's Panama hat hanging
from the lever.

36

V
irgile had left Alexandrine with a stack of wine magazines and returned to Cooker & Co. to look over the lab reports that were coming in. The situation there
was improving.

At the end of the day, he returned to the apartment to find Didier and Alexandrine set
ting the table.

“Virgile, I hope you don't mind. I invite
d Didier over.”

“I picked us up something to eat,” Didier said, with his
signature grin.

Virgile set down his things. “I hope i
t's not pizza.”

“Man of little faith. I went to that restaurant down the street and brought us some foie gras with fig jam and, just for you, son of Bergerac, some
magret de canard
. I'm presuming you'll have a decent bottl
e to serve up.”

Virgile took in the spread of food and the relaxed look on Alexandrine's face. Her nose was still bandaged, but Virgile couldn't miss the light that had come into her eyes again. Was it because Didier was there? Virgile felt the usual jealousy bubbling up again and reminded himself that Didier was not actually his rival. So maybe that glimmer in Alexandrine's eye was from their romp un
der the sheets?

“Alex, you're looking so much better. That bandage will be coming o
ff in no time.”

“I guess confession is good for the soul and the body,” Alexandrine answered, smiling. “I've kept that secret for too long. I think I'm beginning to tu
rn the corner.”

Virgile grabbed a set of keys from a wall hook. “I'll go get us a bottle from the cellar. Something cla
ssic for duck?”

“No Médoc—we get that all the time, or Fronton, which goes best when the duck is served with spices
,” Didier said.

“Well, what about a wine from my home region then, a Bergerac? I've got a few older bottles with smooth tannins that will be just right. I'll grab a Graves too for
the foie gras.”

The three of them sat around the table, spreading foie gras on toast. Didier and Virgile sipped wine, while Alexandrine stuck to water. Virgile filled them in on Mr. Cooker's misadventu
res in Hungary.

Virgile got up to heat up the main course and grab the second bottle of wine, which he had opened earlier to allow
it to breathe.

“You're not really heating the duck in the microwave, are you
?” Didier said.

“Don't worry, I got it!” Virgile said, bringing the dish to the table and serving up the red wine. They started in on t
he main course.

“I'm not used to being so idle,” Alexandrine said. “Tell me a
bout your day.”

“We're catching up on lab reports. How are things on the mildew
front, Didier?”

“On the list of vintners you gave to me, only one said he hadn't found any mildew in his vineyard. I told him he probably hadn't looked closely enough, considering the high humidity and the
temperatures.”

“Good answer. You should stop by tomorrow and give the vines a good look. How'd you get on with that newbie vintner? The idealist from Paris who thinks he can make wine without treating the
vines at all?”

“I told him he should do the canopy management himself, and after he spent a full day of picking off leaves to give the bunches some sunlight, I went back and he was nearly begging me for some effective treatment. We agreed on d
usting sulfur.”

“That's org
anic at least.”

“Boys, you've got to stop. I want to go back to work so much. Enough, I want to get back to my normal life,” Alex
andrine cut in.

Both men looked at her and an uncomfortable si
lence followed.

“What?”

Didier was the first to speak up. “You can't just let it be with
your stepdad.”

“He's right, Alex. You've got
to report him.”

She set down her knife an
d fork. “What's

past is past.”

“Listen, Alex, your childhood is one thing, but the man attacked you in your home. He's dangerous. The only way you're going to come to any peace and be able to go home and, as you say, get back to a normal life, is to get
him locked up.”

She stood up and walked over
to the window.

“Virgile's right,” Didier said. “It's like with the Blanchards—when you keep the ghosts locked away in silence, they always find a way to come back and haunt you. You've got to talk about it. You've got to get this ou
t in the open.”

Virgile walked over to her, put his hands on her shoulders, and turned her around. “Alex, Mr. Cooker has connections with the police. We can go see Inspector Barbaroux t
ogether, okay?”

She looked him in the eye, then looked at Didier. “Okay,
okay, you win.”

Then she grinned. “I see you've already bonded in a conspira
cy against me.”