Vintage (24 page)

When he first rounded the corner and saw the prison, Bruno wasn't sure what was more depressing, the building's clinical red-brick façade or the fact that the surrounding tenements had windows overlooking the yard of the notorious prison.

Following the instructions he had been given, he knocked at a side door and an indifferent guard showed him to a bare room
with block walls painted pale green and only a crude bench. He asked for his contact, a fellow named Khramov, and the guard simply turned and left, closing the door behind him.

He returned after an uncomfortably long time and led Bruno down antiseptic halls toward a small office. Khramov rose from behind an ugly metal desk and greeted him in English.

“So how is Aleksei? Does he prosper?” Khramov asked without any warmth in his voice, avoiding Bruno's gaze. He was the consummate bureaucrat, in a cheap white short-sleeved shirt, bad tie and large plastic-framed glasses.

“Aleksei's doing well. He's a restaurateur.”

“Of course he is. Is his wife still a miserable cook?”

“She's learning.”

Khramov issued a dry laugh. “Fortunately Aleksei knows how to diversify. Well, I understand you have an interest in seeing one of our guests. Mr. Varushkin. But I'm afraid he's in a very, very sensitive sector of our facility. It would be difficult to arrange.”

Khramov cleared his throat. There was a long moment of silence and then he offered a wide, greasy smile.

Realizing that this was a signal, Bruno pulled a clean envelope of euros containing the larger part of his remaining balance of Anna's money. He set it on the desk and pushed it toward Khramov. The man tapped it gently, as if measuring the thickness of the stack.

“It will be difficult, but not impossible,” he said.

He led Bruno down the narrow corridor of a classic cell block with pale institutional colors and a flat fluorescent lighting that made everyone look sick. Bruno couldn't help but feel a consumptive tickle in his throat, having been warned about tuberculosis so many times in the past few hours that he'd grown paranoid. They came to a secure portal and Khramov
unceremoniously dipped his hand into the envelope of cash, pulling out a hundred-euro note and handing it to the guard, who unlocked a sliding iron grate of a door.

The cells here were small, lined with a dozen bunk beds and stuffed with inmates. Khramov noted Bruno's gaze.

“It's a bit tight. Especially during periods of . . . unrest. This block is a holding area. They're mostly awaiting trial or transfer. Sometimes we have to have them sleep in shifts. But we make do.”

They passed another guard, and another hundred euros were handed out. They exited the building and crossed a bleak courtyard filled with small wire-fenced runs, like dog kennels. A grim stone building loomed ahead and then they passed another guard station and Khramov handed over another bill.

“Our system is very efficient, no?”

“I'd say the rules are pretty clear.”

“This is the notorious second cell block of Butyrka. Where Isaac Babel met his fate. The place where Mayakovsky, Solzhenitsyn and Ginzburg wrote of horrors. You're a literary fellow yourself, or so I understand. Then you probably know how writers like to exaggerate.”

He paused at one cell, with three bunks, two of which were empty. A man lay on the third reading a newspaper. He looked over his shoulder with disinterest and went back to reading.

“It's more comfortable than the first cell block. We've painted and tidied things up after the whole Magnitsky affair, but other than that, it hasn't changed much. It was never so bad. Don't believe everything you read.”

They wound through corridors, which grew dimmer and more damp, until they reached a door sided by another guard. Khramov peeked in his envelope and then looked at Bruno.
After a moment's hesitation, he gave the man one hundred euros and he opened the door to a bare white room with only a folding table and two chairs. The place was whitewashed, though old stains showed through the paint and an uneven fluorescent light flickered eerily.

A wiry man sat in one of the chairs, his hands cuffed together and his elbows on the table. He smoked, pulling both hands to his face as he dragged on his cigarette. He eyed Bruno and then nodded for him to sit. He had the bearing of a man used to giving orders, even in prison. The guard closed the door with a clang so that Bruno shuddered and then they were alone.

“Your first time in a Russian interrogation room?” the man asked, nodding toward the old stains on the wall. “The KGB did some of its finest work here.”

He stood and extended his cuffed hands to shake. Bruno took his hand and bowed, surprised by the strength in the grip. He now remembered the man's face from articles in the
Economist
. He was much smaller than the photos suggested. Still, he bore the confident manner of someone who had run one of Russia's largest natural gas companies. His name was Anatoly Varushkin, and he'd once been the second wealthiest man in Russia.

“Mr. Tannenbaum, what a pleasure,” Varushkin said, leaning back and expelling a cloud of smoke.

“I'm humbled you know my name.”

“I may appear to you to be a simple convict, but in a past life I had a taste for finer things. After the Soviet collapse, it was possible for a clever man to make a very large amount of money in Russia. I was one of those clever men. I read your novel about the French vineyards. It was very good.”

“I'm surprised. And honored.”

“We are both wine people. In my day, I was quite a collector.
Maybe too zealous. It seems that I forgot to pay some alcohol tariffs, and then”—he gestured around him—“I found myself in here.”

“I thought Butyrka no longer held tax criminals.”

“They conveniently adjusted the charges. You may have read that I once had political ambitions. They accused me of being a Fascist and a member of the Nazbol. But not to worry. I'll have my chance to defend myself. I'm awaiting trial, which may happen anytime within the next twenty years or so. Fortunately for me, Russia is a civilized country and we no longer have the death penalty.”

“Indeed.”

“So, you have a question for me?”

“Yes. I've been told you may know something about the Constanoff Collection.”

“Ah, so that's what it is. Of course I know of it. I purchased much of it at a state auction. Like the auction where I acquired my company, it wasn't exactly open to the public.”

“So it exists?”

“Very much so. Most of it, anyway. Wine, as you know, was meant to be consumed. ‘Drink the good stuff first,' an accountant friend of mine once told me before he took off for the States, coincidentally a short time before I was convicted.” Varushkin narrowed his eyes. “Maybe you know of him? In any case, I should have listened to him. Little good all those bottles I saved are doing me now.”

“Let me ask you,” Bruno said, leaning forward and licking his lips, his heart pounding. It was all coming together for him. The locker in Chicago must have belonged to this man's accountant. He'd never felt closer to his treasure: “Were there any Burgundies in the collection?”

“Burgundies, Chiantis, Bordeaux, Rhônes, Champagne, Barolos. Constanoff was quite a connoisseur.”

“War vintages?”

“Of course.”

“Are there any left?”

“Those were the glory days, Mr. Tannenbaum,” Varushkin said, ignoring Bruno's last question. His eyes were glassy. He stubbed out his cigarette on the table. “I can remember opening bottles that were worth many times more than my father's entire state pension. Every morning I would open five or six bottles . . . mostly just for a taste, and I'd give the rest away to my staff. Can you imagine my yardman bringing home a three-hundred-euro bottle of Cannubi to his family?”

Varushkin smiled without humor. He fished with his cuffed hands in his shirt pocket and pulled out his cigarettes. Bruno helped him retrieve one and lit it for him.

“Thank you.”

He dragged deeply.

“So, Mr. Tannenbaum, is there a particular wine you are seeking?”

Bruno studied the closed door for a moment and then decided to trust Varushkin. What other choice did he have? “Yes. A Trevallier. From the war. Do you know of it?”

“Of course. That same accountant of mine first told me the story of that famous lost vintage. About how it had vanished into thin air. He became obsessed with finding it. He could never have afforded it, so he used my interest in wine to further his desire to locate it. In time, I also became obsessed with it. I always wanted what I couldn't have. I was the second wealthiest man in Russia. But it wasn't enough. I also thought I should be president. And that ambition led me to this . . .” He waved
his hands at the wall. “The ruling party does not care for well-funded competition.”

“So you found the Trevallier?”

Varushkin blinked. “I'm sorry. You see, in my ‘stone sack'—that's what we call our little homes here—I don't speak to anyone. Sometimes for days, weeks, on end. If you'd just met me now you might think I'm a rambling, doddering fool. But when I practiced business, I was focused. I preferred one- and two-word answers, because they were the most efficient. Look at me now.” He puffed on the cigarette and stared at the ceiling for a moment. “I just babble on and on.”

“That's okay. Take your time. I'm not in a hurry,” Bruno lied, leaning back and smiling.

“You know, when I was sent to prison, they took everything I had. My company is now in state control again. And who's in charge? Some bureaucrat, a friend of the president. Just as in the Soviet days. It's like nothing changed. My wife, Katya, was quite distressed by how quickly we lost all of our liquidity. You can't imagine how that makes her feel. She's a good deal younger than I am and she married me for my money. I think she respected me once . . . was impressed by the authority I commanded. But in here . . .” Varushkin held up his shackled hands. “Toward the end I took to hiding things from her, lest she spend what I'd put aside for my legal defense—should my case ever come to trial, that is. I should have let her have the wine. My loyal accountant took most of it when he fled west.”

Bruno politely cleared his throat.

“Ah, yes, my wine. I still have some hidden away, even from him. And Katya, she never appreciated the finer bottles. Oh, she has taste, but she would never recognize the significance of a . . . say . . . '59 Bordeaux. So I've tucked a few bottles away, just in
case I am ever to leave this place, which seems more unlikely by the day. You know, every sensation in the back of your throat, every rattle in your chest . . . it all feels like the onset of consumption. In the business world I based every decision on probabilities. I know the odds now are greater that I die in here than that I eventually get released. Anyway, back to my collection. The best of it is safely tucked away where only I can find it. And the Constanoff bottles are there as well.”

“And there's Trevallier among it?”

“You want to know if it exists, don't you? That is your quest?”

Bruno nodded.

“I'm a caged rat. But I'm also still a businessman. I have something you want. So you must give me something in return. That's how it works. Even the guards here understand this. They are more entrepreneurial than our nation's leaders.”

“I'm almost out of money.”

“Aren't we all? Money is of limited use to me in here, anyway. But still, I should get something, don't you think?”

“That would only be fair.”

Varushkin's eyes grew distant again. “Everything I own has been taken. There are the few hidden treasures. The wine, for instance. But now I can only close my eyes and open those bottles in my imagination. But you . . . you could derive actual pleasure from those wines, eh? You could profit handily should I decide to lead you to them.”

“That's true. And I'll do whatever I can in exchange.”

“You could help me escape?”

Bruno looked alarmed and Varushkin laughed.

“No, I don't think you could. But I've been giving this some thought ever since they told me you wanted to speak to me. You see, my wife is finally divorcing me. She realizes that I'm going to
die in here and that I won't share with her the last vestiges of my fortune. It's not out of spite that I'm withholding what remains from her. But it's true that we have grown estranged. That's what happens when you marry for money and the money's gone.

“You wrote in your book that you believe in the transformative power of food. You said, and I quote, that, ‘A single meal can change your world, heal your wounds, set you free, if only for a moment.' Do you truly believe this, Mr. Tannenbaum?”

“I do.”

“Good. A man who stands by his word. I want you to prove it to me, then. I want to dine with my wife one last time. Here. You cook. You make all the arrangements with whatever resources you have available. I want one final memory . . . one last meal with my wife. Something that they can't take away from me. If you can do this for me . . . transform my circumstances for a moment, help me convince my wife that I love her still and wish her well, then I will give you the answers you seek.” Varushkin's gaze had grown distant, but Bruno's heart was racing. The Russian had laid out a challenge for which Bruno had been preparing his entire life. If he failed now, he had only himself to blame. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end.

“Mr. Varushkin,” Bruno said, thrusting out his hand, “we have a deal.” Varushkin took it, offering an unreadable smile, his grip strong, almost painful. In his mind, Bruno was already planning the menu.

The mighty salmon is known for the strength of its flavor and the epic nature of its journey. It is as forgiving as it is difficult to prepare well, which is why it is a staple at mediocre restaurants, corporate luncheons and catered weddings. But locked within the salmon's genes is the greatest story in all of nature. The odyssey of its exile to the open ocean waters and the return journey of a thousand miles upstream to its mountain brook to spawn and then die: this is as bittersweet and lovely a tale as ever spun by any bard, priest or poet. Cook a salmon well, and her sweet song will rise from the table.