The Champagne Queen (The Century Trilogy Book 2)

by Petra Durst-Benning

  Leon must have ridden along this road many times, thought Isabelle. He would have pedaled through here very fast while training for his great passion, cycle racing. A smile spread across her lips, and she suddenly felt closer to her husband than she had in all those weeks of mourning.

  They had been riding for a good hour when they reached a flat area by the river shaded by huge old beech and pine trees. It was the perfect spot for a picnic.

  With unaccustomed hunger, Isabelle watched while Ghislaine set out the picnic on a blanket that Clara had brought. Cold fried chicken, a salad with olives and artichokes, cheese, and grapes. And champagne! The women watched admiringly as Ghislaine, with practiced ease, opened the first bottle.

  “À la vôtre!” she said, raising her glass.

  “Santé!” said Josephine and Clara.

  “À la vôtre,” Isabelle and Sophie repeated, then they turned to the food.

  Well fed and satisfied, they lay down in the soft grass. Before Isabelle knew it, her eyes closed. The fresh air, the physical strain, all the food . . . Of course she was tired. It felt good to get out of the house again, she realized, and it was wonderful to have her friends there with her. A lovely outing, and so much better because Josephine and Clara were finally keeping their good advice to themselves.

  Isabelle was woken by the warmth of the sun on her left cheek. She sat up, dazed. A moment later, two pairs of eyes were peering at her expectantly.

  “Finally! I thought you weren’t ever going to wake up. We have to talk, urgently!” said Josephine. Clara nodded energetically beside her.

  “Where’s Ghislaine? Has something happened?” In a second, Isabelle was wide awake, her heart pounding fearfully. Cycling was dangerous. But to her relief, Josephine said, “Everything’s fine. Ghislaine and Sophie have gone to the next village to find someone who can give us a lift back to Hautvillers on a cart. They’ve been gone a long time, and they’ll probably be coming back any moment. We’ve got something we need to discuss before they come back!”

  “What, then?” Isabelle asked reluctantly.

  “The chance of a lifetime!” said Clara excitedly.

  Isabelle listened in silence as her two friends told her about the advertisement in the newspaper. With the end of the century fast approaching, the Americans were predicting that their countrymen’s appetite for champagne would only increase. They were coming to Troyes and holding court in the Hotel l’Esplanade. Any winemaker who was interested in doing business with them simply had to take along a few bottles of champagne for tasting and be able to provide a list of their current stock.

  Isabelle, of course, could see where they were going. To stall for time, she said, “Why Troyes? It’s about seventy miles south of Épernay. If these people want to buy champagne, they could make it much easier for themselves and travel to Reims.”

  “Micheline said that huge champagne auctions took place in Troyes a long time ago. Maybe that’s why the Americans chose it. But really, it makes no difference which town they’re in,” Josephine said impatiently.

  “Don’t you understand?” said Clara, almost pleading. “This could be your chance to get rid of your stock of champagne, all at once. You’re the one who told us that no one in Europe is interested in your wine but that the Americans prefer those kinds of sweet wines—you have exactly what the Americans are looking for!”

  Isabelle looked out over the sluggish waters of the Marne and nervously tried to find something to say. “There are hundreds of vintners in the Champagne region. What makes you think I have any chance at all with the Americans?”

  “Because Americans like your champagne! And besides—we’ll go with you,” said Josephine. “You have all those pretty dresses in your wardrobe. If we do ourselves up nicely, three alluring young women . . . well, if we can’t bewitch the Americans with our charms, who can?”

  “You make it sound so easy. Selling champagne—that takes an expert!” Isabelle said. “Leon rode from pillar to post and managed to sell next to nothing, and now you think that we three women would have any more luck? What do we know about selling champagne? I don’t care how loudly the men in Ghislaine’s restaurant scoffed—no one around here is going to let good business slip through their fingers. I’m telling you, there will be dozens of vintners there. The competition will be huge.” She shook her head. “The trip would be doomed to failure from the start.”

  An uncomfortable silence followed, but it seemed as if she had succeeded in convincing her friends that their idea would not work. “In the past, perhaps, before I knew just how miserably life could treat you, I might have let you talk me into such a folly. I would have looked on the whole thing as an adventure, with nothing to lose and everything to gain. These days, I know better.”

  “But—” Josephine began to say, sounding desperate.

  “You know nothing better!” Clara blurted. “You’re a coward, I’d say. You have no interest at all in finding a way back into your own life, especially when it’s so much easier to sit around and drown in self-pity!” As she spoke, she stood up and grabbed Isabelle roughly by the arm, pulling her to standing. “Well, if that’s how you feel, you might as well go and drown yourself right now. Maybe there are some creepers down there in the water that will pull you down, and then that’s it for you! You’ll be with your Leon again, and someone else can look after the Feininger estate, someone with some guts. Someone like that Henriette Trubert, who can hardly wait to sink her claws into your land.” Clara let out a shrill laugh. “Maybe I’ll pay her a visit this afternoon and tell her that she won’t have to wait much longer, hmm?”

  Frozen with shock, Isabelle could only stand and gape at her friend. This couldn’t be good little Clara talking like that!

  “Clara? We agreed that we would try it my way,” whispered Josephine, sounding almost frightened.

  “My way, your way!” Clara dismissed Josephine’s objection. “We traveled six hundred miles to come here and help Isabelle. Day after day, we nurse poor madame like a bird that’s fallen too early from its nest. And for what? ‘I can’t do that; I don’t want to.’” She mimicked Isabelle’s mournful tone. “You wanted to run the winery, and Leon left it up to you to do just that. A man puts his trust in you, and what do you do with it? And what about the baby in your belly? Are you planning on telling your child that her mama is the biggest coward of them all?”

  “Who do you think you are, talking to me like that? You have no right!” Isabelle pulled her arm free. Every word Clara said was like a stroke from a whip. She had never thought that her friend could be so mean to her—especially not mothering, caring Clara.

  “Clara, what’s gotten into you?” cried Josephine in dismay.

  “What’s gotten into me? Do you really want to know? I am not a grieving widow. I am a loyal and loving wife, but that doesn’t make everything in my life rosy.” As she spoke she seemed to crumple, like a bellows with all the air gone out of it. “Oh, it’s all so unfair!” Then she burst into tears.

  Isabelle and Josephine looked at each other helplessly. Josephine held out a handkerchief to Clara.

  After a moment, Clara blew her nose, then took a deep breath. Red-eyed, she looked out to the river and said, “I would give anything to have the chances you have! Making decisions for yourself. Setting things in motion and making sure they go where you want them to. Instead, Gerhard patronizes me like I’m a little girl. I can’t even decide what soup goes on the table. I get the housekeeping money handed to me, and I have to account for every pfennig, and I have to beg and plead for household purchases. He has to approve the weekly meal plan in advance. I have to inform him about every step I take, whether I’m off shopping or going for a walk or visiting the library, where I’m quite welcome to borrow Gardener’s Monthly or a respectable novel, but I must never dare to open one of his precious textbooks! Women are too stupid for anything like that, in his opinion. The only thing he gives me a free hand with is raising our son, because that’s woman’s wo
rk. Otherwise I have as little freedom as Gerhard can possibly manage, like a dog on a short chain.”

  She looked up, and in her expression Isabelle saw so much despair, so much suppressed fury, that a tremor ran down her spine. She sought some kind of comforting words, some solace.

  But Clara looked at her threateningly and said, “Spare me your pity. I made my own bed, and now I have to lie in it. But you, Isabelle . . . go do something with your life.” Her voice was hoarse now. “Think of that wind of change. You owe it to me and all the other women who have few opportunities.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Daniel Lambert leaned against the windowsill in Henriette Trubert’s office and watched his employer say good-bye to her guest. Until a few minutes earlier, the eighty-eight-year-old Francois Leblanc had been the proud owner of a very well-situated vineyard that he had worked by himself until that day. The sale of his Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier grapes had given the old man a good living over the years, and now the sale of the vineyard itself had made him a rich man. Even richer, however, was Henriette Trubert—in land.

  When Francois was gone, Henriette turned back toward Daniel, wearing a satisfied smile.

  “If only it were always so easy,” she said with a sigh and sat behind her desk. “Now Francois can go and enjoy his remaining years in warmer climes, where perhaps he will be free of the pain his arthritis caused him.” She gestured to Daniel to sit in the chair in front of her desk. He did so reluctantly. This close to the harvest, every moment was precious, and Henriette knew perfectly well that he had no time to chat.

  “Congratulations. The Leblanc vineyard is in one of the best locations in all of Champagne,” he said, because he knew he was expected to say something.

  Henriette laughed. “I’m the last person you need to tell that to! Best if you could go and look it over today and let me know what condition the vines are in. The Pinot Noir, in particular, will be a wonderful complement to our champagnes.” Her smile vanished and, changing the topic abruptly, she said, “By the way, I have heard that Isabelle Feininger is traveling to Troyes to meet the Americans.” Although she tried to adopt an indifferent tone, Daniel could see how tense Henriette really was. Her mouth, excessively made up as usual, was slightly pinched. The dark-red satin of her dress rustled with every nervous movement.

  “I don’t know anything about it, madame,” he said calmly, although Ghislaine had already told him. “The two visitors are a blessing,” she had said, full of admiration. “They really know how to get through to Isabelle.”

  “I assume her friends from Berlin have put her up to it,” Henriette said promptly. “As weak as Isabelle was the last few times I visited her, she would have been in no condition for something like this. If you ask me, the widow is far too frail for the trip, and the kind of tough negotiating she’ll need to do down there is certainly beyond her.” Henriette’s tone betrayed both annoyance and impatience.

  “Why worry about where Madame Feininger goes or what she does?” Daniel asked, as innocently as possible.

  Henriette looked at him suspiciously. “You know perfectly well what this is about. I need to nudge the poor widow about this far to get her to sell me her estate!” She held up her right hand with the thumb and index finger a fraction of an inch apart. “She would probably have signed on the spot on my next visit. And then along come these friends of hers and mess up everything. What happens if Isabelle Feininger actually manages to sell her champagne to the Americans? Most likely it will put her back on her feet again, and she’ll be as arrogant as she ever was. Who knows what else those Berlin witches are whispering in her ear? She might end up wanting to stay here. But I will put a stop to that!”

  Isabelle back on her feet. Daniel could imagine far worse.

  It must have shown on his face, because Henriette immediately said, “Daniel, we are talking about the land of your forefathers! When it belongs to me, you can do whatever you like with it. Picture that for a minute. No more slinking like a thief through the Feininger vineyards. You could legally, legitimately, walk through Lambert land again on your morning inspections. And on New Year’s Eve, for the turn of the century, there will be a champagne with your name on it: Trubert-Lambert. Isn’t that what you want?” Her voice had turned velvety soft and seductive.

  Daniel closed his eyes as if to protect himself from the image that Henriette was sketching out for him.

  “I’d rather talk about what you want,” he said brusquely. “Why is it so important to you to own the Feininger land at all? You already own practically everything around the village. Why don’t you simply buy Isabelle Feininger’s crop from her? The result would be the same—we would have more grapes and could produce more champagne.”

  “And I thought that at least you would understand me.” There was disappointment in Henriette’s voice, along with a little bitterness that her next words only accentuated. “It isn’t enough that my esteemed husband prefers practically anything to business, but it seems I also have a cellar master without the slightest sense of ambition.” She sniffed disdainfully.

  “What does my ambition have to do with your land?” Daniel replied, with no less disdain. “Isn’t it always my champagnes that bring home one prize after another from the major shows? How would you describe my efforts to create the best champagne of all time, if not ambitious?”

  She had some nerve to attack him like that. He practically breathed champagne, day and night; even in his dreams, he tasted the characteristics of the individual grapes on his tongue, possessed by the idea of creating the perfect cuvée. Did she really think he only did it for the money? His love of champagne, his passion for the grapes, his ambition to show everybody what a Lambert could truly do—that was what drove him.

  “Don’t you understand?” Henriette said, her voice becoming shrill. “Trubert champagnes can only be made from Trubert grapes, and those can only grow on Trubert land! Of course I could buy grapes, but it wouldn’t be the same.” Now it was she who closed her eyes for a moment.

  Daniel didn’t know what inner demons she encountered when she did that.

  When she looked at him again, she said, “Do you think I don’t know how my husband’s affair with your sister sullies the name of Trubert, how everyone goes on about it the moment my back is turned? He strives after great love—ha! How ridiculous!” she spat. “I strive after something much grander, much bigger. Love dies but land survives. I will be the one to ensure that the name Trubert becomes the greatest name in all of Champagne! One day it will be like this: someone who wants to drink a glass of champagne will say, ‘Let’s open a bottle of Trubert!’ and everyone who utters that name will do so with due reverence. No one will care what my adulterous husband is up to. Trubert equals champagne—as it should. And this is why I’ve been doing some serious thinking about your meeting with the Americans tomorrow.”

  “Oh yes?” said Daniel sharply. “You know what I think about the whole thing. If all your salesmen weren’t already away, I never would have let you talk me into making this trip, not so close to the harvest. But so be it. I’ll visit the Americans, introduce them briefly to our wines, and open the doors for future business. And then I’ll say a friendly au revoir!” He made a fluttering gesture with one hand, meant to demonstrate his departure.

  “And that is exactly what you won’t do. Instead, you will sell the Americans Trubert champagne with all the passion and conviction you can muster. Whenever you visit our mutual friend, Raymond Dupont, in Reims, you seem able to handle the sales side very well indeed. And you’ll do something else, too, which is sell our champagnes at such an unbeatable price that not even poor desperate Madame Feininger will be able to compete. This business with the Americans is her last chance. If she misses it, then she has no choice but to sell to me.”

  “But—”

  “No buts. Here with me, you enjoy freedoms that would be the envy of any other cellar master. Have I ever interfered with how you create your champagnes? And now, j
ust once, I ask you for a favor.” She looked at him with an expression both imploring and uncompromising. “By tomorrow evening, I want to see Isabelle Feininger broken—her and her clever friends. You know what you have to do.”

  Troyes was a medieval city on the Seine, around eighty miles south of Reims. Until well into the seventeenth century, Troyes had been a major trade center for goods of every kind: silk from the Orient, fabrics from Holland, the finest Calabrian lace, orange trees from Spain, and far more besides. All of it arrived via ship, from the sea and up the Seine to the buyers in Troyes. In return, the foreign traders loaded their ships’ holds with thousands of crates of champagne. The citizens of Troyes were so proud of this that they claimed that the historical old part of the city, if seen from above, was shaped like a champagne cork, which only went to show that Troyes was at least as important as Reims for the champagne trade.

  As Daniel made his way through the narrow cobblestone alleys toward the square in front of the town hall, he wondered whether the American businessmen were aware of such historical facts when they chose the city as a place to buy champagne. He had other questions on his mind as well.

  Why exactly was his loyalty to Henriette dwindling? The vineyards, the wine cellar, the champagne—he and Henriette seemed to have so many things in common, but he was beginning to realize that the gap between his goals and what his employer wanted from him was growing wider and wider.