Silence fell over the table as the family began to eat their meal of chicken and onions. Sara’s watered wine tasted bitter. “Pipi du chat!” her father might normally have complained. In his frugality, he saved the best wines for sale, rather than for his own enjoyment.
Lydia attempted to change the subject. “I had the good fortune to meet Bastien in town, Papa. He promised to call in a fortnight when he returns to Vouvray.”
“Perhaps he would join us for our little fête when we are finished with the harvest, my dear.” Papa’s spirits seemed to be genuinely buoyed by Lydia’s obvious joy.
“See, Luc, you only have to wait a few months and you’ll have a son to help you run Saint Martin.” Maman would not relent.
“What does Bastien know about growing grapes and making wine?” Sara’s voice tightened with frustration. “His family buys wine and sells it for profit. He’s an opportunist, not a vigneron.”
“Sara is right, Marguerite. Although I’m sure Bastien shows great promise in the wine trade, I think his father’s negotiant business and our farm should remain separate for the time being.”
Lydia’s mouth puckered. “Very well, Papa, but you will see in time that Bastien is more than capable of operating the farm. I’ve heard that Philippe has established a vineyard in America and fares quite well.”
“I’m sure that’s the case, my dear.” Maman was dismissive. She did not like to hear about Bastien’s younger brother, the dark horse of the Lemieux family.
The conversation between Lydia and Sara’s parents drifted into more congenial territory. They spoke of the sturdiness of the twice-used barrels Papa was cleaning for this year’s vintage, the poor timing of Madame Roux’s sixth child, born the day before the harvest, and the pantry items Maman would require for the end-of-harvest celebration.
Sara, however, was lost in her own thoughts, marveling at the audacity of her mother’s and sister’s presumptions. Didn’t they know that she was the one who would someday run the vineyard? She would be the vigneron of Saint Martin. She would grow the grapes and make the wine and ship it in shiny corked bottles to America. Papa had said so.
The retreating sun painted the November sky in streaks of orange and gold. The days of picking were nearly over. Every vine had been examined, and Papa estimated that three of the five non-resistant hectares were infected with phylloxera. The seven healthy hectares, God willing, would produce well over two hundred barrels of sellable wine. But only the pressing of the grapes and fermentation in the week that followed would give them a notion of how much wine had been gathered in, and its quality. Sara was keen to help Jacques squeeze the juice from the grapes and was in the cellar, shoveling fruit into the basket press, when Jacques and Papa entered. Sara knew Papa would be required to feign displeasure, for Maman had given him explicit instructions not to allow her to participate in tasks she deemed particularly unrefined, such as grape hauling and pressing.
“Sara.” Papa’s brown eyes warmed. “I know you are eager to be of use, but your maman swore to me she’d have me drawn and quartered if I so much as suggested you move grapes or turn the press. And I have to wonder, despite your resolve, if you’ll break that narrow back of yours.”
Sara looked down at the floor to hide her delight, for this was the opportunity she had been waiting for. “As you wish, Papa, but if you are not going to let me work the press, perhaps you would allow me to watch and record my observations in my notebook?” Sara tilted her head to the side and smiled sweetly at Jacques. Jacques just shook his head, and his lip tugged into a half-grin.
“Fine, fine.” Papa waved his hand as he turned to walk through the long rows of barrels to the back of the cellar. “Jacques, show Sara how it’s done. I’ll be in the back engaged in the sorcery of trying to craft a profit.”
Sara pulled over a stool and settled herself down happily. For three harvests now, Sara had tried to wheedle the intricate details of grape pressing out of Jacques, with little success so far. He had always been reluctant to answer her many questions, but this year would be different.
Jacques silently finished filling the press with grapes. He worked the capstan to slowly screw the top plate down onto the fruit. Sara could hear the grapes squish and release their juice. The basket itself was wider than her outstretched arms. Four iron bands held its narrow, vertical wooden staves together. The juice dribbled down between the staves into a trough and flowed to the tub below. The resulting liquid, known as must, would fill a barrel. Once this batch was pressed, the skins would be cleared with shovels and the press would be refilled to begin the process anew. Each harvested grape would be pressed a total of four times. The must from the first three pressings would be fermented in large vats and pasteurized to make a fine wine that would be sold in casks to the Lemieux family for blending and bottling. The fourth pressing would be made into table wine to be sold cheaply to the local villagers. The leftover skins would be given to the pickers or used for fertilizer. It would take ten days to crush the grapes that had been harvested.
“So, I can see I have your undivided attention,” Jacques teased Sara.
“You do. Pray, go on. I believe you were just about to reveal your vintner’s secrets to me.” Sara loved ribbing Jacques, who took great pride in the fact that he was the only man Papa trusted to work the screw press.
“Secrets? I think not. If you want to spend your time recording the ramblings of an old man, suit yourself.”
“Did you not teach Papa about wine?”
“About winemaking, yes. But he knows more about growing and pruning.” Jacques paused and turned to Sara. “Making good wine is like anything else, my dear. It’s only after you’ve produced vats of vinegar that you are able to master the art of making a fine-tasting wine.”
Sara laughed. Jacques cranked the screw down another notch.
“This press is the same design we’ve been using for almost a thousand years. The pineau grapes require a gentle touch. The mistake many vintners make is failing to add pressure once they hit the cake of grapes at the bottom. With the right pressure and mixing, the wine will sing with the flavors of almonds and quinces—pure, sweet joy. And it will fetch a handsome price. Use too heavy a hand, and you’ll end up with cat water.”
Sara jotted a few notes down in her journal as she observed Jacques working the press. The process took so much time; Sara wondered why Papa hadn’t invested in more efficient equipment, like the new Morineau three-man press she had seen advertised in the wine trade papers. “Wouldn’t it be more efficient to purchase a larger press that could work the grapes faster?”
Jacques shook his head. “Faster is never better. Besides, those presses are costly, and when your father had to decide between upgrading the press and purchasing new rootstock, I advised him to spend his money on the fruit first.”
Jacques was, above all, a practical man, and Papa had relied on his expertise for over twenty-five years now. Jacques and his wife, Sabine, had moved from Bourgogne to Saint Martin after the Prussian war to help Papa make wine from the ancient vines Maman had inherited. Tragically, Sabine Chevreau died of cholera in 1875, three years before Sara was born. Jacques had often credited Luc and Marguerite for sustaining him through the dark days after Sabine’s death. Jacques was part of the Thibault family—a steadfast brother to her father. Sara had never witnessed a stronger bond between two men.
Sara loved to hear how Papa had saved Jacques during the war. It was a gallant tale, one of true friendship.
“Tell me my favorite story again, Jacques,” Sara entreated him.
“You never tire of hearing it?” Jacques continued to turn the capstan, speaking between labored breaths. “Your papa was just a babe, ten years younger than I. He barely had a whisker on that cherubic face of his. His heart was aflutter for his new bride, the charming Marguerite, whom I had not yet met. It was near the end of the Prussian war, 1871. Léon Gambetta was entrenched in a muck-and-mire battle with the Germans. He decided he needed reinforcem
ents from his countrymen.” Jacques paused for what Sara could only assume was dramatic effect. She obliged him and leaned forward.
“Do you know what that brazen rascal did? He circumvented the German armies by running a hot-air balloon across the border, back into France! He rallied us paysans across the countryside to join him in the effort to defeat the Prussian pigs. Your father and I were assigned to the same regiment, you’ll recall.
“During the army’s final stand at Le Mans—it was a gruesome and bloody battle, not for the faint of heart.” Jacques shook his head at the unpleasant memory. “Anyhow, a steely-eyed Prussian pinned me down, raised his axe and made ready to hack me to pieces. My blood ran cold—I was terrified. All of a sudden, the soldier was struck by a force I could not account for. He was knocked to the ground instantly, and I realized that Luc had shot him clean through the head.” Jacques stopped turning the screw and looked at Sara. “We lost the battle, of course, but I won my life that day, thanks to your father. It is a debt I will never be able to repay.”
“What in the blazes are you going on about, man? You have more than repaid me—in sweat spent on that blessed press for the past twenty years!” Sara and Jacques laughed, startled to find Papa standing behind them, scratching pen to paper atop one of the empty barrels.
Jacques looked amused. “Well, maybe I’d agree with that today. How are the figures adding up?”
“Why don’t you two come take a gander? I want to make sure I haven’t missed anything.”
Sara and Jacques huddled around Papa to review his calculations. As Papa ran his finger down the column of figures, Sara’s anxiety grew. With taxes, vine trimming, fertilizer, plowing, sulfur, harvesting, and new barrels, their costs ran to 7,200 francs this year. The last entry caught Sara by surprise. It listed 600 francs in interest expense, which brought the grand total to 7,800 francs.
“Seventy-eight hundred francs! That’s 780 francs in expenses per hectare versus 600 last year. And what is this?” Sara’s finger rested on the questionable fee.
“Interest owed on the money we borrowed to replant half the vineyard,” her father said evenly.
“That’s outrageous! Surely we could find a way to reduce this payment—even just for this year?”
“I doubt it, Sara,” Papa rubbed his forehead, sounding defeated. “We were fortunate to get the loan in the first place.”
“But that was years ago.”
“Yes, but we still owe over four thousand francs in principal this December, and we incur a significant expense each year in interest payments.” Papa’s face was strained as he reviewed the figures again. Sara knew that expenses were higher this year, but this was not unexpected. What was unexpected was the new aphid infestation that had cost them almost a third of their production.
Jacques seemed to be thinking the same thing. “Luc, what price will we need to secure from Lemieux to meet our expenses?”
Papa scrawled his final estimates on the page:
Expenses......................................7,800
Repayment of loan principal.......4,100
Less monies owed to St. Martin.....428
Total expenses...........................11,472
“That’s over eleven thousand francs we owe. That means if we produce just over two hundred barrels from the good vines, we’ll need a price of”—Papa scribbled some calculations—“over fifty francs per barrel. Considering Lemieux gave us fifty-two last year, I’d say we’ll make it, if my estimates are correct.”
“And if the buyers are in a generous mood,” Jacques added.
Sara knew that Papa was also assuming that he could collect the cash or barrels of wine owed to him by the eight neighboring vignerons, winemakers with small properties who had borrowed bread, milk and tools in return for payment after the harvest. He planned to resell their wine at the market price and make a small profit. In addition, he was assuming that he could persuade Lemieux to pay him promptly, rather than waiting four months after receipt of the casks to make the final payment, as was customary. The odds of all these things happening in perfect sequence seemed slim, even in Sara’s limited experience, but she did not want to add to Papa’s difficulty by sharing her doubts.
“Jacques, when are they going to set the price?” Papa was clearly concerned.
“The guild is meeting with the curate next Thursday. We’ll know then.”
“More than last year?”
“Perhaps. It all depends on whether or not the other vineyards are infected and, of course, how many buyers Lemieux has lined up.”
“What do you hear from Cazalet and Breuil?” Papa’s neighbors produced equally fine wines and might also suffer from an infestation. Their collective misfortune could be their salvation this year, if the low production in Vouvray raised the regional prices.
“Only that there’s a lot of demand coming from Paris. That could help us. If the others have been hit hard with the bug, the price will remain high. If not, our price could drop by ten francs or more.”
“We’ll need at least fifty francs per barrel,” Papa repeated.
“Phew!” Jacques leaned in, his elbows resting on the barrel. “I don’t know, Luc. Can you call in any of your debts early?” Sara knew they needed the cash now if they were going to make the December loan payment on time.
“No. Everyone, including the growers who owe me, is waiting on that price.” Papa shook his head in frustration. “Can we produce the tasting wine before the meeting?”
“Of course. But why?”
“If it is of a high quality, we’ll make sure Lemieux tastes it before the meeting. If he likes it, we might persuade him to guarantee us a good price before the meeting, in exchange for our assurance that we will sell him the entire stock. At the very least, perhaps we can persuade him that this year’s wine deserves a higher price. I might have more influence with him now that our families will soon be connected. He could be instrumental in convincing the wine merchants’ guild to set the buy price high.”
Jacques slapped Papa on the back reassuringly. “It’ll be our finest quality yet. I’m sure of it, Luc!”
Sara knew Jacques would do his best. She admired his optimism. They would all work their fingers to the bone to produce a premium wine this year. But Sara remained uneasy, and not because of the usual concerns about production or quality of the wine, or even demand for it. Jean Lemieux was the single most influential buyer when it came to setting prices. It was his changeable character that worried her. Evenhandedness had never been his strong suit.
NOVEMBER 18, 1895
All vignerons agree that every grueling harvest, like a guest that has overstayed his welcome, deserves a proper fête to bid it adieu. The Thibault family opened their doors to the whole of Saint Martin, plus twenty-four Gypsy pickers, not to mention ten chickens and three dogs, for a grand celebration featuring a fine meal of roasted goose, pork, cheese, wine and figs.
The doors between the parlor, living room and dining room were opened to connect the three rooms across the front of the house. Marcheline, the maid, had lit the candles on the three iron chandeliers, and Lydia and Sara had decorated the rooms with spicy-smelling, bright yellow witch hazel branches. Once the dinner service was cleared, all the furniture and chairs were moved to the walls, and Maman even asked Jacques to wheel her pianoforte into the dining room, insisting its gentle timbre would be an elegant accompaniment to the scratching of the peasant fiddles.
Lydia pulled Sara upstairs to freshen up. “Aren’t we fortunate that Bastien has agreed to come tonight?” Lydia stood at her toilette, peering into the looking glass. She pulled a chestnut strand from her forelock, trained it in a curl around her finger and released it to rest at her temple.
“I suppose it’s a comfort to know that your betrothed moves effortlessly between the bourgeois of Tours and us peasants of Saint Martin.” Sara stuck her nose up in mock superiority.
“You know that’s not what I mean, Sara.” Lydia elbowed her, then smo
othed her pale peach-colored dress and leaned forward to inspect her décolletage. “I simply feel that his presence is a compliment to our entire family, and we should treat it as such.”
“Now you sound like Maman!” Sara rolled her eyes. She moved behind Lydia, studying their reflection. Though Lydia was two years older, Sara was taller. Both girls had long, reddish-brown hair, done up tonight, but Lydia’s usually bounced with tight curls, whereas Sara’s fell in loose waves past her shoulders. Lydia had wide blue eyes, which were often round with surprise, but Sara’s were green and shaded by long, dark lashes. To Sara, Lydia looked like the pictures she had seen in books of Carpeaux’s shapely sculpted females, her head tossed back, delighting in life’s dance. She sometimes wished she could be as carefree as Lydia, but Sara knew she was more reserved by nature.
Lydia looked Sara over with a critical eye. “You’re lovely tonight, Sara. I’m thrilled that I could persuade you to wear your hair up. You’re très élégante. Trading your field clogs for street shoes certainly made a difference. We may yet find you a husband.”
Sara stuck her tongue out, and Lydia ignored her. The idea of marriage to any man was abhorrent to her; she could not imagine being caged in that way. She began to notice the unfamiliar prick of hairpins on her scalp.
Lydia fussed with her earbobs for a few moments longer, then flashed Sara her most radiant smile. Sara’s displeasure could only evaporate into a grin of equal proportion.
“Off to the fête!” Lydia clapped her hands with delight.
When Sara and Lydia entered the dining room, the revelers whooped and charged their merriment into full swing. Monsieur and Madame Roux, their children and parents, and Jacques, his sister and her children all paired up for a turn on the floor. The spirits from dinner had already loosened their limbs and tongues, and they spun around the room, elbows linked, striking their clogs on the dull pine to the clipping of the fiddles.
The shiny faces glowing around Sara raised her spirits. As Papa stole her away for a dance, Jacques approached Maman, who accepted his arm, her cheeks flushed from heat and wine. Maman looked bewildered in her effort to mimic Jacques’s footwork. Sara could not help but laugh: Jacques looked like a corpulent cricket twitching his legs in mid-leap. Papa chuckled too, then lifted Sara up by the waist and spun her around until she was dizzy. Sara felt her own cheeks warm with pleasure.
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