Blind Tasting

by A. C. Houston

  Cory takes a quick look at the incoming data on his own iPhone. "Thanks. Great party, too."

  Brett nods. "Call him tomorrow. Tonight, even."

  The display on the digital clock reads 3:16 a.m. Cory is lying in his bed in the dark, wide awake. Snoots is stretched out beside him on top of the covers, deep in dog sleep.

  What should he do? He hasn't called the guy at the startup and he isn't sure he will call him in the morning. It's a great opportunity; Brett knows the people involved, which means their technical credentials are excellent. It's work he's pretty sure he can excel at, and it would be a big financial relief.

  He wishes Duncan were here to talk it over with. What would Duncan think of his work with Snoots?

  Duncan had a brilliant future ahead of him, but it was cut short by a random event, a stupid accident. He had been a confident risk-taker, eyes wide open to the implications of what he embraced. He was someone who could calculate the probabilities, someone who assumed complete responsibility for his own life, his own pursuits. Duncan, more than anyone, had known that sometimes the risks become reality, there are no guarantees of winning.

  But he had loved the quest, the endeavor of pursuing the puzzles and the joys of his life. He was a man who had lived briefly, but it had been a life of significance and fulfillment.

  Cory has enough funds to pay two more months of his mortgage, if he lives frugally. And what he's now contemplating will not lend itself to frugal living. And he's not yet convinced he can do it.

  But the clues are there, tantalizing him. He feels as though he's stumbled upon some powerful tool possessed by no one else, or discovered some new facet of nature.

  With awe, he recalls his training sessions with Snoots.

  It's nothing for the dog; once he understood what his master wanted, it was easy. He didn't deliberate over the cups, his canine nose hovered, quivered a few seconds over them, and then descended on its target, like a GPS-guided missile.

  Those nostrils were receiving giant streams of volatile data from the little cups of wine. The control was also emitting such a stream, and the signature of it and the matching cup must be huge for Snoots, must be like picking out two matching red circles in a set of yellow, green and blue geometric forms. That easy. And that accurate.

  He looks over at his sleeping companion, whose back legs are twitching lightly in some dog dream that is unknowable to humans. Who is this incredible being, whose ancestors have coexisted, cohabited, with humans for untold millennia?

  He wonders if anyone else has made his discovery. He doubts it. He has to keep exploring where this might lead. There is no turning back. He now knows he won't call that startup in the morning.

  Chapter Fourteen

  J. Hamilton Motorworks. Rob is bent over the open hatch of a canary yellow Boxster, inspecting the seating of its engine, which he pulled and rebuilt over the past two days. Boxsters are at the lower end of the price range of the cars he works on, but the Boxster S is a nice ride, it handles well. He still needs Billy to take it for the test drive this afternoon.

  He straightens up and stretches, arching his back. The stretch reveals the contours of well-muscled shoulders beneath his white T-shirt. There is no oil or grease on the T-shirt, nor on his jeans. Nor on his hands.

  Working on these kinds of cars is more like surgery; when there's oil involved he wears thin nitrile gloves. And, Rob's hand motions under the hood are decisive and precise, the physical manifestation of a deep and comprehensive knowledge of how all the intricate parts of these machines, the royalty of combustion engines, fit together.

  Twenty-three-year-old Kelly Day comes into the service area, pushing her layered straw-blonde hair back from her eyes. Her red polo shirt, with the Hamilton logo on it, fits snugly and agreeably over her curves.

  She's carrying a can of coke and walks up behind Rob, sliding her arms around him, offering him the coke in one hand.

  He takes it and slowly releases himself from her embrace, turning to face her. "Thanks, Kell." He opens the can and takes a long drink as she watches him.

  She glances at another Porsche in the workshop bay and tells him in mock concern. "That red Carrera is getting jealous of all the time you're spending on the Boxster."

  He takes another big gulp of the coke, then sets it down on a small stool nearby, smiles at Kelly, and returns to the Boxster.

  It has involved some work. He installed new bearings, timing chains and guide rails into the bearing carrier assembly. There was corrosion on the mating surfaces of the crankcase that needed particularly careful cleaning. The engine's design has no intervening gasket between the metal-on-metal mating surfaces of the crankcase halves, so the contact must be ultra-smooth and clean.

  The tensioning of the various parts of the engine, like the camshaft assembly, demands a touch like Rob's that is both trained and artistic, and he loves restoring these intricate, precision-tooled masterpieces of engineering to perfect health.

  Glancing at his watch, he realizes it's noon and he's really up for a bicycle ride on his break today.

  He owns a Bianchi that he bought off eBay, a high performance Italian road bike with a carbon frame. He likes to go up to Skylonda, or the hills above Stanford University and wind it out.

  Today he'll add a loop through Palo Alto, near the Stanford campus. It's where Dawn's lab is. He's been thinking about her and he located her biotech firm, Genetica, on a Google map. There isn't any harm just cycling past where she works.

  Dawn is walking back to her lab from the mini-mart two blocks away. She'd gone there to buy a yogurt and orange for lunch. It was an excuse to get out and enjoy the daylight.

  For seven out of the past ten nights she has slept at her office, working into the wee hours and then falling into the sleeping bag she keeps rolled up under her desk.

  It was a nice change to go home last night a bit early, enjoy a bath with frangipani-scented candles, and not think about ligand bindings and mitochondrial transmembrane potentials for a couple of hours.

  Later, she woke up in the night, thinking over a specific issue she'd talked to Pete about and considered calling him. But, 2 a.m. was a bit much, even for Pete, who frequently slept in his office, too.

  The walk in the bright California sun feels good. She decides to call Cory tonight, maybe they can do dinner. She hasn't seen him since the afternoon at The Sage's Cask.

  "Hey, Dawn."

  She looks behind her to see Rob gliding up on a bicycle. His fine athletic build asserts itself through streamlined black bike clothes. She is reminded that Cory has a handsome tenant.

  "Hi!" She appraises the sleek bicycle. "Out for a ride? But, not in a Lotus or a Lamborghini, apparently."

  He smiles and shakes his head, balancing effortlessly on his bike as he matches her gait. He pats the handlebars. "No systems. Not like a sports car. Just muscle power, the wheels and the wind. It's nice sometimes."

  She smiles at him. "Where'd you go?"

  "Just around Portola Valley. Light traffic this time of day."

  "See much of Cory? I've been a lousy friend, but I'm just buried in my work these days."

  He looks down, sighing. "I'm a little worried about him. For weeks now he just walks the dog. Doesn't really go out as far as I can tell."

  She nods her head in knowing cynicism. "He's taking this Becca thing really hard."

  Rob ponders her diagnosis. "Yeah."

  "I saw it coming, but I couldn't say anything. He wouldn't have listened."

  Dawn sighs, pulls her book bag off her shoulder, unzips a pocket and roots around with one hand for her security badge, as she continues walking alongside Rob.

  Abruptly, she accidentally rolls her right foot off the curb of the sidewalk, stumbling sideways and dropping the book bag in the street. She stops her fall with her hands.

  A sharp pain shoots through her ankle. "Ohh! God!"

  Rob quickly dismounts from his bicycle, laying it flat on the ground. He kneels next to her, as she g
rimaces and rocks in pain. He puts his hands around her ankle, palpating it gently. "I don't think it's broken."

  His hands feel warm and strong against her bare skin, soothing. She looks over her shoulder at the lab, whose entrance is parallel to them. "My office is right here. I think I can walk that far.’

  She spots her security badge in the gutter next to her and shoves it quickly into her pocket. Rob must think she's a real piece of work. An utter klutz.

  She begins to stand up and Rob moves with her, holding her, putting an arm around her waist for support. She puts her right arm tentatively over his hard, muscular shoulder.

  "Do you have a first aid kit?" he asks her.

  "Almost certainly."

  In a decisive move, he sweeps her into his arms, grabbing her fallen book bag as he does so, and proceeds toward the door of the building.

  Her body thrills to their close physical contact. Her face is toward his neck, which exudes a light scent of clean soap intermingled with healthy male perspiration.

  She feels the need to say something. "This is really gallant of you. I can probably walk."

  The warmth of her light body in his arms quickens his pulse as they walk toward the front door of Genetica. He's acutely aware of her thick, soft hair brushing against his shoulder and neck. "It's better to keep the weight off it. Do you have a cold pack? That's the best thing."

  "I think so."

  He opens the front door and carries her inside.

  Susan, Genetica's twenty-two-year-old receptionist, looks up from her computer at the front desk. She's startled, simultaneously taking in Dawn's predicament, and the attractive male holding her.

  "Oh my god! Are you okay?"

  Dawn shifts a little to secure her hold around Rob's neck. "I twisted my ankle. Stupid accident. I'm going to my office."

  Susan shakes her head of brown curls. "I'm getting the first aid kit."

  She races away and Dawn pulls her badge from her pocket and gestures toward the closed door ahead. Rob carries her to it and she waves the badge at the sensor which flashes green. He opens the door, still holding her and the book bag, and they head down a hall of offices.

  An Asian woman, dressed in green clean-room garb, looks out her doorway as they pass by.

  Dawn waves her off. "I'm okay, Helen. Silly twisted ankle is all."

  Helen Wu, a colleague of Dawn's and a molecular biologist from Berkeley, gazes after them, a bemused smile on her face.

  "This one's my office." Dawn tells him, pointing to the open doorway on the left.

  Rob carries her inside and sets her down in the chair at her desk, noticing the sleeping bag shoved underneath.

  Susan rushes up behind him carrying the first aid kit. Now playing the role of eager nurse, she opens it and presents it to him.

  He retrieves a cold pack, then lifts Dawn's leg gently up on her desk, smacks the pack to activate it and places it against her ankle.

  She places her hand against the pack to secure it, and their hands briefly touch. Another little thrill.

  He remembers her hands and takes her free one, inspecting the palm. "I should put a little Neosporin on these scrapes."

  "They're pretty superficial." But she lets him dab her little wounds, reveling in the continued contact of their hands.

  Susan is beaming at him and introduces herself, offering him her hand. "Susan Hall. Office manager of Genetica."

  He shakes her hand as Dawn watches with mild annoyance.

  Rob is now surveying the office, taking in the shelves of books on biochemistry, molecular biology, genetics, the technical papers in stacks on the floor, and others laid out across her desk. The wall-sized whiteboard is densely covered with diagrams of long molecular chains with arrows drawn between them, and chemical names scribbled alongside in shorthand, and a couple of question marks instead of where arrows could be. It's a work in progress; a network of metabolic pathways that Dawn has been torturing over.

  He turns to her with admiration and astonishment. "You really do heavy shit, don't you."

  She smiles at him. "Listen, why don't I get Vietnamese take-out from Pho Louise after work. It's Cory's favorite. We could surprise him. Can you be there about seven?"

  "Sure. I'll bring the beer." He looks at his watch. "I'd better get back."

  He backs toward the door, still looking at her, smiling. "Stay off that ankle and keep it cold for at least an hour."

  "Okay." She smiles at him. "Thank you for all this."

  "Take it easy, Dawn." He turns and leaves.

  Susan approaches and in a low voice asks, "Where have you been hiding him? Dawn!"

  Dawn blushes and is furious with herself for it. "Thanks for bringing the first aid kit. My ankle will be fine."

  Susan dismisses this comment and continues. "So who is he? Does he have a twin brother? He's gorgeous!"

  "He's a friend."

  "A friend? The way he carried you into the building?"

  "Susan."

  "Okay. So, there doesn't need to be a twin brother." Susan is seeing Rob clearly in her mind's eye. "I've really wanted to get into cycling."

  Pete Johnston appears at the doorway of Dawn's office. He's an African-American, Dawn's age, with short neat hair and glasses. He's wearing a lab coat over clean-room garb.

  He looks at Dawn, vaguely registering her ankle and the cold pack. "You okay? Got a minute to look at some results on allosteric bindings? Come on down to L-3."

  Dawn switches gears mentally. She sets aside the cold pack, puts her ankle down, and stands up, putting her weight on the good ankle.

  Susan muses aloud, mostly to herself, as she stands in the doorway. "Maybe he could recommend a good bicycle for me."

  Dawn gives Susan a forced smile and hobbles past her, heading toward L-3.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Wine Command Center. Open wine bottles clutter the floor near the coffee table. The wines in the training set are all zinfandel, four samples taken from a single winery, but from different vintages.

  Snoots sniffs the control, then sniffs the training set. He looks away without pointing to a cup.

  Cory frowns thoughtfully; the wine in the fourth cup on the table is exactly the same as the control in his hand.

  He takes a different bottle of zinfandel and fills a new control with this wine. It's the same wine that's in the second cup in the training set.

  He offers the new control to Snoots, who sniffs it, then the training set. Again, the dog looks away.

  Cory leans back, deep in reflection. Things have been going extremely well with the training until today. What is different now? The dog identified a zinfandel in other lineups of wine during previous training sessions earlier this week.

  "Surprise!" Dawn calls out, as she and Rob walk through the front door, carrying a bag of food and two six-packs of beer.

  Snoots rushes over to them, barking and wagging his tail.

  Dawn sets down the bag of Vietnamese take-out on the counter. Cory hasn't looked up from the couch, so she walks over to him and hugs him from behind. "Surprise, again!"

  She notices the setup on the table, the numerous open wine bottles on the floor. The room looks messy and a lot of the disorder relates to alcoholic containers. This worries her.

  "Cory, if you need a drinking companion, I'm available."

  He finally looks at her. "Dawn, in scene analysis, one approach is to break the complex into the simple. If you can understand the parts, you can put them together. Something like that was working here. I just had to get Snoots to grasp one idea, play the matching game."

  "The matching game?" She's now wondering if he has been dabbling in substances besides wine.

  "Yeah. Once he understood that I wanted him to find the one sample in a set of wines that matched the control -- and that was a huge breakthrough -- he could easily identify a specific wine among a large set of different red and white varietals. He now does this match whether he has two or ten cups of wine to choose from."


  Rob walks over to see what Cory is up to. "You're teaching Snoots a trick with wine?”

  "Not a trick, Rob. So then I switched the controls. Could he consistently pick a pinot noir from a lineup, or a merlot, or a cab?" He nods deeply at Dawn. "He can."

  "Wow." Now she's interested.

  He continues. "So then I gave him a set of all cabs, thinking I'm making the task harder because there should be greater similarity among all the samples, only cabs." His face flashes sheer delight. "And this guy picked a 2003 cab from Abbey Rose just like that, same wine as the control."

  Dawn sits down on the couch, listening intently as he explains further.

  "Then I tried different vineyards from a single winery for one year. All zinfandel grapes." He points to a set of bottles. "Some labels from Dark Moon 2007. That's what we're doing now. But it isn't working."

  "What's not working?" She's now deep into the problem space.

  "He sniffs the cups and each time he just quits. He doesn't pick the one that matches my control."

  Dawn stands up and begins to pace. She scans the cups on the table, her blue eyes hard in thought.

  "Are you limping?"

  She shakes her head dismissively and stops pacing. Her puzzled face resolves into a conjecture. "Ah. The samples may be too big."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Those cups. The similarities among these closely-related wines may be masking the finer-grained signal you want him to identify, in the amounts you are presenting him with here. These quantities might be generating too much noise and he can't decide which of them matches your control."

  "I can use smaller cups."

  "Don't bother. Get some inkblot paper and what? Q-Tips. Put just tiny drops of these wines on the blotter and space them at least, oh maybe four inches apart."

  "I'll drive over to CVS," Rob volunteers.

  Cory is already walking toward the door. "Let's all go. Hey, did you guys bring food?"

  Dawn smiles. "He finally noticed. Pho Louise."

  "And Anchor Steam?" Cory eyes the beer with enthusiasm.