Blind Tasting

by A. C. Houston

  "Why should I believe that now?" It's not a rhetorical question. She's really asking.

  "You may not care, but pretending to be blind that night was hell for me."

  Her eyes narrow at him. She crosses her arms and begins to walk around the living room. "Really?" She shakes her head, gazing incredulously at him. "How could you respect me so little, have so little faith in me as a person? How could you carry on that ridiculous ruse, even after everything that happened? Why should I believe anything you say?"

  "Julie." Cory walks toward her and touches her arm.

  She whirls away. "Please don't touch me. I was completely open with you, I've been through a really rotten divorce, but I didn't take it out on you. What was I? Some surrogate for your lost love? Becca? My god! What a story you spun about yourself that night!"

  His frustration is mounting. He deserves every word being lashed across him, but she needs to know who he really is. That he's not a manipulative cad. He starts to reach for her again and pulls back, arms at his sides.

  "Yeah, okay, there was someone. Becca. And it's not ancient history. Actually, she dumped me twice, if you want to know the gory details. And she was on my mind that night. At first."

  He is searching hard now for what he wants to express, exactly how he wants to express it. He can see that it matters to her.

  "May I show you something?" she says in an even tone.

  He nods and follows her from the living room down a short hall into what probably could serve as a bedroom. Instead, there are large wooden easels set up around the room, an artist's studio. She modestly mentioned on their stargazing evening that she studied art in France and left it at that.

  Several of the works in this room are complex, layered abstract compositions; there are smaller still lifes of unusual plants, small birds, bottles of wine.

  It's evident that tonight she was working on a large canvas, building up abstract forms in deep maroons, reds, blacks. It makes him think of hurling glasses of red wine against a surface, the liquid striking out in various angles. The picture conveys enormous energy.

  But Julie is pointing to a different canvas, it's the largest one in the room. He is not prepared for it.

  There he is, lying on a hillside under a starlit sky with his beard and duck tail, and Julie next to him. They are clothed in this painting, and looking up at the sky. Pasture and vineyards stretch below them. By the hand of another artist, this composition might convey a sweet or sentimental, nostalgic feeling. It is none of these.

  There is a heroic quality to it. Maybe it's the perspective she chose, or the evocative, emotional colors it is painted in? The night sky appears close, almost touchable, yet spinning infinitely away. Real constellations they looked at are here in sparkling whites, yellows and silvers.

  The composition is representational, but not aiming for realism. The night sky is enormous in the picture. The drawing of Cory is an incredible likeness of him, and she'd done it from memory. But, what startles him is not the great drawing ability, which Julie clearly possesses, but what she captured in his face. a seeker of ideas, a curious explorer.

  How can a painting convey this? And she'd drawn him symbolically, too. In the picture he is holding the big dark glasses in one hand, while looking up at the night sky, nobly pointing out a constellation with his other hand, his eyes uncovered, but closed. And Julie is drawn with a rapturous expression, looking up where he is pointing. His fellow explorer.

  And she expressed all this, felt all this, for someone she believed was blind. He feels close to crying.

  He studies the picture for a long time without speaking. Finally, he tells her. "It's incredible. You painted that."

  "I needed to express what I felt that night."

  "I'm sorry I'm not that amazing guy you painted here." He looks into her eyes. "But, you need to know that you totally blew me away that night. That wasn't pretending."

  Julie looks at him, studying his face. The nuances of his expression are the same as those in her painting: the keen intelligence, the curiosity. But, she's fully aware of how vulnerable she feels, of his power to hurt her. Quietly, she says, "Could we try to be just friends?"

  He watches her place her paintbrushes into a jar. His brown eyes take in the beautiful curve of her neck and chin, her graceful stance.

  With a sudden determination he approaches her and pulls her to him. He can see the uncertainty and the emotion in her eyes. He touches her face and then unties the blue kerchief, letting his fingers run through the soft layers of her red-gold hair. Looking into her eyes, he bends forward to kiss her.

  Suddenly she's kissing him back, her arms wrapped tightly around him. Without breaking their kiss, he lifts her passionately into his arms. When their lips part, he tells her breathlessly, "I don't want to be just friends."

  She tosses her head back, laughing. The beautiful, confident laughter. Still in his arms, she indicates the hall, pointing toward the other bedroom. The one that actually has a bed.

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  Cory's Bedroom. Snoots snuggles more deeply into his dog bed at the foot of the big bed. The late morning light strikes his fur, highlighting its burnished licorice and caramel tones. He is gradually becoming reacquainted with his own bed, but isn't too mopey about it. There is a new pack member and she invites him on the big bed sometimes. He enjoys her petting and attention. The big bed seems to be a major locus of pack activity now.

  Cory, now clean shaven and minus his duck tail, nuzzles Julie's bare shoulder while she reads him yet another local news story off an RSS feed on his iPhone.

  "Is Wine Going to the Dogs? Listen, this is important!" she laughs, only half-heartedly deflecting his amorous advances.

  He playfully bites her earlobe and neck while she continues. "Debbie Hart from Sunnyvale claims her three-year-old Pomeranian can choose her favorite chianti from among several bowls of red wine. Cory! 'Pepper wags his tail at that one' Ms. Hart explains. Ms. Hart says she was inspired by the now-famous dog of the blog Blind Tasting, and his extraordinary ability to identify wines just by sniffing them."

  Cory pauses his kissing. "Hear that Snoots? You're famous."

  The dog opens one eye at the sound of his name, then closes it contentedly.

  Julie turns to face Cory, caressing him with one hand while she reads more. "Jack Keller from San Francisco claims to have taught his parrot to distinguish Pepsi from Coke. The bird knows both words, and chooses the appropriate word when presented with the corresponding cola. Mr. Keller will post his findings on his blog, 'Bird Tasting'."

  Cory rolls back, laughing.

  "There's more." She smiles, looking back at the phone, scrolling down a screenful. He takes the phone from her and puts it next to the bed. He pulls her into his arms, kissing her in earnest now.

  "Don't you want something to eat?" she murmurs between kisses.

  "No."

  "Shouldn't we at least feed Snootsy?"

  "Later."

  The iPhone rings, and from the tone it's neither Dawn nor Rob.

  "Just answer it and get rid of them," Julie tells him, running her hands across his chest.

  He sighs and picks up the phone. "Yeah?"

  Julie sees his mood shift immediately. She stops caressing him and waits, watching his face with curiosity.

  He is listening carefully, intently to someone. Finally he says, "I need to discuss this with my business partners. Is this a good number to reach you? Okay, sure."

  He ends the call, and looks at Julie, a little dazed. "That was Doug Price. Of Price, Goodwill and Darington, VisualAxiom's former investors. They're interested in my training methods for Snoots."

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  Rob's Living Room. Rob is crouched in front of a large motorcycle, whose engine and other parts are disassembled in an orderly arrangement on a drop cloth. He's looking for something among the array of parts when he hears a knock at his front door.

  He opens the door to see Dawn standing there. Her
smile today is neither jousting nor angelic, it's tentative.

  "Hi, Rob."

  "Hey."

  "May I come in?"

  "Sure."

  She sees the motorcycle dissected on the living room floor. The place is definitely a guy's apartment. There is Rob's bicycle leaning against one wall; her memory flashes back to the day at Genetica when he carried her in his arms, looking like an action hero in his black bicycle gear. Today he's wearing torn jeans and a white T-shirt. He's standing politely in his living room, barefoot, with a wrench in one hand.

  She feels she is intruding on his leisure time, his privacy, his life. She looks at the motorcycle, desperately thinking of what to say. "I guess this one has a lot of systems.”

  He nods, chuckling softly. "Yeah. It was a real challenge to ride it up the stairs outside. It's a 1976 Triumph TR7V Tiger. A British bike. Rare."

  He squats down by the front wheel and resumes his work.

  Dawn takes a step closer to him. God, this is awkward. "You were missed at the tasting. It was pretty amazing, Leonard Pillar and his skunky wine."

  "Yeah. It was trending on Twitter for a while."

  She watches him unscrew something, a bolt? She crosses her arms across her chest and swallows. "I was pretty upset about my patent that day at the Creamery." She looks down and breathes in deeply, quietly. “I’m sorry if I snapped at you.”

  "It’s okay." He's not looking up from whatever he's doing, attaching a shaft of metal to a round piece.

  "Rob, are we still friends?"

  He focuses intently on the pieces of machinery in his hands. "Sure."

  Do it now. She leans forward and hugs him awkwardly. He tilts his head toward her slightly, but keeps hold of his machine parts. She retreats in embarrassment. "I'm glad."

  Just leave, he doesn't want you here.

  She doesn't wait to see whether Rob is even looking at her as she opens the door to leave, but when she opens it, Cory is standing in front of her.

  "I was just leaving, but Rob is here," she tells him numbly.

  Cory sees her miserable expression and draws his own conclusions. He touches her arm. "Can you wait a minute?"

  He walks through the open doorway and gets Rob's attention, then looks at Dawn. "Guys, we need to talk."

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  Price, Goodwill and Darington. Cory, Dawn, Rob and Snoots follow a competent, well-groomed receptionist into an opulent conference room with large sunny windows. The room's expensive decor is sleek and modern in shades of plum and pale gray. The receptionist offers them coffee, tea, bottled water or sherry. They all choose the water.

  Presently, two middle-aged men enter the room through an interior door, both of them exuding energy and purpose. They are fit and tan and wear expensive slacks and top-grade oxford shirts. They introduce themselves as Bob Darington and Doug Price.

  Bob smiles confidently. "Nice to see you again, Cory." He scans Dawn and Rob. "You're all Stanford Ph.Ds, aren't you?"

  Dawn nods, but Rob shakes his head emphatically. "I'm just an auto mechanic."

  "He's a world-class engine specialist who works on very high-end sports cars." Dawn adds quietly, but adamantly.

  The investors like this, team loyalty is a good sign.

  Rob looks at Dawn in surprise.

  "Are you at Hamilton?" Doug asks Rob. "Someone there did great work on my 1969 Ghibli Spyder."

  This produces a smile from Rob who remembers the red Maserati well. "That's a tight machine. A rare classic."

  The car talk adds to the comfort level of the business talk. The investors have been following the stories in the papers, talked to readers of Blind Tasting, talked to Denis Stafford and Leonard Pillar. They think it's a very interesting angle on the wine industry. And they are impressed that Cory has agreed to give them a demo on such short notice. They like his confidence.

  Doug makes the central pitch. "We see a big potential for smaller wineries around the world. They could benefit enormously from early calls about how their vintages compare with the established, well-regarded producers. The operating costs are low for each customer. They have the one-time, up-front training fee for their dog. And, even if other preferences or tastes beyond Pillar's ascend to the forefront of the wine world, the methodology is still valid, a dog can be trained for any target. And, if the methodology scales the way we hope it does, there are a number of venues beyond wine that would also be worth pursuing."

  Cory nods. "I assume you'd like to see just how exacting Snoots' matches are?"

  Doug smiles, "You bet." He makes a brief call on his iPhone. "Caroline I think we're ready."

  The receptionist comes into the room wheeling a small cart which carries a number of wine bottles wrapped in plain paper with a different colored dot on each bottle. There are also several sheets of ink blotter and a box of Q-tips.

  "Whenever you're ready," Doug says pleasantly.

  Cory leans forward on the luxurious leather couch and places a blotter on the table in front of him and calls Snoots over to sit opposite. The dog is a little excited and sniffs Caroline's hand as he goes to his spot. Caroline's expression melts into unconscious adoration.

  Dawn, amused, thinks to herself, another one bites the dust.

  Cory takes the control handed to him and offers it to Snoots, who sniffs it lightly, then hovers his head moments over the samples on the table and points his nose decisively at the fourth of eight dots.

  Bob Darington consults his cheat sheet of wine and dot pairings. "He nailed it. Control is a 2005 Oregon pinot noir from Willamette Valley. Same one as the fourth drop."

  The investors are clearly wowed by the speed at which the dog made this match among eight drops of west coast red varietals. They're really curious to see how he'll do with a narrower base of European wines.

  The dog easily pinpoints a Vosne Romanee Côte de Nuit from Domaine du Vicomte Liger-Belair among eight French red burgundies, all 2004 vintages. He performs equally well with a set of 2003 Tuscan reds, and 2007 Spanish whites.

  The final proving ground for Snoots is whether he can identify a match between two wines selected by Leonard Pillar. The investors asked Pillar to provide them with an interesting match between non-identical, but close wines.

  Pillar selected a 2006 primitivo from an Apulia winery in the coastal area of Manduria, Italy as the control. For the match, he selected a 2006 Apulia primitivo clone from a small vineyard located in the Sierra foothills. Despite their distinctive terroirs, Pillar found the flavor characteristics of the two wines to be quite close. Six additional California zinfandels, all 2006 vintages, were added to the test set.

  Cory waits for Snoots to settle and focus. Then he offers the dog the control.

  Doug watches Snoot's nose hover over the test samples a few moments, anticipating that the dog will choose the sixth dot among the seven. Instead, he points to the second dot.

  Cory immediately sees the disappointment on the faces of the two investors. "Not what you were expecting?"

  Doug reveals their collaboration with Leonard Pillar. "Your guy is spectacular at making the identical matches. But, the viable business model requires that he can make the close matches that a human would also agree with. Our customers are, after all, people, not dogs."

  "So Pillar selected all the wines in this set?" Cory asks Doug.

  "Actually, no. Just the close match. We added the zinfandels as decoys."

  "Maybe we should try these samples ourselves," Dawn suggests, knowing exactly what Cory is thinking.

  "Or get a trusted expert to try them," Cory adds.

  Bob and Doug look at each other.

  Doug pulls his phone out and makes a call. "Stefano? Doug Price. Fine. I have an odd, but interesting favor to ask. Could you drop by our offices and be our expert in a quick blind tasting?" Doug laughs. "I can explain it better in person." Doug smiles into his phone. "Right now would be fantastic. You can do it? Terrific! Yes, the Sand Hill office. Thanks so much, Stefano."
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  He looks happily at the group. "We're in luck. Fidelio's sommelier is coming right over. I will definitely trust his opinion, I'm a long-time patron there."

  Stefano listens with fascination to the account of the experiment in progress. He's enthusiastic to meet Snoots, too, whom he's read about, and he recognizes Dawn.

  "See much of Toby?" he asks her, smiling. "He must find your project pretty interesting."

  Dawn looks at him with a painful smile. "Yes, he found it very interesting, but I really haven't seen him lately." She casts a furtive glance at Rob, but he's watching Caroline pour the eight glasses of wine that Stefano will be analyzing.

  With a no-nonsense discipline, Stefano picks up the control glass; he swirls the wine in it, inhales the nose, then takes a sip and savors it carefully before ejecting it into a stainless steel bucket.

  Then he tastes each of the seven samples in turn, spits the wine into the bucket, and immediately eliminates wines one and three. He takes a second taste of the control and samples the remaining wines again; wines five and seven are eliminated, leaving only samples two, four and six. Four goes.

  Stefano takes his time with the final wines, sampling them carefully a fourth time against the control.

  After further deliberation, Stefano shakes his head. "This one is definitely closer, the fruit, the mouth, the finish." He's holding the second wine glass, not the sixth.

  "Interesting," Doug remarks, pouring some of the wine for himself. He tries the two contenders and the control. "I have to agree. Pillar never had access to this zinfandel in glass two. Wonder what he'd think."

  "You could send him a bottle," Cory suggests.

  "That would be due diligence," Doug agrees. "But I have enormous faith in Stefano's palate."

  Stefano gives a gracious nod. "As I'm sure you know, UC Davis has established the genetic identity of the zinfandel grape with the primitivo. I'm curious what the second zinfandel is."

  Doug removes the wrapper from the bottle. It's an estate-bottled zinfandel from a small producer in Paso Robles.