When the Fermentation Sticks by Emily Muirhead

I always remember it on hot days like today. Days when the heat is so oppressive that all I can do is sit in the shade of my porch and not move. I am too old to attempt work on days like today. The air is thick with the scent of rotting grass, a sweet smell of decay that immediately brings me back to that harvest.

#

My name is Étienne Grégoire. I was born in Saint-Émilion, France, in 1922. I was twelve when I fell from a tree and blinded myself in one eye, sixteen when I began working at Château Cheval-Blanc, and eighteen when France fell to Germany. As unrelated as these three events may seem, in my mind the first two saved me from the consequences of the third. Because of my eye I was unable to enlist in the French army, which is why I was able to continue working at the Château. During the occupation the German officers’ love for wine ensured that I remained at Cheval-Blanc instead of in a civilian prisoner-of-war camp.

Château Cheval-Blanc is a winery on the right-bank of the Gironde River in Saint-Émilion. As a child I used to get caught wandering through the vineyards at Cheval-Blanc and chased out by the overseer. The owner of the Château during my childhood was Monsieur Arnaud Laussac-Fourcaud, a small wiry man with eyebrows ten times bigger than the size of his face should have allowed. It was to him that I went seeking a job at the age of sixteen.

I remember our first meeting vividly. I was brought to the cellar at the Château by the overseer, Monsieur Luc, who at first I thought was going to exact his revenge for all those years of chasing me away. He led me through the maze of vats until we reached one of the smaller ones in the back. There Monsieur Arnaud stood cursing furiously at the man who I later learned was in charge of fermentation, Monsieur Thierry. Monsieur Arnaud did not look like a powerful man. He was small, and his face was overshadowed by those eyebrows that seemed as though they would eventually grow to take over his face. Under those eyebrows, however, lay the most piercingly powerful eyes I have ever seen. Light blue with swirls of grey, Monsieur Arnaud’s eyes would come alive like a storm when he was excited, or glaze over with an icy stillness when he was angry. Yelling at Monsieur Thierry, Monsieur Arnaud’s eyes had a chilly intensity the likes of which I rarely saw in the years to come.

Monsieur Luc introduced me and stepped back to allow Monsieur Arnaud to get a good look at me. Monsieur Arnaud glanced at me, his eyes suddenly calm after the rage that had stirred them to life a few moments before, and with a nod of his head said that I would do just fine. With that I became an employee of Château Cheval-Blanc.

Upon settling in at the Château I discovered that Monsieur Arnaud had a daughter. In a town as small as Saint-Émilion I thought that I knew all the other kids my age, but there she was one day sitting on the back porch with a bunch of grapes in her hand. I said nothing to her, but I remember asking around all day to find out more about her. Her name was Caroline. Everyone told me that she was slow. She hardly ever spoke, they told me, but when she did it never made sense. She would spend her days wandering through the vineyard pulling bunches from their vines, but I was told to just leave her alone.

From the moment I first saw Caroline I was intrigued. It struck me that we both spent our youth wandering through the vineyards at Château Cheval, but we had never encountered each other on our adventures. I thought she was beautiful. She was small, like her father, and she had blonde hair that fell in loose curls around her shoulders. Her eyes were large and brown. Although people said she was slow, every time I saw her I noticed an energy behind her eyes. She may have been quiet, but her eyes spoke volumes to me.

My first year at Cheval-Blanc passed in a blur. The times that stick out in my mind the most are those that I spent walking through the vineyard with Monsieur Arnaud. Château Cheval-Blanc was set at the top of a gentle hill, with the vineyard descending behind it down toward the bank of the Gironde River. The whole month of September we would venture out early and walk up and down the rows of grapes, inspecting every bunch. Monsieur Arnaud spent each day explaining to me how the cabernet-franc grapes grown at Cheval-Blanc were finicky. They liked to be picked at an exact stage of ripeness. If harvested at the right moment, Monsieur Arnaud told me, the grapes would do all the work in creating a wonderful wine.

From our first outing together to check the grapes, Monsieur Arnaud took a keen interest in me. When we got to the first row he showed me how to inspect the grapes. I was told the correct way to examine the size, shape, color, firmness, and taste of the grapes. At the second row he allowed me to perform the inspection myself. As I squatted beneath the vine and circled my head around one bunch trying to get a good look at each grape, Monsieur Arnaud stopped me.

“Why crane your neck so much? Can’t you see the grapes from where you are?” he asked.

“I’m sorry, what?”

“You craned your neck and cocked your head in different directions checking that bunch. You looked like a bird as it searches for a worm.” Monsieur Arnaud’s eyes were alive with a gentle flame of amusement.

“Monsieur I can’t see out of my right eye. I’ve been blind in that eye since I was a child. I’m simply trying to get a good look at the grapes as you told me to do.”

“I’ve always liked the way birds search for food. They seem to give such care to their scavenge, their movements are both thoughtful and desperate. It’s almost like watching a dance. That’s how you move when you look at the grapes. With thoughtful desperation, your eyes—excuse me, eye—seems to be searching for just the right thing. You’ll do well at this I think.”

From that day on, instead of instructing me in how to look at the grapes, Monsieur Arnaud simply followed me through the vineyard watching as my eye danced with the grapes.

The Monsieur and I never came across Caroline in the vineyard. Although I kept my eye out for her, she never appeared. However, when we would get back to the Château in the afternoon she would be sitting on the porch with a bunch of grapes in her lap. She would look up and upon seeing us she always kept her eyes focused on me. I could feel her eyes scanning my body as I approached, but as we got nearer she would return her gaze to the grapes in her lap. I never spoke to her, but simply bid farewell to Monsieur Arnaud and left for home. As I walked away every afternoon I would hear Monsieur Arnaud sit down next to Caroline and ask her about the grapes. I never heard her answer.

I came to look forward to those daily encounters with Caroline. Despite the fact that we never spoke, her gaze always filled me with a certain energy that then remained with me the rest of the evening. Monsieur Arnaud never seemed to notice, but it was almost as if Caroline and I had a secret understanding of each other. I felt as though her daily examination of me revealed something new every day, we grew to know each other through those glimpses.

#

By 1944 I had become the overseer of Château Cheval-Blanc. Monsieur Luc disappeared in 1941 and the last we heard he was fighting for the Resistance. Despite the fact that my responsibilities were many, Monsieur Arnaud and I still took to the vineyards at the beginning of every harvest season to inspect the grapes together.

It was in 1944 that the war began to truly affect Saint-Émilion. In June of that year we heard rumors of the massacre at Oradour-sur-Glane, a town just one hundred miles northeast of Saint-Émilion. It was said that the Nazis had gathered the entire town together and shot every single man, woman, and child. Afterwards they burned the village down. I heard that piles of charred bodies were found outside of town a few days after the Nazis had moved on.

Other news of the war told of victories by Allied troops. The Nazis were losing ground everywhere. Before 1944 the relationship between the inhabitants of Saint-Émilion and the Nazi occupying troops had been fairly civil. We provided them with all the wine they could ask for, and they left us alone. This relationship strained when it became clear that the Germans were no longer winning the war. News of new arrests was reported almost every day. The owner of one of the neighboring vineyards and his son were arrested in late July. No reason was given, and their harvest for 1944 was halted immediately.

The temperatures at the beginning of August were absurdly high. As we combed the rows of grapes Monsieur Arnaud listened as I discussed the coming harvest and the recent events in town. With the closure of the neighboring vineyard the demand for our wine was going to increase. I worried that if we were not able to keep up with production the same fate would befall us. As the weeks went by and the heat continued to rise, we became increasingly nervous that our harvest would fail.

Returning to the Château one afternoon in late August, Monsieur Arnaud and I found three Nazi soldiers at the back porch. One held Caroline while the other two argued with some of the workers.

“What is going on here?” Monsieur Arnaud asked, somehow remaining calm despite the fact that his daughter was in the arms of a Nazi soldier. I could see the fire raging in his eyes, but his voice held his normal quiet tone. I looked to Caroline, her eyes were transfixed on mine. The look of fear in her dark brown eyes was like nothing I had ever seen before.

“It’s hot and our men are thirsty Arnaud. Where is our wine?” This was said by one of the smaller officers who had previously been yelling at our workers.

“It is only August, surely by now you know that the harvest won’t start for another few weeks.” Monsieur Arnaud glanced toward Caroline, the gray in his eyes darkening like clouds before a storm.

“Well perhaps we will just hold on to your daughter until then. Surely a worthless idiot won’t be missed around a busy vineyard.” The small officer grinned at Monsieur Arnaud as he spoke.

At this Monsieur Arnaud lunged forward. Our two workers were able to grab hold of him before he reached the officer, whose grin widened at the sudden outburst from Monsieur Arnaud.

“Yes I think that’s a fair trade.” With this the larger soldier who held Caroline began to pull her along as he made to leave.

“But she’s my fiancé!” The words shot from my mouth before I could even realize what I was saying, but I knew we could not let Caroline be taken away. At my outburst everyone turned to stare at me. Caroline’s eyes remained on mine, a light burning behind them. Monsieur Arnaud looked at me in bewilderment but quickly adjusted his gaze to one of a confidant negotiator.

“I am afraid that if my daughter is taken away Monsieur Étienne will not be able to run the harvest. The loss of his fiancé could cause immeasurable delays.” Monsieur Arnaud leveled his glance at the small officer, the grey in his eyes swirling rapidly.

The small officer looked back and forth between his two men, finally motioning for the larger one to let go of Caroline.

“We wouldn’t want to cause any delays,” he said, “But Arnaud I would advise you never to threaten me again.” Once the officers left we did not speak of the incident again. No one questioned my lie and it was accepted that I had done it to save Caroline, but to this day I cannot fathom how it was that easy.

We started the harvest in September. Although a month earlier than when we normally started the harvest, by September the grapes were practically roasted on the vines. The heat stayed with the grapes. As we were preparing for fermentation, Monsieur Arnaud warned me of the likelihood of a stuck fermentation. In my six years at the vineyard I had not yet encountered a stuck fermentation. It happens when the yeast stops turning the grapes’ sugars into alcohol. As the overseer I felt that it was my personal responsibility to see the fermentation through to the end. I went out in search of ice to cool the vats, but there was none to be had. Like many of our workers that year, the yeast folded to the debilitating effects of the heat. Our fermentation stuck in the middle of October.

A few days after the fermentation stalled Monsieur Arnaud called me into his office at the Château.

“We are going to continue with the bottling of this years harvest.” Those were the first words from Monsieur Arnaud’s mouth. He said it without even raising his head from his books.

“Monsieur there is still too much sugar. It’s too thick. Once it’s tasted no one will buy it.” I felt the failure of that season clouding over me as I spoke the words aloud. I left unsaid all of my fears that we would fall victim to the wrath of Nazi troops once we failed to supply them with wine. Monsieur Arnaud raised his head slowly and I saw that his eyes were sparkling as though a light were shining through them. The grey in his eyes swirled like clouds after a storm.

“We harvested at the right time. Let the grapes do their work.” His face remained still but his eyes smiled at me from across the room.

#

Monsieur Arnaud was right that day in 1944. Against all odds the grapes did their work. I was able to keep a few cases of the ’44 Cheval and each time I open a bottle I am struck by the remarkable freshness of it. The scent is almost overwhelming with complex smells of fruit, chocolate, coffee, leather, and spices all mixing together to create its voluptuous texture. Its taste bristles over my tongue with an energy that makes it come alive in my mouth. Every time I drink the ’44 Cheval I am reminded of Monsieur Arnaud’s eyes. The wine holds a power and energy that I have only ever seen matched in those tempestuous eyes.

The 1944 vintage never went to appease the thirst of the Nazi soldiers. In December of that year the occupation ended. Our bottling continued on its normal schedule and by January of 1945 we were ready to begin selling the ’44 vintage. Sales were fairly good despite the chaos that followed the ending of the war.

Despite the fact that we never spoke of the day Caroline almost got taken away, my lie continued to echo in my head throughout the following months. Monsieur Arnaud and I pretended nothing had ever happened, but I wondered if he sensed my hidden desire for his daughter. I thought about speaking to Caroline every afternoon after I finished my work at the Château. As hard as I tried I could never think of anything to say. I think I was too afraid that her silence would not lift, even for me.

#

As dusk settles over the vineyard and the heat recedes with the light of day, I go inside. Walking down the stairs to the cellar I hear my body creak with each step. I try to pretend that it is the stairs I am hearing. The storeroom is toward the back of the cellar, by the smaller vats where I first met Monsieur Arnaud. Taking out one of my few remaining bottles of the ’44 Cheval I let my eyes wander over the news article that I posted above the shelves last year. It is a story of our vineyard to go along with the news that a case of the ’44 Cheval sold for $147,000 dollars at a Christie’s auction.

Back outside I resume my post on the porch. Drinking the wine I think about Monsieur Arnaud and Caroline. He died in 1953 and left Château Cheval-Blanc to me, Caroline passed just a year later. Her death hit me hard. She was the same age as I, and had always seemed to be in good health. However, after her father’s death I noticed that the light in her eyes had dimmed considerably, the energy was no longer there. At the time of their deaths our ’44 Cheval was still selling at extremely low prices. Things changed in 1955 when the vineyard received the highest ranking in the Classification of Saint-Émilion wine. Looking out over the vineyard I remember what I said when I was interviewed for the occasion.

“Here at Château Cheval-Blanc we like to let our grapes do the work.”