After being turned away unexpectedly at the Golden Grain Soju House, William and Richard emerged with faces so rigid that no one would have dared speak to them.
Their respective attendants opened the doors, and the two men came to a stop before the waiting sedans. William Harlan, one hand on the door of his Bentley, adjusted his glasses and spoke to Richard Sands, who was smirking.
“We came all the way here from New York in high spirits, only to come up empty-handed in the end. In the end, neither your splendid distribution network shares nor Wall Street’s numbers could pierce a single legal net set up by some brat in his twenties, Richard.”
In William’s voice, there was a more overt contempt for Richard than the bitterness of defeat. Richard snorted and roughly straightened the sleeve of his bespoke suit.
“Oh, William. You seem rather shocked that you couldn’t do anything about Redwood’s cash cow, aren’t you? Honor and perpetuity, was it? I had such a hard time holding back my nausea back there…”
Then Richard let go of the car door, took a step toward William, and said,
“Things are going to get rather interesting from now on, aren’t they? Wineries and recipes with potential, we’ve always dealt with by throwing money at them, but Redwood already calculated that predators like you and me would appear and built a defensive line in advance. If there’s someone in Napa Valley who laid out such a sophisticated Poison Pill, he’s going to be quite the headache for you, wouldn’t you say?”
William’s eyebrow twitched. Richard’s words had struck precisely at his sore spot.
To Richard Sands, wine was merely one of the many businesses he devoured, but to William, it was somewhat different. On the surface, wine appeared to be the very business that represented William Harlan.
“Do not misunderstand. I was trying to control this liquor, while you were merely trying to replicate it. But the result is the same.”
“No, no… The failed acquisition is only what appears on the surface. Everyone wants money. If something can’t be done with money, it only means there wasn’t enough money. I don’t know about you, but that isn’t the case for me.”
At the sight of Richard Sands speaking mockingly as he got into his car, William’s expression hardened. His words carried the implication that if they couldn’t acquire Golden Grain Soju House, then they could simply acquire Redwood instead.
William knew very well that if those words came from Richard Sands’s mouth, he could never dismiss them as mere bluff.
“You money-grubbing insect of a bastard…”
His mood thoroughly soured, William got into his own car. And all the way home, Richard’s words circled in his mind.
---
The wind stirred up by Ruby Quartz was turning Napa Valley into the eye of a storm, even though it was brandy, not wine. The rumor that had begun in a bar in San Francisco had crossed the continent and struck Wall Street in New York, and now the flames had returned to Redwood, their source, and were raging as a massive tempest.
Naturally, the entrance to Redwood Winery was packed with reporters’ vehicles from early morning. Prestigious media outlets had seized the place all at once to broadcast the news from Napa Valley to the entire world.
From the senior editor of Wine Spectator to columnists from The Wine Advocate, famous for rarely appearing on-site… their goal was only one thing.
To make Warren Winiarski, the legend who had shaken Napa once again thirty years after the Judgment of Paris, open his mouth.
“Warren! Just one word, please! The prevailing assessment is that this Ruby Quartz is Warren Winiarski’s ‘alchemical sublimation of wine.’ What do you think?”
James, a veteran reporter from Wine Spectator, chased after Warren without the slightest regard for the refusal to grant an interview. His questioning strategy was persistent. Rather than simply asking about the quality of the liquor, he praised Warren’s greatness, prodding at his pride.
“You astonished the world with Cabernet Sauvignon at Stag’s Leap. Why did you choose brandy at this point in time? Is this perhaps a challenge to the existing Cognac order?”
Warren walked silently with the collar of his old coat turned up, then stopped at the entrance to the winery. He sent a cold gaze through the deeply carved wrinkles on his face toward the camera flashes and recorders surrounding him.
“Your questions are terribly stale.”
At Warren’s low remark, the noisy scene fell silent as though cold water had been thrown over it.
“Do you think I’d be pleased if you flatter me with some embarrassing phrase like alchemy? And Ruby Quartz is not a toy made to challenge anyone. I merely found a certain inspiration here and made it. That is all.”
“Then you’re saying that Redwood here inspired you… Did you perhaps join Redwood for that reason?”
When the reporter snapped up the question, Warren smiled coldly.
“I believe I already said why I came to Redwood in a previous interview. If you want to know more, go bother Brian. I’m too old now to entertain those flimsy compliments of yours. And if you want to write about Ruby Quartz, please refrain from giving it some childish title like ‘The Return of the Legend.’ Ah, and for your information, the promotional copy for Ruby Quartz was not written by me.”
Warren shut the door firmly and disappeared inside. The reporters looked dejected, yet at the name Brian that Warren had thrown out, they grew frantic again and began searching for me. But by then, having heard that the reporters were swarming in, I had already taken refuge in the mud fields of Coombsville.
It was late afternoon by the time I returned to Redwood Winery, after the reporters’ commotion had swept through like a storm.
As I stared blankly at the magnificent sight of the sunset shining on the foothills of Napa Valley and dyeing the world yellow, I saw a man walking slowly in from below the hill.
“Hm?”
I tilted my head at the sight, one not often seen in Napa Valley. With an old canvas bag slung over his shoulder and cotton pants frayed at the knees, he was far removed from the typical tourist or industry insider who visited Napa.
His face was covered in a graying beard that looked as though it had not been shaved for several days, and deep fatigue and loneliness lingered around his sunken eyes. A white man who appeared to be in his mid-forties. He lifted his head toward the winery building, yet he did not even glance at the Astra Vale promotional banner.
Warren, who had just come out of the aging room, was approaching me when he also spotted the man. Warren instinctively realized that he was no ordinary onlooker.
“If you’re a reporter, we’re already closed for business. Go back.”
The man stopped walking and looked at Warren. His eyes were cloudy, but within them lay a strange yearning.
“…I’m not a reporter.”
His voice was rough and cracked. The man took a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket and held it out. It was not a leaflet for Aeshlon or Astra Vale, but a copy of the label for Quiet Hill, which had recently been released and was currently selling briskly.
“I came to meet the person who made this wine. Warren… did you make this wine?”
“As if that could be. It seems you don’t know when I joined this place.”
The man nodded, then asked,
“Then do you know the man who made this wine?”
Warren’s curiosity was piqued. Until that afternoon, he had been unbearably annoyed by people going around prying into him, but the man before him showed not the slightest interest in Warren even with him standing right in front of him, and was instead curious about the person who had made Quiet Hill.
“You’re looking for the person who made Quiet Hill… It seems that wine left quite an impression on you.”
“Of course. It certainly did.”
The man gave a self-deprecating laugh and went on.
“I was curious. Curious how he drew that out of the Pinot Noir from Grendel Hill in the Russian River Valley.”
Both Warren and I guessed the man’s identity from that brief sentence. A middle-aged man curious about Grendel Hill in the Russian River Valley.
I asked the man cautiously,
“Could you be… Mr. Daniel?”
The man’s shoulders trembled faintly. He turned his head and looked at me.
“How do you know me?”
“I do. The old gentleman very much wants to see you.”
He was Daniel Grendel. The legitimate heir of Grendel Hill, who had fled to France as though chased out of Harrington Winery by Mark Harrington’s thunderous rebuke. After more than ten years without news, he had returned to Napa like a wandering ghost.
“Do you know my father well?”
“…Somewhat. I personally persuaded the old gentleman to contract his grapes.”
“Then you’re…?”
“That’s right. I made Quiet Hill. My introduction is late. I’m Brian Choi.”
When I held out my hand, he seemed at a loss over his dirty hands. But I paid it no mind and clasped his hand.
“You’ve come back safe and sound. The old gentleman will probably be tremendously happy. Have you already been to Grendel Hill…”
I stopped speaking midway. Judging by his appearance, with grime practically running down him, he did not seem to have stopped by Grendel Hill first.
In that case, he had come to Redwood first, rather than Grendel Hill where his father would be waiting… It seemed strange, so I tilted my head and asked,
“It doesn’t look like you have. Is there a reason you came to Redwood first?”
He lowered his head and bit his lip, hesitating for a moment before he opened his mouth.
“I drank this wine in a little bistro tucked away in a corner of Paris. At first, I was enraged because it bore the name of my homeland, so I threw it back. I thought some Napa brat had taken my father’s grapes and was trying to raise his own name with them.”
Moisture slowly filled Daniel’s eyes.
“But the moment I took one sip, I was no longer in a restaurant in Paris. I was standing on that cool, mist-covered ridge of Grendel Hill. With the grapes from our farm, which Harrington coveted so desperately, how did you draw out something completely different from their pretentious ‘Noctis Ridge’… this kind of quiet yet complex aroma? I’d never tasted a Pinot Noir with such a lingering finish.”
He must genuinely have been curious, but it was not a question asked because he wanted an answer. So I merely showed an awkward smile, and he continued, his face hollow with emotion.
“My father spent his whole life tending that vineyard, but because of me, our family’s reputation was driven into the dirt. So even with those fine grapes, he could not earn a better name… But after drinking Quiet Hill, and then hearing that it had won Double Gold, I ended up coming all the way here. I wanted to pay my respects to the person who used Grendel Hill to defeat that damned Harrington who stole my research. Thank you, truly…”
“When Mr. Elias gave me the grapes, he asked me to promise him only one thing. To make sure I beat Harrington Winery’s Harrington Noctis Ridge Pinot Noir. And I did.”
At my smile, he smiled more brightly than anything.
“I wanted to say thank you before I met my father. I felt that I had to. If I hadn’t stopped by Redwood first, my father probably would have said it himself. That if I were a decent person, I should first go there and express my gratitude.”
“When you go, please give him my regards. I should have visited him once after receiving the award, but I’ve been so busy I couldn’t. I really am terribly busy, you see. But… you can’t exactly walk there…”
No matter how much one might talk about Grendel Hill as though it were the farm next door, and Sonoma as though it were the neighboring town to Napa, it was certainly not a distance one could walk. Even by car, it would take more than an hour.
“That’s why I wanted to ask… Could you lend me some money?”
An unexpected development. But I wasn’t so strapped for cash that I couldn’t send Daniel to Grendel Hill in Sonoma from here.
“…Of course.”
“Don’t misunderstand. The reason I look like this… like a beggar, isn’t because I have no money. I may look like this, but until now, I was working as a sous-winemaker at Domaine Leroy in France. But while I was waiting at New York’s JFK Airport for my connecting flight to Napa, I had my entire bag pickpocketed—wallet, passport, credit cards, everything. It had been so long since I came to America that I was excited and completely out of it.”
“Then how did you get here…?”
“I was standing there in despair when, by sheer luck, I found a twenty-dollar bill in my pocket. With that, I begged the driver of a Greyhound bus bound for San Francisco and rode in the luggage compartment.”
“…That’s impressive. Then since it’s come to this, let’s go together.”
Since it had been a while since I had seen Elias’s face, and since I also wanted to boast about the Double Gold, I decided to take him and head to Sonoma.
“I’d be grateful if you would.”
Daniel Grendel scratched his matted hair and gave an embarrassed smile.