Page 7 of Liaison with the Champagne Count
Hisoncleraised a silver brow in query, a smile at the ready. ‘It must be quite the news indeed to make you leave the chateau.’ Julien heard the rebuke. He seldom left the estate. Over the years, after the disaster with Clarisse, he felt more at home with the grapes than he did among people. Oh, he’d not forgotten his manners, but he had less call to use them and he was fine with that. Last night had been the first night in a year he’d had to dust those manners off. ‘Come, have breakfast with me while we talk. If I know you, you’ve been too busy walking the vineyards to have eaten yet.’
Breakfast was a delicious temptation at hisoncle’s. A man could feast at his breakfast table, really set himself up for the day. All of Oncle Etienne’s years in England during the family’s exile and then after—all total a sum of sixty-two years of his life—had resulted in a table that catered to hisoncle’s love of hearty British breakfasts with their eggs and sausages joined with the traditional French preference for something simpler; croissants and tartines with a cup of coffee or tea. Today, though, Julien thought a croissant was all his stomach could handle.
‘You’re not eating,’ hisonclecommented with a pointed stare at his mostly empty plate. ‘Is it bad news, then?’
‘I’m not sure it’s good or bad. At this point, it’s only news, but I fear it does trend towards the bad.’ They took their seats at one end of the table and Julien delivered his news. ‘Sir Garrett Luce is dead. He was killed in a flash flood on a business trip a few weeks ago.’ He watched hisonclefor a reaction. Luce had been his friend, not hisoncle’s. To hisoncle, Luce was merely a means to an end. ‘Luce’s widow arrived last night at the chateau. She means to take up residence there.’
Oncle Etienne calmly sliced into his sausage and took a long bite before answering. ‘And the vineyards? Does she mean to take an interest in them?’
‘Yes. She declared quite specifically to me last night that she means to take them over.’ She was looking for a project, something to assuage the loss he’d seen in her eyes. She was a woman at sea, looking for something to anchor herself to as she’d once anchored herself to her husband. It made him wonder what that life had been like. How had she spent her time? But these were questions he had to banish from his mind. To know her would be to invite disclosures, to bring emotions into the equation. That had not worked well for him in the past. He’d learned his lesson.
‘No one can hear her say that. Her projectcannotbe the vineyards,’ Etienne said with firm finality, coming to the same conclusion Julien had last night. ‘We’ve worked too hard. This a big year for us. The new grapes will be ready for harvest and the vintage we’ve been counting on goes to bottling. Thatvin mousseuxwill be the making of us.’ They were counting on it. They had their extra funds invested in it. More than extra funds, really. There was hisoncle’s loan against the farmhouse and the reclaimed vineyards, a loan granted on the collateral of the profits secured from pre-sales of thevin mousseux, and Garrett Luce’s funds were invested, too, on the strength of Julien’s reputation as avigneron. To lose the confidence, financial or otherwise, of their backers at this point would be to court disaster. If they were unable to make payments on the loan they’d taken out last year to buy some additional acreage, they would lose the lands it had taken generations to claim in their play to raise funds to gather the rest. Neither of them had to say anything out loud about what a setback it would be. The expected profit was meant to go towards making Luce an offer for the vineyards, the last hectares of land to complete the restoration of the Archambeau holdings.
‘I do not think she will sell any time soon.’ Julien addressed the other concern. Even if they raised the money, even if they could continue to control the direction of the vineyards, it would all be for naught if the land could not be acquired.
Etienne nodded thoughtfully. ‘That is the least of our concerns. We have choices there. We can convince her the land is not worth anything, that it is draining her coffers. She might part with the vineyards if not the house.’ He gave a Gallic shrug. ‘It would be a shame not to get the house back, but the land matters more.’ The land could be turned to make more money. The house could not.
Julien frowned. ‘That persuasion seems unlikely if we have the harvest we anticipate and the success we are looking for from the champagne. We can’t sacrifice those things to promote a ruse of low productivity.’ To say nothing of how uncomfortable Julien was with the idea of perpetuating a dishonest scheme designed to push someone towards a fabricated belief from which he’d benefit.
‘There are other ways.’ Hisonclewas undaunted. He spread his hands on the surface of the old oak table. ‘Running a chateau and a vineyard is a large undertaking. Grapes are a year-round pursuit, they’re a demanding mistress. She may tire of it. I think it’s our responsibility to show her how time-consuming it is, especially if she has to make every little decision herself.’
Julien knew what hisonclemeant: give Madame Luce everything she wanted and then ensure it became too overwhelming so that she’d beg for his intervention, beg for him to take on the responsibilities to the point of wanting to wash her hands of the vineyard completely. He was still sceptical. The strategy seemed mean-spirited.
‘Telling people the truth,showingthem the truth by letting them experience it, is not dishonest,mon fils,’ Etienne soothed, reading his mind.
‘But we haven’t been quite truthful, have we? What if she discovers how liberal we’ve been in Luce’s absence?’ Julien had never been entirely comfortable with a few of the decisions he’d made in Luce’s absence over the years, like the decision to use Luce’s grapes in the Archambeau vintages.
Hisoncledismissed the concern with a wave of his hand. ‘Luce hired you to act as his proxy, to make decisions that could not wait for letters to cross the Channel. You’ve done nothing but act in the best interest of the estate. You’ve cost him no money, you’ve not damaged the estate’s reputation. There is nothing to worry about. You were simply doing your job to the best of your ability.’ That was not quite true. If he had been doing his job to thebestof his ability, the estate would have already been producing a profit. He’d merely been maintaining the status quo and making decisions that had been in the best interests of the Archambeaux. In most cases what had been good for the Archambeaux was good for the estate, but there were a few occasions when he’d had to choose and he’d chosen family. Nothing detrimental to the estate of course, just perhaps not a growth opportunity either. For example, he had not entertained offers for surplus grapes even though those offers paid more for them than the Archambeau vineyard did, knowing full well the Archambeau vineyard paid nothing for those grapes.
Oncle Etienne shook his head. ‘She’s a woman, and a grieving one. She’ll have no head for business even if she does decide she’s interested. You worry too much.’ But hisonclehadn’t seen her last night, those sharp eyes duelling with him over the rims of wine glasses. Oncle Etienne always dismissed women, his own wife included, who’d been left behind in England with his son to run the British end of the Archambeau shipping business. Julien did not think Emma Luce would care to be dismissed.
‘Mon fils, you are looking at these events all wrong. Instead of portending ill omens for us, it could be that this is the break we’ve been waiting for.’ Hisonclefixed him with the full force of his considering stare. ‘Luce is dead, and that is regrettable. I know you liked him. But we could only have bought the vineyard and chateau from him at his whim. We might have waited years for that to happen. We’d already waited seven with no sign of him wanting to sell.’ Hisoncleleaned forward, an idea brewing that made his eyes shine. ‘But we don’t need the widow to sell. You could marry her and claim the estate without us expending a single sou.’ Hisonclegrinned. ‘In one fell swoop, we’d have everything back.’
‘She’s in mourning, Oncle. Her husband has just passed. It would be, as the British say, bad form.’
‘You don’t have to marry her tomorrow. Marry her in the fall after the harvest. We’ve waited seven years; we can certainly wait seven more months.’ Hisonclescowled, no doubt thinking him a prude. Julien thought of the woman who’d sat across from him at the dinner table last night, whose loss was evident in the way she spoke of her husband, how difficult it had been for her to share the details of his death. He did not think seven months would change that for her. ‘Marriage takes two willing partners. She’s not emotionally available, not now, not in seven more months.’ He knew from how she spoke of her husband last night that she was not envisioning a second marriage in her future.
‘These obstacles are nothing,mon fils.You make too much of them.’ Oncle Etienne gave a wry laugh. ‘If she does not think she’souvert a l’amour, then make heropen to love, persuade her. You can be very charming when you choose.’ Julien frowned and hisonclepressed. ‘Or is ityouwho is not open to love?’
‘I am not open to dishonesty,’ Julien retorted sharply. ‘Wooing a woman under the pretence of having feelings for her is cruel and devious.’ He could not see Emma Luce tolerating such a betrayal. She did not strike him as a woman who forgave easily, or ever forgot. Such perfidious actions would drive a permanent wedge between themifshe believed him. After last night’s rather frosty start, he thought it unlikely she’d believe such avoltefaceon his part.
Hisonclegave a negligible shrug. ‘Fine then, you don’t have tocourther to wed her. This needn’t be presented as a whirlwind romance or a love match. Tell her up front it’s a marriage of convenience. She’s a businesswoman. Convince her it’s as convenient for her as it is for you.’
Julien’s frown deepened. Usually, he admired hisoncle’s strategic mind, his ability to look at problems from different angles. But not today. He fixed hisonclewith a stern stare, a reminder that he was a man of thirty-seven, no longer a boy to be ordered about. ‘I am to be bartered in marriage for the Archambeau restoration?’
Hisonclelet out a frustrated sigh. ‘Mon Dieu, Julien,tuas besoinde te fairepousserunpaire. I’d marry her myself, sight unseen, if I wasn’t already married.’ He gave an impatient wave of his hand. ‘You were going to marry Clarisse for the estate. This is no different. It’s not as if you’re interested in anyone else at the moment.’
Julien bristled at that. What hisoncleproposed went against his principles. Not even for the Archambeau restoration would he compromise his ethic, nor would he make such a decision that would take someone else at unawares, the full deception not revealed until it was too late to change course. He knew already what Emma Luce would think of such a strategy. ‘Itwasdifferent with Clarisse, Oncle. We were in love.’
‘Youwere in love,’ hisonclecorrected without empathy. ‘It’s been seven years,mon fils. How much longer are you going to carry that carcass around with you? Clarisse certainly hasn’t,’ he added pointedly. No. She hadn’t. Three months after the broken engagement, Clarisse had married a French politician whose star was rising in powerful circles. It had been an extravagant, very public summer affair at the chateau, her family making no apologies for the speed with which it happened after the dissolution of her engagement to the down-at-heel son of the Comte de Rocroi.
‘She has two children now, lives in Paris in agrande maison,’ hisonclepersisted.‘She is touted as one of the city’s premier hostesses.’ Hisoncleraised a brow. ‘And what do you have, hiding among your grapes?’ He paused and then slapped a palm on the table, indicating that a decision had been made. ‘You must come with me. I am meeting with the district growers today.’
Julien groaned. ‘Those old men?’ There were a thousand things to do at the chateau and any of them were more appealing than lunch with the district’s growers, windbags that they were. They’d talk for hours trying to impress each other.
‘Yes,thoseold men. They are our friends and our competition. We must keep an eye on them as they keep an eye on us. Charles Tremblay would like nothing better than to see us fail. He’d snatch up the land and we’d never get it back. And if you’d truly like a bit of revenge against Gabriel Anouilh, you need to show him you’ve moved on from his daughter and that you can acquire that land without him. To that end, it might not be best to mention that Garrett Luce is dead just yet. I don’t want the consortium spooking and withdrawing their support.’ Hisonclegave him a stern look. ‘The other thing you cannot continue to do,mon fils, is hide away and lick your wounds like a whipped cur. You’re too young to be a recluse.’ Oncle Etienne leaned forward. ‘This isouryear. We will throw a grand summer ball at the chateau in June, just as we’ve planned, to celebrate the new vintage. We will invite buyers and they will see your genius. It will be a success and I want you there beside me.’
‘I am always beside you, Oncle.’ Julien reminded him, trying not to take offence. He was the one who grew the grapes, who oversaw the harvests, who decided which vines to prune. Oncle Etienne might be the face of the Archambeau vineyards in their current state today, such as they were—a mid-sized, but high-quality winery—but Julien was the silent brilliance behind the scenes whose effort made those successes possible. It was something he had in common with Garrett Luce, both of them liking to build success backstage instead of on it.
