He had accomplished it He was half-owner of a great vineyard. And Hélène had not the slightest suspicion of what he had done.
Charles had secretly begun to read up on the growing of vines. And why not? Was he not a vintner now? He learned about the different vines: cabernet sauvignon was the principal vine used, but others were planted alongside it: gros cabernet, merlot, malbec, petit verdot. The desk drawers of Charles’s office were filled with pamphlets on soil and vine pressing. He learned about fermentation and pruning and grafting. And that the worldwide demand for wine kept growing.
He met regularly with his partner. “It’s going to be even better than I thought,” Rene told Charles. “Prices for wine are skyrocketing. We should get three hundred thousand francs a tonneau for the first pressings.”
More than Charles had dreamed! The grapes were red gold. Charles began to buy travel pamphlets on the South Sea Islands and Venezuela and Brazil. The very names had a magic about them. The only problem was that there were few places in the world where Roffe and Sons did not have offices, where Hélène could not find him. And if she found him, she would kill him. He knew that, with an absolute certainty. Unless he killed her first. It was one of his favorite fantasies. He murdered Hélène over and over again, in a thousand delicious ways.
Perversely, Charles now began to enjoy Hélène’s abuse. All the time she was forcing him to do unspeakable things to her, he was thinking, I’ll be gone soon, you convasse. I’ll be rich on your money and there’s nothing you can do about it.
And she would command, “Faster now,” or “Harder,” or “Don’t stop!” and he would meekly obey her.
And smile inside.
In wine growing, Charles knew the crucial months were in the spring and summer, for the grapes were picked in September and they had to have a carefully balanced season of sun and rain. Too much sun would burn the flavor, just as too much rain would drown it. The month of June began splendidly. Charles checked the weather in Burgundy once, then twice a day. He was in a fever of impatience, only weeks away from the fulfillment of his dream. He had decided on Montego Bay. Roffe and Sons had no office in Jamaica. It would be easy to lose himself there. He would not go near Round Hill or Ocho Rios, where any of Hélène’s friends might see him. He would buy a small house in the hills. Life was cheap on the island. He could afford servants, and fine food, and in his own small way live in luxury.
And so in those first days of June, Charles Martel was a very happy man. His present life was an ignominy, but he was not living in the present: he was living in the future, on a tropical, sun-bathed, wind-caressed island in the Caribbean.
The June weather seemed to get better each day. There was sun, and there was rain. Perfect for the tender little grapes. And as the grapes grew, so did Charles’s fortune.
On the fifteenth day of June it began to drizzle in the Burgundy region. Then it began to rain harder. It rained day after day, and week after week, until Charles could no longer bring himself to check the weather reports.
René Duchamps telephoned. “If it stops by the middle of July, the crop can still be saved.”
July turned out to be the rainiest month in the history of the French weather bureau. By the first of August, Charles Martel had lost every centime of the money he had stolen. He was filled with a fear such as he had never known.
“We’re flying to Argentina next month,” Hélène had informed Charles. “I’ve entered a car race there.”
He had watched her speeding round the track in the Ferrari, and he could not help thinking: If she crashes, I’m free.
But she was Hélène Roffe-Martel. Life had cast her in the role of a winner, just as it had cast him in the role of a loser.
Winning the race had excited Hélène even more than usual. They had returned to their hotel suite in Buenos Aires, and she had made Charles get undressed and lie on the rug, on his stomach. When he saw what she had in her hand as she straddled him, he said, “Please, no!”