Page 2 of The Widows of Champagne

Josephine

I n the still moments before dawn, Josephine Fouché-LeBlanc wandered among the sodden vines she’d tended the past sixty years, first with her husband, then with her son, and now with her beloved granddaughter whose name she couldn’t quite recall. It was there, just on the edges of her cluttered mind. If she concentrated hard enough. Just a little harder...

Gabrielle. Yes, Gabrielle. The younger woman was the heart of the vineyard now, as Josephine had once been. Her granddaughter would usher Chateau Fouché-LeBlanc into the second half of the century, not Josephine.

The end of her struggle drew near. The Lord wanted her home. She could hear Him calling her to Glory. Antoine would join her there. Or would she join him? The latter, of course. Her husband had been gone for many years.

Her mind wanted to play tricks on her this morning, the battle stronger than usual. She was ready to succumb. Once the harvest was complete. Then, only then, would she submit to the irresistible whispers swirling in her head. The dark, seductive lure was always there, like a breath in a stillroom inviting her to simply let go.

So very tempting.

A light drizzle accompanied her as she slogged along a path her feet remembered, even if her mind did not. The world was eerily quiet, neither dark nor light but a blur of muted grays. The solitude helped her think, to sort through the creeping chaos in her mind.

Josephine treasured these moments alone with her darling vines, as precious as children. She knew each vine intimately. The sense of recognition was a physical ache in her chest.

She paused, looked around until she had a better sense of where she was. On a clear day, standing in this very spot, she could see across the sweeping hills peppered with Fouché-LeBlanc vines and their immature grapes. The vineyard stretched to a point beyond where the eye could see, all the way to the very edges of the world. It was a whimsical thought, and Josephine was anything but a woman prone to whimsy. Those days had died with Antoine, then been permanently sealed in their son’s coffin.

A bird cried in the distance, jerking Josephine out of her painful memories.

She’d lost track of time.

Much had to be done before she welcomed Champagne’s finest citizens into her home. The party celebrating Chateau Fouché-LeBlanc’s two-hundred-year anniversary would be her last. Josephine was too old for parties. Nevertheless, this one would be spectacular. For the sake of the ones she’d lost too soon.

She began retracing her steps.

The chateau rose in the distance, three stories high, the ivy-covered marble hidden within the morning shadows. The windows appeared menacing as they stared down at her, like black, hollow eyes in a condemning face. A trick of the light. Still, she shivered.

The air hung heavy, bloated with the earthy scent of the rain-soaked soil. Josephine shivered again. Would today be full of sunshine and optimism? Or would the sky continue its watery attack? She wanted to cry over the invasion of such an unpredictable enemy. She usually disliked submitting to emotion, but, today, she allowed the tears to come. The drizzle chose that moment to turn into rain, sliding down her cheeks. A silent collaborator, as if knowing she wanted her tears camouflaged, even from herself.

Lord, call me home. I am ready. But that wasn’t true. Too much left undone.

Josephine paused midstep and wiped at her cheeks. She felt a pang of déjà vu so strong her mind leaped over forgotten decades, the individual years immaterial in the bittersweet journey.

Past folded over present, stopping at a single moment. The first time she’d met these vines she’d wept as she did now, but in awe and wonder.

Antoine had taken her hand and leaned in close. “Tell me, ma chère , what do you think of your new home?”

Hopelessly na?ve, Josephine had shifted from one foot to the other. Behind the tangle of blushes and schoolgirl innocence, she’d been desperate to impress her husband of a few hours. She’d wanted him to think of her as a woman, not the wide-eyed ingénue he’d married to merge his champagne house with her father’s. And yet, she’d answered with the truth spilling from her heart. “It is where I belong.”

The sense of homecoming was as real now as it had been that fateful day, when she’d been an untested bride to a man much older than her seventeen years.

“Yes,” he’d agreed, looking pleased, the smile lines deepening at the corner of his eyes. “This is where you belong.”

Their union had been a business arrangement between two powerful families, but their marriage had turned into a grand love affair for them both.

“We will make many babies, you and I.”

She’d managed to give him only one, a boy.

“They will tend the vines with us and grow to love the land with the heart of a true Champenois .”

In that, their son had not disappointed.

“Our life, it will be good for us both.”

She’d blushed then, caught up in the picture he’d painted of their future. Later that night, he’d made the promise again, but with a very different meaning. “It will be good for us both.”

Antoine had been a compassionate man, and a patient tutor both as a husband and a vigneron . He’d taught Josephine how to let the vines set the rhythm of their lives, to tend the grapes, to sample the vin clairs , and then, with uncanny accuracy, to predict how the base wines would mix together to make something truly magnificent. The Great Transformation, he’d called the process.

Josephine loved her small corner of the world, the rolling hills, the vines that had replaced the children she’d miscarried. The subsoil made up of fragile shells from ancient marine animals held a special place in her heart. She could hear the chalky earth whispering forgotten secrets from a time when dinosaurs roamed these hills.

The siren’s song had her stooping to the ground and scooping up a handful of dirt. She stared at the wet clump, the grizzled hand not that of her younger self but of the seventy-seven-year-old woman she was today.

She blinked again and again, and then, at last, she no longer held wet earth. She saw only the dry soil of decades before leaking through her seventeen-year-old fingers. She reveled in the warm feel of that ancient dirt sifting through a hand unscarred by time and toil. The sensation was as vivid as it was real, the experience an almost mystical connection to God’s creation.

Josephine knew her mind was playing another cruel game, tricks upon tricks. But this time, she wanted to disappear into the lie. She wanted to escape from the harsh realities of dismal weather and looming war. She was tired of death robbing her of loved ones. Would it be so terrible to spend a moment in a time before her life had been touched by tragedy?

The chalky soil warmed her palm.

Was this real, or just a memory?

She didn’t know.

Momentarily caught between past and present, she breathed in slowly, hoping to find her way. But where did she want to go? Back to when life was bright and easy? So tempting.

She breathed in again. The foul scent made her recoil, a touch of death to the nose, and that was it. She was once again standing in the present. The wet, decayed soil was unbearably cold in her hand, yet she dropped the clump as if it were a ball of white-hot fire.

Rain continued falling from the dreary sky, sliding beneath her collar. The grapes would be decimated by rot and mold. Gabrielle and her workers would prune, check for fungi or disease, and tie back shoots that came loose. Day after day, week after week, month after month, they had waged their war valiantly. They would still fail.

The enemy was too strong.

The enemy was crafty and cruel.

The enemy was...

Her feet were cold.

Josephine looked down. She was standing in mud that wanted to claim the top of her boots. How long had she been frozen in this moment to have sunk so far into the earth? A few minutes? An hour? The sky with its deceptive cloud cover gave her few clues.

Go home.

Josephine hurried back to the house. It was a fifteen-minute walk, enough time to gather her thoughts into some semblance of order. Back in the kitchen, routine took over. She stripped off her coat, then climbed out of her muddy boots to pull on thick, dry socks. She made a pot of strong coffee, then moved to the scarred table, cupping the steaming mug between her palms.

Her thoughts grew fuzzy again. Luring her, always so enticing. Her mind wanted to drift back across time, back to happier days full of nothing but brightness. She would not allow such frailty of spirit. Still so much to do for the party tonight.

Tonight? Was the party tonight? She thought maybe yes.

How had she missed the passage of two whole days?

She stood on shaky legs, glancing around at her surroundings. She’d come to the kitchen for a reason. Brushing the wet strands of hair off her face, she paced a bit until she remembered. The list. The one she’d begun the night before. Remembering now, she snatched it out from beneath a stack of other papers on her writing desk. Placing her mug on the table, she sat and studied the empty page.

Empty page? Her list had somehow vanished in the journey from desk to table.

No matter. She would start again.

Pencil poised over the paper, she forced herself to concentrate on the party. The champagne would flow freely, that much Josephine promised herself. They would serve only the best. Definitely the 1928. She wrote it down. The ’37, possibly the ’26. She made another series of notations. Once started, the ideas poured quickly from brain to hand to list.

Preparing for the anniversary party made Josephine proud of the past and gave her hope for the future. Perhaps all was not lost. Chateau Fouché-LeBlanc had survived tragedy before. Bad harvests had given way to better ones. Economic crises had forced them to move into international markets. Even untimely death had taught those left behind to fend for themselves.

There was much to celebrate.

A fragment of paper, torn from somewhere—she couldn’t remember where—slipped from tabletop to floor. Josephine reached for it. Words blurred as she laid the ragged page gently back on the table. She ran her fingertips over the looping text. Her handwriting. That was her handwriting.

When had she made this list? Today? Yesterday?

Unearthly silence settled over her. Darkness beckoned, seductive and full of false promises. Shutting her eyes, she confronted the familiar battle with her legendary iron will. One day, she would lose this fight, but not today.

No, she vowed. Not today.