Chapter 22
STILWELL WALKED INTO the lobby of the Hotel Atwater on Sumner Avenue and had to marvel at its lush appointments and stylish modern furniture.
After a lengthy renovation and refurbishing by its owners—one of the island’s old families—the hotel had transitioned from a down-at-the-heels overnighter known by locals as the Ratwater to a place to see and be seen.
It was now considered one of the top hotels in downtown Avalon, rivaling the two venerable hillside hotels, the Zane Grey and the Mt.
Ada (the old Wrigley mansion), as the best place to stay on the island.
To the left of the registration desk he saw a counter with a house phone. He picked it up and asked the operator to connect him with Helena Novak. When she answered he identified himself, and she said she had been given a heads-up by Marquez and would be down shortly to meet him in the lobby.
They found an empty corner with a sitting area and took chairs across a coffee table from each other.
Stilwell was surprised by Novak’s age. He thought she could not be much older than thirty.
She was dressed similarly to Marquez, in jeans and a work shirt.
She had sun-streaked hair and was deeply tanned, presumably from days spent in vineyards.
“I don’t know if I can help you,” she said. “I mean, I found the damage to the vines today, but I have no idea who did it.”
“I understand that,” Stilwell said. “I’m actually more interested in what you might have seen on previous visits to the vineyard and whether you’ve received any odd or offbeat questions from anybody.”
“Like what?”
“Like maybe someone asking what would be the worst thing to happen to a vineyard.”
She scoffed. “Well, nobody’s ever asked me that,” she said. “I would remember.”
“If someone did, what would your answer be?” Stilwell asked.
“Um, fire. Obviously.”
“A fire is not controllable. What is something that would cripple the vineyard without threatening people or adjoining properties?”
“Probably what happened today. Where those vines were cut is devastating.”
“Well, aren’t the root systems still intact? I mean, I know it will take time, but won’t the vines just grow again?”
“Unlikely. Like I told Mr. Marquez, the canopy collects sunlight and sends it down the shaft to the roots. The roots take in water and moisture and send it up. If that connection is severed, both sides will probably die.”
Stilwell nodded.
“How did you get the job at ABC? If you don’t mind my asking.”
“Well, I grew up in Napa and my father was a winemaker,” Novak said.
“I’ve been running around vineyards for as long as I can remember.
I went to UC Davis to study viticulture and then spent a year at a vineyard in the Rh?ne Valley.
I started making wine with my dad when I came home.
When Mr. Marquez called my father to try to hire him, he wasn’t available.
He was about to retire, in fact. He told him that I was the next best thing and I got the job. ”
“That’s great. And that was two years ago?”
“Yes. I planted the new vineyard.”
“And how is it working with Marquez?”
“He’s been fine. He’s got a lot of other businesses and isn’t there a lot. I think he even owns part of this hotel. At least, he gets me a discount.”
“How often are you here?”
“Every two weeks I come down for a day or two.”
“From Napa? Is that where you live?”
“Yes.”
“Are you aware of the other vandalism that occurred up at ABC?”
“Yes, Oliver called me every time.”
“And were you involved with the repairs?”
“No, not really. It’s not what I do. I’m about growing grapes and making wine.”
Stilwell nodded. He had one more thing he wanted to ask but needed to approach it carefully.
“How is the vineyard doing in general?” he asked. “Seems like a huge gamble to plant a vineyard. You have to wait so long before you have wine you can sell, you know?”
“It takes a lot of time and a lot of money,” Novak said. “We’ve had some setbacks because of the vandalism and other things, but I don’t think we’ll miss our target by much.”
“What other things are you talking about?”
“Well, we had some black rot we had to deal with. But our biggest problem is labor. We are one relatively small vineyard on an island. It was already hard to find seasonal pickers. Then all the ICE stuff last year made finding field-workers even more difficult. They’re all gone—deported or hiding.
We might not have fruit that’s mature enough to make wine, but we still need to harvest it every year.
That didn’t happen at ABC last October, and that set us back, time- and budget-wise.
Mr. Marquez had to pay some high-school kids, including his grandson, to come pick grapes.
It was a mess because they’d never done it before, so it was very slow. ”
“And what about the black rot? What’s that?”
“It’s a disease caused by a fungus.”
“How do you treat it?”
“Different ways. We used a fungicide, but you also have to go in and cut out infected leaves and branches. That was another thing we couldn’t find the labor for, and that contributed to its spread. We have it under control now.”
“Is it going to delay production?”
“Not really. But it means less fruit, which eventually means less wine.”
“And less profit.”
“Exactly.”
Stilwell nodded. He had gotten a good sense of what was happening at the vineyard.
“Can I ask you one last thing?” he said. “Just for my own education.”
“Sure,” Novak said.
“Marquez mentioned that the damaged vines were French clones. What does that mean?”
“It just means the vineyard was propagated with cuttings from French vines. You get a genetically identical copy of the mother vine, and the theory is that you will then get the same characteristics in the wine you eventually make.”
“Is that expensive? Marquez mentioned filing an insurance claim.”
“Oh, yeah. It’s much more expensive than germinating seeds and starting from scratch.”
“You learn all this at UC Davis?”
“Some of it I did, but most I learned from my dad.”
“Well, listen, thank you for taking the time to talk with me. I’ll let you get back to your evening now.”
“Like I said, I don’t know if I was a help, but I hope you catch the people who did this.”
“Do you think it was more than one person?”
“Who knows? But whoever it was, they should be locked up. I’ve never seen Mr. Marquez so upset.”
“I think I understand why.”
Stilwell stood up. He shook hands with Novak and headed to the lobby’s exit.
Out on the sidewalk he called Steve’s and ordered one rib eye and two rice pilafs.
He was told it would be ready in fifteen minutes.
He had parked the ATV out front. He got in and headed toward Crescent.
Steve’s was on the second floor of a building and had one of the better views of the harbor.
Along the way, he called Tash to assure her that dinner would be there soon.
“Good,” she said. “I’m starved.”
“Sorry about the wait,” he said. “It was another vandalism up at ABC.”
“Really? Then why were you at the Ratwater?”
Old habits died hard. Tash had grown up knowing the hotel by its nickname. It was also apparent that she had been checking his phone location.
“I had to interview a witness there,” he said.
“Who was that?” she said.
“The viticulturist who found the vandalism today.”
He had intentionally kept Novak’s gender out of his answer. It seemed to quell Tash’s curiosity and she changed the subject.
“Did you get rice?” she asked.
“I did times two,” he said.
“Hurry home.”
“I will.”