“Of course I’m curious about you. I loved experiencing Paris with you.”
“I feel the same.”
For a few seconds she allowed herself to get lost in his eyes.
“I don’t think much of this wine ...” Hanna’s voice drifted to them from inside, then she stepped out onto the balcony. She was holding an almost full wineglass in one hand, and a bottle in the other. Bente didn’t register what was going on at first; her vision was too clouded by the whole situation—by the wine, by being so close to Didrik again. She blinked, focused on the bottle, and her eyes widened.No!It couldn’t be ...
Shit.
“Fuck” was all Bente managed to say before she leaped to her feet. “You openedthat bottle?” She snatched it out of Hanna’s hand.
“Yes—it looked a bit sad, it didn’t even have a label. It reminds me of the stuff our neighbor mixed up in the bathtub when we lived on Lövvägen. You remember the guy who—”
“Hanna, you can’t drink that wine—it’s almost eighty years old.” Bente felt her desperation rising.
“Don’t worry, I’ll reimburse you,” her sister said cheerily. She took another sip and grimaced.
“It’s irreplaceable!” Bente snapped. “Stop drinking right now. That’s the bottle we’re working on.” She took the glass away from Hanna.
“But how was I supposed to know ...” Hanna rolled her eyes. “You always complain about my cocktails, so I thought I’d pour you a glass of wine.” She sighed loudly. “Like I said, I’ll reimburse you.”
“It’s not about that.” Bente groaned. Gazed at the bottle. “How am I going to explain this to Camille?”
The others had heard the argument, and now they came out onto the balcony.
“Well, since it’s open, maybe we should all have a taste?” Agneta suggested with a shrug. “I mean, it’s the reason for this evening’s dinner party, isn’t it? It would be a shame to let it go to waste.”
Bente was about to protest, then realized that her mother had a point. They could try it. And it might make good content for the show—if Didrik had managed to talk Don around.
She ran and fetched her camera while everyone gathered around the dinner table.
She provided each of them with a clean glass, and gave brief instructions on how to treat the wine. She contemplated the pale-red liquid in her glass. The sediment swirled around when she moved it. There was nothing wrong with the color, she thought as she tilted the glass and studied the contents against the white surface of the table. However, she had no great expectations about the taste, which must have deteriorated over the years. It was only the very best wines that opened up and improved during such a long storage time, and she wasn’t sure this one fell into that category.
They all sniffed their glasses simultaneously.
Elnaz reached for Bente’s camera and began filming. Bente stuck her nose in the glass and inhaled, then glanced up at Elnaz and the others, feeling both pleased and surprised. “I’m getting dried berries.” She sniffed again. “Tobacco and cedarwood.” She took a deep breath. “There it is, leather and mushrooms.” She usually allowed everyone else to say what they thought when she conducted a tasting, but right now she was completely caught up in the moment. She realized what she was doing, and looked to the others. “What are you getting?”
“The same, I think.” Don swirled his glass just as Bente had done. “Maybe a little earthiness?”
“Good,” Bente said.
“And ... stables?” Didrik looked inquiringly at her. Bente nodded eagerly—she could smell that too. “Shall we taste?”
“I already know what it tastes like,” Hanna said.
“Yes, but try again—take your time. Think about what you’re really getting. Close your eyes.” Hanna did as Bente instructed, and the others followed suit. “Although I guess your cocktails have probably already destroyed your taste buds for the evening.”
Bente swirled her glass again and took a small sip. The taste reflected the nose, but she was also picking up pine needles. The wine wasn’t particularly mellow; back then the alcohol content was relatively low, unlike today’s Bordeaux wines. But it was clearly from a good vineyard, and had been made using high-quality grapes. There was very little roughness on her tongue—the tannins had faded over time.
“Just imagine, this was bottled eighty years ago,” Didrik said. “And it’s been lying at the bottom of the sea until very recently.”
Bente nodded. “Unbelievable. That’s what’s so exciting about wines, the way they change and develop. The acidity would have been much greater when the wine was bottled, but it’s since rounded off; the flavors of mushrooms, an earth cellar, and a stable come from age. But the taste can deteriorate if it’s aged for too long. It could even be that those flavors were more noticeable twenty years ago, when it was probably meant to be drunk. It’s hard to know for sure.”
She held up the bottle to the light; the sediment had dropped to the bottom.
“How do you think the conditions have affected the wine? The darkness, the pressure at the bottom of the sea?” Don seemed genuinely interested.
“The darkness and the cold temperature are why the wine has kept so well. The relatively constant temperature and the water pressuremade it keep for longer. It might not have survived that length of time in an ordinary wine cellar.”
