A path less straight (pt. 6)

The grapes of mirth

“So we’re just going to drop in unannounced?” I asked Egg.

“Last time I saw Giorgio he told me to drop by any time I was in the area,” Egg replied. “He’d be insulted if I did not take him literally.”

Either side of the road vineyards stretched over the hills. Egg drove the tiny rented Fiat with one hand on the wheel, content to leave the speed limit well alone. The one car that came up behind us was waved past at a wider part of the road.

I, too, felt relaxed. A meal in a compact, but excellent restaurant, followed by a slow and quite possibly romantic meander back to our hotel room in the old part of town had unwound me after our flight the previous day. I decided that I would just let the next weird thing wash over me without reacting.

“So who is he, exactly?” I asked.

“My godfather.” Egg answered.

Egg turned the corners of his mouth up slightly in response to my murdered rendition of the Godfather theme tune. He negotiated the car around a tractor before elaborating.

“He is an old friend of my mother. He used to be in the same line of work, but now he makes wine,” he said.

“So he isn’t involve in the mob?” I pressed.

“Cass, not everyone in Italy is a member of the Mafia,” he replied.

Our route took us through a village, the sort of place that tourists proclaim as enchanting and gets used in holiday brochures and as the backdrop to films, but with the tacked-on compromises for modern facilities and conveniences glaringly evident. The tiny houses crammed together proudly displayed their satellite dishes, Italian matron figures held mobile phones to their ears as they herded their grandchildren and the café whose chairs and tables spilled into the cobbled square advertised its free wi-fi.

Egg turned the car into a road that was little more than a gap between two buildings and then along a lane that could not make up its mind which direction is was supposed to be going. He slowed the car to a halt, licked his finger and stuck it out of the window, frowning. After a few seconds and before I could ask him what he was up to, we were under way again, turning down a narrow farm track, which led onto a wider road. He drove along this for a short while before turning to drive onto a gated driveway, the ornate gate swung open under its own power.

“Is this it, or are we lost?” I asked him.

“This is it,” he replied. “But he must have moved the gate since the last time I was here.”

The villa was a single story affair, built from weathered stone with a classic tiled roof, but I judged it more modern than its materials. It resided in a large garden of neatly mown and freshly watered grass, liberally sprinkled with well-coiffeured trees. A collection of buildings that ranged between ancient rustic shed and modern industrial unit lay to one side with its own road access, I took this to be the winery.

We parked by a weathered statue of a robed woman who stood in a circle of flowers at the end of the driveway. She regarded us with a permanently measured gaze. A small bird, perched on the hand of her out-stretched arm took offence at our arrival and fled twittering as we disembarked from the car and approached the door.

We were greeted at the door by a woman who looked like she was trying too hard to fit the role of wizened, old maid figure and ushered into an antechamber that was decorated strictly in the taste category with nothing from the catalogues of personality or comfort. It was a bit intimidating so I looked to Egg for reassurance, but he was staring out of a window. I followed his gaze to spy a courtyard bedecked in flowers with an ornate stone fountain.

“It is so pleasant to see my godchild again, and he has brought a beautiful companion.” I nearly jumped out of my skin, standing inside the doorway was a trim, tanned man with thick black hair, wearing a smart, grey designer suit with the collar open. He had a hook to his nose and his eyes were predatory, but the rest of his face was pleasant enough. His voice was deep and rich and his English carried enough of an accent to be exotic without being difficult to understand.

“My dear, I am Giorgio, welcome to my home,” he said.

I managed to murmur my own name and there followed a hand-shaking and kissing ritual in which he overshadowed the awkwardness on my part with the grace and fluidity of his own. He went through something similar with Egg that seemed better rehearsed and promptly told us that lunch should not be long and of course we were staying for it.

Egg had proved annoyingly fluent in Italian, it was handy, but it meant I was relying on him for communication. Now it meant I was standing like a lemon as a conversation that probably would have excluded me in English went on bilingually. I was rescued by a tap on the shoulder from a slim and exotic woman who was probably young enough to be Giorgio’s daughter, but somehow I sensed that she was not.

“You, must excuse the men while they talk of business.” She purred. “I am Isabella, let me show you around the winery.”

She led me away with a sway that could have graced the catwalks of Milan, and quite possibly had done, I considered. Her tour was bright and friendly, every step of the wine-making process had a funny story, and her depth of knowledge made me realise that she was far more than the trophy wife.

“I would have made wine anyway,” she confided. “But Giorgio’s money certainly made it easier. Now, here is the secret at the heart of my craft.”

The device made little sense to me. Something was obviously poured into the top and cascaded down a series of ramps, funnels and slopes until it ended up in a number of different barrels at the bottom. It was kind of like a medieval pinball machine built by an enthusiastic but quite insane carpenter.

“It’s, er, well, kind of...” I trailed off. I should have said it was a metaphor for my past few days.

“Let me show you,” she said.

She pulled a rope and a barrel at the top tipped grapes into the machine. They bounced and rolled down chutes and tracks. Some collecting in one trap set off a counterweight that redirected another stream, others spun wheels that altered the course in other ways. I stood there and laughed at the fairground of the grapes.

“Each grape is sorted by the machine so that the taste of each vat of wine is perfect,” she explained. “The original device was designed by Leonardo Da Vinci, but there have been some small improvements since then.”

“It’s fantastic,” I said. “I wish I had one to pair up my socks.”

A path less straight (pt. 5)

Around the bend

The sun was up at some unearthly hour. Eventually I stopped cursing its brightness and decided I might as well join it, with no cloud in the sky there was little chance of anything beating it.

I found myself alone in the cabin with no note explaining this occurrence. It crossed my mind that I might have been marooned here by the pair of odd brothers, but the keys to the hire car were still hanging on a hook. I had got as far as filling the kettle and lighting the gas before an aquatic commotion down on the lake shore disgorged Bracken onto the beach.

“Morning,” he said leaving a sodden trail on his path through the cabin. “Let me get some clothes on and I’ll make a start on breakfast.”

Some clothes turned out to be a pair of baggy shorts and a t-shirt bearing the legend ‘Atlantis 2008 – still soggy’, he had towelled his hair until it was a damp mess and left it like that.

“Now, my lady,” he said, taking a bow. “Wouldst thou liketh a cup of tea?”

He busied himself around the kitchen area, emptying most of the contents of the fridge into a large frying pan and sourcing some clean cups. With a steaming mug of tea in my hand, I asked him where Egg was.

“He’s gone for a walk to clear his head, poor little fellow was up all night trying to divine the future in the entrails of goats,” he replied. “Plus we might have decided to finish off that bottle of whisky.”

“Goats?” I asked.

“Oh, don’t worry,” Bracken answered. “Nowadays we use computer simulated goats, it's just as accurate but there’s far less bleating.”

He lit the grill, cut the remains of a loaf of bread into thick slices, fussed over seasoning and then broke the remaining supply of eggs into the pan.

“I’ve been recalled, so we might as well use everything up,” he explained. “Roll-mop herring?”

I looked into the proffered jar and declined.

“I was going to set the little blighters free, but it looks like they’re too far gone for that.” He took one himself and chewed it slowly and noisily, a look of bliss on his face. “How burnt do you like your toast?”

Egg arrived just as Bracken was serving up, pale faced and sunken eyed.. The meal looked just like randomly fried leftovers, but smelled divine. We ate in silence. The toast was only very lightly burnt.

“So what now?” I asked, a second mug of builders-strength tea in my hands.

“Bracken’s contact says Mother flew to Florence, which means she is probably visiting an old friend who has a villa not too far from there,” Egg answered. “I’ve booked a flight and hotel there, or you can return home with Bracken, if you want.”

I cancelled thoughts of shoe boutiques and chic little restaurants and replaced them with spaghetti trees and olive-throwing competitions, still it appealed, so I agreed to a little Italian adventure.

“And the goat entrails?” I enquired.

“You learn to ignore anything my brother says eventually,” Egg replied. “Everything’s done on spreadsheets now. The best I can scry is that you should save your work often. Something’s not right.”

I drove the hire car while Egg dozed in the back seat. Bracken was navigating, although somewhat randomly, insisting that we stick to the gravel back roads that wound through the forests and calling turnings according to his whim. He cautioned me to watch out for the locals who all thought they were rally drivers.

“Admit it,” I said. “You have no idea where we are and we are going to miss our flights.”

“Nonsense, my dear lady,” he replied. “Has Egg ever explained to you about following roads where they want to take you, rather than forcing them?”

“I think he mentioned it once,” I said. “It didn’t make any sense then either, the quickest route is the shortest one, any navigation app will tell you that.”

I pulled the car over to the side of the trail and came to a halt. My phone woke at my touch, I flicked across to the appropriate icon, launched the program and held the device in front of Bracken’s face.

“See!” I told him.

“Yes,” he said. “Not far to go now.”

He tilted the phone so that I could see the screen clearly, the arrow indicated we were only a few miles from the airport. I tapped at the screen like it was a faulty dial, but the situation did not change.

“But, that’s not...” My words faded off. “But, look, we’re facing the wrong direction, right now you’re taking us further away.”

“I tell you what, how about a little bet?” He said. “Loser buys the winner a drink. We have to join the main road anyway, so you turn the car around and follow the map to here.” He indicated a spot close to the airport. “I’ll continue straight on and meet you there. I warn you though, I’m going to jog.”

“You’re on.” I told the maniac.

Once Bracken had closed his door, I turned the car quickly and set off with vigour, imagining I was one of those rally driving locals. Trees dashed by and stones rattled against the underside of the car. Coming around a corner it slid slightly so I reigned it in. A left turn took me onto a metalled road and I increased my speed.

The phone chimed and told me I should make a right turn, I slowed down as this was our finish line. Bracken was impossibly sat by the side of the road, a wild flower in his hand, he looked like he had not even broke into a sweat.

“You owe me a drink,” he said as he settled back into the passenger seat and threaded the flower into my hair.

As we parted in the airport, Egg urged Bracken to patch things up with Huggy, while Bracken urged Egg to grow a moustache. Bracken went down on one knee to kiss my hand and then flounced off to flirt with the girl at the check-in desk. Egg smiled and shook his head.

A path less straight (pt. 4)

My God, it's full of apps

With the boat returned unsunk despite Bracken’s best Admiral Nelson impression, we retrieved the car and Bracken directed us along a series of gravel roads to the wooden cabin he was renting. It looked like a completely rustic affair from the outside, with a separate hut for the toilet and no running water, but a wire promised electricity. Bracken had not locked the door, being short on pockets and long on trust.

Inside was more modern, with worn but comfortable furniture, a small, but ample kitchen and bedroom space on an upper level. Bracken handed us beers from the fridge and invited us to make ourselves at home while he dressed for dinner.

“He doesn’t seemed concerned,” I commented.

“Nothing bothers Bracken much, that what makes him good at his job,” Egg said. “Well, nothing except his relationship with Huggy, and that’s always on and off.”

Bracken reappeared in well-worn jeans and a shirt that had seen better days. He had his phone clasped to his ear and was having a rapid conversation that kept veering into something that sounded like Russian. Egg led me outside when his brother started banging about in the kitchen.

Down at the lake shore we watched the water and sipped our beer. The part of me attuned to city life marvelled at the complete lack of traffic noise. Tree rustled, somewhere across the lake a duck gave a raucous laugh, a series of waves lapped gently on the shingle beach, but there was no man-made noise other than that we made ourselves.

“Does he know where your mum went?” I asked. “When you two speak to each other I don’t catch more than one word in three.”

“He’s checking with someone who might know where she went from Vladivostok, but she didn’t say anything to him other than saying she was going to spend some time with friends and family.” He responded.

“That’s a start,” I said.

“The sky should be clear tonight, I’ll see if i can get through to Aphelia,” he said.

I frowned, the phone signal was excellent, I had made use of it to reassure my parents that I was not being spirited away to be married into a cult. Just then Bracken called to say dinner was ready and I never got around to asking him what he meant.

Dinner was salmon,accompanied by sautéed mushrooms, a mashed root that I could not identify and a sweet berry sauce, it was all excellent. Bracken said he had caught the fish himself, although I saw no fishing equipment, and everything else was gathered from the forest. He admitted that the beer was shop-bought, as it was out of season this time of year.

Throughout the meal he asked me everything about myself, recanted tales of his time in Russia that all seemed to revolve around potatoes or vodka or often both and let slip a few stories about Egg. I asked him what he did in the family firm.

“Trouble-kneeing,” he said. “Its like trouble-shooting, but instead of going in all guns blazing, you creep up on trouble, tap it on the shoulder and then, when it turns around, you knee it in the knackers as hard as you can.”

“So, why do they call you Bracken?” I asked.

“Because that, my good lady, is what it says on my birth certificate,” he replied with a straight face.

“He’s named after where he was found,” Egg added. “Some negligent sasquatch parent abandoned him in the undergrowth.”

“How dare you besmirch my honour!” He cried in mock anger. “Actually, its where I was conceived. Of more interest is why we call my brother Egg.”

“And why is that?” We had briefly giggled over the names in each other’s passports at the airport.

“Because after three live births, our mother was fed up with pregnancies, so left him in a nest for Dad to sit on.” He replied.

After more beer Egg taught me how the Finnish use a sauna, although I was glad he suggested we use bathing costumes rather than leap naked into the lake. I was a little dubious but there was no showering facility. Emerging from the water I felt clean and relaxed, the sun was just touching the trees across the lake. As I redressed I checked my watch, I recalled setting it to local time, but it did not appear as late as it should have been.

Egg and I sat on the lake shore and watched the stars slowly come out of hiding above us. There was a hooting and hollering as something naked dashed from the sauna and plunged into the water, Egg shook his head slowly. The splash turned to a wake and then vanished from my view in the gentle ripples.

“There are many more stars here than at home,” I commented.

“No lights to scare them away,” he explained. “Perfect for calling Aphelia.”

He retrieved his phone from his pocket, but instead of making a call he thumbed open a star-gazing app and placed the phone on the ground. Gazing out over the lake I could almost believe the stars and their reflections formed two separate hemispheres of night sky, leaving us adrift, floating amongst the points of light. Egg stood, looking up and turning, as though looking for a particular star.

Some stars seemed so close and bright. I twisted my body, but could not see the trees and cabin behind me, just more stars, my change in viewpoint making them into new and different constellations. Something nagged me that they should not behave like that.

Egg put his hand on my shoulder and pointed out a shooting star, it seemed impossibly close. He took a half-step forwards and made a grab for it. Opening his hand, he showed me a little sparkling sphere about the size of a ball-bearing. I suddenly recalled the mushrooms Bracken had prepared for dinner.

Threading her way through the shining throng was a short woman in a summer dress, her curly hair cascaded down her back and she was barefoot. As far as I could tell she had just materialised out of the air, but then I was too mesmerised by the surrounding galaxy to be a credible witness.

“Egg,” she said, with a voice that seemed all sparkle and comets. “Unexpected and long distance. It’s Dad, isn’t it? His heart.”

“Yes,” he replied. “You knew?”

“We’ve always been very close, even when we are so far apart,” she answered.

“I’m looking for Mother,” he said. “Has she been in touch?”

“She called me from Baikonur three or four months ago, we argued as usual, you know what she thinks of my marriage.” She shook her head lightly and frowned. “After then, nothing.”

“This is Cass, by the way,” Egg said belatedly. I smiled and waved, wondering if there was some sort of protocol to be observed. She greeted me in return and went on to ask about Vesta, Egg reassured her, but I could not help feeling there was something between them they were avoiding discussing in front of me.

As they spoke Aphelia slowly became less distinct, her voice sounding like she was drifting away from us. She finished with a warning.

“Be careful, Egg, there’s something major brewing and they don’t always let the junior members of staff in on that stuff.”

“Something’s been screwing up forecasting recently, I was told it might be a storm of some kind,” Egg said. “Do you think this may have something to do with Dad?”

“I don’t know, I’m too far away to have a clear picture,” she replied. “You need to find Mother to get to the bottom of it. Be careful who you trust. Take care, Egg, give my love to Vesta.”

With that she was gone. Egg stood still for a moment and then bent down, retrieved his phone and put it back onto standby. I realised I could see the trees and the lake again; the stars were once again distant pinpricks of light, still beautiful, but not quite bursting with same amount of splendour.

“That’s enough star-gazing, I think,” Egg said. “Fancy a night-cap?”