“Master painters from the caves,” Cota told him, as if reciting a rehearsed line all the Dovilins were forced to repeat to buyers. “God speaks to many artisans down here.”
Athanasius nodded at the artwork that could be considered Christian to some, especially those involving fish and grain, shepherds and sheep. Then he caught a row of black vases in the Spartan style with red gladiators.
“These look imperial,” he said.
“They are,” she said, and looked this way and that quickly, her voice lowering to a conspiratorial whisper. “They say the wine in these amphorae pass through the lips of Caesar himself.”
“Impressive,” Athanasius said. “But risky. What happens if he doesn’t like it, or even falls ill?”
“We make sure that can never happen. That’s why the angels take their sip first.”
Athanasius started. “Angels?”
Cota nodded, as if sharing the secret of the ages behind the great Dovilin wines. “Something about the air in the amphora,” she said. “Too much of it and the wine turns to vinegar. Not enough and the wine is too bitter. So for the final fermentation we leave the amphora open just enough for the proper amount of air to escape. We like to say it is for the angels to take their sip of the spirits, their ‘angel’s cut.’ Then we seal the amphora shut with a special piece of cork and ceramic capping.”
“Like this one?” Athanasius asked, picking up the cork capper from an amphora to Cota’s dismay and sniffing it. “I see you use resin as a sealant. Smart. The resin preserves the wine once sealed and flavors it with the proper fermenation, provided you know what you’re doing. What is this indent on top of the cork with the Dovilin emblem?”
Cota took the cork from Athanasius and quickly placed it lopsided atop its amphora. “There is something in the resin,” she said. “Once the cork is sealed, it cannot be tampered with in any way, or the cork discolors. If it is not discolored, the palace staff then use a thin iron hook to pierce it and pull it out, and the wine is ready for serving.”
“So who applies the proper mix of resin?” he asked.
“The whore of hell,” she sniffed. “I think I hear her now.”
They moved on, but Athanasius made sure to remember the pattern and décor of the amphorae bound for Rome. It was here in this chamber, before the amphorae were sealed, where he would poison Domitian’s wine.
He tried to keep up with Cota, who breezed through the main wine cave just behind the face of the winery without explanation. Their tour, it seemed, was over. Along the way he noted similar patterns on the amphorae here as in the Angel’s Vault, and they seemed to have more markings for weight, price, destination and such.
He realized he might have to use these sealed amphorae as his key to identify those bound for Domitian, then go back and poison an identical and open amphora in the Angel’s Vault, then switch them. Simple but not easy, he suspected.
They had arrived outside in the courtyard below the towering façade as the Dovilin winery was closing up for the day. He noted the servants moving in and out of the cave, as well as security: almost a dozen ex-legionnaire types doing nothing much but standing around and looking tough.
“This way,” she said, tugging his hand. “The office is upstairs.”
They climbed a short flight of stone steps to the second story of the façade, where an open arch led into an impressive office with a table and fine furniture, but no husband.
“Vibius?” she called out.
Athanasius heard muffled voices. They seemed to be coming from behind the wall of shelves with scrolls, which Athanasius assumed to be commercial contracts and delivery schedules, sales receipts and records.
Cota cocked her ear, and her eyes narrowed. Her lips formed a thin, grim line, and she marched to the wall and pushed something that opened it to reveal another room behind it.
Now the voices were loud and clear—a young woman’s and a man’s, presumably Cota’s husband. There was a definite slap, then the girl’s voice cried out: “Stop it, Vibius. You know I am only trying to help the vineyard.”
Vibius said, “I will help the vineyard, and you will do what I want.”
“I know what you want, Vibius, and you’ll never get it with me.”
“You little whore,” he said. “You’ve given yourself to every rat in the streets. Now you want to get holy with me? I think not.”
“Vibius!” Cota screamed, and Athanasius followed her inside to see her husband threatening this girl with long dark hair, her hand at her face where it had been struck.
Vibius turned and looked at his wife and the stranger with rage. “What do you want?”
“This is Samuel Ben-Deker. Your father wants you to put him to work.”
Athanasius could feel Vibius’s stare. “Are you sure you haven’t already, Cota?”
“Vibius!” she screamed again, so that all inside and outside the winery could hear.
But Vibius was unmoved. “Take this one to suitable quarters tonight and see if you have any use for him tomorrow,” he ordered the girl, who half-turned her face to reveal a ghastly split cheek that made Cota gasp.
“Yes, sir,” she said and in defiance gave Vibius a mock Roman salute.
He brought up his hand to strike her again but thought better of it when Cota sternly repeated to him, “Vibius, your father.”
“We’ll go out the back way,” said the badly beaten girl, and walked through an archway into the Angel’s Vault toward the secondary vault doors that led to the caves deep inside the mountain.
Athanasius turned to Cota. “I’m to follow her into that?”
“Where else for you, Ben-Deker?” Vibius said. “Now leave us.”
Feeling very strange, as if he had been to this place before, Athanasius followed the girl and her long, black hair into a stone cave that led only to darkness. The long shafts of light from the sunset that had streamed across the floors of the winery office began to disappear as the vault door closed behind him.
“The Dovilins order the wine vaults sealed off every night from the inside as well as the outside,” the girl explained and turned to face him. “Don’t worry about the dark. I know the way. By the way, Samuel Ben-Deker, my name is Gabrielle.”
Suddenly he stopped, watching the last shaft of light touch her bleeding face and illuminate it like a halo of light, before the vault door plunged them into darkness.
It was the girl from his dreams back in Rome.
That evening Dovilin thought he had better see how things went with the new Jew and sent Brutus to find Vibius. It was Cota who showed up in the courtyard.
“Where’s my son?” Dovilin asked her.
“You know you should be asking one of the Sweet Grapes girls if you want to know what my husband does at night, Father,” she replied flatly.
Dovilin had neither the energy nor time to reply. His son’s marriage was what it was. For himself, he would have gladly taken care of Cota’s needs were it not for his firm belief, more stoic than Christian, that feelings of eros were better channeled into business and accumulating wealth. It was a lesson he had somehow failed to pass on to his son, as Cota was quick to remind him all too often. “Just tell me about Ben-Deker. How did things go?”
“Fine,” she said, although Dovilin knew there was more that she was holding back. “Vibius didn’t like him, of course, but he didn’t stop your little whore from taking him to the caves for the night to sleep with all your other slaves.”
Dovilin thought he understood now. “I don’t like Gabrielle either, Cota. None of us do. But the vineyard needs her. The family can master the science of wine production, but the creation of great grapes is an art. She understands the soil, the sun, the wind and water like nobody else.”
“She has help with that, Father, you know it,” Cota said darkly. “Deep down in the caves.”