Brunello

Before visiting the winery, they spend the night in Pienza, a town so small you can walk from one end to the other in five minutes. Rusty wonders aloud how people can live in these little medieval towns. Surely, they can’t survive by selling trinkets to tourists. He looks at Paige. Well, maybe, if the tourist is his wife.

On fan back wicker chairs in the hotel’s roofed courtyard, they wait for the rain to stop. The hotel’s atmosphere is distinctly Mediterranean. Even now in the early fall, everything looks spectacularly vigorous and lush. Rain drips from marble arches that support the hotel’s terra cotta tile roof. They stare at an olive tree growing out of an old well in the middle of the courtyard. It’s surrounded by planters of red geraniums. Pink geraniums cascade from large windows to the damp red brick floor. More flowers and jungle-sized vines sprout around low beaded walls.

“Isn’t it beautiful?” Paige says. 

Now after a week of medieval hill towns built into the Tuscan landscape, Rusty is weary of farms and olive trees and undulating hills and Roman arches and, most of all, churches. Every town and farmhouse had a place of worship, and if you’d seen one, you’ve seen them all. Even this hotel is connected to a church.

When the rain slackens, he holds an umbrella as she tiptoes through ankle-deep water gushing down the tilted street. They must walk several blocks to their rented Peugeot since motorized traffic isn’t allowed at the hotel. By the time they get in, they’re soaked,  and then the rain stops.

Being cold and clammy does not diminish Paige’s enthusiasm for this hill country, with its soft gray and tan fields ridged by narrow cypress. Rusty, however, focuses on the narrow road, inscrutable road signs, and feckless foreign drivers.

“I’ll take that one.” Paige points out yet another villa like the one in that movie.

about the writer who catches her husband cheating and, instead of doing something sensible like going to Palm Springs, decides to buy an Italian villa. Paige claims the book is better.

“It would almost have to be, wouldn’t it?”

Moments after they turn off the highway, a pair of pheasants appears among the vineyard’s orderly rows of grape vines. Then a hare hops across the gravel right in front of them. 

“Giorgio said we might see some wildlife on this road,” Paige says.

But Rusty’s more skeptical. “Giorgio must’ve been watching for us and opened their cages.”

Giorgio is the winery’s public relations director, through whom Paige arranged this tour. Short notice, but fortunately a group tour is already planned for this morning and Giorgio says they can come along. They arrive to join the others in the large tasting room.

“I’m checking these to see if they are good,” puffy-cheeked Giorgio explains, while opening opens two bottles. He swirls, noses, and tastes each wine before he expectorates into a stainless-steel spittoon. “It’s too early in the day to actually drink this.” Letting the wine breathe, he tells them briefly about the vineyard’s history, then leads them out to the vineyards. Bunches of blue grapes hang below the leaves on trained vines as far as the eye can see. 

“These are Brunello grapes.”

Giorgio cuts a couple of bunches for everyone to taste. Although Rusty expects tartness, the grapes prove surprisingly sweet. 

“The Brunello approach is to produce fine wine in the fields, rather than in the cellar,” Giorgio says, and cheerfully answers questions about growing conditions and vines.

“Isn’t this fun?” Paige says.

“The Riddle approach is to drink, not talk,” Rusty says.

They descend a tight spiral staircase to a spacious underground storage room where wine is aged in French oak barrels. They continue down to an even lower area to watch grapes being crushed—not by dancing peasants but machines. Juice feeds through transparent hoses into colossal stainless-steel storage tanks.

After more explanations, Giorgio brings everyone back up to the tasting room. Rusty generally considers wine talk pretentious. But after sampling a generous glass of each wine poured earlier, he agrees with his darling that the first is light and mellow, the second heavier and more complex. 

“Even though 2002 was an off year, this bottle will sell for over sixty Euros,” Giorgio says of the more complex vintage.

Rusty sees the excitement in Paige’s eyes. “Want to get a bottle?”

            “Sixty bucks!” he says. “Are you serious?”

            Paige sighs.

For the rest of the day, she seems distant. Rusty can’t understand why. It’s only wine. There’s plenty more to be had around here for less than sixty bucks.

*

Next morning, they visit the old Roman fortress town of Lucca and stroll by shuttered three-story houses on the narrow, curved streets. Deep shade is provided by balconies festooned with potted greenery.

“Look, there’s Puccini’s house,” Paige notes.

And a little later: “Look at those trees, Rusty. Napoleon’s sister planted them.”

At her insistence, they climb the Guinigi Tower. Six flights of spiral staircase later, they’re on the rooftop among the hanging gardens, where large trees unaccountably grow.

“Lucca’s leading family built this in the 15th century to be closer to heaven,” Paige reads from a brochure.

“And poured boiling wax down on their enemies,” Rusty adds.

Drinking in the view of town and surrounding countryside, Paige says, “Well, I feel closer to heaven.”

Back on the street, Paige discovers Lucca’s many charming little shops, giving Rusty some time to read. He wishes he could share her keen excitement about such things, but it just isn’t in him.

Later, on the roof of a huge decorative church, they spot an archangel. Paige snaps away with her little 35-millimeter camera.

“The wings are retractable,” Rusty says, having consulted the tour book.

“Retractable?”

“To survive high winds. It’s a miracle,” he says.

Paige shakes her head.

A little later, she photographs a 13th century Romanesque cathedral.

“Let’s go inside.”

“Must we?”

They enter the Duomo di San Martino through carved arches and huge doors. Despite stain-glass windows, the interior is dark. After letting their eyes adjust, they pass through statues and paintings to a clear glass tomb, where a crowd is listening to a dark-haired young woman talk in English about “The Little Saint.” 

“She was a peasant employed by a rich family that had more than it could ever eat. But this was during a time when many were poor and hungry. So, like Robin Hood, the woman whose body lies in the crypt began stealing from her rich employer, hiding a little bread in her apron each day, and giving it to the poor. 

“There are no secrets. Who knows how it happened? Perhaps another servant saw what she was doing and informed. Maybe an overseer found a starving peasant with bread that could only have come from the great house. There really were a lot of starving peasants in Lucca in those days, and it’s possible that so much bread was disappearing that the rich master himself began watching everyone more carefully. No one really knows how he found out what The Little Saint had been doing, but when he did, he was incensed. 

“The master waited for the peasant woman to leave his gates. If he found her carrying stolen bread, as he suspected, she would be killed. Asked what she was hiding in her apron, the trembling woman said, ‘Only flowers,’ though in truth she was stealing bread as usual. Certain she was lying, the master commanded her to open her apron.  When she did, a miracle occurred. Instead of the bread, dozens of daffodils fell out.”

As Rusty turns to Paige, a tear slides down her cheek.

“Many years later,” the guide continues, “when this good woman’s body was dug up, it hadn’t deteriorated at all. She was preserved like on the day she was buried. This was another miracle. She became a saint. Her remains were put into this special crypt.”

After appreciative murmurings, the crowd disperses and Paige says, “Let’s go.” As she starts to walk away, Rusty says, “Hang on. I want to ask her a question.”

“You stay. I have to get out of here. I’ll see you outside.”

Approaching the crypt for a closer look, Rusty gazes upon the dried-up form in the faded blue habit, flowers still in her hands. He asks if any scientists have ever examined the little saint’s body.

“Of course,” the guide says.

“And?”

“After a careful examination, they found that the remains contained huge amounts of lead, probably from old water pipes. They thought the lead was what had preserved her.”

A smile.

“But they were scientists, you understand.”

At a nearby bar, Rusty finds his wife sitting under a beige umbrella. The only other customer has a newspaper spread out in front of him.

“You won’t believe what I just found out.” Noticing Paige’s red nose and running mascara, Rusty asks, “Are you okay?”

“That poor little woman was so brave.”

Rusty offers his handkerchief. “But listen, her body—”

“And so wronged. She put up with so much abuse but did what was right even if it meant she had to die.”

RustyHHDonov puts his arm around Paige and pulls her close. Remembering how happy she was yesterday at the winery, he asks a server, “Do you have a bottle of Brunello? Bring it to us, per favore.”

Paige sniffs. Rusty pats her hand. No need to tell her anymore.

© 2024 Rick Neumayer

“Brunello” will appear in the forthcoming THREE FOGGY MORNINGS: Stories by Rick Neumayer. If you like this one, I’d love to hear from you.