Wein & Tod

Mira Valensky liebt guten Wein. Was also liegt näher, als über den jungen Weinviertler Starwinzer zu berichten? Dann wird Hans Berthold beim Joggen erschossen … Schon bald stellt sich heraus, dass nicht nur Mira seine blauen Augen faszinierend gefunden hat.

Idyllisch ist in dieser Welt höchstens der Blick vom Ried Hüttn aus – in Pastelltöne getaucht liegt einem Wien zu Füßen. Weinseligkeit herrscht mehr bei den japanischen Einkäufern als unter den Winzern.
Die Bank will der Witwe den Geldhahn abdrehen, das alteingesessene Weingut Kaiser versucht mit allen Mitteln, zwei Großaufträge an sich zu reißen, mit den Nachbarn ist man schon seit Generationen verfeindet.

Mira Valensky erlebt ein berauschendes Weinjahr – und löst mit Hilfe ihrer Putzfrau und Freundin Vesna einen neuen Fall zwischen Big Business und Genuss.

Hörprobe - gelesen von Eva Rossmann zur Verfügung gestellt von literadio.org

Gebunden mit Schutzumschlag, ca. 274 S., 13,5 x 21 cm
ISBN 3-85256-311-9
Ca. € [D/A] 19,50/€ [I] 18,50/sFr 34,30
Auslieferung: September 2005

English Version:

Senior reporter Mira Valensky loves good wine. Naturally she jumps at the chance of interviewing the latest big-name wine maker from Austria’s Weinviertel region. Hans Berthold is then shot dead while out jogging … Soon it becomes clear that Mira is not the only one enchanted by his blue eyes.
A wine thriller that flows between big business and the finer things in life – Mira Valensky lives through a heady vintage year and solves a new case with some help from her Bosnian cleaning lady and great friend Vesna Krajner.

Page 54-55
I park my car in front of the village gasthaus, step inside and discretely look around for Aichinger who is the only one who knows me here.
Through the clouds of smoke I see some men at the bar, two of whom are wearing trademark dark blue overalls. Not a single woman in sight. Curious glances.
I sit down at an empty table. ‘I’ll have a white wine spritzer please.’
The waiter approaches with a knowing smile on his face. ‘I take it you too are from the papers’, he asks. So much for the idea of casually listening in or even asking a few questions! I sigh and nod.
‘Your colleagues left a quarter of an hour ago.’ He speaks German very well, but with a Slovakian or maybe even a Czech accent – whatever the difference might be.
‘Where are you from?’
He looks at me suspiciously. ‘From Mikulov, just over the border.’
A Czech then, not that it helps me much.
I drink my spritzer and try to glean something from the atmosphere. Pick up scraps of conversation. The men speak in low tones, throwing me the odd stolen glance. I stand up, go to the bar and pay. ‘Berthold had a lot of enemies in the village – Aichinger thinks’. I address my words to the room. At once everything goes quiet.
‘He should keep his mouth shut’, answers a short little man in a loden jacket.
‘Eh’, said another in overalls, ‘but one thing is for sure. None of us would have been shot while we were out jogging. Anyone who wants to be that big is bound to get himself some enemies.’
The landlord carries on polishing a beer glass, with such zeal that it flies out of his hand. Following a shrill smash and a stifled curse, many of the customers suddenly start taking. The little man hisses at me: ‘It doesn’t matter what they say, Hans was a good lad. And now plenty go jogging here too. They should be glad that we had him here in the village. Who else would have got the wine business onto its feet? Who’d ever heard of Treberndorf before?’
‘That’s right’, said the landlord.
But a couple of them look as if they wouldn’t dare disagree just because I’m a journalist. Or of course because it isn’t done to speak ill of the dead. Except in the gasthaus. Among friends. When it’s getting late and a few drinks have gone down. ‘In vino veritas’ reads a plaque above the bar. But today I have the feeling I’m not going to get to the truth of this.

Page 275-278

I go to look for Vesna but neither her nor Eva are anywhere to be seen. Frankenfeld must have gone back down into the cellar. Perhaps they are both with him. I’m in a hurry so I drive the couple of hundred metres. Jirji and Josef are cleaning the grape crates in front of the hall to the cellar, so engrossed in their work that they don’t even notice me. As I go through the gate of the upper floor I’m struck by the sweet smell of grapes and fermentation. The days of accidental intoxication by fermentation gases are thankfully over. Today the room is automatically ventilated and the fermentation curves controlled by computers.
Frankenfeld is standing beside the hydraulic press looking visibly nervous. I could have taken the opportunity to ask him about Birgit Zauner. But he anticipates me: ‘Right now some customers just arrived and Frau Berthold is showing them the cellar. I’d have to tell Jirji and Josef to stop cleaning and pack the delivery myself. By the way, I’ll tell you what I know. I’ve been giving it some thought and you’re right.’
I stood there open mouthed. ‘How come the change of heart?’
‘A few things have become clear to me. Do you think you could give the hydraulic press a clean? I’m so busy I don’t know what to do next. Maybe we could talk tonight. It’ll be better that way.
I nodded. ‘What’s the story with the cleaning?’
‘You just get inside the press and carefully spray the inside down with the hose. It’s got to be completely clean. I’ll be back soon.’
‘And we’ll talk?’

‘Yes.’
‘Where?’
‘No idea, we’ll see.’
‘Okay.’
‘Put the Wellingtons on. They’re over there. You might get a bit wet.’
‘I’ll manage.’
I hear Frankenfeld hurrying away and turn the tap as far as it goes. The opening of the gigantic press is underneath and I just have to climb into its belly and stand inside the drum. Its round form intensifies the sound of the water as if it were a cloud burst and in the semi-darkness I try to get to the places where traces of grape are still stuck, in a damp mist that tastes of grapes. There are worse things. I realise Frankenfeld wants to talk to me. I must find a moment to fetch my Dictaphone. Just in case. Maybe he’s listened in on my conversation with Birgit Zauner. But what difference would that make?

I turn round carefully in order to be able to scrub the other half of the belly of the press when I suddenly feel a lurch. I try to hold on tight and to roll on to my side. Someone has switched on the press. Both the machine’s open side panels have closed and I roll around in the cylinder, trying to scream. Someone’s set a trap for you, Mira. The press still isn’t moving that quickly and I can still haul myself up, running against the rotation of the cylinder like a hamster on its wheel. The holes that the grape juice drips through look like tiny spots of light, at times above me, at others below. But here in this metallic stomach everything is dark. Dark and wet. The slippery plastic – the inner lining that I’ve been spraying – has me sliding all over as I scream out again. Nobody can hear me.

Once more the holes are beneath me. I kneel down and try to feel around to see if the press can be opened from somewhere inside. There must be some way of opening the side panels but I’m lifted up again, tumbling round and, after another full circle, I try once more.
Suddenly the press comes to a standstill. I listen carefully. Did someone hear me? I call. No answer. No matter. I feel around again where the opening must be. A new sound. Not loud, but threatening, as if an animal were trying to get its breath. And I’m stuck in its stomach. I look up and, in almost complete darkness, try to catch sight of something. It must have been a figment of my imagination as if the ceiling is closing in on me. I can scream as loud as I like. Pneumatic press, think Mira! How does it work? Martina explained it to you but you weren’t paying attention, weren’t listening, and now I can hardly stand up. I kneel down, lying as flat as possible. Pneumatic. Air is pumped into the plastic lining so that it inflates like a balloon, slowly. The grapes are gently squeezed, said Martina, and then more air is pumped in so that the last precious drops of juice drip out through the holes into the tank. My juice, my blood. It won’t stop pumping in air until all the juice is squeezed out. My fingers dig into the holes, I lie on my stomach, the noise gets louder, sounding somehow hungrier. I can feel the lining touch me from above. I am trapped and can no longer breathe, even if the lining still isn’t squeezing me, it is enveloping me, pressing down quite gently. My scream is muffled, as if the sound of the press is getting louder or is it the blood pumping in my head that doesn’t want to be squeezed out? It’s hopeless to scream, flatten yourself out, Mira. What’s the point? The press is merciless, one of the best on the market, a precision machine. Then suddenly, I hear a hiss. And then the final onslaught, as if it were taking in air once again, and I too automatically breathe in.