“I don’t know what you’ve heard,” I said as I leaned back to recount my story, “but the truth is, everything that happened, was planned.”
Two days ago, I was walking through the vineyard behind my hotel, and I came across two men having a heated argument in German. I backed away, not wanting to get involved. Unfortunately, they were on the path that took me back to my hotel, so I decided to wait behind some vines until they had left.
As they argued, the taller one of the two, took a swing at the shorter one, but missed when the shorter one ducked. The taller one cursed and walked away.
Now it was safe for me to go through. As I approached, the shorter man said something hard in German. I looked at him with a lost expression and shrugged. He realized I didn’t know German, so he switched to English.
“That guy is an idiot,” he grumbled. “He thinks we need to get rid of the bees and wasps because they scare the grape pickers. Hah, what do Vintners know, they only see the grapes after they are harvested. They don’t understand that the vineyard is a living conglomeration of things, a system of interplaying forces, that only, in the end, produce grapes. I am the vigneron. I am the vineyard expert. I’ve spent years learning how to grow vines in the best and healthiest manner. He doesn’t respect the work I do.”
I smiled nervously, feeling totally embarrassed, as if I had accidentally come across a loud, lover’s quarrel.
Seeing my discomfort, he said, “I don’t trust him. I know he will do something foolish,” then turned, left the path and went down one of the steep rows of the vineyard.
I didn’t think any more of it, other than to feel embarrassed at being a party to a public quarrel. Then yesterday, after having a nice walk in the hills, I was following the same path back to my hotel.
There, at the same spot where the quarrel had taken place, I saw the tall man, lying face down in the path. I ran to him and shook him a little, saying, “Mien Herr, mien Herr.” He didn’t respond. I turned him over and saw that his face was grotesquely swollen with what must have been hundreds of sting marks. I touched him; he was cold.
I knew I should run over to the hotel and inform the police, but before I did, I thought I would get a better look. I guess I was channelling my inner Sherlock Holmes.
He was wearing one of those beekeeper hats, the kind that has a fine screen mesh attached all around the brim. Half of the screen was tucked into his shirt at the back, but the front half was open and loose. I also saw a large European wasp, stuck in the interior of the netting, still buzzing, very angry. I was taken aback. The wasp was almost twice the size of the wasps we have in Canada. Also nearby, I saw some spray cans of what looked like bug killer.
Just then, the shorter of the two Germans from yesterday, the vigneron, came up the path. He didn’t look surprised to see the vintner dead.
“Idiot fool,” he said, “He took my beekeeper’s hat and gloves, bought some bug killer and decided to get rid of the wasps himself. It looks like a wasp got underneath the netting, and he opened the netting to get rid of it. Unfortunately, when a wasp stings, it releases pheromones, and that brings all the other wasps to join the battle. He deserves what he got!”
As I was still kneeling beside the vintner, I saw the vigneron, reach down and lift the hat’s netting. The wasp didn’t fly away. It seemed stuck to the mesh. He then crushed it with his fingers and pulled it off.
“If you stay here with the body,” I said nervously, “I’ll go back to the hotel and inform the police.”
“Yeah, that is good,” he replied.
As I walked away, I realized that the vintner was murdered, and I would need to tell the police detective to look for traces of crazy glue on the hat’s screen mesh.