The Vintage Caper

tips, cosmetic surgery, studio larceny—had been replaced by talk of cellars and vintages, Bordeaux versus California, optimum aging times, and, of course, wine prices.
    Roth found himself holding forth to small but rapt audiences, household names who would normally have been a little out of his social reach, and the business possibilities were not lost on him. It might be wine today, but it could easily be a juicy contractual crisis tomorrow. Throughout that snowy Christmas week Roth’s skis lay untouched, and Michelle had their personal ski instructor all to herself.
    The Roths shared a jet on the way home with a couple whom they knew slightly from L.A., and who had been wildly impressed to see Roth in such celebrated company. Roth waved away their flattery and complained, in a good-natured way, of being kept far too busy to ski. The implication was that he had been talking business, not Bordeaux, and Roth was happy to leave it like that. It was a satisfactory end to a most satisfactory week.
    His good mood lasted until the evening, when he and his wife arrived back at the house in Hollywood Heights and found that Rafael wasn’t there to greet them. Nor had he left a note to explain his absence. It was unusual, and worrying. But as they went from room to room they began to relax. The Warhols were on the walls, the Giacometti was stalking across the terrace, and the house seemed to have been untouched. In Rafael’s tiny basement apartment, his clothes were still hanging in the closet and his bed was neatly made. There was no sign of a sudden departure. The Roths went to bed early, puzzled, irritated, but not unduly worried.
    It wasn’t until the following morning that Roth went down to the cellar.
    “Jesus Christ!” The bellow of anguish almost caused Michelle to fall off her StairMaster. She hurried down to the cellar, where she found Roth staring, as if hypnotized, at a wall of completely empty wine racks.
    “My Bordeaux! Every goddamn bottle! All gone.” Roth began to pace back and forth, fists clenching and unclenching in fury. A hirsute man would have been tearing his hair out. “If I catch that little son of a bitch, I’ll kill him. I’ll tear his heart out.” Muttering ever more grisly death threats, he went upstairs in search of his BlackBerry.
    In quick succession, he called the security guard at the gatehouse, the L.A.P.D., and his insurance company.
    The guard was the first to arrive, clutching his logbook. By now, Roth had more or less regained the power of coherent speech. “OK. I want to know who got into my house and when, and why the fuck they weren’t stopped at the gate.” His finger jabbed the guard’s chest. “And I want to know the name of the asshole who was supposed to be on duty.”
    “I’m on it, Mr. Roth.” The guard, with a silent prayer that he hadn’t been on duty at the time, consulted his log, finally looking up, triumph mixed with relief. “I got it. Christmas Eve, some kind of medical emergency. An ambulance came through at 8:20, left at 10:50. Tom was on duty. Your caretaker gave him the OK.”
    “I’ll bet he did, the little shit.” Roth took the logbook from the guard and peered at it as if hoping for further revelations. “That’s it? No hospital name? No medical I.D.? Jesus.”
    “We got the license number. And I guess they said it was an emergency.”
    “Yeah, right. Couldn’t wait to get their hands on my wine.” Roth shook his head and handed the logbook back to the guard, who made a deferential exit. He got back to the gatehouse just as the police arrived: two bored-looking detectives out on an errand that they already sensed would be a waste of their time.
    “OK,” said Roth when they arrived at the house. “I’m a generous contributor to the P.B.A., so it would be nice for once to get something for my money. Follow me.” The detectives nodded in unison, the same thought going through their minds. Here was another big shot who sent the Police Benevolent Association a check each Christmas for $100 and expected special treatment.
    They were hardly through the cellar door before Roth started. “See that?” he said, pointing at the empty racks. “Three million bucks’ worth of wine, took me ten years to collect, impossible to replace. Impossible. And those bastards knew what they were doing. They only took the Bordeaux.”
    “Mr. Roth.” The older of the detectives had his notebook out while his partner started to look around the