The Grapes of Rothschild

a visit with baron philippe, who's done most of what's worth doing in life--and that includes making the best wine on the planet

In many ways, I am a divided man, one foot in the 18th Century, the other in the 21st. My only hope is that my grandchildren will have the means to preserve the château as a show place, as a witness to a life of elegance. It is a miracle that I can continue to live this way at all, because the era of large homes and big rooms and lovely furniture really ended in 1945. There are new layers of society today, new obligations, new dreams. Has one the right to live this way? Some would say the peasant world would not tolerate it, but the workers in the field value my way of life. Château Mouton is a star and it shines on them as well.

--Philippe De Rothschild

Precisely how Thia and I found ourselves at the table of Baron Philippe De Rothschild in Bordeaux, nibbling canclons oux olives, drinking a toast to the absent Ingrid Bergman, chatting with the former prime minister of France, sipping at glasses of the finest wine on the planet, is still not entirely clear to me. It certainly wasn't because of my knowledge of wines, which amounted to a mild preference for Bordeaux over Burgundy. Nor was it because of any reputation for mingling wit the upper classes of the jet set. I fly coach.

The invitation to spend about a week with Baron Philippe at Château Mouton had come from friends of friends; the fact that I am a writer and editor at Playboy had something to do with it, but rather vaguely. It would be all right to write about the baron and the visit, I was told, but it also would be all right merely to partake of his hospitality. The baron was in the habit of ranging widely for an interesting blend of house guests, and an American journalist and his wife from America would round out the list nicely.

So, having read what I could about the Rothschilds, and having been bitterly cursed by a number of friends who did know their vintages, my wife and I arrived at the Bordeaux airport on a drizzly fall afternoon. Waiting to greet us by a green Mercedes limousine were the baron's press agent, her assistant, a porter and the chauffeur. We introduced ourselves and the press agent, a lively Parisian woman named Georgie Viennet, was relieved to find that Thia and I both spoke French. The porter scooped up our luggage and we drove off.

The afternoon began to clear during the hourlong drive to the château through the Médoc wine country. On either side of us were pebble-strewn fields with row upon row of thin, short vines. We had read that on this rocky stretch of France, just a few miles wide and long, were four of the five premiers crus (first growths) of great Bordeaux vintages. But it was still striking to see famous names we'd seen only on expensive labels now flashing past us merely as road signs: Chateau Margaux--4 Kilometers ... Chateau Lafite-Rothschild--Next Right.

We came upon Château Mouton-Rothschild suddenly. It was unmarked, save for an obelisk by the side of the road with a gold polyhedron on top of it. At first, I took it for the Star of David. Past manicured lawns and flower beds rose a plain, stone structure, cream-colored, two stories high. I asked Georgie where the château's turrets and gables were; she explained that there was a smaller building I couldn't see, nestled among the trees, that would meet my requirements, but it was used only for formal dinners. What we saw before us was the main château, a converted stable that the baron and his wife had turned into something we would find, Georgie assured us, quite spectacular.

Outside the main gate, standing in a line at attention, were eight attendants in uniforms, evidently waiting for the arrival of someone important. To my discomfiture, it turned out we were the VIPs, and our luggage was whisked away before I could explain which was whose.

We were led through the front door into a marble hallway and up the wide stairs to the second-floor living quarters. The main living room is long, with plants everywhere, and paintings and sculptures--César, Dubuffet and Brancusi, among others--lining one wall, a series of half-moon windows along the other. The windows look out on the Mouton vineyards, which are lit up in the evening and which stretch as far as can be seen. At the far end of the room is a life-sized 16th Century Italian horse of polished wood, a wry reminder of the building's origins.

A white-jacketed butler told us that Monsieur le Baron would be joining us shortly for high tea and, in the mean-time, poured us glasses of Henriot champagne. Thia and I were standing by the windows with Georgie and her assistant, looking at the gently swelling fields, when I heard the sound of slippered feet behind us.

"Hello, my young friends," said a voice. "I am Rothschild."

•

I had researched Baron Philippe's life before leaving, but what I found seemed somewhat preposterous. I knew he was the maverick of a family whose wealth and influence in Europe had been unrivaled for 200 years. I knew, too, that he produced some of the best--and most expensive--wine in the world. What went beyond fairness, or even credibility, was that he was also a poet, a scientist, a translator, a race-car driver, a yachtsman, a bobsledder, a film maker, a businessman and an art collector. It became yet more galling to find, as the story emerged, that he'd left a lasting mark in each of his chosen fields, no matter how briefly he dabbled in them. A couple of writers had used the term Renaissance man in describing him.

Baron Philippe is 76 years old, and before I turned to meet him, I had expected a distinguished, elderly gentleman, greatly fatigued from years of Renaissancing about. The man who introduced himself looked no older than 55, with a firm, strong voice and a fringe of still-auburn hair beneath a bald pate. He resembled Picasso. He was wearing a Guatemalan poncho and espadrilles, which, I was to find out, are his favorite clothes when puttering around his domain. As to his vital signs, I noticed that he noticed Thia's figure.

There was some introductory chatter that meandered from French to English and back again, and we sat down to tea: croissants baked in the château's kitchens, fresh honey purloined from the château's bees, served on antique bone china. Each cup and dish had an individual design. There were 170 such china settings and we were to have a different display at each meal.

It was early evening, so we took Philippe's advice to "retire" to our bedrooms to rest and freshen up. Our host had known very little about us in advance, or what our sleeping habits might be, so he provided a genteel solution: Thia was given the large Chinese Bedroom, while the adjoining Monkey Bedroom was reserved for me. Each room at Château Mouton is named after its decor: Thia's walls were hung with delicate Chinese glass paintings of every period; mine were decorated with tapestries and English prints covered with jumping, prancing simians of every description. There was a tall tangerine tree potted in a corner of Thia's room and a giant, canopied bed stood in the center of it. (Georgie told us that Elizabeth the Queen Mother of England, who had visited the week before, had used the same bed.)

The servants had unpacked our suitcases and laid our clothes in separate drawers. My rented tuxedo and Thia's gowns were not only hanging in the closets but had been pressed while we were at tea. In each bathroom, the tubs were filled with steaming water at exactly 120 degrees--there were carved wooden thermometer holders hanging in each tub.

I was wandering around the Monkey Bedroom, looking at the furnishings, when I heard a low shriek from Thia. I walked back to her room and found her pointing a horrified finger. Beneath a 17th Century Dutch tortoise-shell dresser, the servants had neatly placed Thia's pair of ratty, worn terrycloth slippers. "I wonder if I can burn these in the sink," she muttered.

After bathing, we decided we'd take a nap and climbed into Thia's enormous bed. We pulled the sheets over us and Thia remarked they were made of Port-hault linen. "I once saw a handkerchief of this stuff in Bloomingdale's," she said. "It cost forty dollars; we're lying on yards of it." The opulence of the linen, along with a vision of the queen mother's ample figure reposing on that very bed, made it unthinkable to consider any activity other than sleep.

Dinner was at nine and we gathered in the living room in formal dress to meet the other guests: Guy Dumur, literary critic of a leading Paris newsmagazine; Lars Schmidt, a theatrical producer married to Ingrid Bergman (she sent her regrets that she couldn't make it that weekend); Philippine Pascale, the baron's married daughter and an actress; her four-year-old son, Julien; and Joan Littlewood, the longtime dynamo of British experimental theater, a fiery, caustic and diminutive woman who has wisecracked her way through her role as Philippe's occasional escort since the death of both of their spouses in 1976.

From the few encounters I've had with old wealth, it's been my impression that one of the earliest lessons taught to family members is how to put outsiders at their ease. The newly rich want to show off; the old rich don't have to. The Rothschild group insisted on first names, asked us about ourselves, poked fun at (continued on page 144) Rothschild (continued from page 82) one another's stuffy evening dress and, within minutes, Thia and I felt embraced. There were no social tests to pass. We were there and that was enough, By the time the butler announced dinner, we were boisterous and talkative.

In ancient European homes belonging to nobles, it was the custom not to have a dining room but to set up dinner tables in different locations around the castle. Our first dinner at Mouton was served in the baron's library. Surrounded by leather-bound first editions, we sat down at a table set by the library windows. By tradition, there are no cut flowers anywhere at Mouton: Every plant is living. On the table were about a dozen tiny pots, each planted with a different wildflower or wood. The late Pauline de Rothschild, Philippe's American-born wife, is credited with the château's artistry, including the peculiar and original table decor: tall cauliflowers, a small berry bush, a couple of asparagus shoots.

(A few days later, I peeked into another room where a woman gardener known as Marie-la-Fleur, trained by Pauline, was arranging her tiny potted plants for dinner. Her main job at the château is to take a daily bicycle ride through the countryside to gather plants and weeds; then, when she places the evening's selection on the table, she sits in every guest's chair for a few moments, adjusting the position of each pot to make sure that no person's vision of the ones across the table is obstructed.)

Meals at Mouton are accompanied by a small printed menu with the Rothschild coat of arms embossed at the top--five arrows fanned out like a hand of cards, held together by a ram's head. The courses are listed (Philippe's chef has refused offers from three-star restaurants), followed by a list of wines: three at lunch, four at dinner. The best wine of the evening is reserved for the third course. That first night, after a Château Margaux and a Château Latour that were roughly as old as I am--33--the house wine was poured from one of the baron's special, high-necked decanters: It was a 1929 Château Mouton-Rothschild. Those knowledgeable about wine consider the '29 Mouton the wine of the century. If you can find a bottle to buy, it will run you upwards of $740. So it was not just the best wine served that night but a wine to mark one's life.

Conversation was eclectic, careening from drama to politics to the recent visit of "Queen Mum" to the foibles of some of the guests at the table. It was unstrained and funny and occasionally raunchy. If anyone threatened to become pompous or pretentious, Joan Littlewood was ready to pounce. This did not exclude Philippe. After a short stretch of baronial pontification on French politics:

Joan: Say, Guv, you belong on Hyde Park Corner.

Philippe: Ah, Joan, people in glass houses----

Joan: Should turn out the lights when they go to bed.

Philippe: Let's just have some silence for a change. (A moment's quiet around the table.) Ahhh, what a nice silence.

Joan: Mmm-hmm. And look who broke it.

Dinner lasted three hours. Philippe flirted with Thia and held forth in a commanding voice that would break into a braying, full-throated laugh, mostly when Joan said something. Guy talked about his friend Simone Signoret; Lars about a wonderful castle he and Ingrid had visited in Norway; Philippine about a Star Trek episode and Monsieur Spock; I scrubbed the rust off my French and tried to keep up. With my second glass of '29, I insisted on complimenting Philippe on the wine and drawing him out on the subject. "Oui, c'est pas mal," he admitted. A high compliment: Not bad. He refused to use the jargon of connoisseurs, dismissing most wine experts with a snort of contempt. "Snobs are useful," he said, "but I judge my wine by whether my guests ask for seconds." Besides, he went on, a wine can't be judged in a vacuum. It depends on the circumstances in which it is savored. And by those standards, he said, the best bottle of wine he ever had was a carafe of ordinary white wine he shared with the first love of his life in a tavern in the Pyrenees....

"First love!" Joan sniffed. "Why don't you tell us about your other loves?" She turned to the rest of us. "Why, the man has had adventures on every continent----"

"Now you're going too far!" Philippe warned. He sounded gruff but unmenacing.

"Oh," Joan said, unfazed, "you Rothschilds don't scare me."

"No?" The baron was already calmer.

"What are you going to do--sic your banker cousins on me?" Joan turned to me in a mock whisper. "Château Lafite is the enemy fortress. The cousins fire shots across Mouton's bows every morning before breakfast."

Philippe shot an uneasy glance at me, slapped the table in exasperation and tried to join the conversation to his left. No one was ruffled by the exchange; banter at the table was the rule. Three waiters came out with dessert--meringue glacée--and the cellarmaster poured the fourth wine of the evening: a chilled Château d'Yquem, the queen of the sweet sauternes, vintage 1914. On the shelves around us, books in bright-red and brown leather gleamed as the moon poked through slatted windows. I watched three generations of Rothschilds: Philippe, his head thrown back in his throaty laugh; Philippine, gesturing theatrically with a red-lacquered fingernail; Julien, his eyes darting from his mother to his grandfather.

While dessert plates were being cleared and brandy and Monte Cristos were being passed around, I asked Philippine quietly if Joan had been serious about the cousins' being enemies.

"Well, no," she said with a slight smile, "not really. There's always this, you know." She had flipped the menu between us and was tapping her finger on the coat of arms. Five arrows, clustered in the middle, pointing outward.

•

In 1769, like other Jews in Frankfurt's overcrowded, medieval ghetto, Mayer Rothschild had to wear a yellow star on his coat, pay a Jew Tax when he crossed a bridge and tip his hat when young thugs yelled, "Jew, do your duty!" That year, he sold a few coins to an agent of the crown prince, William, which entitled the family to a plaque by the door: By Special Appointment. In the years that followed, by collecting coins avidly and undercutting established brokers, Mayer's modest trade picked up.

He had five sons and five daughters. The daughters didn't count; the sons did--prodigiously. He taught the boys their first lesson: All the brothers shall stand together; all shall be responsible for the actions of the others. And then their second lesson: Buy cheap, sell dear.

In 1806, Napoleon invaded most of Europe. It was the Rothschilds' big break: They were commissioned by the fleeing Prince William to collect as many debts for him as they could before Napoleon's collectors did the same thing. They did fine and took their cut off the top. Number-three son, Nathan, a chubby youngster, went to London to engage in a bit of war profiteering. He did fine, too. In fact, by the time Waterloo rolled around in 1815, Nathan, who still spoke in what the British thought a comical (continued on page 156) Rothschild (continued from page 144) Yiddish accent, was the most respected banker in London.

Sons James and Salomon had moved to Paris and Vienna, respectively, and the brothers kept in touch. They established a system of couriers and carriage routes and so had the best intelligence network in Europe. Nathan heard about the French defeat at Waterloo before the British government did, calmly sold British currency to make it seem the English had lost, then, when the panic he had engineered was at its strongest, bought a bundle and made a fortune.

By 1817, the British, Austrian and French governments had found occasion to borrow from the Rothschild brothers. But with Napoleon swept away, prosperity had returned to Europe and it was time the Jewish upstarts were put back in their place. They were cut out of the financial rebuilding of the Continent. An enormous French bond issue was handled by established bankers and the Rothschilds were snubbed, socially and financially. The bonds were snapped up and rose rapidly in value. Then, suddenly, they plunged. The Rothschilds had done it again: They'd cornered the bond market, then dumped it. In the words of Frederic Morton, biographer of the family: "The great world knew what it meant to cut a Rothschild." From then on, they got Europe's business.

In 1822, the Rothschilds lent Prince Metternich 900,000 gulden. By coincidence, six days later the brothers were made hereditary barons by the Austrian government and were given the coat of arms they had sought: lions, unicorns and eagles, with five arrows clutched in a hand, representing the five brothers then living in five European capitals. They became the world's first multinational company.

Once, Nathan presented a note from one of his brothers to the Bank of England. The bank apologized, saying it cashed only its own notes. The next day, Nathan and nine of his clerks appeared at the bank carrying sacks and 10,000 ten-pound Bank of England notes, demanding that they be redeemed immediately for gold. They carted off £100,00 worth of gold. The next day, Nathan appeared again with his clerks and made the same demand. The panicky bank officials asked him how long he intended to keep that up. "Rothschild will continue to doubt the Bank of England's notes," Nathan thundered, "as long as the Bank of England doubts Rothschild notes." That day, the Bank of England declared that thenceforth it would cash any Rothschild check, any time, anywhere. With Nathan spearheading the family's financial dealings, the Rothschilds were thought to be worth £200,000,000 by the time Nathan died in 1836. There were no taxes then.

In Paris, James, the youngest son, cut the widest swath. A regular at salons of the day, a friend of writers and artists, he had a fortune estimated at more than all the other bankers in France combined. He had Louis Philippe wrapped around his finger and was creditor to most of the kings of western Europe.

Salomon had moved to Vienna, where he formed a friendship and an alliance with Metternich, and ended up owning most of the coal and ironworks of Silesia--a situation that displeased Hitler 100 years later. By buying, cajoling and bribing everyone in sight, Salomon systematically stripped away the anti-Semitism built into Austrian and German law.

In Naples, brother Carl also became a banker, bought the king of Naples and financed most of the other Italian states. In 1832, the Pope received him at the Vatican and allowed Carl to kiss his hand rather than his toes, a scandal of the time.

And in Frankfurt, oldest and slowest-witted brother Amschel remained the clan's figurehead, rooted on Jew Street in the ghetto, presiding over the many intra-Rothschild weddings and stroking a young comer named Otto Bismarck. He also took care of the family matriarch, who, two years before her death at 96, complained, "Why should God take me at a hundred when He can have me at ninety-four?" God compromised.

In the 1840s, railways were beginning to spring up across Europe. Before his death, Nathan had made one of his few miscalculations, not believing locomotives would add up to much. It was a conclusion with which his old pal the Duke of Wellington agreed: "Railways will only encourage the lower classes to move about needlessly," the duke remarked. But brothers James and Salomon, in Paris and Vienna, were ready. By the middle of the decade, they were, according to biographer Virginia Cowles, the railway tycoons of Europe.

In 1840, it looked as if war would break out. War wouldn't do the banks any good, so the brothers decided to stop it. As Cowles says, "All branches of the Rothschild family in all five countries went into action. They soothed ministers, cajoled editors, talked pacifism at every social gathering." Peace was assured and the fellows got together in Paris for party.

Meanwhile, in London, a third generation had taken over. Lionel started running the bank bequeathed to him by his father, Nathan, and began, at long last, to spend. Palaces, country houses, furniture and artwork from all over Europe. A Japanese garden in the back yard of his city home. The mikado's ambassador paid a visit, strolled through the palms, stone bridges and temples, shook his head and said, "Marvelous. We have nothing like it in Japan."

Uncle James built himself the most magnificent palace in France, with the possible exception of Versailles, and named it Ferrières. Napoleon III stayed there on one notable occasion (servants lined the route from Paris with lit torches; over 1000 head of game were shot in one afternoon's outing) and both Bismarck and Wilhelm I chose it as their headquarters when Prussia occupied France. The Prussian king was impressed: "A king could not afford this. It must belong to a Rothschild." When James died in 1868, most of the crowned heads of Europe were in attendance; the President of the U.S. sent his condolences.

Alphonse took over from his father, James, at Ferrières and continued to build up the fortune. He was well connected. His protegee became Napoleon III's wife, the Empress Eugenie, and he shared a mistress with the emperor, the courtesan La Castiglione. He talked regularly with Bismarck and entertained the Prince of Wales. Meanwhile, his cousin Anselm was running things in Vienna and was still battering away at Jewish restrictions in the Austrian Empire. Once, when Anselm was refused membership at the Casino Club near Vienna, the young man purchased a sewage-disposal unit and placed it within smell of the club. A membership card was dispatched to him forthwith, but he doused it with perfume and sent it back.

The Rothschilds financed France's war indemnity to Prussia without severe hardship in 1875. The family had already branched out into many other areas. Lionel's brother Nathaniel had left London for Paris and decided, in 1853, to buy a plot of land in Bordeaux that produced excellent wines. It was called Mouton. His uncle James followed suit in 1867 and bought a vineyard named Lafite. He bought it, he said, because it reminded him of the street in Paris where his bank was located, Rue Lafitte. The brothers owned scores of mines throughout Europe, in addition to their railway holdings. They financed Cecil (continued on page 198) Rothschild (continued from page 156) Rhodes's diamond empire in South Africa; they bought a Russian petroleum concession (which they later sold for shares in the Royal Dutch Shell combine) that made them the chief competitors to Rockefeller's Standard Oil. In 1885, Baron Nathaniel became Britain's first Jewish peer. The new Lord Rothschild gave the best parties of his time.

Charity had become a major activity of the family in all the capitals. Hospitals, schools and museums with the Rothschild name were built throughout Europe. In London, the police always knew they could get a hot meal at Lord Rothschild's near Piccadilly; and for years, the Rothschild carriages were given right of way on London streets. The family pet goat was allowed to roam freely through Piccadilly Circus.

Nathaniel's brother Leo was the first Rothschild to develop a passion for automobiles, and he founded the Royal Automobile Club and pushed for a new 20-mph speed limit. Another brother, Alfred, threw himself into the arts and entertainment on a lavish scale. Evenings at Alfred's included zoos, circuses and symphony orchestras hired especially for the occasion. Liszt tinkled the Rothschild piano for the guests' amusement. Alfred also drove around London in a carriage pulled by four zebras and left his fortune to Almina, Countess of Carnarvon, who looked around for something to invest her cash in and decided to back an expedition by Lord Carnarvon, who promptly unearthed King Tut's tomb.

Back in France, Alphonse and Gustave ran the bank, while Edmond plunged into his own interest: a Jewish homeland. He invested over £6,000,000 in helping Jewish settlers migrate to Palestine (thus paving the way for the eventual state of Israel). He made three trips to Palestine between 1887 and 1899 aboard his palatial yacht. He would dock it in the port of Jaffa and invite the farmers and immigrants aboard to sample the yacht's kosher kitchen.

The Rothschilds were ahead of their times with respect to social welfare. In London, Lord Rothschild provided all his estate workers with free medical benefits, free housing and old-age pensions. Later, during the Depression, it was said that few, if any, Rothschild employees lost their jobs.

In 1911, the Rothschild insurance company in England declined to insure the newest and biggest passenger ship, the Titanic. "It seemed too big to float," Lord Rothschild explained later.

Lionel Walter, Lord Rothschild's first son, was elected to Parliament and made one speech his first year on the subject of undersized fish.

Baron Henri, a grandson of the Nathaniel who had bought Mouton, became a doctor and invented the modern ambulance, which he put into service for France during World War One. He was also a playwright under the pen name André Pascal and steered a yacht named the Eros around the Mediterranean. He stocked it with playwrights and pretty girls. His second son was named Philippe, and he was born in Paris in 1902.

Biographer Morton says that during the 19th Century, the Rothschild family amassed an aggregate of six billion dollars.

•

"What links do you feel toward the rest of your family, toward your ancestors?" I asked Baron Philippe the afternoon of our second day. We were walking through the Mouton vineyards alone. The grapes had been harvested and occasionally Philippe would swing his polished walking cane at a dead grape leaf.

"I like to think I'm a self-made Rothschild," he began slowly. "I hardly ever saw my mother or father. I was an adolescent during World War One and my father was spending all his time with his ambulances. My mother, too, was away from home, helping to set up the ambulance service. I was seventeen by the time they returned. My father was not very interested in young people: They frightened him, in fact. And I never became close to my mother, either. So I didn't know very much about the Rothschild traditions.

"But as I've grown older, I've acquired a tremendous respect for my ancestors. What they achieved through the Nineteenth Century is beyond words, really. There have been few families in history to compare with us. The only one I can think of is the Medicis--and they didn't last as long as the Rothschilds. No other. I know of no other, unless you look to the royal families ... perhaps the Bourbons."

"Do you ever find yourself wondering if you've inherited certain family traits--the kind that have been written about in books and plays?"

Philippe threw back his head and laughed. Rajah, the baron's pet hound, looked back at us curiously.

"That's too romantic, much too romantic. I'd love to be able to say I recognize myself in Lionel and his zebra-drawn carriage. Charming. I would love to say it, but I'd be pulling my own leg. Here, Rajah!"

Rajah is a dog with utterly no respect for his master. In the week we spent at Mouton, with servants and businessmen virtually bowing their way out of the baron's presence, never did we see Rajah obey a command. Now the dog scurried off between the rows of vines.

"What about your feelings toward the rest of the family today? Do any of the old traditions prevail?"

"No, not really," he answered, swiping again at a vine. "Except for weddings, and so forth, we don't see much of one another. My cousins, don't forget, are bankers, businessmen. I don't like the word businessman. My brain isn't angled that way."

We had walked to the edge of his property. Several feet beyond a narrow ditch was the beginning of the Lafite vineyards. There was no separation, no fence. The vines looked identical. About three quarters of a mile in the distance, partly obscured by trees, was Château Lafite, looking like a traditional French castle. It was shuttered.

"Of course," the baron said pensively, staring at Lafite, "you might say we are still linked by the notion that we should behave in a certain way and that whatever one does reflects on the others. That is unusual today, because prominent families--even in politics--don't have those kinds of checks on their behavior; someone isn't necessarily judged by what other members of his family may do.

"We are distant cousins now, we Rothschilds, so we can have our own personal feelings toward one another. We have been an entity for nearly two hundred years, and that no doubt has an influence on us, even if we don't think about it. No doubt it influences our behavior. We still keep alive the notion that we have responsibilities to one another."

We turned back toward Château Mouton. Philippe pointed to the tallest structure on the landscape, about three miles away. It was an oil-refinery tower.

"Look at that!" he said disgustedly. "A Shell refinery next to the best vines in the world! I started to fight it after 1945--alone. No one else would help me, not the merchants, not the other growers, not my cousins. The local politicians did nothing. I deeply criticize them! If there were a court-martial for vandalism, I would take them before it! Shell employs three hundred people, they said. Well, I alone employ just as many. We won't know for fifty years what the effect of the refinery is, but what shortsightedness! Mouton means everything to me, but Lafite means little financially to the banking Rothschilds."

"Still, why didn't they come to your aid when you asked?"

"Ah, who knows?" Philippe said bitterly. "Well, perhaps one does. After all, they did inherit a large portfolio of stock in Royal Dutch Shell. But so did I!"

It was a beautiful sunset. As we approached the château, Philippe's mood brightened.

"Do you want to know how I first heard stories about my family? I spent some time with my aunt Jane, my father's sister. She was considered something of a pariah by the family. She had married an Italian Jew everybody disapproved of. The marriage lasted a week, though she never gave up on her faithless husband. It was she who told me endless stories about the family, and it was through her that I began to get some notion of the Rothschilds. I remember that she gave up his bedroom for me--the very room where she had what was probably the single act of love in her entire life. How is that for romance?"

"Do you remember when you first felt like a Rothschild?"

Philippe frowned for a moment and thought, rubbing at his fringe of hair.

"Possibly, possibly. I recall one instance that may be difficult for others to understand. I entered grammar school early in the century. Motorcars had just begun to replace horse-drawn carriages, and for hundreds of years, wealthy people had ridden in carriages with liveried coachmen, footmen and sometimes riders for the horses as well. So when I was driven to school in an open car, there were two people all dressed up in livery and braids to accompany me. It felt terribly odd and made me seem different from children who arrived by horse, bus or on foot."

It was getting to be time for high tea, so we headed for the château gates. Philippe paused.

"But to return to your first question," he said. "Family links? They have been a problem since Cain and Abel. My cousins' raison d'être is banking. On my tombstone, I should like to have engraved the word poet."

He turned to call his dog.

"Here, Rajah! Here, Rajah!"

Rajah trotted off in the opposite direction.

•

Before dinner, as we gathered for champagne, Thia and I presented the baron with our house gift, It had been a topic of concern before we left the States. At long last, someone who literally does have everything. We decided something silly was the solution. A friend suggested a bottle of Ripple. But on the basis of the baron's prior interest in Playboy, we decided on a sweat shirt with a Rabbit head on it.

The baron and the Rabbit head hit it off. He unwrapped the package and laughed and pulled the sweat shirt over his silk jellaba. Joan looked so pleased at the proceedings that we gave her the extra Rabbit shirt we had brought. She swore she would do something special with it. Later, as was the custom, the house gifts were placed for viewing on a couch in the living room. I strongly doubt two sweat shirts with giant Rabbit heads have ever been laid so carefully upon a priceless Queen Anne sofa.

Another cheerful and improbable dinner. Roast duck and a procession of wines that included a Cheval Blanc '59, a Lafite '44 and, incredibly, a Mouton-Rothschild '11. The wine lived and, with it, the extraordinary feeling that we were connecting with a time 66 years ago, when William Howard Taft was President of the United States and Europe dozed before World War One.... In the present, Joan was in fine form. She was recalling a night at the theater with hard-drinking Irish playwright Brendan Behan.

"Brendan was in his cups, roaring with laughter at his own lines from the front row. One of those very British queers came up to our seats. He had two tiny, yipping dogs with him. The queer said, 'I see you laugh at your own jokes, Brendan.' Brendan looked at him out of blood-red eyes and said, 'Yes. But at least I don' suck me own dogs.' Then he turned to me and said, 'I must be a fookin' genius.' He was, y' know."

When the 1911 Mouton-Rothschild arrived with the third course, I drank it very slowly, inhaling the aroma and swishing it around in my mouth. Thia and I looked at each other with wide eyes. Philippe merely drank it. I began trying to explain to him how delicious it was. Philippe laughed.

"My winemaster used to have a list of two hundred and fifty adjectives that experts and writers and others use to describe their experience with wine," he said. "You've used one of them. Try a few more. There's no wine without words."

The baron did have a couple of rules. For one thing, he said, he never offers guests hard liquor. It's available if they request it, but he feels that nothing dulls a palate like a shot of whiskey or gin. He was particularly appalled that Americans invariably ordered cocktails at good restaurants before their wine but thinks the custom is dying among the younger generation. And he absolutely refuses to be drawn into comparisons of California wines and Bordeaux (though he does compare them when he gets excited enough).

"Wines from different areas should not be compared," he said, "any more than Burgundies and clarets can be compared, or apples and oranges. One can only express preferences."

What about those blind taste tests in which certain California wines were de-dared superior to some of the best French Bordeaux?

Philippe looked at me pityingly. "For one thing, California wines are made with a fourteen percent alcoholic content, which is two percent higher than French wines. How can you compare the two? On a bottle of California wine, you may get drunk. On a bottle of Bordeaux, never! In the second place"--his voice went up an octave--"what are we talking about? Red wine, white wine, fine individual wines or plonk? Of course, there are some fine wines in California. But I'm a Bordeaux man, and that's that--until the day I taste something better."

Some other wine lore, via the Baron of Rothschild: Carrying a wine less than ten years old flat in a basket before uncorking is simply pretension. At that age, a wine has no sediment. Young wines also should be allowed to breathe longer than very old wines, which should be drunk almost immediately. White wines should be drunk very cold, while red wines should be drunk at room temperature--though this refers to European-style chilly rooms, not American ovens. To Philippe, this means about 60 degrees. A delicate, good red wine shouldn't be drunk with salad that contains vinegar; the vinegar taste may overwhelm the wine. Same goes for highly seasoned food. Finally, the baron, for one, has no patience with the restaurant ritual of tasting a bit of wine before it is poured out to the diners. "It's all an act," he says. "Any wine steward worth his salt will have smelled the cork himself to determine if the wine is acceptable. He has no business approaching the table with corked wine! On many occasions, I have sent a bottle back even after the sommelier has given it his sanction."

Dinner broke up about midnight. I went to bed and dreamed of little boys in antique cars with liveried chauffeurs and of the Good Queen Mum looking on in sympathy.

•

The next morning, Raoul Blondin, Philippe's cellarmaster, took us on a tour of the château and its cellars. First, inside a vast whitewashed building: specialoak casks, enough for the château's output of 250,000 bottles, lined up in rows like pews in a white cathedral. Then, to one side, the enormous fermenting vats where the wine from the most recent harvest was stored. We climbed up on one of them. Thia asked Raoul, a ruddy-faced, good-humored man, if we could have a sip. He wrestled open a large faucet and let some purple liquid trickle into a couple of glasses.

"What an honor," Thia said. "We're drinking the newest Mouton-Rothschild!"

"Ah, non, non, madame," Raoul said vehemently. "You are not expressing yourself correctly. What you are drinking now is grape juice. In five years, it will be wine. In twenty-five years, it will be Mouton-Rothschild!"

I searched his face to see if this were a standard little joke Raoul had for tourists, but he seemed serious. He added that we were the only ones besides the baron and himself to have tasted this vintage. He hadn't yet formed an opinion of the 1976 or 1977 wine, but he was predicting that 1975 would be the best vintage since World War Two.

"My son will know if I am right by the turn of the century," he remarked. No, he definitely wasn't kidding. Raoul's father had been the baron's first cellar-master.

Then it was on to the caves themselves, the cellars.

Along the walls leading to the cellars were hung spidery old vines, dry and brittle and eerily beautiful. Raoul explained, as we walked behind him, that some of the vines hung high on the walls dated back to the clays before Phylloxera--the vine disease that wiped out most of the French vineyards at the end of the 19th Century. It was then, he said, that French growers imported hardy roots from California and grafted them onto the French roots. Raoul laughed, as if he knew how California wine was maligned around the dining-room table of Château Mouton, and said, "Imagine--most French Bordeaux today comes from a California root."

The cellars are huge catacombs first excavated in 1854. They are lit by electric 'candles in holders on the walls and are cold, dank and musty. There are racks upon racks of bottles, with fungus growing everywhere; as Sir Alexander Fleming commented during a visit, there is a fortune in penicillin in the baron's cellars. The cobwebbing and fungus got thicker as we proceeded deeper into the caves, for the deeper we went, the farther back we went in time. Raoul, chatty in the daylight, became quieter, almost reverent as we approached the darker recesses. The 1920 bottles. The 1910s. We paused. Raoul patted a fragile, blackened bottle of 1900.

"One wonders how it lived," he said, "what it went through, what history it has seen."

We were in the cellars' private reserves, which are normally off limits to visitors. On racks that stretched to the roof of the caves were 24 bottles of each vintage, plus five magnums and two giant jeroboams--for historical reference only. And some 5000 bottles for the family's private use. There were fewer than 40 bottles of the 1929. We had drunk three the night before last....

Raoul told us stories about special bottles of wine: The baron had sent Dc Gaulle an 1859 vintage--one of eight bottles left, over 90 years old at the time. It was still lively, said Raoul, who had tasted it. In the early Sixties. Khrushchev was sent a couple of bottles of 1880. "Probably never even knew what he was getting," Raoul sniffed. I felt even guiltier about the bottle of 1911.

•

The next afternoon, the baron drove Thia, Philippine, Julien, Rajah and me to the beach on the Bay of Biscay. About 30 seconds into the trip, I began to wonder how the baron had lived so long. He was hitting 80 on a narrow country road. He had his goggles on and sat far back from the wheel of the Mercedes, his arms extended in race-driver fashion. (Of course, he had been a race-car driver. I'd seen the trophies.)

People along the road scattered as the baron leaned on his horn; one bicycle rider landed in a ditch. But as I looked back, I saw most of them wave. With an unamused shake of her head, Philippine explained that most people in the region knew very well that her father drove like a demon and everyone was only too happy to get out of the way. Julien loved his grandfather's speed, but Rajah howled.

"Quiet, Rajah!" the baron yelled. Rajah howled louder.

At the beach, we disembarked, took off our shoes and began to walk along the sand. Philippe, as always, brandished his cane, adjusted his poncho and set the pace. Thia and Philippine walked together, Julien and Rajah trotted off and Philippe and I talked about his life.

We began by discussing his love for sports, especially cars, since I was still dizzy from the ride. As early as the Twenties, Philippe recalled, he already had a vast number of cars, including a succession of Bugattis. He discovered a "wonderful gift for driving, which I still have," and began entering races. During the Twenties, he won second places at the Grand Prix of Germany and the Grand Prix of Spain and came in fourth at the Grand Prix of Monaco. He had two close encounters with death--a steering wheel from his Bugatti broke off in his hands in Spain and his Stutz Bearcat caught. fire at Le Mans--so he decided to give it up.

At the same time, he had taken up sailing, which he did seriously every summer from 1920 to 1939. He entered his boat and crew in the 1928 Olympics at Amsterdam and came in eighth out of 35. "It was gale weather," he said. 'The Nordics were better trained for the rough stuff: We had a crack crew for light weather, and I'm sure we would have won if it had remained fair." He added that he has a very good hand at anything that can be steered--the helm of a boat, the wheel of a car, the wheel of a bobsled. A bobsled?

"Yes. We were nearly the world champions in the early Thirties, at St.-Moritz. We broke the record on our first two runs, then turned over at the end of our third and final run."

Hadn't he started out to be a scientist?

"Yes, I got my degree in science, in physics. In college, I had spent most of my time in the labs. I became very interested in the link between electricity and optics. In my opinion, I did nothing of any great interest, but I am told some of the work I did in optics was later used in spectroscopes. I also became a member of the Curie Foundation and sat through a number of meetings with Madame Curie. But still and all, after a while, I realized I did not want to make my career in science. I wanted to deo other things, have fun."

"That's when I got involved in show business. I had worked with my father on some'plays he wrote, but I had also studied architecture and design, and when my father told me he was planning a large new theater at Place PigalIe, I threw myself into it. I helped design and build the theater--we were the first Paris theater to use electric spotlights--and later became its director. While I was there, we produced plays by Sacha Guitry, Jules Romains and Jean Giraudoux and opened the door to the new wave of playwrights.

"But by 1931, I began to become fascinated by a newer form of dramatic expression: films. Pictures had been talking for only a couple of years and no sound films had yet been made in France. So I produced an early French 'talkie'--and one of the first French films to be shown internationally. It was called Lac aux Dames--Ladies' Lake-- and was a tremendous success. Colette wrote the dialog, Marc Allégret directed and it starred Jean-Pierre Aumont and Simone Simon-a lady I would have fallen madly in love with except that I was in love with another actress at the time. I worked on all aspects of the film--including butting in on the director."

What came next?

"Well, there really wasn't any 'next,' because throughout that time, I was caught up with the real love of my life: Mouton, and its wine. Unless, of course, you consider my poetry and my translations. Or my museum. But they came much later."

Of course.

"Anyway, shortly after I moved permanently to Mouton in 1922, I was horrified to find that wine was being put in casks and the casks were sent to Bordeaux for bottling. I decided instantly that if my wine were to retain its character, the wine should be bottled here at the château under my control and seal. Our family had run the operation for years from a distance, and Mouton-Rothschild had long been recognized as one of the world's leading wines, but converting to a system of bottling inthe château proved to be a colossal task. The merchants attacked me and my Lafite cousins hesitated for a year before deciding to back me up. But at last I managed to persuade the owners of the three other premiers crus to adopt château bottling. Today, wine authorities are still trying to make the system compulsory throughout France.

"By 1924, I had my first château-bottled label. By the way, that label was in itself revolutionary: It had a cubist design on it. I suspended the artistic designs in 1936, but I picked up the idea again after the war. As you probably know, every label since 1945 has been designed by one of the world's leading artists--Picasso, Braque, Motherwell, and so on." (A Beverly Hills wine store, in a moment of oenological hubris, in 1977, offered one bottle of each Mouton since 1945 for the aggregate price of S20,000 for the 32 bottles.)

How do you pay the artists, while we're on the subject?

"I don't. We barter. I get their design, they get cases of my wine--their favorite vintage--plus a supply of the year for which they designed the label, when the wine matures. Anyway, Mouton was always a labor of love. It wasn't even profitable, with very few exceptions, until around 1960.

"My great battle was to have Mouton reclassified to its proper status. In 1855, when the Bordeaux wines were classified for the first and presumably only time, only four were ranked as premier cru, while Mouton was classified as first among the second growths. My great-grandfather's cousins bought Lafite twelve years later and found they were one up on Mouton. My great-grandfather was so angry that he created the Mouton-Rothschild motto: 'Premier ne puffs, second .ne damgue, Mouton je suis.' 'I cannot be first, I disdain to be second, I am Mouton.' But. Mouton was selling a fraction below Lafite until I took over in 1922. From then on, it sold as high, sometimes higher. And prices are an exact reflection of the quality of the wine. Yet it still took another five decades of lobbying and pressure to prove what was obvious. At last I won. In the special reclassification of 1973, Mouton--and Mouton alone--was put in its proper category, alphabetically among the first four premiers crus of France. An act of justice and a sweet victory."

What about Mouton-Cadet, since that's what many Americans recognize from your advertisements?

"My advertisements, yes. Remember, please, that we advertise only Mouton-Cadet. Mouton-Rothschild, which bears my name, is never advertised. It is beneath its dignity. Well, what happened was that we had some hard years between 1930 and 1932. The wine was thin, too thin to be bottled as Mouton-Rothschild. Someone suggested almost as a joke that we bottle a Mouton Junior. Junior in French is cadet. We blended the three harvests with some other good-quality Bordeaux wines and the name stuck. Today, Mouton-Cadet contains very little wine from my own vineyards. It is a blend of several good Bordeaux, a pleasant mélange. I drink it myself."

What happened to Mouton--and to you--during World War Two?

"Well, I was an officer in the air force. When France fell, I had the misfortune to be laid up with a broken leg. But I got away, escaped to Morocco. We all hoped that the colonies would carry on the fight, but the Vichy puppets were already installed and I was arrested. I spent six months in jail, only to be escorted back to Vichy France and imprisoned there. When a Vichy court set me free, I skipped, made my way on foot over the Pyrenees, hitched a ride on a plane to England and joined De Gaulle and the Free French. In 1944, I landed on the Normandy beaches with the Second British Army and, as soon as I could, I set out to look for my wife, Lili, and our daughter, Philippine. I found that Lili had been arrested, betrayed by a domestic. She was not a Jew, but because she was married to me, she was sent to an unknown concentration camp. I traced her from camp to camp, and finally I found out that she had died in Ravensbriick, a month before the war ended. She had been thrown into the oven, alive.

"Mouton itself was occupied by the German army and became the headquarters for its antiaircraft network. The Vichy puppets had nationalized Lafite and Mouton as Jewish properties. The Germans appointed a wine Fuhrer, a certain Heinz Bömers, to watch over wine production in the Bordeaux region. The Nazi higher-ups had a respect for Mouton, so the cellars were not looted--they were keeping our wine for their victory. After the liberation, I got back in time for the harvest. It was the famous vintage with the V on the label--1945, a fine year.

"I'll tell you something interesting about that period. I got a letter in 1950 from Bömers, asking me if he might become my wine representative in Germany. I still remembered Lili's death--to say nothing of the holocaust--and said, no, I wanted no German representative. I got another letter from him in 1960, repeating his request. I said no again. Well, here it is, 1977. I have an agent in Germany. He is Julius Bömers, son of Heinz, who died in the Sixties."

Philippe was remarried in 1954, to the former Pauline Potter of Baltimore, an American blue blood who had begun a career as a dress designer with Hattie Carnegie. It was she who converted the stables at Mouton into the showcase of art it is today, and together they planned the wine museum on the château property: a collection of frescoes, tapestries, jewel-encrusted cups, mosaics--any piece of artwork that has anything to do with grapes or wine. Guide Michelin tells its readers it is worth a detour by itself. It was also Pauline who brought Philippe out of a kind of isolation, initiating the dinners and weekends at Mouton that became a tradition and invitations to which became sought after.

That day, as we continued our walk on the beach, over a year after Pauline's death, Philippe could not keep from weeping as he told me about her. To edge him off the topic, I began talking about women in general and asked him for his thoughts.

"Ah, yes. Amitiés amoureuses--loving friendships. I always had them, all my life. Pauline knew how much I was attracted to women." A quick glance down the beach to where his daughter was strolling with my wife. "Things can be done, you know, if they are done with elegance and restraint. But it needs delicate handling. When a couple has shown its strength by surviving many, ah, detours, then you've achieved one of the most important things in life. Because a couple that lives together for decades and decades is entitled to need--now and then--breathing spaces that can renew the couple."

So it goes both ways? The woman has the same rights as the man?

"Women have equal rights--even though they have different physiologies. A woman can fall in love and be claimed by passion, whereas a man can make love with sentimental indifference. I've seen the proof of it--women becoming overly involved with me--and I've handled a great many women in my life. But, as in all things involving love, there are no generalizations."

Once again, we had talked until dusk. Time to return to Mouton for tea. Philippe made a few stubborn attempts to get Rajah's attention and was impassive when Julien, with a soft whistle, got the dog to bound up to the boy with slobbering, wet face kisses. We bundled into the car and Philippe took off in a thick cloud of sand and smoke, wheels spinning madly.

•

More dinners, more wine, more terrific conversation. By Friday night, we had progressed to a Mouton-Rothschild 1900 for the third course, which made me want to go to confession the next day. Quail, trout, filet au poivre, indescribable desserts. Philippine had promised to send us tickets to her stage production of Harold and Maude, in French, when it came to New York. Lars wanted Thia and me to meet him and Ingrid in Paris on our way back to the States. (Me and Ingrid Bergman ... in Paris? Would Sam be there, too? What had I done to deserve all this?) And Joan, as always, indefatigable: At least one portion of bread she'd been served was fit only "for Viennese rats," she declared, at which Philippe let out another roar of displeasure. Commenting on the domestic eagerness to please: "Thia, child, be sure you don't fall asleep in the tub with your hand outside the water. You're liable to wake up and find your fingernails polished."

During those meals, I was able to fit together some of the last pieces of Philippe's life. In the company of others, he was less forthcoming, but he talked modestly about his poetry--most of it love sonnets--for which he had won several literary awards; his increased interest in early Elizabethan poetry, which led to his translating such poets as Donne, who had thitherto been published only in century-old translations. His books on the Elizabethans were required reaching at the Sorbonne, Philippine pointed out. His most recent project, just published, was a full translation of Tamburlaine the Great, also destined for the college lists.

And then, during a quiet moment over dessert, when even Joan remained mute, some soft-spoken thoughts on the future of his lovely country life:

"Yes, it may soon be over. I don't think living this way, for however few years I have left, is normal. In any case, I don't think future generations will have the dilemma, simply because they will not have the means. Taxes today are so heavy, death duties so expensive, that it will be impossible to carry on this sort of life. The family fortunes are dwindling, at least here in Europe. What was possible fifty years ago is no longer possible for us."

If you feel it's not normal, don't you see a contradiction in continuing this lovely but lavish way of living?

"I have to admit I live with a certain panache here, but don't forget that Château Mouton is a very special place. We produce something of exceptionally high quality. So it's normal that this product should be supported by a mystique, a background of elegance and luxury living. It is for show. It is part of the handling of the wine, its wrapping. It fits into the mythology of the château and it is felt right down to the lowest workman.

"You notice that my servants call me Monsieur le Baron. Fine. But I have never used the Baron in my other professions: not when I raced, or sailed, or produced motion pictures, or published books. It is strictly for public relations, for the wine. And the people here at the château and in the region surrounding it understand this and support it. But, as I say, it is nearly over."

A silence. Then Joan: "Enough sentimental crap. You men go swig some of the baron's wretched brandy."

•

"Jew, Frenchman, Rothschild. How do you rank them in your own life?" I was sitting by his bed the next morning. He was in pajamas, his back against a couple of large pillows, a portable writing desk over his lap.

"I'm a Frenchman and a Rothschild," he said. "And a Jew well behind the two others." A pause. "Philippine was brought up as a Catholic, as I promised her mother. It was just as well, since it saved her life during the war. She is bringing up her childten as she pleases. Now, understand, I'm not saying I would be thrilled if Julien grew up to become the archbishop of Bordeaux."

I tell him that I find that interesting because most people would assume a Rothschild would be very aware of his Jewish background, especially because of the family history and because of the Rothschild role in creating Israel.

"It's the same thing I said in regard to my family. We may not be dose on a day-to-clay basis, but if ever we have to pull together.... It's like this: The minute a Jew is attacked because he's a Jew, I would rank being Jewish in the first place. For that reason, I support Israel. Israel is the answer to Naziism, the answer to pogroms, the answer to concentration camps and the hideous martyrdom to which Jews have been born. But since I am also French, I must remember that France was a colonial power for a hundred and fifty years and cannot ignore the Arabs. Some accuse France of having become anti-Israel, but I think it is merely a subtle political position taken by the government, which is neither pro-Arab nor pro-Israeli. I do not disapprove, provided there is no harm done to Israel."

I ask him if his cousins are more supportive of Israel than he is.

"In some sense, yes, because my cousins are in a position to give support. I am not."

Why?

"Because they have more means. They are the financiers. You will remember that I referred to myself as self-made. That is relative, of course, but the truth is that, having started as one of the richest of the Rothschilds, my father let his fortune dwindle. He was not well in his later years, was not capable of managing Iris own affairs. When he died, there were no more yachts or motorcars. Here at Mouton, I built myself up from what was left. I like to think that through creation and innovation I just happen to have come up with a profitable business."

It was the first chip in the fairy tale. The baron's resources were not, and are not, limitless. While his cousins' wealth may yet be large enough to leave fortunes to the younger generations, Philippe's is not--though it is now larger than what was left to him.

There is a sensitivity to the question of wealth--or to the flaunting of it--that emerges when the topic is probed. I asked him about a story on CBS' 60 Minutes that was aired several years ago. There was a brief interview with Philippe and Pauline, some film of the château and its cellars and a scene that produced outrage among viewers: Rajah was shown being served a prepared meal on a silver dish by a butler. I mentioned this to Philippe. He became intensely agitated.

"I am delighted you put the question to me. I was very, very cross and am still cross with the CBS people! I loathe that film! It was very naughty! They did that behind my back; it was done to show bad, dirty misbehavior and I resented it deeply! It shocked everyone here. The film crew asked some stupid servant, I don't know which one, to bring Rajah's meal down on a silver tray that particular day. The dog is served like all dogs in the world--his meal is carried down to him in a normal dish wrapped in a towel. We were horrified when we saw that on television! I am happy to set the record straight."

Philippe's ambivalence about the lavish life is a mark of his personality. He is proud not to be a businessman like his cousins yet is equally proud that he built up his wine business. He speaks of himself as a man of the progressive left yet betrays a nostalgia for feudalism and royalty. He claims not to be much affected by his family tradition, but it's hard to spend any amount of time around him without plunging into history. He is above having to prove anything to anyone yet cannot resist a bit of showing off to a visiting journalist.

Philippe had hinted several times that he had something special planned for our last evening at the château. As I left his bedside that morning, I wondered what could be more special than what we'd already experienced. Then it occurred to me that there was something about the way he was talking to me about his life, something about the ascending quality of the meals and the age of the wines that seemed to be building to a climax. It was almost theatrical. With a magazine journalist as his audience, Baron Philippe, at 76, was taking some curtain calls.

•

The last supper was held in Petit Mouton, the small Victorian castle I had looked for the day we arrived. The guests were in their Saturday-night best and even Philippe had brought out his finest jellaba for the occasion. Petit Mouton is very nearly camp: Its red-fabric walls make it a ruby jewel box, festooned with paintings in ornate frames. There are settees embroidered in gold, great Oriental ottomans and thick brocade pillows piled everywhere.

For the first time, Thia and I had to share the guest-of-honor spots with a friend of the family: Jacques ChabanDelmas, De Gaulle's prime minister and now president of the National Assembly. He arrived with his wife, and waiters ushered us to our seats. I was at one end of the table with Chaban-Delmas, his wife and Thia were at the other end, on either side of Philippe. Joan had not yet arrived, so the first course was served as I attempted small talk with the president.

Outside the dining room, there were whispers from some of the servants. Suddenly, at the doorway, an apparition: Joan Littlewood in a Bunny costume. Bunny Joan had spent the afternoon with the château's seamstress, creating a pair of ears and a tail of wadded cotton that had been stitched to the red sweat shirt we'd given her. Posed in the doorway, with a couple of limp rabbit ears flopping over her brow, Joan's mad version of a Bunny was riveting.

As the entire table turned to look at her, there was a moment of horrified silence--it seemed to me that the former premier of France's jaw was on his collarbone--and then Philippe began to laugh, a loud, long horselaugh that was taken up by everyone else. Joan sat demurely down at her place at the table with only a slight smile on her lips, removed the ears and took a sip of Margaux.

The ministerial ice was broken and Chaban-Delmas and I began to talk. I asked him about his experiences with De Gaulle. After the second glass of Margaux, he launched into an imitation of his mentor:

" 'Chaban,' the general said to me, 'I want you to go to Washington and check out this young Kennedy lad. Does he think? Has he a vision?' This was in 1961, and after I had been in Washington a few days, President Kennedy asked me about the general. 'I'm supposed to meet him this spring, as you know,' the President said, 'but I'm in awe of him. He is like some sort of monument.' 'Well,' I replied, 'all you have to do is visit him exactly as you would visit a monument: with the utmost respect and a minimum of familiarity.' "

The political gossip and the conversation around the table were so engrossing I hadn't glanced at the menu. When the third course arrived, I looked up to see Raoul approaching the head of the table with a decanter in his hands. I smiled at him, but he only nodded solemnly. He leaned over to the right of the baron and poured into his glass. I finally looked down at the small menu with the familiar arrows at the top. The third wine of the evening was a Mouton-Rothschild 1878.

I took a couple of hesitant, trembling sips. By then, my palate was pretty fair. I would have known if the wine had faded. It had not. It is difficult to separate the atmosphere of the moment from the pure taste of the wine, but to this day, I am certain it was the most delicious liquid ever to enter my body.

The baron's daughter was impressed, as were the other guests. Chaban-Delmas, shaking his head, lifted his glass in a silent toast to Philippe at the other end of the table. Still stunned, I followed suit. Philippe lifted his glass, grinned slightly and said, "I apologize, messieurs. It isn't ... quite ... a hundred years old." Then he took a sip himself, licked his lips and remarked, "C'est un bon vin."

The rest of that night, and the morning of our departure, blurred past. After dinner, Chaban-Delmas and his wife left and Joan and Thia decided to organize a bilingual game of charades. I made up a charade for Philippe to act out: the Mouton motto, ending with that grand and arrogant phrase Mouton je suis. I have a memory of that night: the guests arranged in two teams, seated on ottomans and sofas inside a jewel box of a Victorian castle, with Joan's Bunny ears back on and the Baron of Rothschild angrily pounding the floor with his walking stick--the only pantomime he felt adequately conveyed the charade I am Mouton. His team was stupid not to guess it instantly, and he told them so when his time ran out and he flung aside his cane in frustration.

•

The entire staff was again lined up outside the château gates as we prepared to leave on a bright Sunday morning. Thia had all her embossed menus in one hand and a parting gift of Mouton brandy (prepared exclusively for the baron and his guests from Rothschild grapes) in the other. Philippe and I had been chatting about all the years we had covered in our talks and about how impressed I had been to hear of the many careers he had tried. We were standing by the car.

"You know, my young friend," he said quietly, "every man has many strings for his bow. A man should find the best string for his bow as he grows older. I may have gone deeply into different areas throughout my life, but I have only followed through profoundly in my love for poetry and my wine. I do not know about the future. I do not know how this society will change. I am not optimistic about its long-term future. But I believe there is still room for men of eccentricities--whether they be astronauts or poets or winegrowers."

Those were pretty much his parting words. The man does have a good sense of theater. We drove down the pebbly road and I turned to wave. The servants were waving at us, still in a line in front of the gates. Off to one side, Baron Philippe was bent over, his poncho billowing in the wind. He was slapping his hands against his thighs, calling energetically to Rajah. The clog, ignoring him, continued to gnaw on a very old vine.

"The '29 Mouton was not just the best wine served that night but a wine to mark one's life."

"The Rothschilds financed France's war indemnity to Prussia without severe hardship in 1875."

"In 1911, the Rothschild insurance company in England declined to insure the Titanic."