“I think because my great-grandmother asked him to. She was really disappointed and angry with him when she found out what he’d done. It was like she knew that it would cause a further rift between them, and she had felt guilty enough as it was for coming between their lifelong friendship. She always warned my great-grandfather not to gamble cars, homes, or land. She insisted that they were too personal and that people got too angry and couldn’t forgive that kind of loss.”

Julia nodded, and then I dealt the final blow, “Once the south side vines started producing its one-of-a-kind grapes, that soured what little had been left between them to nothing.”

“Is that the end?” Julia asked.

I looked around the table, nodding before finishing off my own glass of wine.

“What about the parts that I was told, growing up? You didn’t even mention those,” Mr. La Bella asked, his brow furrowed as if he wasn’t sure which direction was up anymore.

My dad took over, and I was grateful. “After the bet, like James mentioned, my grandfather kept trying to get the land back. He did more than just try to play for it again in poker. He asked your grandfather to split it in half. Then, he offered to buy it back for double what it was worth and then triple, but your grandfather kept saying no. I think it was in part just to torture him. I’m sure your grandfather couldn’t have cared less about the vines, especially since he didn’t even know what they would come to produce at that point.”

Mr. La Bella sat there, taking it all in, his head shaking back and forth in disbelief. I squeezed Julia’s hand under the table, and she squeezed it back. The gesture made me smile as my dad wrapped the rest of the story up.

“My grandfather’s insistence on there being some way to get the land back only fueled your grandfather’s stubbornness to keep it. To be honest, I think he liked having something over my great-grandfather, especially since he felt like my great-grandfather had something over him,” he said, referring to my great-grandmother. “But, once the land started producing grapes that didn’t taste like any other in the county, all hell broke loose. My great-grandfather went to the courts and tried to fight to get the land deed overturned, but they refused, saying too much time had passed. He told anyone who would listen that your grandfather had stolen the land from him and was crooked. He even called the police, but nothing worked. The bitterness grew between our families because Great-grandfather Russo refused to let it go, and Great-grandfather La Bella didn’t take kindly to being called a thief and a liar.”