The big, bleach-blonde secretary was smacking her bubble gum as I went to see the chief. I adjusted my wine-stained trench coat and ran my fingers through my black mop of hair. As I opened the creaking door into a room filled with cigar smoke, I couldn’t help but notice the chief’s gorgeous gams and ebony stiletto heels, her legs draped across the tidy desk as she smoked a dog leg of a cigar and blew doughnut-sized smoke rings. She knew that she was beautiful and used it to her advantage, and that’s why I work cheap – $5 a day plus expenses.

“I want you to investigate,” she said to me. “The pinot mob is creating quite a ruckus. They’re trying to take over – killing merlot and chardonnay sales.”

She placed a crumpled piece of paper in my palm; it looked like the fortune from a stale fortune cookie I got recently at Wong’s Chinese.

“It’s a clue, handsome,” she said.

I smoothed out the paper in my palm and read it: Joe’s Winery, Russian River Valley. I bowed as deeply as my flabby stomach would allow and made my exit as the chief blew me a kiss.

I knew I needed to go north, so I got into my ’47 Studebaker with an overnight bag and a Colt .38 snub-nose revolver in case there was any trouble. Then I hit the road, driving north past beautiful, meaningless coastal towns until I reached sleepy Sonoma – the way to the Russian River Valley.

I sped away, past Lady in the Lake Tavern and on down the road. I had only one goal: to close in on the pinot gang. I finally spotted the flickering neon sign that said, “Joe’s Winery, free tasting Saturdays, 10:00 a.m.-4:00 p.m.” I shut off the engine and approached the winery, which was located in an old, red barn.

I would have knocked on the door, but it was already wide open. There, seated among a hundred wine barrels, was Joe and a wine moll enjoying wine, bread and cheese. Their laughter filled the cobwebbed rafters, but it stopped when I arrived with my .38 caliber.

I got right to the point: “Where is the pinot mob?”

Joe, who looked and sounded like Bela “Dracula” Lugosi, smiled sadistically and said, “I crushed them with that wine press until there was no juice left and the skins screamed for mercy, then I fermented them.” His laughter hurt my ears as he continued, “The yeast eats the grape sugar like a hungry ghoul devours a corpse – it turns into alcohol as it bubbles and boils in that vat over there like a witch’s cauldron. After that, I entombed them for several months in French oak barrels and bottled them.”

I put the revolver down and we walked down the row of barrels. “Pinot noir, pinot gris – I prefer the Italian names, pinot grigio and pinot blanc,” he drolled on. “These wines are grown everywhere, and that is why the pinot mob is going to take over the world… And you know the greatest thing of all? There are mutants – a race of super-mutants and clones of pinot noir. No radiation exposure necessary; just natural mutation, each a delicious wine.”

I was starting to think Joe needed to spend some time in a padded cell. We went over to the table where the wine moll was sitting, looking like a white zombie, and poured a glass of pinot grigio. It was light and crisp, with dashes of melon, orange peel and grapey nuances. Wonderful. Next was the pinot blanc, with many of the characteristics of chardonnay but not over-oaked like a flowery Meursault. Beyond wonderful. Finally, the king of the mutants, pinot noir, the great Burgundian grape that produces Pommard and La Tache in France. It smelled like hay, and the taste on my palate was that of burnt cherries, watermelon and spice. Terrific.

After six glasses of wine, I started to get a little fuzzy. I stared at Joe and the zombie girl as they smiled and laughed. Everything seemed to go a little sideways, and the next thing I knew I was waking up in my Studebaker parked by the Lady in the Lake Tavern. My eyes felt like they’d been glued shut with airplane glue, but I was happy to be alive. I started the car and headed south to report back to the chief.

When I got back, she was still in stiletto heels and smoking a stove-pipe cigar. I told her the truth: the pinot mob was strong and delicious, and merlot and chardonnay better get out of town before they get rubbed out.

She batted her blue eyes at me and handed me an envelope with a few fivers in it, then motioned me out of her office with her long fingers and said, “Farewell, my lovely.”