“I guess I have to get out of here before midnight to keep my carriage from turning into a pumpkin?” David teased her.
Maria walked him to the door. He hugged her again and started kissing her, this time very slowly, with a soft tenderness that reignited that feeling of burning desire. They wound up in bed yet again. This time there wasn’t the same intensity, but instead a puzzling feeling of deep sadness as if both were trying to recover something that they had lost a long time ago. When they finished, Maria inexplicably began to cry. He held her head tight against his chest until they both fell asleep.
When she woke up the next morning, David had already left. On her dresser mirror, he had left a piece of paper with a drawing of a smiley face.
Day 11—Thursday, November 12, 2015
Once she arrived at the office, after stopping for her Cuban coffee, Maria started to sense that something in her felt uneasy about the events of the previous night. She had to spend half of the day without anybody talking to her before she felt more at ease.
She was waiting for the right time to talk to Larry and ask him to approve her trip to New York. Meanwhile, she began to go over her report along with her notes. Lazo had come from Cuba when he was seventeen. It was possible that the couple in question had provided him with false documents, perhaps only so that he could pass for eighteen, or maybe in order to hide something that had happened in Cuba. Perhaps they were blackmailing him and that’s why they had met in Miami Beach, so that he could pay them. Something had happened to his uncle. Was this couple involved in his death and the baby’s disappearance?
She decided to go through the suitcase one more time that Gladys Elena Gonzalez had given her with the belongings of her deceased husband. She put on a pair of gloves and began to place every item on the desk until the suitcase was empty. As she gingerly felt her way along the top, she realized that there was a compartment that she hadn’t noticed before. Inside she found a manila envelope. She anxiously opened it and was surprised to find several green sheets of paper in which Lazo was seeking a job at Radio Marti. Then, among the papers, she found another one, a white one that was thicker. It was his fingerprints that had been taken right there in the very same station! Maria couldn’t believe it. The document was dated August 21, 1992, the Friday immediately before Hurricane Andrew would batter Florida. Every time they took fingerprints, they always gave one copy to the individual and also kept another on file at the station. She had looked everywhere but hadn’t been able to find Lazo’s fingerprints and, the entire time, they had been right there, somewhere in that very building! After spending a few hours filling out forms, making calls, and asking for authorization, she finally managed to gain access to the warehouse where they stored old archives. She spent the rest of the afternoon going through a mound of papers that had never been filed due to the hurricane.
Around five in the afternoon, she returned to her desk with two sheets of paper on which were clearly visible the black ink marks of ten fingers belonging to the man whose identity she had been seeking. She was so excited about her discovery that she couldn’t wait to knock on Larry’s door.
“I found his prints. We have to compare them to the ones at Immigration and send them to Cuba. Also, I’m heading off to New York,” she told him without beating around the bush.
She had to explain things in more detail if her boss was going to give her the green light.
Maria felt that indescribable feeling that invaded her every time she came across a new clue.
Chapter 13
Day 11—Thursday, November 12, 2015
The first thing Maria did when she got to the office was compare Lazo’s fingerprints with those in the Department of Immigration’s database. She didn’t find anything. She called a friend who worked there, but she was on vacation. She thought about calling Larrea and asking him to set up a meeting with his writer friend in New York. If he had falsified some documents, he surely wouldn’t want to talk to the police, but perhaps if his friend explained the case, it would be easier. She was about to dial the number when Fernandez walked in the office.
“Hey, Fernandez. Do me a favor…” she explained to him what she needed.
“Look, I’ll even take you with me to Manhattan if I can…but I’m not promising anything.”
Maria left her colleague working on setting up a meeting with the novelist in the Big Apple, and, after calling Gladys Elena and confirming that she was home, she went to Hialeah again.
After the coffee ritual and Maria answering, once again, that she hadn’t found Gladys’s daughter yet, Maria asked, “Did you know that your husband was looking for a job with Radio Marti?”
“No… Was it an electrician’s job?”
“No, as an editor. Was he a writer?”
“He wanted to be. He wrote me some poems, one for our daughter when she was born, and he had published a few things under a pseudonym… He said that they were political in nature and, that if he used his real name, they could’ve persecuted his family.”
“What family did he have in Cuba?”
“Truth is that he never had any contact with them when we were together…he never gave me specific information.”
“You didn’t suspect anything?”
“No. He was good to me. He was a decent man. I’ve already told you that.”
“Your mother thinks that he was hiding something.”
“My mother has a vivid imagination. She barely knew him. She didn’t like him because she wanted me to marry my boyfriend from Pinar del Rio and, as you know, in the end that’s what happened.”
“Did you know a couple, older than he, who were his friends?”
“No.”
“Did he ever disappear unexpectedly?”
“No… Why are you asking me this?”
“Please be patient, I’ll explain later.”
“Did he have money problems?”
“We didn’t live lavishly, but we made do.”
“Did he get a lot of phone calls that made him nervous?”
“No… Actually, now that you mention it, only once right before the hurricane and the accident. Ray had a beeper. My God, I had forgotten about those things! Now we all have cell phones… Because of his work, they had to be able to reach him at any hour. One time he returned a call, and he said very little. At the time, he said he was going out to get something—I don’t know what—and he left. He was gone for more than an hour. I remember because I was giving the baby a bottle, and she took forever to drink it. I was watching an hour-long TV show, and, when it ended, I thought it was odd that he hadn’t returned. I’m not the jealous type. I was just worried that something had happened. But he came back a little while later, and he was fine, and in a good mood. Well, a normal one… I had to put the baby to bed, and I didn’t bother asking him why he took so long. I think that was a week or so before Hurricane Andrew…”
“Do you have what he wrote?”
“I didn’t give them to you before because they’re so personal…the poems…and I honestly forgot about them because I didn’t put the envelope in the briefcase. But if you want them…”
“I’d like to see them, but if they don’t seem useful to the case, I won’t take them with me.”
Gladys Elena left the little room and came back shortly with a bulging envelope.
Maria looked at the family photos once again and, before opening the envelope, asked Gladys Elena point-blank:
“So there’s another thing that intrigues me here. Your daughter Elenita looks a lot like her father, doesn’t she?”
“Yes, everyone says that…it’s a striking resemblance.”
“But Elenita also looks like those drawings of what Gladys Mercedes would look like at this age, right?”
“Yes, certainly.”
“So your older daughter also looks like your husband, but he isn’t he
r father. How do you explain that?”
For a moment, the woman appeared thrown but quickly regained her composure.
“I don’t know. Resemblances are subjective. When Mauricio and I were young, people thought we were siblings and they’d freak out if they saw us kissing… They said we looked alike… Not so much now, because I don’t have black hair like I had back then and we’ve both put on weight…”
“Did the person who made those drawings of your daughter ever meet Elenita?”
“No, they do it on the computer using a baby picture of her, one of me, and one of her father.”
Duquesne sensed that this woman was also hiding something, but she didn’t press. She opened the envelope. She read two or three yellowed pages with poems that struck her as mediocre but sincere, and afterwards she flipped through a black and white marbled composition book like the ones used in school. In small but clear writing, there were drafts of articles, poems, phone numbers, and addresses noted in the margins, and some sort of diary.
“Ok, I’ll leave the poems with you, but I’d like to take the notebook. I promise that I’ll take care of it and give it back to you. Maybe there’s a name or a phone number that could give us a lead.”
“I’ve read it many times and I’ve never found anything, but go ahead and take it. I hope it helps you.”
Maria detected some semblance of hostility or uneasiness in the woman’s voice. Without a doubt, something had changed between them.
When she got back to the station, Fernandez welcomed her with great enthusiasm. He did everything short of jumping for joy.
“I spoke…I spoke with Bengochea, and he agreed to see us on Saturday because he has work tomorrow. I think it would help if I came along… I’ve already priced tickets and going one day and coming back the next is expensive, but I can pay mine with miles if there’s no budget, and I found a reasonably priced hotel a few blocks from Times Square, and the ticket would cost less if we return on Monday.”
Maria had only gone to New York once, with her parents. It was her high school graduation gift. She remembered when they went up to the Empire State Building and took in the amazing view of the city. She even had pictures of the three of them in Rockefeller Center. She was overwhelmed by St. Patrick’s Cathedral where her mother had lit many candles, but the best part was seeing Cats on Broadway. The song “Memory” greatly moved her parents. She didn’t understand back then why Cubans wore their emotions on their sleeve. Now these images of her happy, youthful mother invoked a bittersweet sensation, and Maria understood better the pain of life’s losses.
Chapter 14
Days 12 and 13—Friday and Saturday,
November 13 and 14, 2015
They bought tickets for a flight that would leave Miami on Friday evening at quarter to six and arrive at LaGuardia around nine. That way they could get in a full day of work and arrive in New York early that night. They arranged a breakfast meeting with Bengochea for nine thirty the next morning.
Maria had to find something in her closet that would be appropriate for the New York fall temperatures. Everything she tried on was out of style. She thought it was silly to spend money on clothes she would never wear in Miami, but early that morning she ran over to Dolphin Mall and bought herself a leather jacket and a black sweater from Burlington Coat Factory, getting good deals on both. It didn’t take her long to pack for a two-day trip. She called her father and asked him to take her to the airport. That way they could visit on the way. She texted Patrick because she knew that was the best way to get in touch with him. She wondered if she should call David. She opted to write to him instead, saying that she was going to New York for the weekend for an interview related to the case. Actually, it was unnecessary because anyone with a cell phone could reach her as easily in Miami as in Timbuktu.
She didn’t know how Fernandez had managed to get them such a reasonable rate in the Millennium Broadway Hotel in the heart of Times Square. It was an older hotel with lots of white veined brownish marble, displaying the splendor of a different era, and looked a little dated. The rooms, however, met all modern standards. She had barely hung up the four outfits she brought when Fernandez, who was staying two floors above, knocked on the door asking if she was ready to go. Maria was surprised by the natural way her colleague could flow amidst the comings and goings of such a diverse population, the brilliant neon lights, and the never-ending traffic dominated by yellow taxis. She was a little uneasy, but two streets later, she felt a great rush like when she went to the Miami-Dade County Youth Fair as a child and rode the roller coaster with her friends. Fernandez took her by the hand, and they went into a crowded bar where it was so loud you couldn’t hear your own thoughts.
“We’ll have a beer here and later we’ll grab some Cuban-Chinese food.”
Two beers and twenty minutes later, Maria was feeling so great that it was hard to leave. She didn’t regret it. Although they had to walk a few blocks to get to the Calle Dao restaurant, it was worth it. Maria didn’t know what to choose from such an extensive and surprising menu. Duck empanadas? Roasted pork with fried rice?
Fernandez, on the other hand, was looking at the right side of the menu and said, somewhat embarrassed, “These prices aren’t like the ones at the Chinese-Cuban joints my parents used to take me to.”
Maria assured him they would split the check.
They ate heartily. The place was full, but not packed, and one of the waiters explained to them that during lunch and happy hour they had a hard time fitting everyone in, and that the regulars were people who worked nearby. The restaurant had been open little more than a year and was already a great success.
Maria thought about looking over the questions she and Fernandez would ask Bengochea the next day, but, when they got back to the hotel, she was so exhausted that she chose to just go to bed and meet back up with him in the lobby at eight in the morning.
The writer told them to meet in a café close to where he lived in Brooklyn. She preferred to take a cab. She really wanted to go over the famous bridge, but Fernandez insisted they take the subway. The station was very close by, and they got off five stops later at Prospect Park. Maria was surprised by the massive park where the fall colors were at peak. She couldn’t help herself, and she took out her phone and snapped pictures of the red, brown, and golden leaves. Meanwhile, Fernandez was punching in the address of their destination in his phone’s GPS.
“Ok, it’s in Park Slope, in one of the nearby neighborhoods. The houses are on the streets, which run east to west, and businesses line the avenues.”
They didn’t have any difficulty finding Roots Café on 5th Avenue, a wide two-way thoroughfare with cars parked at meters along both sides and several two and three-story buildings that housed travel agencies, insurance companies, health food stores, fruit markets, and a few restaurants. Roots Café was in the basement of a red brick building. On the walls hung a number of guitars and a cheap painting of a matador about to kill a bull. The menu was posted in big letters behind the counter. There weren’t more than seven or eight tables. She saw a man with a navy blue sweater and a laptop sitting at one of the tables. She immediately knew it was Bengochea and went over to greet him.
He was surprised.
“I wasn’t expecting a female officer…much less such a pretty one.”
In general, this type of comment, which she had heard before, irritated her, and what made it even worse was when he looked her up and down, visually undressing her. Nonetheless, to her surprise, she felt pleased; it was nice to know that she could still attract a man.
Fernandez sensed the brief moment of tension between the two and rushed to introduce himself, but Bengochea hardly looked at him. He treated him more like he was his employee.
“Why don’t you order breakfast for the three of us? The special is really good here… In the meantime, Duquesne and I will get to know each other a little bett
er.”
Maria, maybe without realizing it, did the same thing the writer did moments before. She looked at his balding head, with only a few white hairs on the sides, his gray beard, short and well groomed, and his full gray mustache and eyebrows that arched over eyes as dark as the bottom of a well. His body was muscular, hard. He looks like Sean Connery, she thought. She noticed he wore a wedding ring and remembered her mother’s advice: Never get involved with a married man. It will never end well. Why had she remembered that? Could it be that she was actually attracted to this stranger? Why were these long-lost sensations coming back to her?
“Well then…how can I help you? By the way, we’re speaking informally, right? It’s always like that among Cubans. And, you are both Cuban, aren’t you?”
“Fernandez was born in Cuba, but came when he was young. I was born here. I guess you could say we’re Cuban Americans.”
“Ah! We’ll I’ve spent thirty-five years in the United States and I’m still Cuban…”
“I get that.”
“Many who came through Mariel don’t want to know anything about Cuba, or at least that’s what they say, but…”
At that moment Fernandez came back with a tray of three steaming cups of coffee and some egg, cheese, and sausage sandwiches that looked delicious. They ate in silence for a few minutes. It was Fernandez who broke the ice.
“I’ve read just about all of your work. The book about the training camps in Matanzas really moved me. It’s so realistic that it almost seems like you witnessed it firsthand, and the Major’s character is really well defined—a decent man who feels like he has to act against his principles in order to survive…which still happens in Cuba.”
Bengochea choked on his sandwich. Maria realized that Fernandez’s comment wasn’t unwarranted, and she was grateful that he had come with her. She broke into the conversation.
“So then, we aren’t trying to find out what you might have done in Cuba… We’re trying to solve a case of a man who died in an accident when his car fell into a canal in Miami in 1992, and now it looks like he was murdered. We suspect that a couple helped him falsify documents and then blackmailed him later. They might have had something to do with his death. Since you were in the Orange Bowl and Tamiami Park maybe you’ll remember them. We believe that people called him El Oso.”
The Miracle of Saint Lazarus Page 8