Queen of Bones

by Teresa Dovalpage

  Before turning on the recorder, Martínez went over the notes that she had taken the day before. Lázaro Domínguez, a plumber, had found the body of his partner, Víctor Pérez Díaz, also known as Victoria Sunrise, in the bathroom of Pérez Díaz’s apartment. Pérez Díaz’s head had been resting on the floor, and there had been glass shards all over the sink and floor, some embedded in his skin. He had died of a blow to the head that left a small hole in the back of his skull. Conceivably, he could have hit his head against the bathroom wall-mounted metal cabinet—the mirror that had covered it had fallen and shattered. But a backward fall? Martínez didn’t buy it.

  Pérez Díaz had been a transvestite and had been dressed as a woman when found dead. It could have been a hate crime. Martínez had been seeing more of those in the last three years, especially after the official position against homosexuals had softened.

  She pressed play and listened to the first interview.

  Interview One:

  A Man from the Hot Land

  My name is José Miguel García, but everybody calls me Pepito, and I’m from Oriente, from la tierra caliente. Yes, I was born in Punta Blanca, the hottest spot in the country, and that’s why I’m like this. I make a living as a musician—a drummer—and to play batá, your blood has to be hot. There’s no other way.

  Why am I telling you all this, Officer? Right, sorry, I meant ‘Lieutenant.’ Just to explain the little issues, the problemitas, you brought up.

  I’ve been involved in a couple of minor incidents because of . . . unfortunate circumstances, but I’m not a killer. Never will be. I’m a man who loves and enjoys life. My own and others’. I had no reason whatsoever to take Victoria’s.

  Okay, back to the issues. Yes, the first time I went to jail was for battery. But I didn’t attack a woman or anything! It was another guy, a shit-eating Habanero who called me a Palestinian. You know that’s how they call people from the Holguín province. He told me I was an illegal alien here in Havana, and why didn’t I go back to where I belonged? I had no choice but to kick his ass. Instead of taking it like a man, he ran to the nearest police station and filed a report. There were plenty of witnesses because the entire neighborhood came out to see the show. I went to el tanque for a month, and that was that.

  Ah, no, no! The maría issue is something different. See, I’ve smoked weed. I admit it. Who hasn’t, in my business? I had a little bit with me because I needed it. For inspiration. You go drumming like I do, kumbakin kin kin kumbakin, without the weed, and it sounds like two trains crashing, but when you get high, you can make the drums follow the rhythm of the heart. That’s the secret, and maría helps you do it the right way. Santa María, Mother of God.

  But I’ve never sold it. I have other ways of making money. I have my music, and I’m good at it.

  Yes, I might be a little high now. I don’t know when I last used it. I honestly don’t. Three days ago, maybe. Two days? I can’t remember, sorry! I hope you’re not gonna hold that against me.

  Well, me and Victoria . . . We were friends, sort of. More like acquaintances. I respected her. That’s why I don’t usually get in trouble, because I respect people, provided they respect me.

  Sure, I knew she was a guy. Or a transexy or whatever the hell that’s called. I knew she was born with cojones, just like me. But if she wanted to be called a she and wear wigs and fake tits, that’s her life. Who am I to criticize anyone? Live and let live, you know?

  I saw her for the last time yesterday. We met on the stairs. I was coming down, and she was leaving the building. We said hi but didn’t chat.

  No, I didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary.

  Comrade, I don’t know about any of her visitors. As I said, we were acquaintances. She didn’t talk about her private life with me, and I didn’t exactly linger at her place either.

  Yes, she had a guy, Lázaro. They’ve been together forever, or at least since before I came here, but he didn’t live with her.

  No, no! I didn’t see her today. I didn’t see that other guy you’re talking about either. I didn’t see anybody. I don’t make a habit of spying on my neighbors!

  Interview Two:

  Panda Bear

  Sorry, Comrade Lieutenant, I’m still in shock. I can’t believe my girl is gone. I’d been so mad at her since yesterday! I’ll never forgive myself for the way I treated her. I thought she was cheating on me. With a Yuma. But maybe she was. It’s up to you to find out that, isn’t it?

  No, of course I didn’t do it! I loved Victoria. I was jealous, yes, and I wanted to beat the crap out of her and that guy, but I would never have—

  I don’t know what I’m saying. It’s just nerves. Yes, I’m a man, but I have feelings too, coño.

  We’ve—we were together for six years. I met her at Café Arabia this one night I went to a show. She sings—sang there once or twice a week. I didn’t like it, other guys looking at her half-naked on the stage, but she insisted it was her art. If she had to choose between her career and me, I came second. So I accepted it. But she respected our relationship, for the most part. Sure, she was a flirt, but aren’t they all?

  Well, that’s something I don’t want to discuss. Not here, not now. Yes, I knew all about Victoria’s past. No, we didn’t talk about it. She’d cut ties with her family because they didn’t accept her as she was. I didn’t get to know her parents. Everybody in her circle treated her as a woman and called her Victoria Sunrise. That, or they weren’t in her circle anymore.

  She loved me. I know that for a fact. She called me Panda Bear. Why a bear? Ah, Lieutenant, I guess you’re not familiar with our terms. In our world, a bear is . . . what I am. A man’s man. Not effeminate, not a maricón. Do I need to explain that too? Okay, sorry I brought it up.

  But don’t you want to know who came in and out of the building? I mean, I saw them! And I’d like to tell you about it.

  I was watching the building from eight o’clock this morning. See, yesterday, Victoria and I had an argument in the street when I found her with another guy, that Cuban who lives in La Yuma now. The other one you guys arrested. They were on their way to the mariconga. She swore they were just friends, but I didn’t believe her.

  I went to the apartment and waited for her after the mariconga. She assured me there was nothing between them, that I was making too much of it. “We are old friends,” she said. “From the times before I was me.” I was sort of convinced, but not completely, so I took the day off and told her I was going to Pinar del Río. I planned to spend the day watching her building to make sure she wasn’t meeting that Yuma again.

  The first to arrive was a bisnero. He sells stuff to Victoria pretty often. Ah, you know, black market stuff: milk, pork, rice, whatever. Sure, I can give you his name and address, but I hope he doesn’t get in trouble because of this. I mean, being a bisnero isn’t a crime, at least not a serious one.

  He was carrying a huge package. He left without it, and more people went in. They were Alberto, from the next-door tribe, with a bag full of groceries; a woman who lives on the second floor; and another gal I didn’t know. She was carrying an umbrella, a big red one. I can’t tell you for sure if she went to visit Victoria because the balcony door was closed. That’s what she does when she doesn’t . . . when she didn’t want anybody to know what she was up to. Yes, you’re right. It was raining. And the woman could have gone to visit another neighbor. She left soon after going in. But to be honest, I didn’t pay much attention to her. I was more concerned about men going into the building.

  The next one to ring the bell was that Yuma, the guy I saw yesterday. Ah, that was what I had suspected all along. Victoria had lied to me! I got so pissed, Lieutenant. I yelled at him and went upstairs, ready to slap her. Yes, I was mad, but—never enough to kill her. I was mad because I loved her.

  I came in shouting, “Puta, where are you?” She didn’t answer. But I knew she w
as still in the apartment because I hadn’t seen her leave. I went to the kitchen, then to the bedroom and finally found her body in the bathroom, lying on the floor. The bathroom was wet; it always is. There’s a leak I’ve been planning to fix forever. I thought she had slipped and fallen down.

  The bathroom mirror was broken, and there was glass everywhere. A mess. She might have tried to hold on to the cabinet as she fell, and the mirror got unglued? That’s the only thing I can think of.

  Anything unusual? Well, she didn’t have a wig on. It was right there, though. On a chair. Maybe she was combing her hair when—she looked like she had fainted, but she was . . . dead.

  She was lying faceup.

  Eh, now that you mention it, yes, it is a little strange to fall and land faceup. But it didn’t occur to me then. I didn’t suspect foul play until you guys came in.

  No, I didn’t notice anything out of place. The apartment looked just like it had the day before. No signs of a fight. It smelled of food, like she was cooking. And she was—I saw a big pot full of arroz congrí in the kitchen.

  Enemies? I don’t know. There were people in her little world at Café Arabia who didn’t get along with her, or who she didn’t get along with, but nothing serious.

  I can’t imagine my life without her. I just can’t. I’m sorry, Lieutenant. I don’t mean to cry in front of you again, but I can’t help it. I’ve lost the only woman I’ve ever loved, and I haven’t had the time to come to terms with it.

  Interview Three:

  The Matriarch’s Story (I)

  My nephew is a decent young man. He’s had issues with the law, but he’s cleaned up his act. He lives for his music. He has lots of friends. Some good, some bad, some so-so. The bad ones have led him astray in the past, but he doesn’t see them anymore. He’s cleaned up his act.

  I know that because I watch him all the time. I’m responsible for that boy. If something were to happen to him, what would I tell my sister? She entrusted Pepito to me when he was fifteen. He wasn’t doing anything constructive down there in Punta Blanca, the ass end of the world, so she sent him to Havana.

  A famous musician, that’s what he wants to be. I pray to the orishas that he finds his way to fame someday. And he will. He’s that good, seriously. You have to hear him play. Even my godfather, Padrino, says he’s never seen a batá drummer like him. Siacará!

  What? Yes, I’m a Santería believer. Proud of it too. I am a daughter of Oshún. My nephew is a son of Changó, the orisha of war and thunder. He can be a little careless and hasty, because that’s how all Changó’s children are. But he has a good heart.

  Victoria? Ay, Comrade! What can I tell you? Poor guy. Nah, I called him Señora and amiga to humor him, but in my eyes, he was a guy. I’m too old for those modernisms of trans-this and trans-that. You’re born with a pinga, you are a man. Period. Even if you cut your pinga off. Which I don’t think he did, by the way. But that’s none of my business.

  A decent person, yes. He wasn’t the kind to have ten drag queens for dinner every night, shrieking and partying and bringing shame to the neighborhood. He had his boyfriend or whatever he was, that Lázaro, but they kept quiet. And the truth is, if you didn’t know what they were, at first sight they looked like a regular couple.

  But everybody knew.

  Yes, I want to cooperate with the investigation. I have nothing to hide! Please, ask away, and I’ll answer as best I can. Siacará!

  Siacará doesn’t mean anything bad, Lieutenant. It’s just a Santería word I’m used to saying. Sorry, I didn’t mean any disrespect. I promise it isn’t a curse or anything!

  The day started quietly enough. It was raining. My husband went to the grocery store, and I left the door open for him . . . Well, I always leave the door open. I like to know what’s going on in the building. Around noon I saw a woman with a red umbrella on our staircase landing. I think she went into Victoria’s apartment, but I’m not sure.

  No, I didn’t see her leave. But I was busy cooking. My husband, Pepito and I had lunch. Nothing else happened until I heard the commotion next door. Lázaro was yelling that Victoria was dead. I rushed over and saw him. He was wearing a dress, like he always did, but didn’t have his wig on. He looked more like a man in death than I’d ever seen him before. I felt sorry for him, but in a way, I thought he deserved it. He sinned against God and nature, trying to make himself into a woman when the orishas had made him a man. That’s wrong. I don’t care how many maricongas Mariela Castro sponsors. If El Comandante were still in power, we wouldn’t be seeing such things.

  Interview Four:

  The Bisnero

  Ay, Lieutenant! You mean Victoria wasn’t Victoria? That she wasn’t a woman? With those tits? I would have sworn—I’ve been dealing with her and her man for over two years, and I never suspected it. She was always nicely dressed and very feminine. A lady past her prime, maybe, but still rocking it.

  I don’t know much about my clients’ private lives. I mean, I don’t have time for that. Yes, I am self-employed. I buy and sell different things. For a profit, yes. I have a license, but not as a bisnero, since it isn’t an authorized profession yet. I’m licensed as a grower and seller of ornamental plants and a collector and seller of recyclables too.

  This morning I sold Victoria a pork leg, the biggest one I had, for forty CUCs. She told me she was having some friends over for lunch. Yes, I delivered the haunch to her apartment. That was early. It was just starting to rain . . .

  Lieutenant Martínez turned off the recorder and began to review the results of the search conducted at the victim’s apartment. The most significant piece of evidence was a screwdriver found on the kitchen counter. The fingerprints on it matched those of José Miguel García, also known as Pepito. There was no blood, but he could have cleaned it. She browsed a file that contained a detailed description of his encounters with the law. He seemed too young and not like the type to plan and execute a crime like this, she thought. He didn’t have a motive. Unless Pérez Díaz had tried to flirt with him, and he had panicked and attacked her. This type of thing had happened before.

  He claimed he had last seen the victim the day before the murder. Hadn’t he seemed nervous when he’d said it? Though Martínez was waiting for a detailed forensic report, the wound on the dead man’s skull could have been made by the tip of the screwdriver. But why would García have then left the weapon in plain sight? She wasn’t ready to charge him with that crime yet, but she would keep him locked up. She had to, anyway. He’d had marijuana in his system and had admitted to it, so there was no way he would be back on the streets anytime soon.

  As for the others, two witnesses had confirmed that Lázaro Domínguez had been walking around the block watching the building all morning. Pérez Díaz had been dead for at least two hours before his partner found his body, so Domínguez wasn’t technically a suspect. There was also that woman both he and Magdala had seen. Martínez wrote: Woman with a red umbrella?

  She also wrote: Pork leg? A copper pot full of black beans and white rice had been found on the stove, still warm, but there had been no trace of a pork leg. And yet, the first cops who answered the call had noticed a strong smell “of something roasting.” When she herself had arrived, the apartment had smelled of what could very well have been a pork roast. But the oven was empty.

  Juan Chiong, the Cuban American tourist who had been at Pérez Díaz’s apartment when the police arrived, said that he had planned to have lunch with Pérez Díaz, a childhood friend. It would have made sense to find a roast then. Chiong’s alibi had been verified with El Asilo de los Ancianos Desamparados employees. The flan he had brought had come from La Dulcinea and been sold at the time he’d said he had bought it.

  No, Chiong wasn’t a suspect. But Lieutenant Martínez was still seething about the way she had been ordered to act around him. When she informed La Seguridad, the Ministry of the Interior, that the
re was a foreigner involved, a Cuban American, they had forbidden her to record their conversation and basically told her to treat him with kid gloves. Unless she had concrete proof against him, they’d said she’d better let him go. Messing with an American tourist could harm the now-improved USA-Cuba relationship. “First the Yankees were the enemies,” she grumbled. “Now we’re kissing their asses. How crazy.”

  Anyway, the guy had been born in Cuba. He looked Cuban enough to her. And his claiming not to have known that his friend was a transvestite before he’d come back to Cuba didn’t ring true to her.

  1

  Chinese Witchcraft

  Chinese witchcraft is so hermetic that even Calazán Herrera . . . couldn’t penetrate any of its secrets or learn anything from them. He only knows that they often eat a paste of bat meat made with ground bat eyes and brains, excellent to preserve sight.—El Monte

  Dear Juan,

  I haven’t heard from you in twenty years, but I’ve never stopped thinking of you and wondering what was going on in your life. I’m sure you haven’t been as curious about mine, but I’ll fill you in on the details. I never graduated from the ISA. I’m a mortician now. I chose to become a mortician the day I didn’t die.

  This is better. It’ll hook him, like opening a movie with a sex scene. But it’s not true. The day I didn’t die, the last thing on my mind was a career change.