Coonts, Stephen - Jake Grafton 7 - Cuba
Page 10
them carefully, filled them with water, and corked them.
Diego hadn't mentioned water or food, but Ocho
remembered his conversation with his brother, Hector, and
thought bringing water would be a wise precaution.
He also had two baked potatoes in the bag.
Diego would laugh at himthey were not going to be at
sea long enough to get really hungry, or so he said.
Please, God, let Diego be right. Let us be
in America when the sun rises tomorrow.
There would be a man waiting in the Keys, waiting on
a certain beach. Diego showed Ocho a map with the
beach clearly marked in ink. "He was a close friend
of my wife's brotherea"...Diego said. "A man who
can be trusted."
The boat was fast enough, Diego said, to be in
American waters at dawn. They would make their
approach to the beach as the sun rose, when
obstructions to navigation were visible, when they could
check landmarks and buoys.
Diego was confident. Dora believed her father,
looked at him with shining eyes when he talked of
America, of how it would be to live in an American
house, go to the huge stadiums and watch Ocho play
baseball while everyone cheered... to have a
television, plenty to eat, nice clothes,
a
carl
Dios mio,
America did sound like a paradise! To hear
Diego tell it America was heaven, lacking only
the angel choir ... and it was just a boat ride
away across the Florida Straits.
Of course, Diego said they would probably get
seasick, would probably vomit. That was inevitable,
to be expected, a price to be paid.
And they could get caught by the Cubans or
Americans, get sent back here. "We'll be no
worse off than we are now if that
happensea"...Diego argued. "We can always try again
to get to America. God knows, we can't get any
poorer."
Dora with the shining eyes ... she looked so
expectant.
She was the first, the very first woman he had ever made
love to. And she got pregnant after that one time!
When she first told him, he had doubted her.
Didn't want to believe. She became angry,
threw a tantrum. Then he had believed.
He thought about her now as he walked the dark
streets, past people sitting in doorways,
couples holding hands, past bars with music coming through
the doorways. He had spent his whole life here and
now he was leaving, an event of the first order of
magnitude. Surely they could see the transformation
in his face, in the way he walked.
Several people called to him, "El Ochoff"...Several
fans wanted to shake his hand, but no more than usual.
This was the way they always acted as he walked bythis
was the way people had treated him since he was fifteen.
He left the people behind and walked past the closed fish
markets and warehouses. His footsteps echoed off the
buildings.
The boat was in a slip, Diego said, behind a
certain boatyard.
He rounded the corner, saw people. Men, women, and children
standing in little knots. Hmm, they were right near the
slip.
They were standing around the slip.
He saw Diego standing on the dock, and Dora.
People stepped out of the way to let him by.
"All these peopleea"...he said to Diego, "Did you
announce our departure at the ballpark? I thought
we were going to sneak out of here."
Diego had a sick look on his face. "They're
going with usea"...he said.
"What?"
"The captain brought his relatives, my brother
heard we were leaving, talked to some of his friends...."
Ocho stared at the boat. The boat's name on the
stern
was written in black paint, which was chipping and peeling
off.
Angel del Mar,
Angel of the Sea. The boat was maybe forty feet
long, with a little pilothouse. Fishing nets still hung
from the aft mast. The crowdhe estimated there were
close to fifty people standing here.
"How many people, Diego? How many?"
"Over eighty."
"On that boat? In the Gulf Stream?
Estd locot
Diego was beside himself. "This is our chance, Ocho.
We can make it. God is with us."
"God? If the boat swamps, will He keep us from
drowning?"
"Ocho, listen to me. My friends are waiting in
Florida. This is our chance to make it to America,
to be something, to live decent.... This is
our
chance."
People were staring at him, listening to Diego.
Ocho looked into the faces locking at him. He
tore his eyes away, finally, looked back at
Diego, who had his hand on Ocho's arm.
"No. I am
not
going."...He pulled his arm from Diego's grasp.
"Go with one less, you will all have a little better
chance."
"You
have
to goea"...Diego pleaded, and grabbed his arm.
"Ochoea"...Dora wailed.
"You have to goea"...Diego snarled. "You got her
pregnant! Be a man!"
CHAPTER FIVE
Eighty-four people were packed aboard
Angel del Mar
as she headed for the mouth of the small bay under a
velvet black sky strewn with stars. A sliver of
moon cast just enough light to see the sand on the bars at
the entrance of the bay.
The boat rode low in the water and seemed to react
sluggishly to the small swells that swept down the
channel.
"This is insaneea"...Ocho said to Diego Coca, who
was leaning against the wall of the small wheelhouse.
"We'll make it. We'll reach the rendezvous in
the Florida Keys an hour or two before dawn.
Vamos con Dios."
"God had better be with usea"...Ocho muttered, and
reached for Dora. The baby didn't show yet. She
was of medium height, with a trim, athletic frame.
How well he knew her body.
As far as he knew, he was the only one on the
boat who had brought water or food. Oh, the other
passengers had things, all right, sacks and boxes of
things too precious to leave behind: clothes,
pictures, silver, Bibles, rosaries,
crucifixes that had decorated the walls of their
homes and their parents" and grandparents' homes.
Boxes and sacks were stacked around each person, who
sat on the deck or on his pile. Men, women,
children, some merely babies in arms... It appeared
to Ocho as if the Saturday night crowd from an
entire section of ballpark bleachers had been
miraculously transported to the deck of this small
boat.
The breeze smelled of the sea, clean, tangy,
crisp. He
took a deep breath, wondered if this were his last
night of life.
He pulled Dora closer to him, felt the warmth and
promise of her body.
/>
Well, this boatload of people would make it
to Florida or they wouldn't, as God willed it.
He had never thought much about religion, merely
accepted it as part of life, but through the years he had
learned about God's will. He was not one of those
athletes who crossed himself every time he went to the
plate or prepared to make a crucial pitch,
vainly asking God for assistance in trivial
matters, but he knew to a certainty that most of the
major events of life be you ballplayer,
manager, father, husband, cane worker, whateverare beyond
your control. Events take their own course and
humans are swept along with them. Call it
God's will or chance or fate or what have you, all
a man could do was throw the ball as well as he could,
with all the guile and skill he could muster. What
happened ajfter the ball left your fingers was beyond your
control. In God's hands, or so they said. If
God cared.
For the first time in his life Ocho wondered if
God cared.
He was still thinking along these lines when the boat
buried its bow in the first big swell at the harbor
entrance. Spray came flying back clear to the
wheelhouse. People shrieked, some laughed, all tried
to find some bit of shelter.
People were moving, holding up clothing or pieces of
cardboard when the next cloud of spray came flying
back.
The boat rose somewhat as she met each swell, but
she was too heavily loaded.
"We're not even out of the harborea"...muttered the man
beside Ocho. His voice sounded infinitely weary.
Dora hugged Ocho, clung to him as she stared into the
night.
She barely came to his armpit. He braced himself
against the wall of the wheelhouse, held her close.
The boat labored into the swells, flinging heavy
sheets of spray back over the people huddled on the
deck.
The door to the wheelhouse opened. A bare head
came out, shouted at Diego Coca: "The boat
is overloaded, man! It is too dangerous to go
on. We must turn back."
Diego pulled a pistol from his pocket and
placed the muzzle against the man's forehead. He
pushed the man back through the door, followed him into the
tiny shack and pulled the door shut behind him.
The man next to Ocho said, "We may make it...
if the sea gets no rougher. I was a fisherman
once, I know of these things."
The man was in his late sixties perhaps, with a deeply
lined face and hair bleached by the sun. Ocho had
studied his face in the twilight, before the light
completely disappeared. Now the fisherman was merely
a shape in the darkness, a remembered face.
"Your father is crazyea"...Ocho told Dora, speaking
in her ear over the noise of the wind and sea. She said
nothing, mexgly held him tighter.
R was then he realized she was as frightened as he.
Angel del Mar
smashed its way northward under a clear, starry
sky. The wind seemed steady from the west at twelve
or fifteen knots. Already drenched by spray, with no
place to shelter themselves, the people on deck huddled where
they were. From his position near the wheelhouse Ocho
could just see the people between the showers of spray, dark
shapes crowding the deck in the faint moonlight, for
there were no other lights so that the boat might go
unnoticed by Cuban naval patrols.
"When we get to the Gulf Streamea"...the fisherman beside
Ocho shouted' in his ear above the noise of the wind and
laboring diesel engine, "... swells ... open
the seams ... founder in this sea."
In addition to heaving and pitching, the boat was also
rolling heavily since there was so much weight on
deck. The roll to starboard seemed most pronounced
when the boat crested a swell, when it was naked to the
wind.
Ocho Sedano buried his face in Dora's hair
and held her
tightly as the boat plunged and reared, turned his
body to shield her somewhat from the clouds of spray that
swept over them.
He could hear people retching; the vomit smell was
swept away on the wind and he caught none of it.
On the boat went into the darkness, bucking and writhing
as it fought the sea.
Late in the evening William Henry Chance met his
associate at the mahogany bar hi El
Floridita, one of the flashiest old nightclubs
in Old Havana. This monstrosity was the dazzling
heart of prerevolutionary Havana hi the bad
old days; black-and-white photos of Ernest
Hemingway, Gary Grant, and Ava
Gardner still adorned the walls. The place was full
of Americans who had traveled here in defiance of
their government's ban on travel to Cuba. As
bands belted out salsa and rhumba, the Americans
drank, ate, and scrutinized voluptuous
prostitutes clad in tight dresses and high
heels.
Chance's associate was Tommy Carmellini, a
Stanford law school graduate in his late
twenties. The baggy sportscoat and pleated
trousers did nothing to show off Carmellini's wide
shoulders and washboard stomach. Still, a thoughtful
observer would conclude he was remarkably fit for a
man who spent twelve hours a day at a desk.
"Looks like the Cubans have come full
circleea"...Chance said when Carmellini joined him at
the bar. He had to speak up to be heard above the
music coming through the open windows.
"Goes around and comes aroundea"...Tommy Carmellini
agreed. "I wonder just how many different social
diseases are circulating in this building tonight."
When they were outside on the sidewalk strolling
along, William Henry Chance pulled a cigar from
the pocket of his sports jacket, which was folded
over his left arm. He bit off the end of the
thing, then cupped his hands against the breeze and lit it
with a paper match. The wind blew out
the first two matches, but he got the cigar going with the
third one. After a couple purr's, he sighed.
"Smells deliciousea"...Carmellini said.
"Cuban cigars are the real deal. Gonna be the
new "in" thing. You should try one."
"Naw. I just might like cigars. I've made it this
far without smoking, I'm going to try to go all the
way."
They paused outside a nightclub and listened to the
music pouring out. "That's a good band."
"If you close your eyes, this sorta feels like
Miami Beach."
"Miami del Sud."
They walked on. "So what do you hear?"
"The pacifiers are working. All three of them. This
afternoon Vargas talked to his subordinates about this and
that, the minister of finance had phone sex with a girlfriend,
and Castro's top aide talked to the doctors for
an hour."
"How is the old goat doing?"
"
Not good, the man said. The doctors talked about how
much narcotics to administer to ensure he didn't
suffer."
"Any guesses when?"
"No."
"The Cuban exile, El Gato, where does he
fit in?"
"Don't know yet."
"He's in the casino now with three Russian
gangsters, people he knows apparently, playing for high
stakes."
"El Gato is supposed to be an influential and
powerful enemy of the Castro regimeea"...Chance
muttered. "Sure does make you wonder."
"Yeahea"...sd Carmellini. He and Chance both knew
that the FBI had an agent and three informers in El
Gate's chemical supply business looking for
evidence that it was the source of supply for some of the
makings of Fidel Castro's biological warfare
program. So far, nothing. Then El Gato
unexpectedly comswanned off to Havana. Chance and
Carmellini were coming anyway, but now they had a new
item added to their agenda.
And Castro was dying.
"I'd like to know what the Cat is going to tell all
his exile friends when he gets back
to Floridaea"...Tommy Carmellini said.
"Maybe if he winds up in the right offices
we'll find out, eh?"
That reference to the executive pacifiers made
Chance grin. He puffed the cigar a few times while
holding it carefully between thumb and forefinger.
"You don't really know much about smoking cigars, do
you?"
"Is it that obvious?"
"Yes, sir."
Chance put the cigar between his teeth at a jaunty
angle and puffed fearlessly three or four times.
Then he took the thing from his mouth and held it so he
could see it. "Wish I could get the hang of itea"...he
said. "Cuba seemed like a good place to learn about
cigars."
He tossed the stogie into a gutter on the street.
"Makes me a little light-headed."...Chance grinned
sheepishly and wiped a sheen of perspiration from his
brow.
He stood listening to the sounds of the crowd and the
snatches of music floating from the bars and casinos,
thinking about biological weapons.
Angel del Mar
was only a half hour past the mouth of the harbor when
the fisherman beside Ocho Sedano pulled at
his arm to attract his attention. Then he shouted,
"We will reach the Gulf Stream soon. The swells
will be larger. We are too deeply loaded- We
must get rid of what weight we can."
The boat was corkscrewing viciously. Ocho
nodded, passed Dora to the fisherman, pulled open