Coonts, Stephen - Jake Grafton 7 - Cuba

by Cuba (lit)

  burned immediately."

  They paused on a corner, watched the people who filled

  the sidewalks under the crumbling buildings. Just down

  the walk to the left a Cuban was trying to sell

  trinkets to a pah* of Germans and having no

  luck. To the right a tall young white guy,

  American or Canadian probably, was locked

  in a passionate embrace with a local girl.

  "Sun, sex, and socialismea"...Carmellini

  muttered. "Makes you wonder why there aren't more

  Cubans."

  Chance closed his eyes, enjoyed the caress of the

  breeze on bis face and hair. He could hear

  snatches of music amid the honk of car horns and

  traffic sounds. Havana was very much alive this

  evening, as it was every evening.

  Finally he opened his eyes, looked again at the

  Cubans and tourists swirling about him. And

  Carmellini standing there, quite nonchalant, looking

  bored.

  "Do they have any ideas about who broke in?"

  "Americans. CIA scum. No evidence, but

  they're sure."

  Chance nodded.

  'There was talkea"...Carmellini continued, "of rounding

  up likely suspects, doing some thorough

  interrogations, just to see what might turn up. That was

  Colonel Santana's suggestion: apparently he

  is a rare piece of work. Vargas overruled him.

  Said they couldn't torture tourists every time the CIA

  did something they didn't like or soon they wouldn't have

  any tourists."

  "Anything else?"

  Carmellini shrugged, scratched his chin. "I listened

  to almost three hours" worth of that stuff, and you know,

  they didn't mention Fidel Castro even once."

  "Didn't say his name?"

  "Nope. And the technician said he hadn't heard

  them mention Castro all day."

  "Curious."

  "It's odd. I would have thought"

  After a bit Chance said, "The lab is just the tip

  of the iceberg. There must be machinery for drying out the

  cultures, for packing the microorganisms

  into warheads or mixing them into some sort of chemical

  stew to be sprayed from planes. There must be trucks

  that transport this stuff from place to place. And then

  there are the weapons: where the hell are they?"

  They went into one of the nightclubs and found

  an empty table. Six whores were sitting around the

  table beside them. The girls were drinking daiquiris and

  having a fine, comloud time. One of the girls looked

  the two men over while the band tuned up just a few

  feet away.

  "Washington wants more informationea"...Carmellini said,

  ignoring the whores.

  "They would."...Chance chewed on his lip for a bit, then

  picked up the wine list. "Tonight's the night we go

  into Vargas's safe. Are you comfortable with that?"

  Carmellini took his time answering. Chance was about

  to repeat the question when he said, "If the alarms are

  off."

  'They'll be off."

  "Sure."

  'Trust, me."

  When the waiter came they ordered dinner.

  "So tell me again alxwt the Ministry of

  Interiorea"...Carmellini said. "Everything you can

  recall. Everything."

  Chance leaned back, closed his eyes, tried

  to visualize how the building looked when he had

  stepped from the taxi

  out front on his way to his meeting with Alejo

  Vargas.

  "There is a guard kiosk out front on the

  sidewalk. You then walk through the front entrance to the

  guard station inside. They check your credentials

  again, call whoever you say you want to see. This

  person comes to get you, leads you through the halls to the

  office you are to visit."

  "Cameras?"

  "Security cameras mounted high in corners,

  monitored by the main guard station. There are two

  separate systems, at least, with pictures playing

  on separate monitors."

  "Infrared sensors?"

  "I think so...."...The fact is he should have paid more

  attention. Looked more carefully, consciously noted

  what he was seeing. "Yes, I remember seeing

  one."

  "Motion detectors?"

  "No."

  "Laser alarms?"

  "Yes, mounted at ankle height."...Presumably

  these were only on when the building was not occupied.

  "Alarms on the windows?"

  "Yes."

  "Vibrators on the glass?"

  "No."...If there had been vibrators, the

  computer would have had a much more difficult job sorting

  out the voices from the electronic noise of the

  vibrators when it tried to read the light refracted

  by the crystals.

  "Were there internal security doors, doors that

  might be closed when the building is not occupied?"

  "Yes. Every hall had them, but I doubt they were ever

  used."

  "And internal security stations?"

  "I saw none."

  Carmellini thought about it. Closed security doors

  made a burglar's access more difficult, but they

  provided a peaceful, quiet place for a burglar

  to work once he had gained entry.

  "Do they have backup power when the power goes

  off"..."...Carmellini mused.

  "They mustea"...Chance replied thoughtfully. "A backup

  generator of some type. I'm going to walk in

  assuming that they do, but I'll be improvising as I

  go."

  "We'll sure as hell find out soon enough,

  won't we"..."...Carmellini said, and grinned. That was the

  first grin he had managed all afternoon. The death of the

  lab worker had hit him hard, but the cool execution

  of the guard at the front door by William

  Henry Chance had hit him like a punch to the solar

  plexus. Chance just gunned the man down and kept on

  trucking, as if killing another human being were something

  he did every morning before lunch.

  All evening Carmellini had studied the older man,

  watched him for a sign that the murder of the guard was

  anything more than absolutely routine. And he had

  seen nothing. Nothing at all. Chance looked as if

  he might be having dinner in a restaurant in the

  Bronx with a Yankees game from a kitchen radio

  as background noise.

  Carmellini stared at the food on the plate that the

  waiter put in front of him. He didn't want

  a mournful. But what he wouldn't give for a stiff

  drink! He sipped at a glass of water, felt

  his stomach knot up.

  "Order a drinkea"...Chance said as he used his knife

  and fork. "One. Something on the rocks. You need it

  We have a long night ahead."

  Carmellini looked around for the waiter, and found himself

  staring at one of the whores at the next table, who

  gave him a big grin. He grinned back. A

  man just has to keep things in perspective.

  The sun had been down for several hours when

  Enrique Poveda and Arquimidez

  Cabrera drove up to the fourth EHV tower they

  hoped to blow. After a quick look aro
und, they unlocked

  the padlock on the gate and put bn their tool

  belts. Each of the men picked a tower leg and started

  up. About ten feet above the ground they found the shaped

  charges of C-4 plastique still firmly taped to the

  steel legs. Working in the darkness by feel, each man

  took a chemical timer from his belt, a device about

  the size and shape of a fountain pen, and inserted it into the

  plastique. The timer was already set to explode as

  near to 1:30 A.m. as possible.

  After setting the timers, they climbed down to the ground,

  then ascended the other two legs. In minutes they were

  back on the ground.

  They locked the padlock, closed up the back of the

  van, and drove away.

  "One moreea"...Poveda said. He wished he had a map

  or diagram, but all that had been left behind in

  Florida. There he and Cabrera and the U.s.

  Army power grid expert had labored for days over

  satellite reconnaissance photos,

  photographs taken from the ground by not-so-innocent

  tourists, and computer-generated diagrams. They

  selected the target towers and committed their locations

  to memory. Not a single sheet of paper

  left the room with them.

  So now Cabrera pointed down one street and

  Poveda motioned toward another. The men chuckled.

  "I am very sureea"...Poveda said. "Two blocks

  down, right turn, then on for a half mile."

  "Okay."

  "I am glad it was tonightea"...Cabrera said. "The

  charges had been in place too long, the new

  padlocks were there too long, I was getting

  nervousyou know what I mean, my friend?"

  Poveda grunted. He knew. His stomach felt as

  if it were tied in a knot. He hadn't felt this

  uptight about an operation since his first one, fifteen

  years ago, when he was very young. He had been

  to Cuba many times since, eight as he recalled, and

  none of them were as tense as that first time, until now.

  The Cubans had almost caught him and his partner that

  time. The partner was eventually caught six years

  later and died under interrogation, or so they heard

  months after that. Poveda had promised himself then and

  there that he would never be taken alive, that he would not

  die in a Cuban prison.

  Communists! He made a spitting motion out the open

  window. The communists took everything from the people hi

  Cuba who had worked and saved and built for the

  future, and gave it to the people who had not. Now look

  at the place! Everyone poor, everyone on the edge

  of starvation, the cities and towns and factories

  rotting from lack of investment. The communists ran off

  the people who could make Cuba grow, the people the nation needed

  to feed everyone else. Ah, these bastards deserved

  their misery, and by God they had had some. Universal

  destitution was Castro's legacy, his gift

  to generations yet unborn.

  Poveda was a pessimist. He knew that soon

  Castro would be dead and things would change in Cuba.

  "They'll forget Fidel's faults, remember just

  the goodea"...he told Cabrera, for the hundredth time.

  "You wait and see. In a hundred years the church

  will make him a saint."

  "Saint Fidel."...Cabrera laughed.

  "I shit you not. That is the way of the world. The people he

  pissed on the most will call him blessed."

  "Saint or devil, we'll fuck the son of a

  bitch a little

  tonightea"...Cabrera said as the van pulled up to the last

  tower.

  Poveda killed the van's engine and lights and the two

  men got out. Silence.

  "Awful quiet, don't you think"..."...Poveda

  asked.

  Cabrera stood by the van's rear doors, listening,

  looking around. Poveda dug in his pocket for the key

  to the padlock, inserted it.

  It wouldn't fit. He tried another.

  "What's wrong?"

  "Key doesn't seem to want to go in this lock."

  "Let's get the fuck outta here, manea"...Cabrera

  said, and started for the van's passenger door.

  A spotlight hit them.

  "Put up your handsea"...boomed a voice on a

  loudspeaker.

  Poveda dropped to his knees, pulled a 9-mm

  pistol from his pocket. He didn't hesitatehe

  aimed at the spotlight and started shooting.

  Something hit him in the back. He was down beside the

  rear tire trying to rise when he realized he had

  been shot. People shooting from two directions, muzzle

  flashes, thuds of bullets smacking into the van like

  hailstones. A groan from Cabrera.

  "I'm hit, Enrique."

  "Bad?"

  "I think... I think so."...He grunted as another

  bullet audibly smacked into his body.

  The bullet that hit Poveda had come out his

  stomach. He could feel the wetness, the spreading

  warmth as blood poured from the exit wound. Not a lot

  of pain yet, but a huge gaping hole in his belly.

  He lifted the pistol, pointed it at Arquimidez

  Cabrera, his best friend. There, he could see the back

  of his head. He fired once; Cabrera's head

  slammed forward into the dirt. Then he put the barrel

  flush against the side of his own head and pulled the

  trigger.

  Sitting in the back of a van just down the street from the

  Ministry of Interior, William Henry Chance

  watched the second hand of his watch sweep toward the

  twelve. It passed 1:30 A.m. and swept

  on.

  The lights stayed on. Carmellini was looking at his

  own watch.

  "What the hell is wrong now"..."...Carmellini asked.

  "I don't know."

  "Oh, Lord."

  They sat there in the van looking at the lights of the

  city.

  "It went badea"...Tommy Carmellini said. "Time for

  us to boogie."

  "We'll give them a few minutes."

  "Jesus, when it doesn't go down as

  planned, something is wrong. What are you waiting for,

  a phone call from Fidel? Let's bail out while

  our asses are still firmly attached."

  "If I had any brains I wouldn't be in this

  businessea"...Chance replied tartly.

  His watch read exactly ten seconds after 1:32

  A.m. when the lights of downtown Havana

  flickered. "All rightea"...Carmellini said, and whacked

  his leg with his hand.

  The lights flickered, dimmed, came back on,

  then went completely out. All the lights. Only

  automobile headlights broke the total darkness.

  'That's it. Let's goea"...Chance said to Tommy

  Carmellini. They opened the back of the van and

  climbed out while the driver of the van started the

  engine. Chance walked the few steps back to an old

  Russian Lada parked at the curb behind the van and

  got into the passenger seat. Carmellini started the car

  and turned on the headlights while the van pulled

  away from the curb.

  The two agents drove down the street toward the

  Ministry of Interior, a hulking imm
ensity even

  darker than the night.

  The three guards at the main entrance of the Ministry

  were illuminated by the headlights when Tommy

  Carmellini

  drove up. He killed the engine and pocketed the

  key as William Henry Chance got out on the

  passenger side.

  Of course the guards had seen Chance's uniform from the

  car's interior light while the door was opennow they

  flashed the beam of a flashlight upon him. Then they

  saluted.

  Chance was dressed in the uniform of a Security

  Department colonel. He had been to the building

  several days ago in the daytime wearing civilian

  clothes: he thought it highly unlikely mat anyone

  who had seen nun then would recognize him now. It

  was a risk he was willing to take. Still, his stomach

  felt as if he had swallowed a rock as he

  returned the guards" salute, and spoke:

  "We were just a block away when the power failed all

  over this district."

  "Yes, Colonel. Just a minute or two ago."

  "And you are?"

  "Lieutenant G6mez, sir, the duty

  officer."

  "Have you taken steps to start the emergency generator,

  Goodmez?"

  "Ahh... I was about to do so, Colonel.

  It is in the basement. I was waiting to see if the

  power would come back on immediately. Often these Outages

  last but moments and"

  "The darkness seems widespread, Gomez. Let

  us start the generator."

  "Of course, Colonel."...The lieutenant began

  giving directions to his two enlisted men, who

  obviously knew nothing about the emergency generator.

  The lieutenant began by telling them which room the

  generator was in.

  Chance interrupted again. "Perhaps you would like to take them

  there, supervise the start-up, Lieutenant. My

  driver and I will guard the front entrance until you

  return."

  "Of course, Colonel."...With his flashlight beam

  leading the way, the lieutenant and the two enlisted men

  made for the stairs.

  Carmellini opened the trunk of the car, extracted a

  duffel

  bag, which he swung over one shoulder. Without a word

  to Chance he disappeared into the dark interior of the

  building.

  Carmellini took the main staircase to the top

  floor of the building, then strode quickly down the

  hall to Alejo Vargas's private

  office. The door was locked, of course.

  Working in total darkness, Carmellini ran his hands

  over the door. One lock, near the handle. From the

  bag he extracted a small light driven by a

  battery unit that hooked on his belt. He donned