by Ted Bell
Castro was struck speechless.
“And we have cultivated new, powerful allies,” Manso added.
“My brother Raul’s trips to China?” Castro sputtered. “You are beyond stupid, Manso. You believe anything my brother says? The Chinese don’t give a rat’s ass about Cuba. Or Raul either.”
“How do you know the Americans would not prefer our new government, Comandante?”
“You have betrayed us to the Americans?”
“My brother Carlitos and I have many friends in America, from our days working for el doctor Escobar in Colombia. Carlitos is a very powerful player in that world, you know.”
“Carlitos is a drug-addled lunatic. Out of control. And Pablo Escobar’s Mafiosi friends in America, what’s left of them, are nothing but pitiful gangsters. Powerless, castrated eunuchs who sell their stories to the magazines and movies.”
“Ours will not be the first government to include a few sympathetic outlaws, Comandante. In fact, one of them has just purchased the Hotel Nacional. He intends to create a beautiful new casino like the one of Señor Meyer Lansky. Our new government will welcome these investors with open arms.”
“Infidel! You will have no government because you won’t live long enough to preside, you filthy—”
Castro must have pulled his revolver from its holster because he now had it jammed into Manso’s temple.
“It is a fitting way to end the struggle, Manso,” Fidel said, his voice barely under control. “I kill the ignoble traitor who would murder our noble revolución!”
He pressed the gun to Manso’s temple and pulled the trigger.
“The gun is empty, jefe,” Manso said. “Don’t waste your time.”
Castro heard the hammer’s harmless click five more times before he screamed in frustration and threw the useless weapon at Manso’s head, barely missing him.
“How?” he asked.
“Don Julio,” Manso said. “Your beloved manservant. This morning, very early, before we left for the dedication, he removed the cartridges while you were ‘busy. ’”
“Don Julio! No! He, of all men, would never betray—”
“You, of all men, should not be surprised at who any man will betray for the right amount of money, Comandante.”
Castro lunged for the control stick and wrested control of the cyclic from Manso. He shoved it forward.
“I will go down then, Manso. But we go down together!” Castro screamed over the jet turbine engine’s roar.
The helicopter instantly went into a precipitous dive. Manso screamed and fought for the cyclic. But Castro had a death grip on the control stick. The old man was ready to die, Manso could see it in his eyes. The green mountains rushed up to meet them as the chopper began its sickening death spiral.
24
Hawke was standing at the bar with a martini glass in his hand. The other hand was stuck in the pocket of his dinner jacket. Unlike those of most men she knew, Alex’s hands were always naturally quiet. A good sign. A sign of inner calm, she thought.
He looked pretty good in his tuxedo. Very Mel Gibson, she decided, with his black hair slicked back in waves from his forehead and the deep tan he’d acquired down in the Caribbean. He didn’t see her coming.
She planted a big wet one on his unsuspecting cheek.
“Hey, sailor,” Vicky said, taking the stool next to him, “buy a lady a drink?”
Hawke smiled, and said, “Name your poison, darling.”
“Yours looks lethal enough. My daddy called those ‘see-throughs.’ I’ll have one, too,” Vicky said. “Used to be, Daddy never would drink liquor he couldn’t see through. Now, all he drinks is bourbon. He says gin brings out unpleasant qualities in a man. ‘Loudmouth soup,’ he calls it. And when he flew on an airplane, he always took a flask.”
“Why?”
“He said he just plain didn’t trust airplane gin.”
“My beautiful girl.”
“Yes?”
“Did you come here with him very often?”
“Yes. All the time. It’s my most favorite place in Washington. That’s why I was so surprised when you suggested it.”
“I hoped you’d like it. Does your father get to Washington much?”
“I wish. Ever since he went back home to Seven Oaks, it’s been tough to get him out of his rocker on the front veranda. He’s got some old hunting dogs and he likes to stomp around his fields with them, looking for quail or pheasant. That’s about the extent of his current travels.”
“I’ve never been to Louisiana,” Hawke said. “Perhaps we could go down and visit him sometime.”
“I’d like that very much. You’d love Seven Oaks. It’s smack dab on the Mississippi River, on the River Road, about twenty miles south of Baton Rouge.”
“It all sounds very Scarlett O’Hara.”
“A whole lot of good things in the South have gone with the wind, but not Seven Oaks. I had a heavenly childhood. There’s a reason for all those stories about the Mississippi. It’s a storybook river. Daddy loved politics, but he hated living in Washington. He once said that if he owned Washington and Hell, he’d rent out Washington and live in Hell.”
Hawke smiled and reached across the table to squeeze Vicky’s hand. Seeing her here where she’d had so many cheerful hours with her father was wonderful.
Hawke signaled the bartender and ordered her drink.
“I’m very happy to be here with you tonight,” he said, putting his hand to her cheek and caressing it.
“Funny, I was just thinking the same thing,” Vicky said, trying to hide the effect his touch had on her. Her martini arrived and Hawke raised his glass.
“Who shall we toast?” Vicky asked.
“Let’s see. How about Tom, Huck, and Vicky? Or was it Becky?”
“You are a total and complete piece of work, you know that, Hawke?” Vicky said, laughing. She clinked her glass against his, and said, “Cheers. I need this.”
“A brutal day at the office, Doc? Anything you can talk about?”
“A new patient,” Vicky said, swirling her olive around in the vodka. “Poor guy. He’s suffering from an addiction. Incurable.”
“Really? Odd. I should think you could cure anyone of anything. I read in The Washingtonian, the magazine so prominently displayed all over your reception room, that you are considered one of the best doctors in town.”
“Some addictions are best left untreated. Let me borrow your pen, honey.”
Hawke pulled a slim gold pen from his inside pocket.
“Thanks,” Vicky said, and began scribbling all over the menu. Female behavior at times was mystifying, as he’d told Stokely on the way in from the airport. But then again, as a woman, he supposed she was entitled.
“Monsieur Hawke,” the obsequious little maître d’ said, “your table is ready.”
He followed Vicky into the small dining room, unable to take his eyes off the movement of her body under the swishing red silk skirt. Pleats. What was it about pleats?
When they’d been seated, the waiter arrived. He was an ancient white-haired gentleman wearing white gloves.
“Why, good evening, Mr. Hawke! You too, Miz Vicky,” he said. “Lord, I haven’t seen you since you was a little thing. Look at you! You grown into a beautiful woman.”
“Herbert! I can’t believe you’re still here.”
“I can’t either, Miz Vicky. I just turned ninety-two years old today and still going strong.”
“Happy Birthday! Alex, Herbert was a great friend of Daddy’s and always took care of me when I came here.”
“I imagine he did,” Hawke said, rising to shake the old fellow’s hand. “He’s certainly taken good care of me. Happy Birthday, Herbert.”
“Thank you, suh. You know, Miz Vicky,” Herbert said, “this old place ain’t ever been the same since your daddy left town. I still remember him playing the piano and telling his jokes. Have everybody in the place laughing.”
“And you used to let me slide
across the parquet dance floor in my socks. It was just like ice skating.”
“Lord, we had us a good time, didn’t we?” Herbert said, a smile lighting up his soft brown eyes. “Can I bring you all something more to drink?”
“That would be great, Herbert,” Vicky said. “Two Ketel One martinis straight up, please.”
After the elderly waiter left, there was a long silence in which Hawke simply sat there staring at her. Vicky was not one easily embarrassed by silences at the table, but the intensity of his stare finally got to her. She noticed that he still had his right hand stuffed into the pocket of his dinner jacket.
“Gun in your pocket, big boy? Or, you all just happy to see me?” she asked, unable to think of anything more original.
“No gun,” he said. “Just this.” He pulled a small black velvet box out of his pocket and placed it on the table. He saw the look in her eyes, and said, “Don’t worry, Doc, it won’t bite. Open it.”
She reached for the velvet box. “Oh, Alex, I—”
“Miz Vicky?” The waiter had somehow reappeared at their table.
“Yes?” Vicky said. “What is it, Herbert?”
“My apologies for disturbing you all,” Herbert said, “but there is a telephone call for Dr. Sweet. The gentleman said it was urgent.”
She looked at Alex. “Oh, Alex, I’m so sorry. I have to take it. It could be one of my patients, an emergency.”
“Of course you should take it,” Alex said, standing up as she pushed her chair back. “I understand completely.”
“Order me something yummy, will you? Whatever you’re having.”
Alex picked up the menu she’d been scribbling on at the bar. For a moment he couldn’t figure out what she’d been writing and then he saw it. She’d been correcting all the French errors. There was a note at the bottom, in French, addressed to the maître d’. It suggested that he take a crash course at the nearest Berlitz school before handing out any more mangled menus.
Alex smiled. He’d taken an instant dislike to this new chap they’d put at the gate. Disliked him despite the fact that Hawke was quite sure he wasn’t remotely French.
“That was quick,” he said, standing when Vicky returned and took her seat. She picked up the little black box she’d left on her empty serving plate.
“Hmm,” she said, looking from the box to Alex and back to the velvet box.
“Yes, hmm,” Alex replied.
“Weird. There was no one there, Alex,” she said, smiling and brushing a wing of auburn hair away from her eyes.
“No one there?”
“No.”
“Well, they’d hung up, then?” Hawke asked, lines of worry suddenly furrowing his brow. “Been disconnected.”
“I don’t think so, Alex,” Vicky said. “I could hear breathing at the other end. It’s so strange. I was thinking, none of my patients would have any idea of how to reach me here. I’ve got my cell phone, but of course you can’t have it on in here.”
“I’m sure it’s just a mistake.”
“It didn’t sound like a mistake, Alex,” Vicky said. “It sounded horribly deliberate. Almost like—”
She never finished her sentence.
A brutal explosion rocked the room. The sound and force of the shock wave hit instantaneously. Watches and clocks stood still. Time itself stopped and was exploded into countless pieces of flying glass, masonry, and human agony.
Alex found that he was no longer seated at a small, round table talking to Vicky. He seemed to be on his back, staring up into a roiling white fog. A fog that smelled more like harsh, choking smoke. There were cries and moans coming from all around him. He was aware of a jabbing pain in his shoulder and tried to roll away from it.
It got worse. He seemed to be lying on a bed of broken glass and cutlery. He held his hands up before his face and saw that they were sticky and bright red. He felt it might be a good thing to get out of there. He just wasn’t sure where he was. He heard a woman’s voice nearby, whimpering. He recognized it. It was Vicky.
“Doc?” he said, but there was no reply.
The acrid smoke was so thick now, he couldn’t see where any of the cries were coming from. He couldn’t see anything at all.
He got to his hands and knees and started crawling over the glass in the direction he thought her voice came from.
“Vicky,” he shouted. “Vicky!” That’s when he heard her.
“Alex, it hurts,” the voice said. “I’m cold. Where’s Daddy? Where’s my daddy?”
And then the voice stopped.
25
“Christ, it’s hot,” Congreve said to Sutherland. “Hotter than the bloody Exumas, if that’s not a physical impossibility.”
“You could probably take off that blue blazer without offending the local citizenry,” Ross said.
Ross wasn’t exactly sure what an actual “harrumph” sounded like, but it had to be something similar to what emerged from Congreve’s direction.
It was ten o’clock Saturday morning. The temperature had already climbed into the nineties.
They were in Nassau. And time had not been kind to Nassau.
An invasion of giant cruise ships, disgorging their legions of T-shirt shoppers, had laid waste to old Nassau Town. Straw markets and lazy little shops on Bay Street had been replaced with cheap souvenir emporiums full of worthless gewgaws. American fast food outlets had replaced the clubby little Bahamian restaurants. Everywhere he looked, Ross saw to his dismay that the island had succumbed completely to the dollar.
“Well, Ross, you were quite right. This is a lovely spot,” Congreve said, straining to be heard over the angry buzz of motorbikes careening through the crowded streets. He and Ross were negotiating their way along Bay Street, dodging the hordes of invading Americans as best they could.
Inspector Sutherland had flown them up at first light in Hawke’s little seaplane. Mechanics aboard Blackhawke had worked through the night to repair the damage done by the missile and the ensuing fire. Ross had risen at dawn, gone to the hangar for an inspection, and pronounced Kittyhawke airworthy.
“Must you fly so bloody low over the water, Ross?” Ambrose had asked, once they were airborne. “We’re not exactly a pair of jet jockeys sneaking in under the radar screen, after all.”
“Sorry, Chief,” Ross had said, pulling back on the stick and gaining altitude. “I thought you might actually think it was fun.”
Fun? There was nothing remotely fun about being sealed in an aluminium tube that might plunge from the heavens into the briny depths at any moment.
Now, having made it to Nassau alive, the two Scotland Yard detectives were decidedly lost. The house they were looking for was supposedly on this small street. They’d turned right off of Bay Street onto Whitehall Road as directed. After the blistering sun and crowded sidewalks of Bay Street, they found themselves plunged into shade. The road was choked with overhanging banyan trees. Birds of every hue sang from the branches. Multicolored oleanders and orchids and falling blossoms of frangipani filled the air with narcotic fragrances.
“I’ve never ventured into an actual South American rainforest, Sutherland,” Congreve announced, “but I imagine it to be a vast sunny plain compared to Whitehall Road.”
The trip to Nassau had been planned the evening before. The two detectives had spent a long frustrating day with the files pertaining to the murder of Alex’s parents.
The CID files had yielded a few names of officers and detectives who’d worked the case here in Nassau, but all of them seemed to be either dead or retired. Endless phone calls, countless dead ends. They’d almost given up the angle when Ross had noticed a faded signature at the bottom of the police report.
“Hold on, what’s this?” Ross asked.
Congreve leaned over to take a look. “Just some ordinary policeman by the looks of it. The signature is so smudged and faded, you can’t even make it out. Believe me, I’ve been over it with a magnifying glass a thousand times.”
; “Well, it’s our last shot. Let’s see if we can’t enhance it enough to get something out of it.”
Ross scanned the document into the computer. He then used a program called Photoshop to enhance the entire image. After long minutes of fiddling with it, and endless hemming and hawing by Congreve, he had it. A legible signature suddenly appeared.
Officer Stubbs Witherspoon.
The signature belonged to an obscure member of the Nassau Constabulary, probably now dead or long retired.
“Here’s a thought, Ross. Why don’t we just ring Nassau directory information? Maybe the old fellow still has a listing.” In short order, they had Witherspoon’s home number from Bahamian information. Both holding their breath, they dialed the number on the sat phone.
Someone picked up the phone on the first ring and said, “Stubbs Witherspoon.”
Mr. Stubbs Witherspoon, upon hearing what the English detective was interested in, had immediately invited them to Nassau. He had told Congreve to look for number 37 Whitehall Road. He had said it was a pale pink house, with blue shutters and that he’d find an arched gate covered with white bougainvillea. It had all sounded simple enough when Congreve had been standing on the bridge of Blackhawke writing it down.
Now he and Ross had been up one side of the street and down the other three times.
“If you wish to pay a visit to someone in this road, you’d better arrive armed with a machete,” Congreve said, using his sodden handkerchief to mop his brow.
“Perhaps we should go somewhere and ring him up, Chief,” Ross said. “It’s already gone half past ten.”
And that’s when a woman magically appeared from the dense shrubbery pushing a baby carriage.
“I wonder if you might help us,” Congreve said. “We’re in a bit of a fog here, you see. We’re looking for number 37 Whitehall Road. Can you possibly steer us in that direction?”
“Why, number 37 is right here,” she said, smiling. “You standing right in front of it! See? Here’s the gate!” With a great laugh, she pulled back a massive portion of green shrubbery and revealed an ancient arch covered in white bougainvillea. “Mr. Stubbs, he live in dere. Always has.”