North of Havana df-5

by Randy Wayne White

  Lenny… the man I found repugnant because he insisted we had so much in common; but he'd been right; I knew it to my marrow, and if I wasn't certain then, I proved it to myself when 1 turned to Taino and said, "Remember the tall girl, Dewey? She was one of the most decent people I've ever met. And she was my friend."

  As I said it-she was my friend-I watched the involuntary smugness that came into Taino's eyes… and then I saw the smugness change to fear because he was looking at me, seeing what was in my face… and then I shot him before he could move or speak-a clean head shot from a good angle, but I added another to the chest just to make sure.

  I used the Browning because a handgun seemed more personal.

  It was not unlike the dream that haunted me: a human head vanishing in an explosion of iridescent vapor. But unlike the dream, I could see the residue of Taino's face fade from gray to white, could see his white robes sponging scarlet, could watch his quivering hands stiffen and go still.

  I waited for a moment, taking my time, but not too much time, because now I wanted Taino's people to panic. I wanted them to run off into the night and leave their Stone Age weapons behind.

  So I swung the sights onto Molinas, who had dropped to his knees, arms crossed in front of his face… but then I hesitated… hesitated because Taino's shocked followers were behaving in a way that I had not anticipated.

  They were screaming at me-I hadn't expected that. I also hadn't expected them to surge toward Taino's fallen body.

  Were they insane?

  Then they were pushing toward me idiotically; coming at me in a rage. Couldn't they see that I had an automatic weapon and could kill them all? So I fired two more rounds into the tree limbs above me to freeze them… and then everyone did stop because of what happened next. There was the sound of the breaking of a tree limb overhead… a muffled scream… and from out of the dark leaves, amid a feather-veil of startled white-crowned doves, a little boy fell to the ground at my feet.

  I stood there as stunned as the priests, as stunned as everyone else who was now watching him closely… watched Santiago, illuminated by the golden firelight, stand quickly, brush some of the feathers off his clothes… then heard him say to me in a gush of relief, "Holy Mother, that was close!" as he straightened two aged medallions that hung around his neck on a single new cord of fishing line.

  One of the medallions was a crusted green-a St. Christopher's medal? The other looked to be made of obsidian… some kind of polished black stone that had been carved into a swirling figure-eight… or the symbol of infinity.

  I was looking at the reverent expressions on the faces of the priests… saw the same countenance in the eyes of the men who, a moment ago, had been mobbing me. A child falls among them from a tree of white doves, and he is wearing ornaments that the gods refused to reveal to them. Yes… yes… this was something important…

  I felt Santiago touch my elbow. "You idiot, were you trying to shoot me?"

  I was still watching the faces of the priests. Said, "Huh…? No

  … no I wasn't trying to shoot you. What the hell were you doing in that tree?"

  The boy was breathing heavily, still frightened. "Because the strange Yankee said I was supposed to watch over you. But maybe he didn't mean high over you. And try to help you, only I don't know how. Maybe that tree wasn't such a good spot."

  Very slowly, I moved my hand and patted his shoulder. Said, "No, it was the perfect spot," listening to Santiago's words being passed through the crowd-I was not to be harmed; the child had said it.

  The two priests-white robes and white hats, just like Taino's-were on their knees now, chanting something, staring at us. The other men had bunched up around Santiago, wanting to touch the medallions, or maybe touch the boy, but their veneration was like a shyness and they maintained a respectful distance.

  All but Molinas. I surveyed the clearing… then the cemetery… then looked toward the docks where Castro's yacht was moored.

  Molinas was gone. He was probably out there in the jungle now, running for his life. I could follow him. Maybe I should follow him-track the man down, kill him, then try to escape to international waters in the fishing smack. Fidel Castro, who had debased so many and so much, would not endure personal debasement, so it was probably better than what awaited me back in Havana.

  Or was it?

  I released a long, heavy breath, then tossed the Browning and the rifle to the ground. I put my hand on Santiago's shoulder and walked him through the parting wall of men… was nearly to the docks before I asked what I knew I had to ask: "Were they in the grotto?"

  He touched his fingers to the medallions. These? "They were right where the other Yankee told me to look. He's a very strange Yankee. He can do magic tricks. He says that he can heal people."

  I looked at the figure of Fidel Castro standing on the bridge of his yacht-a man who was back in control-and then I stared at the Gulf Stream darkness beyond. I said, "I would love to believe that."

  Epilogue

  On the first official working day of the first month of the new year, I was standing among the commercial docks and rusted warehouses that line French Canal in Colon, Panama; had been standing there for more than an hour because I was waiting to see an old friend.

  Two friends, really. Two ladies…

  I had no other reason to be in that nasty little city. No one in their right mind would want to spend time unnecessarily in Colon, because it is one of those drunken-sailor destinations: ratty bars and prostitute curb-stations and way too much traffic on broken streets that were never designed to handle the burden of what Colon has become-Central America's busiest, tackiest, and probably most dangerous duty-free seaport.

  Which is why I was eager to finish my business and get the hell away from there. I wanted to catch my ride back to the isolated beach house I had rented east of Coco Solo. A nice little house up on stilts with a porch that framed its own seascape. Nothing behind the house but an ascending jungle canopy from which the wild cries of howler monkeys awoke me each morning at first light. Nothing to the sides but empty beach… and an interesting lagoon in which I had already begun to collect some unusual littoral specimens. I'd found some striped tunicates there, an interesting species because, unlike some other tunicates, they are solitary creatures. They clump on rocks or mounds of sea grass and grow there alone, feeding by filtering water and, as they do so, clean way more water than organisms that size could be expected to clean.

  "The duality of design," Tomlinson had replied, when I told him what I'd been doing. He'd been speaking by phone from Dinkin's Bay; had reconfirmed that he and Dewey and Rita had made it to Key West safely… which is where he had left them to sail back to Sanibel. Then he had said, "This's going to sound strange, man, but guess what? I don't have a clue who you're with. And I didn't know where you were till you told me. I thought Castro, that asshole, might have you in prison. But Panama-far out."

  Nope, not prison. I'd spent a day, a night, and part of the next day at the State Security complex in Havana, Villa Marista, hoping that Santiago's renown would spread quickly enough through Cuba to save me from the killing bluff at Mariel. The prospect didn't even qualify as tenuous hope. Castro being Castro, the idea was, in fact, an exercise in absurd optimism. If the Maximum Leader wanted me dead, no child wearing sacred medallions could stop it. Each time my cell door opened, I looked up expecting to see the face of my executioner. On a Thursday afternoon, though, the door opened and I was shocked to see a face so unexpected that I thought I might be hallucinating. After that, it was a matter of mustering political clout to negotiate my release.

  But because I didn't want to burden Tomlinson with all the sensitive details, I had replied, "You didn't know I was in Panama? What's so strange about that?"

  I could hear some of the old excitement in his voice. "It's because this whole last year, I knew things, man. I could look at you and I knew where you'd been. I knew where you were going, who you were going to meet. Not that I ever k
new what was actually going to happen. But now… it's like I've lost my powers. Like maybe that whole gig in Cuba burned them all up. It was so damn heavy. You think?"

  I'd told him, "If that means you're going to start behaving normally, then I hope so."

  When he answered, his voice turned sad and a little wistful. "Me too, man. Seriously-the whole scene was getting to be a drag. The omniscient are friendless for a damn good reason."

  So Tomlinson now knew where I was, but he didn't know whom I was with. That's the way I wanted it. It's the way it had to be; the only way it was possible to work out security and logistics. Which is why I had chosen the rental car that now pulled up and stopped at the curb beside me. Some kind of Japanese model; the chunkiest, safest, most nondescript rental car I could find. Its windows were tinted almost black. Tinted windows, very important.

  I left my spot by the warehouse and was smiling involuntarily as I walked over to the car. I waited for the driver's window to open and then I leaned in and kissed the copper-dark lips, touched the raven hair, traced the handsome Indio face and cheeks of the woman with whom I'd rendezvoused clandestinely two days earlier and was now sharing my beach house. And then I stood and asked Pilar Fuentes Bal-serio, the sovereign of Masagua, a commoner's question: "All done shopping?"

  Which earned me the regal smile. "I have everything we need, I think. Know what? I had a good time. I really did, Marion. It's fun acting like a woman again." Then she turned from me, studied the warehouse I had been watching, then looked back into my eyes.

  The way her eyes bore in, the way she looked at me…

  It was one of her many rare qualities; a gift that she seemed to reserve for me, just for me… a quality that I had never forgotten, that I would never forget.

  She became serious. "Have they come out yet?"

  "No. But they're in there. A buddy of mine knows all the shipping schedules, and her friend's name was on the manifest. They should be leaving anytime."

  She had asked me before, now asked again: "Are you certain you don't want to speak to her; to let her know you're here?" Pilar wasn't pressing me, but was telling me that it was okay if I wanted to.

  Three days before, Dewey had gotten my message from her service and dialed the number I had left. She had told me, "I need some time, Doc. In my way, I will always, always… care for you as a friend. But I need some distance. And I need some space to try to put all of this behind me. I hate to say it, but seeing you would bring back… too much."

  I told Pilar, "No, I don't want her to know. I just want to see her, make sure she's all right."

  "Then you'd better get in the car because the doors are opening. The warehouse doors-see? Better hurry."

  I hustled around to the passenger's side, watching the double-wide barn doors slide away, and I ducked in beside Pilar and saw through tinted glass an old white Chrylser convertible pull out with Rita at the wheel, Dewey sitting beside her. It was a striking car; a classic that Geis would have treasured-a two-door roadster with red leather upholstery; the kind of car a famous writer could drive around Cuba while dreaming up stories about big fish and African beaches. I also noted that the car was sitting low on its springs. Nothing lead-heavy in the trunk, but things heavy enough. Things that, like the car, were probably very valuable and not too big to be hidden away in one of Candelaria's mausoleums.

  I wondered: What else did shrewd Rita find?

  Pilar looked at them a moment before she said, "She's beautiful. She really is. And Marion-her face… she must heal remarkably fast."

  Dewey did look good. She had a blue scarf around her neck. I watched her tilt her head back and laugh, reacting to something Rita had said. Watched Rita look both ways, adjust the radio knob, then turn left onto the street and drive away from us.

  I sat there in silence watching the blond hair and the fluttering scarf, thinking things that I, too, did not care to remember… until Pilar reached into the backseat, dug through some sacks, and dropped into my lap something that genuinely surprised me-a Rawlings Heart of the Hide catcher's glove; the Gold Glove series.

  She said very softly, "It came with his luggage. This afternoon. He's already at the house waiting for us, and he says he wants to throw. It may be a little awkward at first. Are you sure it's okay?"

  She wasn't talking about Gen. Juan Rivera.

  I had turned my face away from her; I was looking at the glove. I looked at it for quite a while, then I put it on and tapped my fist into the pocket. I waited awhile longer- I couldn't trust my voice-before I said, "Sure. Anything for the woman who came to Cuba and rescued me."

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