Havana Best Friends

by Jose Latour

  The major accompanied Trujillo to the doctor’s office. He watched gravely as a very young doctor examined the captain’s throat, then shook his head sadly at the burning cigarette. Not before taking the patient’s pulse and blood pressure did the doctor prescribe the caplets, two days in bed, and as much water as he could drink. A male nurse gave Trujillo four oversized yellow caplets and instructed him to take one every twelve hours. Trujillo swallowed the first immediately. Fifteen minutes later, driving a Ural motorcycle with sidecar, he was on his way to Miramar.

  There were no rooms available at the Sevilla, but the desk clerk, a courteous middle-aged woman, sympathized with the nervous-looking deaf mute and called a colleague at the Deauville. Two minutes later she hung up and with a smile assured Marina they could spend the night at a nearby hotel, on Galiano between Malecón and San Lázaro. As the taxi driver opened his trunk by the Deauville’s main entrance, a bellhop materialized out of nowhere and, frowning at the antiquated suitcase, seized their baggage. With a practised eye Marina surveyed the lobby in three seconds: two-star, inexpensive, old, the kind of place tour operators book for low-cost, no-frills sightseers.

  At the desk, Marina said they were the people sent from the Sevilla and gave her name. The clerk checked a clipboard, nodded, grinned, then asked for identification. Marina threw some fast sign language at Elena. The teacher could easily lip-read the word passport, but the hand movements looked pathetically spurious. The clerk stared for a moment. That good-looking woman was deaf? Elena opened her handbag and surrendered the document.

  Marina filled the cards and gave Elena hers to sign. In the instant before placing the ballpoint on the thick paper, the teacher realized she could no longer sign her name. She panicked. What was her new name? She moved her eyes to the right line. Christine Abernathy. She signed a CA followed by an indecipherable scribble. Was the woman also a little stupid? the desk clerk wondered.

  As soon as the bellhop pocketed the dollar and closed the door of room 614 behind him, Elena turned to Marina. “Dammit, I almost …”

  She stopped in mid-sentence when Marina repeatedly pressed her forefinger over her lips.

  “What?”

  Marina edged closer and whispered in her ear. “This room may be bugged.”

  Elena frowned, partly in incomprehension, partly in disagreement. “You think so?” she murmured as she gazed around the room. Two single beds, a cheap chest of drawers, a closet, a bathroom, a sash window framed by thin curtains, an air conditioner, a TV set, two white plastic armchairs.

  Marina turned on the air conditioner and the TV before spelling out Sean’s precautions when in Cuba. Then she suggested sticking to the same routine, just to play it safe. After all, Christine was a deaf-mute; it would seem odd to hear a conversation going on in their room. Elena agreed to communicate in a low voice as banality reached new peaks in a Spanish quiz show. They sat on the beds, facing each other. Elena crossed her ankles and interlaced her fingers. Marina tucked both feet up beneath her and supported herself on her right arm.

  Initially, the simplicity of the plan remained unaltered. They would leave the hotel in a few minutes, a couple of friends taking a walk, buy a carry-on at one of the dollars-only stores on Galiano Street, then return to the Deauville, move Elena’s things from the old to the new suitcase, and leave for the airport. At this point they frowned simultaneously and stared at each other, albeit for different reasons.

  “The hotel people will wonder,” Elena said, knitting her brow.

  “Which airport?” Marina asked.

  “What?”

  “Which airport should we go to?”

  “You’re losing me now.”

  Marina inhaled deeply before beginning to whisper her explanation. “When I realized that Sean and the cane had disappeared, I assumed he had betrayed me. How could I know what had happened? So I went to the airport to see if I could catch him there, threaten him with exposure …” She tried to choke back tears and failed.

  Elena felt sorry for her. They hadn’t been married, but it seemed as if something had been going on between them. “What I can’t understand,” she said as Marina paused to wipe away a tear, “is how this man could enter your room and abduct Sean without your waking up.”

  “I can’t figure it out either,” Marina said, shaking her head. “I was exhausted after all the excitement, sleeping like a log, but there must’ve been some noise. The guy had to knock on the door, must’ve threatened Sean. How come I didn’t hear a thing?”

  “Beats me.”

  “Well, as I was watching out for Sean at the airport – really pissed off, you know, believing he had screwed me – I tried to picture what he’d do. And it suddenly came to me he wouldn’t go to that airport because he’d figure it was the first place I’d think of. You follow me?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  Marina shifted her weight to her left arm and slid her legs in the opposite direction. “Suppose you’re running away – well, we are running away – first thing you should do is play devil’s advocate. ‘Where would they look for me?’ Which is the same as, ‘What places should I avoid?’ Do you understand what I’m saying?”

  “Sure.”

  “So, you say to yourself, I shouldn’t go home, or to my parents’, or to my best friend’s.”

  “Or to the nearest airport.”

  “Exactly. Then, I figured that Sean would travel to Varadero, or Santiago de Cuba, or some other town where you can catch a plane to Canada, or Mexico, or any other country. Actually, I thought – God, forgive me – that he had planned it all well in advance, that he had bought two tickets in Canada: one for a plane leaving from some Cuban airport other than Havana’s, another from where the first plane lands to Sean’s final destination.”

  “I see. You’re wondering if we should do that.”

  “Exactly. Just to be on the safe side. We don’t know if this man your father … well, killed is the word, I’m sorry. We don’t know if he has an accomplice; someone who knew where he was going, who might know about the diamonds and is looking for us right now, or who will start chasing us in a few hours.”

  “Oh, Marina. You think so?” Elena asked, wide-eyed.

  “It’s a possibility.”

  Elena stood and paced the room nervously before fumbling with the remote to turn up the TV’s volume. Marina kept her eyes on the Cuban teacher.

  “So, you suggest we go where? Varadero?” Elena asked.

  “I don’t know. What’s the busiest Cuban airport after Havana?”

  “Well, I seem to recall some newspaper article said Varadero was number two.”

  “How far is it?”

  “Roughly 120 or 140 kilometres from here.”

  “How can we get there?”

  “We could take a cab.”

  Marina considered this for a moment. “No, I don’t think so. It would attract attention, the driver would remember us because of the high fare. Can we take a bus?”

  “Sure, there’s a bus company, Vía Azul, the ticket is ten dollars. But I don’t know how many departures they have each day, or the timetable. We’d have to call.”

  “Okay, that’s decided. We’ll go to Varadero Airport, say we just called home and found out my son’s been in an accident. We need two tickets, preferably for Toronto, but if there are no immediate flights, we’ll fly to Cancún, Mexico City, Jamaica, any other city where we can make a connection.”

  “Sounds good to me.”

  “Fine. I’ve got to pee.”

  Marina made her way to the bathroom and closed the door behind her. Elena stared at the TV for a minute or two, not watching, overcome by the mess she had got herself into.

  “What will people here think?” she asked when Marina came back into the room consulting her watch. “We come begging for a room, then leave after a couple of hours?”

  Marina took a deep breath and stared at the ceiling for a minute, ransacking her brain. “I think it was in the New York Times, I�
��m not sure, but I read somewhere you have some medical institutions here that treat foreigners. Is it true?”

  “Yes. There are several, the Cira Garcia, the Camilo Cienfuegos, the –”

  “Fine. We say you are being admitted into the Cira Garcia. We had to get a room here because we arrived a day early, but we made a call and they told us you would be admitted today. I’m staying with you.”

  “Sounds plausible.”

  “Okay, let’s go and buy you a carry-on and call the bus depot.”

  “Fine. Do we leave the cane in my suitcase?”

  Pretending to be exasperated, Marina rolled her eyes. “Oh, Elena, you are so naïve at times. After what we’ve been through, we’d better not let that cane out of our sight till we’ve sold the last little stone. We eat with it, shower with it, sleep with it, and if either of us feels like fucking a guy, it becomes our dildo.”

  Elena surprised herself by giggling, then fought the impulse. She knew she shouldn’t be laughing a few hours after two men had died before her very eyes, but this Marina was quite something. Smiling faintly, she began struggling with the leather straps and rusty locks of her suitcase.

  After almost two minutes unsuccessfully pressing the buzzer of Apartment 1 and waiting for an answer, Captain Trujillo took the stairs to the second floor to have a word with the informer.

  Zoila introduced him to her husband, a bald man in his late fifties working on his stamp collection, then offered Trujillo a seat at the kitchen table. She brewed espresso, learned that her downstairs neighbour was not in, said she didn’t know where Elena was. Maybe she had gone to the movies, to visit one of her pupils, or to the beach, she speculated. It took Zoila a full minute to list the household chores she had to perform at weekends – cleaning, cooking, doing the laundry, ironing, defrosting her fifty-year-old GE refrigerator, standing in line at the market to buy rationed food, standing in line at the Youth Army market to buy non-rationed fruit and vegetables. She was making it plain that Trujillo couldn’t expect her to spend hours staring out of the window. Twice he tried to suppress sneezes and failed.

  Wiping his nose, the captain asked her to give him a call as soon as she saw Elena, then shook hands with the philatelist, and left the apartment. Zoila and her husband felt sure they would go down with the flu in a few days; the man was a walking germ-spreader. On the ground floor, Trujillo spent another two minutes pressing the buzzer of Apartment 1 before leaving the building and kick-starting his motorcycle. He was ready to go when, over the old engine’s coughing and sputtering, Zoila’s voice reached his ears. He raised his eyes to her balcony. Yes, there she was, trying to make herself heard. He placed his hand behind his ear to signal that he couldn’t make sense of what she was saying. She put her left fist in front of her mouth and with her right made circles around her ear, to indicate that he was wanted on the telephone. Trujillo killed the engine and again climbed the stairs.

  “Thanks, Comrade Zoila.”

  “You’re welcome. The phone’s on the side table.”

  Trujillo sat down on the couch and grabbed the receiver.

  “Captain Trujillo at your service.”

  “Hi, Félix.”

  “Who’s this?”

  “Pichardo.”

  “Hi, buddy. What is it?”

  “Pena wants you to meet him at First Avenue between 34th and 36th, Miramar. Says they found the rental there, abandoned apparently.”

  Trujillo remained silent, eyes on the wall. Zoila hung on his every word.

  “You heard me?”

  “I heard you. First between 34th and 36th, right?”

  “Affirmative.”

  “Pena’s on his way?”

  “Affirmative.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Negative.”

  “Take care.”

  “You take care. You’ll get pneumonia or something.”

  The patrol car, a Peugeot, was parked ten or twelve metres behind the Hyundai Accent. Its driver remained behind the wheel; his partner stood by the passenger door, left elbow resting on the roof, puffing on a cigarette. When they saw the captain getting off the motorcycle, the driver stood up and the other cop ground out his cigarette. Trujillo returned their salute half-heartedly.

  “Been here long, comrades?” he asked as they shook hands.

  “ ’Bout ten minutes, Captain,” said the driver, a swarthy sergeant with an impressive black moustache. He held a clipboard in his left hand.

  “You searched it?”

  “No. Dispatcher said not to. We found it” – the man shot a glance at the clipboard – “at 2:32. Our orders were not to do anything till you DTI people got here. They said you were a major.”

  “The major is on his way. I’m Trujillo.”

  The captain circled the Hyundai, peering through the windows. By the passenger door he yanked his damp, crumpled handkerchief from a back pocket and glanced disgustedly at it before shaking it up and down to smooth it out a little. Covering his fingers with it, he leaned through the window and opened the glove compartment. He found a road map and a copy of the lease. It didn’t surprise him at all to learn that Sean Abercorn was the lessee; Marina Leucci was also authorized to drive the car. The form said they would be staying at the Hotel Copacabana.

  Trujillo turned his head and glanced at the upper floors of the building five and a half blocks away. Well, sometimes people did pretty bizarre things, like leaving a vehicle five blocks away from home. Out of gas? Maybe. Had the key been in the ignition he could have checked that, but it wasn’t. However, the Hyundai was pointing eastward, as though they were going to, not coming from, the city. Visiting a friend in the neighbourhood? Possible. Lazy people then, driving for just five blocks.

  Trujillo was sweating profusely under the merciless sun and his mouth was parched. He gazed around in search of a public place close by where he could ask for a glass of water. Pedestrians in beachwear returning home eyed the cops curiously. Deeply suntanned teenagers rode bikes, bounced balls, or played pranks on adults. There were some large, flaky-barked trees in the vicinity, none of them leafy enough to provide a decent shade. Two blocks to the east a neon sign identified a restaurant. But he had to wait for Pena. He took off his cap and wiped his face dry with the sleeve of his shirt. Across the street, the calm blue sea was an invitation. The right place to wade in, cool off, get rid of a stinking summer cold.

  “Hey, guys, let’s get some shade in your car, okay?”

  Pena arrived three minutes later, in an unmarked Lada. Trujillo stepped out of the patrol car as the major crossed the street. Standing by the Hyundai, the captain handed the lease to his boss, who seemed more interested in the document than in the rental. Finally, Pena lifted his gaze to the ocean and considered something for a moment.

  “You speak English?” he asked his subordinate.

  “Not one word.”

  “You know whether either of these two speak Spanish?”

  “According to Elena Miranda, the woman is Argentinian.”

  “Let’s go to the Copacabana, then. Have a talk with this guy Sean; she can interpret. We’ll use the rental as an excuse. We thought it had been stolen and abandoned, blah, blah, blah. Leave your motorcycle here, we’ll ride in the Lada.”

  Ten minutes later they learned that Mr. Abercorn and Ms. Leucci had checked out. The parking attendant on duty – second shift – recalled having seen the Hyundai on Saturday, but not on Sunday. The desk clerk – same shift – had no idea if they had moved to another hotel or left the country.

  “I need a glass of water,” Trujillo said.

  At the hotel bar, the captain guzzled three glasses of ice-cold water.

  Pena drove back to where the Hyundai was and pulled over, behind the motorcycle. Using his radio, he asked the dispatcher to call the rental agency, report the abandoned vehicle, and ask them, no, order them, to send someone to pick it up immediately. Then he dismissed the cops in the patrol car and returned to the Lada. As he was sliding behi
nd the wheel, Trujillo sneezed explosively.

  “Coño, Trujillo, turn your face away!”

  “Sorry,” he said in a muffled voice, wiping his nose.

  “You want to infect the whole force?”

  “I said sorry.”

  “Okay, okay. That the only handkerchief you got?”

  Trujillo stared through the windshield for a moment before speaking. “You keep bitching about my cold, pulling rank on me, I’m gonna take the two days off the doc prescribed.”

  Pena considered it prudent to let it pass.

  “Of course it’s the only fucking handkerchief I got,” Trujillo added. “I left home at seven this morning, I must’ve sneezed a million times, you think it should be clean and dry?”

  Keeping his eyes on the avenue, Pena took a packet of Populares from his shirt pocket and presented it to the captain, who took one, lit it, then brought the flame over to Pena. They smoked in silence for a minute.

  “Look at that,” Pena said admiringly.

  She was a nice-looking, light-skinned black woman in a two-piece bathing suit. Trujillo had to restrain himself from smiling. The chick was fine, but what the old fox was actually trying to do was patch things up by playing the man-to-man sex card. He wondered how such a perceptive, sagacious, astute, experienced cop could become so transparent when dealing with subordinates. Then he realized it was a ploy. The son of a bitch!

  “I don’t like it,” Trujillo said.

  “You don’t like that superb broad?”

  “I don’t like the whole setup. Yesterday evening’s pounding on a wall, that Elena Miranda isn’t at home today, that this rental was abandoned here, that these tourists checked out.”

  Pena mulled this over, smoking in silence. He crushed the butt in the ashtray before speaking. Trujillo flipped his out of the window.

  “I’ll go back to the unit,” the major began, “call Tourism, ask if these two checked into some other hotel. I will also ask Immigration if they flew out today. You stay here. When the people from the rental agency arrive, check the trunk and the back seat, see if they ran out of gas. If you find nothing suspicious, go home and rest awhile. Meet me at my office at nine sharp tonight. By then I should have reports from Tourism and Immigration and we’ll figure out what to do next.”