Frame 232

by Wil Mara

  The Clementes went to church every Sunday, and the priest adopted a subordinate air when they met after services. His parents were devout, so Galeno’s religious education extended well beyond the church walls. Icons hung throughout their home, and a luxurious Bible lay open on a stand in the living room. His parents prayed each night, and Galeno and his brother, Olivero, were expected to kneel with them. A rosary was always woven between his mother’s fingers. They thanked God for each other and for their plentiful bounty. Then Mother and Father would take their two sons to their rooms and tuck them in.

  And they would be read to, the parents alternating between the two boys so neither would seem favored over the other. And when the stories ended, their hair would be stroked and their cheeks kissed. Neither could imagine a greater love in the universe. Their father would speak of wondrous days to come, of days spent hard at work in a place called “university” and of taking over his businesses together, as brothers, to continue amassing the family riches. The present was glory and the future unlimited, and the burden of worry was an unknown quantity.

  Neither boy took much notice of Fulgencio Batista’s rise to power at first. It was the early fifties, and they were too young to be concerned with such matters. They heard his name spoken among the adults, and they got the impression he was not well regarded. Their father once called him a “feckless punk.” Nevertheless, their prosperity continued. A second car appeared in the driveway, making their mother one of the only women in the community who had her own. She was given a small safe for her best jewelry. There was also talk of buying land purely for investment purposes, maybe leasing it to tenant farmers.

  And then, with the swiftness of an ax blade, it all changed. Even now, Clemente could remember the date—August 11, 1956.

  It began with a knock on the front door. The boys were in their rooms, changing to play baseball in an empty lot down the street. It was a Saturday afternoon, and their mother was baking a cake for dinner that evening. She wiped her hands on her apron before answering.

  The brothers, thinking it was their friends growing impatient, ran down the steps to greet them. Instead they found two bullish-looking men in dark suits. They had the hard faces of street brawlers, but the suits were tailor-made. They also wore gold rings and watches. They were both gangsters; Galeno was a smart kid and could see through the slick packaging. You could put them in suits, but it changed nothing.

  The men seemed to have little interest in his mother. She was frightened, Galeno could tell, and this angered him. He watched the men carefully, promising himself he would act if necessary. He was still small and was no match for either of them, but the thought of his mother being harmed made his blood boil. She retreated to her bedroom, and her husband came out bleary-eyed and shoeless; he had been resting.

  When the men asked him to come outside to speak, he seemed hesitant. But he went, closing the front door quietly. Galeno and Olivero understood that he did this so they would not hear the conversation. There was something sinister about all of it, and they knew real fear for the first time in their lives. They were genuinely unsure if their father would come back.

  When he did, he looked dazed.

  By collecting small bits of conversation between their parents over the next few days, the brothers pieced together a general sense of what was happening: new businesses called “casinos” were being opened on the orders of President Batista. These new casinos, they heard, were to be stocked with the finest foods and liquor Cuba had to offer, for they would attract visitors from all over the world, especially America. Galeno knew America was the richest country in the world, but this idea of catering to their tourists made him feel dirty, as if they were royalty and the Cuban people were merely their servants. His father produced some of the best wines, sherries, and rums on the island. He had labored for years to formulate his blends. Now Batista was demanding that he increase his output in order to please these foreign customers. And he wanted the supply at a cut-rate price. Other distributors had made similar demands of Arturo in the past, and Galeno remembered his father always politely refusing. He had never compromised where his product was concerned. But this time he was being given no choice in the matter.

  As time passed, other Batista agents came to the home, always unannounced, always with a new twist on the deal. More product, lower prices, a free delivery here and there, privately labeled bottles for friends of the president, and then, inevitably, the demand for exclusivity. The life Galeno and Olivero had known slipped away in stages. The second car disappeared, then the jewelry in their mother’s safe. Restaurant visits became less frequent; clothes were handed down.

  Once the luxuries were gone, the essentials began to diminish. Their father worked longer hours, and he sometimes wasn’t home when they went to bed. His parents fought from time to time, something they had never done before. Young Galeno found his mother crying a few times, and he vowed to find the cause of her grief and destroy it.

  Then came the night of June 10, 1958.

  “Ou vle yon lòt?” the shirtless bartender asked in his native Creole. Do you want another?

  This pulled Clemente out of his reverie and back to the present. He looked at the man, who was as thin as a whip and as dark as coal. “Wi, tanpri.” Yes, please.

  The bartender nodded and whisked away the empty glass. The ramshackle hut in which Clemente sat passed for a drinking establishment in this forgotten corner of the world. The beer was usually warm, the roof leaked when it rained, and the air reeked of rotting vegetation from a nearby compost pile. But there was also running water, cable television, and even an ancient computer with Internet access. Getting here might have required a two-mile walk from the encampment, but it was the way Clemente kept in touch with the rest of the planet.

  The bartender, whose name was Seydou, set down the second rum and waited. Clemente removed a bill from his pocket and handed it over. Seydou nodded reverently and withdrew.

  Alone now in the gathering afternoon heat, Clemente turned his attention back to the television: a tiny CRT on a platform that hung from the corrugated ceiling. CNN was running through a sports segment; celebrity news would be next.

  Father Breimayer had a hundred questions for him, he knew. The priest was a good and decent man, one of the most admirable Clemente had ever met. Breimayer had been through his own share of hardship, Clemente had learned. He had seen things that would have devastated the spirits of other men. But he was a follower of the Lord, and the Lord had delivered him. Breimayer drew his strength from his faith, the kind of faith Clemente had known at one time, a time so far back that it seemed a part of someone else’s life rather than his own.

  And what of forgiveness? That, too, had been promised in the Holy Book, taught to him by his parents. The Lord understood the frailties of the human condition, accepted the errors and misjudgments of his brood. Through his divine mercy, he released them from the crushing burden of their sins. And in his Kingdom, when their time in the prison of mortality drew to a close, they would be welcomed with open arms.

  Clemente had wondered endlessly about this over the years. What would be his final judgment when he stood before the Lord and the ledger of his life was opened? Even with God’s capacity for compassion, was time now the only barrier between himself and eternal damnation? How could anyone forgive such sins? How was one spared such suffering? Would genuine remorse coupled with decades of good works be sufficient? Clemente had come to suspect it would not. For any hope of reconciliation, he felt he had to make some effort to balance the specific injustice of his transgressions. Even if he failed, maybe the sincerity of the effort would be sufficient. Was that the policy? Was that what God was waiting for? The search for this answer had been his obsession. Please, Lord, present me with the opportunity to redeem myself.

  When CNN returned to the story on billionaire Jason Hammond, Clemente thought perhaps that opportunity had arrived. The mention of the American city of Dallas sent a familiar charge throug
h every bone. The mention of the dead president sent another. But it was the face of the woman that gripped his heart with an icy hand. He had never forgotten it. She was the daughter, yes, but her eyes were so like her mother’s.

  He knew Margaret Baker’s lens had found him that afternoon, in spite of his meticulous precautions. Now a strange feeling filled him—a mixture of great relief, sadness, and a dozen other emotions that had been hibernating in some cavernous corner of his soul.

  And something else came to the surface then, as certain as anything he had ever known.

  The time had come to leave this place.

  21

  FREDERICK RYDELL stood by the French doors in his den and watched the sprinklers twirl over his surgically perfect lawn. Some of the spray dotted the flagstone pavers on the patio—a patio where he had stood with the most influential intelligence figures in the nation. Conversation had ranged from state secrets to dirty jokes and was stage-propped with the usual brandishments of male ritual—a pipe or cigar, a ceaselessly ringing cell phone, and a rocks glass of straight whiskey or vodka or whatever.

  He had one of those drinks in hand now and was mindlessly rotating it in such a way that the ice jingled along the sides. When he had poured it ten minutes earlier, he tried but could not recall the last time he had indulged in alcohol during daylight hours, much less working hours. The latter was irrelevant, however, as he would not be a part of America’s workforce today. He had already left a message on Theresa’s machine saying he was feeling a little under the weather and wanted to get some rest. He could not recall the last time he had done that, either.

  Deep concern continued to press upon his mind. It had started the day before, following the realization that Hammond had not only dodged his attempt to put pressure on him but had managed to turn the situation around in his own favor simply by using the media to provide a measure of protection for himself. He turned half the people in the nation into his personal security force by leveraging the public’s fondness for him. Now how did I not foresee that possibility? This was the question that had plagued him until finally, reluctantly, he’d swallowed the harsh truth that he had badly underestimated the man. Hammond was nothing like the bored rich kid some in the media made him out to be. Not even close.

  Once Rydell accepted this, he dug deeper to study his adversary. A former Harvard student with a sterling academic record. Not someone whose parents had bought his way in but rather someone who had earned it. And his other record, his “professional” record—success with nearly everything he touched, including many instances where others had failed before. Hammond wasn’t just another spoiled legacy brat. He was legitimate, and he was formidable.

  But there was even more to it than that. Rydell couldn’t assemble a sharp-edged image of Hammond because the man was also a study in contrasts. He had a natural, easy brilliance in many subjects, yet he seemed genuinely humble. He had been handed an empire he’d played no role in building, yet he appeared to be managing it with remarkable efficiency. He had tremendous resources at his command, yet he exercised phenomenal self-control. No record of drug use or excessive drinking, no tabloid photos of Hammond with prostitutes or controversial celebrities. And he was apparently a religious man as well. Sincere, compassionate, and moral. That’s a problem, Rydell thought.

  Now Hammond had the public on his side as well. They loved his reaction to the frame attempt Rydell had orchestrated. Another David-versus-Goliath scenario, and the American people never tired of those. Hammond had known exactly what to do, had manipulated the media perfectly.

  Now we’re the ones who need to be careful, Rydell thought bitterly. Particularly that idiot Birk. Taking out Burdick had been good—something that should’ve been done ages ago. But to let Hammond and the girl get away again . . . Rydell felt the urge to choke Birk to death with his bare hands. How much did Burdick tell them? How much do they know?

  He brought the drink up and took another sip. This time the ice jingled because his hand shook, which only served to make him angrier. There were few things he hated more than losing control of a situation. The enemy was out there, methodically chipping away at the wall that had protected him for half a century, and he wasn’t able to do a thing about it. “Just find them and take them out,” he had told Birk. Birk had countered with an argument about logistics, about how it would be nearly impossible to get to them with the public’s attention fixed in their direction. Rydell knew this was true, but he wasn’t interested in excuses. “Find a way,” he had said. “That’s why you’re being paid so much.” He had let his emotions get away from him during the call—another source of irritation. Ultimately, however, he didn’t care what Birk thought. He owned the man.

  One sprinkler zone quit, and another squirted to life. Rydell put his free hand gingerly on his chest and took several measured breaths. There was a tightness inside, the kind that always accompanied the feeling that danger was closing in. If Hammond and the girl did learn too much, what then? He wondered again about disappearing sooner than planned. Was that possible? Realistic? Maybe. . . . Most of the pieces were in place now. Even his sick-day call had inadvertently created an advantage. He could do another tomorrow, tell Theresa he wanted to go to the doctor, just as a precaution. Ever faithful, she would cover for him. That would buy forty-eight hours, maybe seventy-two.

  But it wouldn’t be enough, not in the long run.

  What would happen if Hammond learned about Clemente and got the word out? And what if Clemente was still alive? Rydell wanted to tell himself there was no chance of this, but he didn’t fully believe it. Galeno Clemente was another one he had tragically underestimated. Even if he really was dead, if the public found out about him, the investigation would begin anew, and this time the media would be relentless. It was bad enough in years past, but now, with the power of the Internet and all regard for privacy relegated to history . . .

  And even if he did manage to escape, the fact that a high-ranking intelligence officer had suddenly disappeared would send the government into pandemonium. They would have no choice but to launch a massive investigation. And if they discovered my connection to the assassination . . .

  His phone twittered, jolting him out of his thoughts. He yanked it resentfully from his pocket, expecting to see Birk’s number on the caller ID. More whining, more excuses. This time Rydell wouldn’t worry so much about decorum. He would give Birk a tongue-lashing he’d never forget.

  All emotions came to a standstill when he found a different number on the tiny screen. It produced only a faint memory at first. Then he noted the location—New Jersey—and the pieces of the puzzle came together. The color drained from his face until he really did look ill. He closed his eyes and shook his head. Please tell me this is a wrong number.

  But it wasn’t, of course. Rydell mumbled a short run of profanities and considered letting the call go to voice mail. But that would only prolong the inevitable. This particular individual would keep trying until he got through.

  Rydell took a deep breath and unfolded the phone. “Yes.”

  There was no greeting from the other end, no “Hello” or “How are you?” The caller launched immediately into his own profanity-laced tirade, and he did so with such rage that Rydell was forced to hold the phone a few inches from his ear.

  “I have the situation under control,” Rydell replied. “Don’t be con—”

  “I am concerned. I am very concerned. The situation does not appear to be under control at all.”

  “I have someone on it right now. The problem will be taken ca—”

  “Your confidence is not being felt on this end. Not by any of us.”

  “It’ll be fine, believe m—”

  “It had better be, or you’ll have more trouble than you’ll know what to do with. Am I clear?”

  Rydell’s body stiffened. There was no instrument in existence that could measure how much he hated this man.

  “You’re clear,” he replied.

 
The line went dead.

  He stood there, phone in hand, for a long time. He thought more about his hatred for the man and for the way they were inextricably fused together. This bond would haunt him into eternity. He would pay for it forever, for something the four of them had done as very young men so many years ago—him, the man he had just spoken with, and two others. Four men who had craved power all their lives and yet were utterly powerless when it came to dissolving their baleful union. Through them, he was as trapped as it was possible to be.

  Or am I?

  For the first time, he began to wonder if this was irreversibly true.

  22

  HAMMOND SAT on the edge of the hotel bed with his eyes locked on the television, where a female MSNBC newsreader was reporting the latest with a photo of him in the corner of the screen. Noah was talking at the same time through the speaker of Hammond’s phone. Sheila, in a chair by the table, was reading a text message on her own phone and looking particularly distressed.

  “. . . Weldon of Reuters, the only journalist Jason Hammond will speak with, confirmed yesterday that the billionaire was, in fact, investigating the assassination of President John Kennedy based on new evidence he claims to have in his possession. Hammond admitted to Weldon that he was at the home of Professor Benjamin Burdick at the time of Burdick’s murder but said he had nothing to do with the shooting. In spite of this, he is still wanted by the authorities for questioning. Hammond stated that the killer was an unidentified assassin who also tried to kill him as well as a female friend whose involvement is still unclear. Based on an anonymous tip received by major news services earlier today, the woman is believed to be Michigan resident Sheila Marie Baker—” a second photo, a head shot of Sheila taken from her Facebook page, slid into the frame alongside Hammond’s—“who owns two gyms in her current hometown of Dearborn but spent her childhood in the Dallas suburb of Addison. . . .”