by Dan Simmons
I leaned on the railing. After a moment, Guest let out a long breath.
“I know I shouldn’t be talking like this, but you live up there at the finca, Lucas. Well, not right at the finca, but close. You’ve seen them. You know what I mean.”
I said nothing. Guest nodded as if I had agreed with him.
“A week or so before she left on her stupid Collier’s cruise,” whispered the other man, “Ernest asked me to go running with her… with Martha. It was when he was away with the boys during the first round of that pigeon shoot, and he didn’t want her to get lonely. So I ran with her. She can’t run worth shit. So I’d run half a mile ahead, then double back to her, then half a mile ahead, then back to make sure she was still moving… you know the drill.”
A gull flew over in the starlight. We both watched it. It made no noise. Guest raised a make-believe rifle and sighted on the gull until it disappeared beyond the Cubans’ shack.
“Anyway,” he whispered, “all of a sudden… one of these times when we’re running together for a few paces… she asks me what I thought of her choice of a husband. I said, ‘What do you mean? Do you mean what do I think of Ernest?’ And Gellhorn says, ‘No… I mean what do you think of my choice?’ And then she goes on—between panting like a dog ready to drop from exhaustion—she goes on to say that she’d picked Ernest mostly because he was a very good writer… ‘Not a great writer,’ she said, ‘but a very good one’… and he could certainly help her grow as a writer and help her career. ‘And,’ she said, ‘there’s always the money from the books he’s already written. That’s nice.’
“Well, Jesus, Lucas, you could have knocked me over with a feather. What a ball-breaker. What a tough, mercenary, self-serving bitch. To talk about Ernest like that in front of me. She didn’t imply that she loved him at all, do you know what I mean? Just that he could help her career. What a bitch.”
The millionaire’s whisper was getting louder. I could hear the emotion in his voice. I nodded toward the sleeping men. Hemingway was sleeping belowdecks forward, with the boys, but someone might hear at least the tone of Guest’s agitated whisper. I raised my eyebrow.
He nodded as if chastised and dropped his whisper to an almost inaudible level. “And besides, everyone in Havana and Cojímar… everyone except Ernest… knows that Martha’s been having an affair an with José Regidor.”
“El Canguro?” I whispered in surprise.
“Yeah,” said Guest. “The Kangaroo. That handsome jai alai player. Just Marty’s type. And Ernest’s good friend. That bastard. Oh, that bitch.”
I shook my head noncommittally, then whispered, “I’m going below. Unless you want me to relieve you now. It was a long day.”
Guest shook his head. “Patchi will be up in half an hour to take the watch.” He patted my shoulder clumsily. “Thanks, Lucas. Thanks for talking with me.”
“Sure,” I said, and slid noiselessly down the ladder.
THE NEXT MORNING we headed southeast, losing track of Cayo Confites and Cayo Verde astern, catching only a glimpse of the landmasses of Cayo Romano and then Cayo Sabinal to the south—both extensions of the mainland rather than true keys—and continuing along the edge of the Gulf beyond Punta Maternillos. The pig was driving us crazy. The animal was still in the Tin Kid, but squealing constantly now.
“Let me kill him and scald him and scrape him,” said Fuentes. “That will quiet him and calm our nerves.”
“I don’t want the mess right now,” said Hemingway, at the wheel in the cockpit. “And I don’t want to lay up so that you can do it in the dinghy.”
Fuentes shook his head. “I think that we will all be as crazy as that pig before we reach the caves.”
Hemingway nodded. “I have an idea.”
The Pilar swung north toward what appeared to be a white mirage floating in the blue sea. It was a small key—a fourth the size of Cayo Confites, its high point less than a foot above sea level. There was no reef and no real vegetation. No other land was in sight. I estimated that this key was about twenty-five miles from Confites and about twenty from the mainland.
“This is not on the charts,” said Guest.
Hemingway nodded again. “I know, but I marked it the last time we patrolled this area. It looks perfect for our purpose.”
“Our purpose?” said Guest.
Hemingway showed his teeth. “We need a pen for the pig.” To Fuentes, he said, “Go on aft, Gregorio. Take the Kid and el cerdo on up through the shallows and show him his new home. We’ll pick him up tonight or tomorrow morning on the way back.”
The boys laughed to watch the pig run to one end of the island, dip its trotters into the lapping surf, squeal, and then run to the other end.
“He won’t have anything to eat, Papa,” said Gregory. “Or to drink.”
“Watch,” said Hemingway. “I told Gregorio to cut open that coconut with his machete and fill one half with water so the pig does not suffer until we return. Then we will eat it tomorrow.”
“The coconut or the pig, Papa?”
“The pig,” said Hemingway.
We reached the suspected submarine caves in mid-afternoon. U.S. Naval Intelligence had sent us on this mission, and as was usual with Naval Intelligence, the mission was more joke than job. Hemingway put in at a local village on the mainland to see if they knew of any large coastal caves, and the people there said of course they did, that they were a famous Cuban tourist attraction. They appointed a boy about Santiago’s age to show us the way.
A mile down the coast, the boy showed us where to anchor, and with Fuentes staying aboard the Pilar, the rest of us took turns ferrying into a small cove. A weathered sign above the white spit of beach read in poorly spelled Spanish SEE THE SPECTACULAR CAVES—THE TENTH WONDERS OF THE NATURAL WORLD.
“La cuevas espectacular,” Hemingway muttered darkly to himself. His face was redder above his new beard than sunburn alone would explain. He was in a vile mood.
“The boy says that no tourists have come here since the war started,” said Guest. “The Germans could be using it.”
“Yes, Papa!” cried Gregory. “The cave is probably filled with food and ammunition.”
“I just hope there’s some fucking beer,” muttered Ibarlucia, whose mood was even darker than Hemingway’s.
We followed the boy and the faint path up the beach, through a tumble of rocks, and into the largest of several cavities in the cliff. Hemingway was carrying his .22 pistol in an old holster, Ibarlucia had one of the submachine guns from the boat, and Patrick carried his mother’s old Mannlicher .256. Standing just inside the cave entrance, we could see only rough rock floor that stretched away into total darkness, but echoes suggested that the cave was very large. A cool, damp breeze breathed out of the depths at us and felt very good after the long day in the sun and the heat.
“I brought a lantern,” said Roberto Herrera.
“We have flashlights!” cried Hemingway’s boys.
“It is not necessary,” said the little Cuban boy. “I will turn on the lights.”
“Lights?” said Hemingway.
Hundreds of colored bulbs came on. They were strung around the huge cave like Christmas lights, hanging from and between stalactites, arching over dark apertures, one string rising to the high point in the cave almost a hundred feet above us.
“Wow!” said Gregory.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” muttered Hemingway.
“Look, Papa,” called Patrick, running ahead. “You can see where it narrows way over there. That has to be it! That’s where the Germans have hidden their supplies. That probably leads to another giant tunnel. They wouldn’t leave their things out here!”
The Cuban boy did not know where this tunnel led, only that it was “much favored by lovers.” There were no electric lights there, so we lit lanterns and turned on flashlights and followed Patrick and Gregory for several hundred yards down a narrow, winding corridor. While pausing at one juncture, Sinsky cut his hand on a sharp rock. Gu
est had a handkerchief but could not stop the bleeding, so he, Sinsky, Herrera, and the Cuban boy headed back. “You bring out the German sausage and beer and we’ll picnic on the beach,” called Guest as he disappeared back up the narrow passage.
Patrick, Gregory, Hemingway, and I pressed on. I watched the back of the writer’s head as he ducked under rocks and stalactites, carrying the lantern, trying to keep up with his excited sons. At some places we had to crawl through the mud or over slick rock. At others we had to skirt pools that were either an inch deep or connected with the bottomless sea. And still the tunnel stretched on. We walked and crawled and squeezed through for what seemed like hours. Why was Hemingway doing this?
At that moment, I began to understand something about the man and the way he mixed reality and fantasy. Hemingway had seen war, and he knew what was coming. He knew that his oldest boy would certainly be in it—and quite possibly these younger ones as well if the conflict dragged on. The writer was giving his sons a taste of boyish adventure this last summer before the grim reality of war settled in on America. The Crook Factory, the sub patrols—it was all a way to restructure this terrible world war into something small and personal and romantic, with a dash of danger but very little of the mundane misery and terrible vulgarity and sickening tragedy of a real war.
Either that or he was nuts.
I felt a surge of anger then, but it was interrupted by Gregory. “Papa! Papa! It narrows here. It’s not as large as the forward overhead hatch on the Pilar! I bet this is the entrance to their secret storehouse!”
We crouched at the tiny opening. It was actually a little below the floor of the cave, a ramp of slick rock going down into darkness beneath the sharp bottom of a boulder. The boys were right about one thing… the main tunnel ended there.
“Can you fit into that, Lucas?” asked Hemingway, lying on his belly and playing one of the flashlight beams into the darkness. The narrow passage turned to the left in an even smaller aperture.
“No,” I said.
“I can, Papa!” cried Patrick.
“Me too!” said Gregory.
“All right, boys,” said Hemingway, handing the flashlight back to his youngest son. “Gigi, you’re the smallest, so you go first. Mouse, pull Gig out by the ankles if he gets stuck.”
“Can I carry the pistol, Papa?” said Patrick. The fourteen-year-old sounded out of breath.
“You’ll need your hands free to dig,” said Hemingway. “And it may get hung up in your back pocket. I’ll hand it down to you if you need it.”
The older boy looked disappointed but nodded.
Hemingway patted both boys on the back. “Go on to the end, boys—if there is one. Good luck. I know you won’t quit. You both know what it means if we find the depot.”
They both nodded, eyes bright in the lantern light, and then Gregory squeezed into the opening and disappeared. Patrick followed a few seconds later. Both boys made it through the first two tight places. Hemingway continued calling to them after they were out of sight, but only Patrick’s voice could be heard—faintly—echoing back up the narrow tunnel. Then there was silence.
The writer leaned back against the cave wall. I could see burst capillaries in his cheeks and nose—tiny hemorrhages that were not usually visible in the sunlight. He looked very happy.
“What if they get stuck?” I said softly.
He looked at me with a steady gaze. “Then I guess they’ve had it,” he said. “But I’ll put them in for a Navy Cross.”
I shook my head. It was the first time we had been alone together since I had received the two radio transmissions, but this did not seem like the right time to mention them. Hemingway had no trouble mixing his fantasy and reality, but I still liked to keep the two separate.
Ten minutes later there was a muffled noise from the passage and the soles of Patrick’s sneakers appeared. We helped pull the older boy back up the last bit of tunnel. A few seconds later, Gregory scuttled out backward. Both boys were covered with mud from head to foot. Gregory’s shorts were torn in a score of places. He had removed his plaid shirt and wrapped it around something bulky. The bundle clinked. In some places, blood from small scrapes mixed with the mud on Gregory’s chest and back, and both boys’ hands were a mess. They were very excited.
“Right at the end, Papa!” said the younger boy, his voice so loud that it echoed in the dark tunnel. “It was right at the end, too narrow even for me to crawl forward, and I thought that we’d failed… but then I found these!”
“He did, Papa! I helped him wrap them. We thought it was empty, but we found these!” Patrick’s voice was as excited as his younger brother’s.
Hemingway held the lantern closer as Gregory unwrapped the bundle with shaking fingers. “Good work, lads. Good work!” Hemingway’s voice was as excited as the boys’ voices. Suddenly I felt like an intruder, an adult stumbling into a boys’ universe.
“You did it, Gig! You did it!” Hemingway was saying, patting the boy on the back so fiercely that the ten-year-old could hardly untie his package. “Let’s see what you got!” said Hemingway.
Gregory pulled out four bottles, their brown glass visible through the patina of mud.
“They’re German beer bottles, Papa,” said Patrick, trying to wipe the grime off one. “We looked at them in the flashlight beam down there. They’re really German!”
Hemingway’s face had fallen as he took one of the bottles in his hand and held the lantern above it.
“They’ve been here, Papa!” Gregory was saying. “The krauts. We thought that the tunnel just ended, but then we found these. I mean, their main depot must be at the end of one of those other little tunnels that led off the main passageway. We can’t search them all today, but we can come back tomorrow morning! I’ll go into the narrow ones. I wasn’t afraid at all, Papa… not even when my shoulders got stuck and I had to wiggle but couldn’t go forward or back until Patrick pushed me hard. Really I wasn’t, Papa!”
Patrick was looking at his father’s expression. “They are German bottles, aren’t they, Papa? That one has a label still and the words are in German…”
Hemingway set the bottle down. “They’re German beer bottles, all right,” he said. “But made in the States by naturalized Germans. This one was brewed in Wisconsin. They were probably just tossed down there by picnickers. Tourists who came down this long tunnel for… something or the other.”
There was a silence broken only by the hiss of the lantern flame. Suddenly Gregory turned his face to the cave wall and burst into tears. His shoulders moved up and down in silent sobs. I could see Patrick biting his lip; the older boy was also crying. Hemingway looked like he was ready to cry any minute as well. He put his big hand on Gregory’s small shoulder. “You gave it your best shot, old man. I’m proud of you. In fact…”
Hemingway waited, but the boy kept his face turned away while he cried. Patrick looked up. “In fact, I’m recommending both of you for the Naval Cross for leading this expedition. And also…”
This time Gregory turned around. He was still crying softly, but he was listening.
“And also,” said Hemingway with a chuckle, “an eventual transfer to Naval Intelligence.”
THE CUBAN BOY TOOK HIS DOLLAR TIP—a fortune—and walked back to his village. We anchored in Spectacular Cave Cove that night. Hemingway authorized the opening of the Ethylic Department, and everyone was rationed three glasses of whiskey, even the boys. We built a large driftwood bonfire on the beach and made a serious dent in our provisions. We had not paused to catch any fish during our rush down the coast, so Fuentes laid out bread, canned beef, chilled chicken and sliced beef from the cooler, various vegetables, and freshly made potato salad. Hemingway ate several thick sandwiches of raw onion on dark rye bread, washed down by his ration of whiskey.
No one kept watch that night.
The next morning we detoured a few miles north to what the boys had named Cayo Cerdo to pick up our pig.
“Well, I’ll be g
oddamned,” said Hemingway.
“Our pig’s gone,” said Gregory.
“The bloody island is gone,” said Winston Guest.
The island was there, actually, only it was about three feet underwater—a nasty little sandbar more than twenty miles from the nearest land.
Gregory was studying the horizon with binoculars. “I wonder if Cerdo swam for it,” he said softly.
“Probably straight to the mainland,” said Hemingway. “Unless he went north and east instead of south and west.”
“I have seen this before,” muttered Fuentes. “This reef is high enough to hold the sand between the tides. But when the high tide comes… swisshh. Gone.”
“Poor Cerdo,” said Gregory.
“We should have left him with the Cubans,” said Sinsky.
“Fuck the Cubans,” said Hemingway. “Let’s skip Cayo Confites and make straight for home. We can’t go after the Southern Cross or anything else without the provisions that were supposed to be waiting for us at Confites. We’ll restock and head back out in a few days.”
“It will be a very long day and night for you at the wheel, Ernest,” said Guest.
Hemingway shrugged. Ibarlucia and the boys discussed what the here-now, gone-tomorrow island should be called on their revised chart. They settled on Cayo Cerdo Perdido—“Lost Pig Key.”
LATE THAT NIGHT, during the last stages of the approach to Cojímar, I had some time alone with Hemingway on the flying bridge. I pulled out the codebook and showed him the first intercepted transmission.
“God damn,” said the writer. “It’s definitely from the Southern Cross?”
“Same Abwehr code as Kohler’s,” I said.
Hemingway tied the wheel off and held the flashlight closer to steady the grid.