Midnight in Havana

by Peggy Blair

  “You did the right thing, Sophia. I was afraid I would end up working today. I have learned over time that what I most fear often happens. Radio that young officer back and patch him through, will you? And by the way, Feliz Navidad.”

  “Thank you, Inspector,” Sophia said, and then less certainly, given the circumstances, “I hope you and your family have a Merry Christmas as well.”

  Ramirez was undressed and scruffy with a light morning beard, but he was waking up rapidly. His plans for Christmas Day were shattered. There had been enough left of the chicken from last night’s dinner to invite his relatives back for a second time tonight. The dinner on Christmas Eve was the first meal with meat that he’d tasted in months. The disturbing nature of this call made it unlikely he would enjoy two.

  The line crackled as the dispatcher connected Espinoza and said goodbye.

  “Officer Espinoza?”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “You’ve done a good job so far. Now make sure you preserve and protect the scene and keep onlookers as far back as possible. Do you have any yellow barrier tape?” Ramirez hoped that Patrol had some. If they were out of tape, it could take months to find more.

  “I will call for some, sir.”

  “Good. I will be at the scene as soon as I get dressed. You are the officer in charge until then.” Ramirez could almost see the young man’s face break into a smile as the patrolman contemplated a day of real police work.

  A dead child. Ramirez wondered when the boy would drop by.

  NINE

  Mike Ellis woke up around five in the morning. His head cracked with pain. He didn’t realize that Hillary’s things were gone until he went into the bathroom to get a glass of water and an aspirin. For a split second, his adrenalin spiked at the thought that someone had broken into their hotel room.

  Then he remembered their argument. The way Hillary left him standing on the Malecón, arguing with himself. He walked back to the bed. Her side was empty, the pillowcase smooth.

  Damn. He pulled open the closet doors and the drawers. She had taken all her belongings except her birth control pills, which sat on the bathroom counter. Maybe that was deliberate. Her way of telling him sex between them was over, that she didn’t need to protect herself from his sperm any longer.

  The small combination safe in the closet was open. All the Cuban money in it was gone. Only his travellers cheques remained. The miserable bitch, he thought, incredulous.

  He straightened up too quickly and felt his head reel again. He went back to the bathroom sink and splashed some water on his face, looked at the horror in the mirror.

  His scars were an angry shade of red, even uglier and more raised than usual. He gulped down a glass of tap water, then another. His mouth had the taste of copper pennies; he couldn’t feel his lips.

  What the hell happened last night? After he got back to the hotel, Christmas Eve was mostly a blank. He wondered how much money it took him to get that drunk and hoped he had some left.

  He found his pants folded neatly on a chair by the desk, but he didn’t remember putting them there. He checked the pockets. Empty. Then he searched the pockets in his jacket, the floor, the desk, and the hotel safe again. Nothing. Where the hell is my wallet?

  That’s when he panicked. He thought of the woman from the bar. She took my fucking wallet.

  Ellis lay down again on the king-size bed and tried to remember the night before. Did she come to his room? Did they have sex? What if she had AIDS?

  But he recalled only vague images that lost more detail the longer he was awake. Nothing. His brain was as frozen as the right side of his face. He made it to the bathroom in time to throw up. My God, Mike, that was one helluva bender.

  No wife, no wallet, no identification, no money, and God only knew what other risks he’d exposed himself to. Here he was, stuck on an island in a communist dictatorship, unable to prove he was a Canadian if he had to. In a country where just being American was illegal.

  Shit. Shit. Shit. He’d have to cash his travellers cheques at the currency exchange wicket in the hotel when it opened and report his missing credit card to Visa. He tried to remember what else he’d lost besides his wallet and his wife. His health-care card, driver’s licence, passport. Some American money. Maybe some tourist pesos. His police ID.

  Shit. Double-shit. O’Malley would not be happy. His badge was in his wallet, and badges were supposed to be guarded as carefully as guns.

  He wasn’t sure how to replace his lost passport; didn’t even know if there was a Canadian embassy in Havana. The Foreign Affairs website recommended making a photocopy; he had one in his suitcase. He wasn’t sure if that would help, but until the government offices opened, there wasn’t much he could do.

  He stumbled when he got up, his legs wobbly beneath him. He showered, put on his jogging pants and a sweatshirt, tied on his running shoes. He’d started running years before, after he and Sloan became partners. Afraid that driving around in a patrol car every day would make him soft. He remembered the old joke: a hard man is good to find.

  He took the back stairs to the hotel exit and walked up Agremonte towards the Malecón until his legs felt more steady, then turned left and began a slow jog towards the centre of town. Some of his sluggishness ebbed away as he regained control of his feet. He pounded along the seawall. There was a light breeze and he eased into the rhythm of the run.

  He stopped just shy of the tall medical towers, the centre of Cuba’s plastic surgery business. A dozen or more police cars blocked the seaway. The sidewalk crawled with at least twenty policemen, although it was still too early in the morning for rubberneckers, as they called gawkers back home. He saw technicians in white overalls. A small man kneeled next to a body on a tarp. He wondered if someone had drowned.

  Ellis thought of asking one of the policemen how to report his stolen wallet, but he didn’t want to get in the way if they were dealing with a death, and he wasn’t sure if anyone spoke English anyway. As he swung back towards the Parque Ciudad, it occurred to him that Miguel could probably tell him what to do.

  TEN

  Inspector Ramirez called his subordinate, Detective Rodriguez Sanchez, at home. He heard the fatigue in his colleague’s voice and immediately knew that Sanchez had been up late the night before as well.

  “Merry Christmas, Rodriguez. I am sorry to wake you, but it appears we have to work today.” He briefed the younger man about the situation. They punctuated their words with failed attempts to stifle yawns as both tried to feed oxygen to their tired brains.

  Although only in his early thirties and a relative newcomer to the Major Crimes Unit, Sanchez was Ramirez’s best investigator. Ramirez had recently assigned Sanchez to the sex tourism websites that had started to show up in their monitoring of internet transmissions to and from the outside world. Given the hours Sanchez spent involved in virtual policing, Ramirez thought he might actually enjoy being involved in a real-life, down-to-earth, homicide investigation again. Even one so early in the morning.

  “You still have contacts at the airport, Rodriguez?”

  “Yes, of course. I was just there last week.”

  “Good. Then I need you to go back and check the registries. This man, Señor Ellis, had to disclose where he was staying when he checked through Customs. I want the name of his hotel. Get copies of the surveillance tapes from when he first cleared Customs as well. Oh, and Rodriguez, check the dogs, will you?”

  “I have a car today, but no fuel. I will take a bus, or hitchhike. Faster than waiting for someone from Patrol to pick me up.”

  Ramirez sighed. The fuel shortages were a problem for the whole division. They managed by rotating cars and using whatever other transportation they could find.

  Sanchez had no personal car. If he had run out of fuel rations for his police car for December, he couldn’t get more until January 1. Ramirez wondered what would happen if all the Havana police cars ran out of fuel. Slow-speed foot chases? He might have to find his m
en bicycles.

  It was another reason he assigned Sanchez to computer work; Sanchez could do it from the office. Few government buildings, other than theirs, had authorized internet connections. Some of the higher-end hotels, like the Hotel Nacional, had internet access, but only for foreign tourists. Otherwise, with limited exceptions, the internet was illegal in Cuba.

  “Call Dispatch when you finish at the airport and ask Sophia to send a car to pick you up. I’ll wait for you at the scene. Later today, trade cars with someone else on the squad: you’ll need one.”

  “Half an hour,” Sanchez said, and hung up.

  Ramirez shaved quickly, then dressed in his patrol blues. He always wore his blue-and-grey uniform to crime scenes. There was a pragmatic reason for this. Ramirez could get his uniforms laundered at government expense, but not his suits. Dry cleaners were for turistas only. Besides, Francesca had scolded him when he was first appointed to head up the Major Crimes Unit and came home with stains on his clothing of somewhat dubious origin. “I have no laundry soap, Ricardo,” she said sharply, “and I am not a technician. I prefer not to clean up your crime scenes.”

  His wife would be distinctly unhappy to know how many of his crime scenes followed Ramirez home. But he made a point from then on of wearing his uniform at such times and discovered that his men liked it, too. It made him seem like one of them instead of their superior.

  Ramirez kissed his sleepy wife goodbye and apologized for having to leave. “I will be home as soon as I can. I promise to make this up to you when this case is completed. Please put aside some chicken for me if any is left, will you?”

  His daughter and young son were asleep, arms splayed out across each other in their bed. He kissed each of them lightly, afraid of waking them up. They would have to open their gifts without him. He hoped they enjoyed their small presents. He had done his best to find them toys, never easy with the embargo.

  ELEVEN

  Inspector Ramirez arrived on the Malecón to find Hector Apiro kneeling beside a small body on a plastic tarp. The dead man walked closely behind him, a worried look on his face, perhaps concerned that the investigation of his own death would be delayed by this tragedy. Ramirez gave him a look to let him know that, yes, the child was his immediate priority.

  The dead man backed away, twisting his hat in his hands, but he lingered, nervous and expectant, the way a teenage girl might wait by the phone.

  “Merry Christmas, Hector,” Ramirez said to the pathologist. He wondered how Apiro had celebrated Christmas Eve.

  Even though Apiro was Ramirez’s closest friend, Ramirez had never been to his apartment and Apiro had never accepted an invitation to his, not even to join them for last night’s festivities. The small man lived alone. He once told Ramirez he never expected to marry.

  “I allowed myself to imagine, years ago, that I might find love someday. I got over that illusion quickly. There was a patient. It was stupid of me. You can imagine the ethical complications, Ricardo, even if she had felt the same way. That’s the only real problem with being a dwarf, you know, once you get past the height issues. One’s dreams, even shattered, aren’t as small as others might think.”

  Ramirez knew Apiro would spend all Christmas Day processing the crime scene and the child’s remains, making sure the evidence was rock solid.

  The small man looked up and smiled. “And Merry Christmas to you, Ricardo. How was your dinner last night?”

  “Very good. I had almost forgotten what chicken tasted like.”

  “Ah, chicken. I remember 1998, when the Pope came to Havana. Castro found everyone a chicken that Christmas. I wondered if Castro was a babalao. Because there were no chickens anywhere before the Pope’s visit, yet Castro found thousands.”

  Ramirez chuckled. A babalao was a high-ranking Santería priest, a magician who offered animal sacrifices as part of his dark magic. Castro had indeed pulled chickens from thin air.

  “Tell me, Hector, which one of those men is Espinoza? I put him in charge of the crime scene this morning.”

  “He’s the young one over there.” Apiro pointed towards a policeman, hardly more than twenty, who looked both proud and apprehensive at the same time.

  “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

  Ramirez walked over to the stocky patrolman, who was attempting to make himself look taller by standing on the balls of his feet. “Officer Espinoza? You did well today.”

  “Thank you, Inspector.” The young man blushed. He handed Ramirez a clear plastic exhibit bag containing the wallet and the Canadian passport. “Inspector Ramirez,” Espinoza added, an undercurrent of excitement in his voice, “I believe I have identified the deceased.”

  Ramirez smiled somewhat to himself. Calling victims “the deceased” was the way that new officers distanced themselves from the dead. But in his world, the dead were not distant at all. He glanced at the seawall, where the dead man lifted his hand in the air hesitantly, trying to catch the inspector’s attention.

  Espinoza explained that he had radioed the other officers who worked foot patrol in Old Havana while he waited for Ramirez to arrive.

  “I asked if any of them saw a Cuban boy of eight or nine years, dressed in red shorts with a small pattern, either this morning or last night. Officer Lopez said he would check the Ferris wheel—it is a magnet for children around here. He just radioed me to say that the ride operator is in the process of opening up the park. He says the man seems very nervous.”

  Not surprising, thought Ramirez. Most Cubans were frightened by a visit by the police.

  “Perhaps he is concerned that the presence of the policía will deter potential customers. What did Lopez find out?”

  “There was a boy dressed in red shorts that ran around with a small gang of boys yesterday. Chasing after tourists for money.”

  “Have Lopez take a statement, will you?”

  “Already done, sir.”

  “Good. Did the witness know the boy’s name?”

  “No, sir. But one of the officers who usually stands in front of the Palacio de los Marqueses de Aguas Claras stopped some boys in the late afternoon and warned them to be less aggressive with tourists. He remembers one had a yellow shirt and red shorts with a white print. He recorded his name in his notebook and threatened to contact the boy’s parents if he didn’t stop bothering the extranjeros. It could be the same boy.”

  “It probably is.”

  Ramirez recorded Espinoza’s badge and section number in his notebook and considered having him transferred to his own section. Foot patrol officers who could think independently were as rare as chickens. Most were nearly brain-dead with boredom.

  He thanked the young patrolman, then picked up his radio and had Dispatch contact Detective Sanchez.

  “Rodriguez, I need you to do one more thing before you come here,” Inspector Ramirez said. “Get in touch with Interpol, will you? I want a criminal record check on Señor Ellis.”

  Ramirez pulled his daughter’s crumpled drawing out of his pocket and provided Sanchez with the Canadian’s full name and date of birth. He was glad he had managed to find a pen. Finding a pencil could take years.

  “Tell me, is that Señor Rivero, the fisherman?” Ramirez inclined his head to a gnarled man in his late sixties or seventies who stood nearby, a metal bait can at his feet. The man looked shaken and somewhat bewildered.

  “Yes. I asked him to wait, in case you had any questions.”

  Ramirez walked over to Rivero. The older man was shaking. From wading into the cold water, no doubt, but likely also from his find. A child’s body was not what Rivero got up so early that morning to catch.

  Words poured from the old man like water. “When I saw the bright red fabric puffed out with air in the current, I thought that someone lost a jacket. It looked like a flower, blooming in the waves. Then I saw a small brown hand floating above the water and realized what it was.”

  The fisherman’s knees were bleeding, scraped on the jagged rocks as he dragg
ed the boy’s body from the water. His face was ashen. He was clearly in shock. Ramirez put his arm around the man’s shoulder and gently escorted him to Apiro.

  “Thank you, Señor Rivero, for everything you have done here. Believe me, it is much appreciated.”

  “There was nothing I could do.” The man shook his head, his eyes red from tears. “He was already dead. So small, just a boy.”

  “Hector, can you put a bandage on that knee for Señor Rivero? And if you have a thermos with you, I think Señor Rivero could use a coffee to warm him up.”

  Apiro nodded and smiled at the man kindly as he reached into his kit. Ramirez knew he would make sure Rivero had a shot of rum before he left as well. “Dr. Apiro will take care of your injuries. Is there anything else we can do for you?”

  “No, Inspector, thank you.”

  “Let’s hope the rest of your day is less upsetting. But you should feel very proud of the way you behaved today; you did well to brave the cold water.”

  Many Cubans would have walked the other way when they saw the body in the water. Afraid they would be blamed somehow for the child’s death.

  Ramirez looked more closely at the child’s body. The boy was shirtless, malnourished, like so many Cuban children. Ribs poked through his skin. His right eye was heavily bruised.

  Apiro gently turned the boy over. There were flat purple bruises on his back. He used his gloved hands to pull down the boy’s shorts and underpants.

  “Look here,” he said, pointing out injuries to the rectum, small tears.

  “Rape?”

  “At this age, not likely to be consensual,” the doctor murmured. “There was a strong degree of force involved in this assault. It would have been very painful for this child to sit down for some time, excruciating to go to the bathroom.”

  “Do you know how he died?”

  “I can’t say yet for sure, but based on this,” Apiro pointed to some swelling at the back of the head, “I would guess he was hit with something hard.”