Cuba Libre

by Elmore Leonard

  Virgil picked a spot by the after turret on the port side, swung his hammock from the forward side of the turret to an engine-room skylight he managed to hook on to. He was ready to climb in the sack when he realized he was missing something important: the three-foot notched board he'd wedge across one end of the hammock, where he'd lay his head, to keep it spread open. Otherwise it was like sleeping in a cocoon. Virgil slipped below to the crew's berth, forward, but couldn't find his board anywhere, goddamn it; he was pretty sure some swabbie, trying to be funny, had hidden it. And it was too late now to go to the ship's carpenter shop, find the right piece of board, cut it to size and notch it. Shit. He had in mind to look for a swabbie already asleep and swipe his board. But it could end in trouble, and he'd already done 10 days' bread and water this cruise for fighting. As he went back topside three bells sounded. It was 9:30.

  Two officers at the rail, aft of the turret, were watching a steam launch as it swung wide around the stern and headed for the Havana docks. Both officers were smoking cigs. Virgil remembered this, the smell of tobacco and their comments, wondering who the launch belonged to and where it had come from. There were boats out there all day long: bum boats coming alongside to sell different kinds of fruit and sweets; gigs and lighters chasing around the harbor like taxis with cargo or passengers; but hardly any this late.

  When Virgil finally rolled into the sack the canvas curled around him and there was nothing he could do about it. Again he considered looking for a board, but then thought, hell, count the stars and go to sleep. Except there weren't any stars, not with that layer of clouds up there. Christ, but he wished he had a board. You didn't have one, there was no way to sleep on your side in a hammock without suffocating to death. Virgil told himself to quit complaining. He closed his eyes, hearing very faintly rumba music coming across the water from Havana, three hundred yards to port.... The explosion--the way it came there was no getting ready for it. It was like it burst in his head, deafened him, in that moment shattering all sense of where he was until he felt the ship heave and shudder beneath him and saw the bow rise from the water like it was climbing out of the trough of a storm wave. He could see it, the bow a good three hundred feet from him in the air, in smoke rising so thick the bow was hidden now, though he could see pieces of the ship bursting in the smoke, flying into the night sky like rockets, and bodies. Christ, men, blown out of the fo'c'sle, and he felt the ship heave again as the bow came down to settle in the water, listing to port and swinging his hammock close to the rail. He heard screams now of men in pain and screams for help, the sound of the screams clear and then dying out, fading, a quiet settling, and he became aware of a faint whistling-hissing sound, air being forced out of the ship by the water rising inside her. Virgil breathed to calm himself, thinking, you have to get out of here, out of the goddamn hammock and over the side, swim for that steamship only about a hundred yards away, the City of Washington.... And the second explosion rocked the Maine amidships, the towering twin smokestacks vanishing from Virgil's sight, gone, the superstructure gone, in that moment erupting in a blaze of light, the ship bursting, ripped apart, and Virgil felt himself lifted from the deck, hammock still around him, blown into the cloud of smoke, stunned, his head ringing so loud it was all he heard, blown into the hot sky, an oven, and then falling through smoke to hit the water, the surface on fire, Virgil still wrapped in his canvas shroud.

  He was picked up a good fifty yards from the ship, taken from his scorched hammock, both ends burned away, and laid in the bottom of a lifeboat among bodies gathered from the water. He knew this. He could smell burnt flesh. He was on his side, close to a lifeless face without hair or eyebrows staring at him, a fireman he believed he recognized, a fireman or one of the coal passers. He'd seen him in the head washing, the same one who'd been playing an accordion that evening in the starboard gangway. Virgil tried to move but couldn't, wedged in among the dead, below him and on both sides. He could hear voices, the sailors aboard the lifeboat talking to each other. He wanted to yell to one of them, Hey, mate, I ain't dead. But, Christ, he couldn't speak. Couldn't move or speak.

  They hauled him up a ladder, not too gentle about it, and laid him out with the dead bodies on a varnished wood deck, close by a row of chairs with leg rests, and left him. He could hear voices and wanted to call out, Sweet Jesus, somebody, look at me, will you? Don't slide me over the side blowing taps till you take a look at me. Feel my goddamn pulse. Finally-how much later he wasn't sure, it was still dark--he felt the toe of a shoe nudge him and heard a voice say, "I think this one's still alive."

  The evening of the second day he closed his eyes and opened them and closed them again sighing with relief, saying, "Thank you, Jesus," and in the morning when he woke up he was able to move his head, his hands, his feet.... He cleared his throat, pretty sure he could talk, and the nurse ran out before he could say anything and returned with the doctor who had said yesterday he'd been blown senseless. So the first words Virgil spoke after his experience were to the doctor. He said, "I think somebody set off a mine," and told about the launch running full-out away from the ship just before the explosion. After that he asked how many were killed and if Captain Sigsbee was all right. The nurse told him Clara Barton stopped by his bed to see him and asked him his name.

  Virgil said, "Oh, is that right?" trying to think of who Clara Barton was.

  They got him up on his feet. Virgil walked to the end of the ward and back past empty beds, seeing not one of his shipmates here. The nurse, holding on to him, said he was the only one in this ward who had survived. Virgil had to lie down again, dizzy from the exertion. The doctor told him to be patient, he was lucky to be alive.

  That night a man in a light gray military uniform came to see him, sat at his bedside in the dark and smoked cigarettes as he asked Virgil questions, never taking off his hat. Virgil didn't know if he was Spanish or Cuban. The man asked Virgil about his experience and listened with a grave manner, saying, "Oh, that must have been terrible."... "Oh, you are so brave."... "Oh, you were fortunate to sleep on deck." Finally asking about the launch Virgil saw before the explosion.

  "Did you get a good look at it?"

  "I've seen plenty like it," Virgil said. The harbor was full of them. "What do you call those boats, falucas?"

  "Yes, but this particular onemif you saw it again, could you identify it?"

  Virgil hesitated. "Are you investigating the explosion?" "Assisting with it, yes."

  "Are Americans investigating too?"

  "Oh yes, we both are. What we like to know, if you saw a person on the boat you believe you can identify."

  Virgil barely saw the launch, much less anyone aboard. Still, he didn't like this guy asking him questions in the dark and he said, "Since I'm American, I better wait and talk to the Americans investigating it."

  "What's the difference? We all want to find out what happen."

  The man speaking with a strained sound to his voice now, Virgil sensing the guy would like to scream at him and shake him and was holding on to his temper.

  "I'll talk to the Americans," Virgil said.

  The man in the dark said, "You want to make this difficult, uh? Is that what you want?"

  Virgil said, "You want to know what you can do with your questions?"

  His mysterious visitor got up and left.

  When the nurse came to check on him, Virgil asked her who that guy in the uniform was. She said he didn't tell her his name and probably wouldn't if she asked him. She said, "They have an ugly disposition, those people. They like to make your life miserable."

  Virgil asked her who she was talking about. Who's they?

  The nurse said, "The Guardia Civil. They're like police, only worse."

  Later that night Virgil woke up as two guys in uniform were pulling him out of bed. He said, "Hey, what's going on?" smelling ether. One of them said something in Spanish and a third one stepped in and pressed a cloth to Virgil's face. This was all he'd remember of his last night i
n San Ambrosio.

  Chapter Four.

  AND RES PALENZUELA, CHIEF OF municipal police for the city of Havana, received a telephone call informing him of an American named Tyler who arrived today at Regla with horses and cattle. Palenzuela assigned an investigator by the name of Rudi Calvo to follow the American, see if he was here for a reason other than the livestock. This Ben Tyler appeared to be a drover, he told Rudi Calvo, but who knows? He could be an agent of the United States government. Rudi Calvo asked who it was wanted to know about the American. His chief said, "Guardia Civil, Lionel Tavalera."

  "Him?" Rudi Calvo said. "Why doesn't he use his own people?"

  "Who knows? Maybe they're busy somewhere torturing children."

  "But why is it his business?"

  "The American brought thirty horses to sell," Palenzuela said, "but according to the custom declaration paid duty on only ten, eight hundred fifty pesos instead of twenty-five hundred."

  "So?" Rudi Calvo said. "Why is that his business?" "Whatever his reason," Palenzuela said, "he's Guardia Civil. You must know it's their business to know everyone's business."

  At 9:00 P.M. Rudi Calvo came to the home in the Vedado suburb of Havana where Palenzuela kept his American mistressmher name was Lorraine--and entertained close friends. Rudi sat with his chief in the front courtyard of the house to give his report.

  "From the ferry dock the subject went directly to the Hotel Inglaterra, where he registered and left his belongings, a bedroll and a saddle. He spent almost two hours in the bar among the newspaper correspondents before going out again. His associate, the one named Burke, remained."

  He had caught Palenzuela getting dressed for the evening, suspenders hanging, buttoning his shirt, a collar not yet attached, the chief's mind apparently on something else, the reason he said, "Who?"

  "Charlie Burke," Rudi said, always patient with his chief, and explained that they already had a file on Burke, a dealer.in cattle who had been here several times before. "The subject went out again accompanied by Victor Fuentes and proceeded to la Habana Vieja, where they dined in a cafe and then visited stores, selecting new clothes for the subject. Shirts, trousers, a suit coat, good boots and a very fine panama." "He bought a suit?" Palenzuela said. "Only the coat, a black one." "Expensive?"

  "I believe alpaca."

  "Where did he go for the boots?"

  "Naranjo y Vazquez."

  "They're all right, but not the best."

  "He removed his spurs from the old boots and put them on the new ones."

  "Why? If he wasn't riding?"

  "No, I think because he's used to wearing them. Or he likes to hear himself walk."

  "A cowboy," Palenzuela said. "And where did he buy his hat?"

  "Viadero's."

  "Of course."

  "He put on the clothes, the black suit coat and pants the color of sand, or perhaps more of a cinnamon shade." "How did it look?"

  "Elegant, with a white shirt and a kerchief of a light blue shade, the kerchief his own."

  Palenzuela said, "Hmmmm," nodding. "I like a kerchief sometimes."

  "He had something he brought with him wrapped in newspaper," Rudi Calvo said. "I had been wondering, what is that he's carrying? Well, he unwrapped it now in the store. It was a revolver, I believe a Smith & Wesson.44, the one with the spur beneath the trigger guard for the second finger."

  "The.44 Russian," Palenzuela said, "originally designed for a grand duke. I have a pair."

  "He carried it," Rudi said, "in a shoulder holster."

  "If he isn't a spy," Palenzuela said, "he could be an assassin."

  "He put on the holstered pistol beneath the suit coat and stood in front of a mirror to look at himself this way and that, pausing to adjust the hat, getting a slight but very smart curve to the brim. He stood there it seemed for several minutes." "Admiring himself."

  "Perhaps, though it seemed more as if he was surprised at his appearance, not used to seeing himself dressed this way."

  "Or to see if the revolver was noticeable," Palenzuela said.

  "I can't believe the customhouse would allow him to have it."

  "I'm sure he didn't declare it," Rudi said, "and because he was with Fuentes they didn't search him."

  "Yes, Fuentes would handle it," Palenzuela said. "Then what?"

  "The subject returned with Fuentes to the Inglaterra, to the hotel bar where the other one, Burke, was drinking with one of the newspaper correspondents."

  "Which one?"

  "Neely Tucker, of Chicago."

  "Is he an important one?"

  "Not as important as the ones with the New York papers.

  If you aren't certain how important they are, ask them. This Neely Tucker has gone into the country a few times. He wrote about visiting General Gomez, but I don't believe he's a spy."

  "Is he the one who said Gomez looks like an Egyptian mummy?"

  "I believe that was the correspondent who wrote Facts and Fakes about Cuba, a very popular book in America. Did you read it?"

  "Why would I?"

  "It's very good. It tells how much of the war news is made up in Tampa and Key West, the correspondents too lazy to come here."

  "Or afraid," Palenzuela said.

  "Yes, and write stories from communiquSs they receive. Skirmishes become battles."

  "Well, soon we won't have to worry about the correspondents, the ones here will be going home."

  "Why is that?"

  "Why? Because we'll be at war. The Americans have an excuse now, the ship blowing up."

  "Did we do it?" Rudi said.

  "Who do you mean we? We can be we with the Spanish when it suits us, but not when they blow up an American battleship."

  "Did they?" "How do I know? They don't tell me things like that and I don't ask."

  "It could have been accidental, a fire."

  "If you want to believe that. Anyway," Palenzuela said, "perhaps the horses are the only business of this Ben Tyler. The customhouse said his bill of sale is to Senor Boudreaux."

  The American planter, the same Senor Roland Boudreaux who had presented Andres Palenzuela with a matched pair of palominos for his carriage and had been to this house with his own American mistress, who was a good friend of the police chief's American mistress.

  "And the other one, Burke," Rudi said, "has sold cattle to Senor Boudreaux. I believe livestock is their only business." Rudi paused. "At least it would seem to be so."

  Palenzuela had learned to listen to Rudi Cairo and trust him, since it was necessary to trust at least someone.

  "But what?"

  "Several times I noticed the same individual, an officer of the regular army, lingering in the vicinity, on one street and then another, twice in the same shop we were in but trying not to show himself in a conspicuous way."

  "Lingering," Palenzuela said. "Not simply loitering, passing the time."

  "I could be mistaken," Rudi said, "but I was given the feeling, from his manner, we were both observing the same subject."

  "He was following the American?"

  "I believe so."

  "Do you know this officer?"

  "He's with a hussar regiment, one of those peacocks in the bright uniform, Lieutenant Teobaldo Barban."

  "Why is that name familiar?"

  A woman's voice came from somewhere in the house, in English. "Will you be much longer?"

  Rudi watched Palenzuela look up at the ceiling. "We are nearly finished."

  "We don't want to be late."

  "No, we won't be."

  Rudi waited to see if the woman kept here was satisfied with that reply from the chief of the municipal police of the city of Havana. She seemed to be, having nothing else to say, so Rudi sakf, "You want to know why the name Teobaldo Barban is familiar. He's the officer who enjoys fighting duels." Palenzuela nodded. "I remember now, easily insulted." "And from what I understand," Rudi said, "it's difficult not to insult him. Barban is Madrilefio, from a good family. In the time he's been here he's cal
led out three men to satisfy his honor."

  "Other officers?"

  "Cubans of class, not military. He didn't hesitate to shoot each one through the heart."

  "On the beach at dawn?"

  "On the Prado at dawn, before the statue of Queen Isabella."

  "God protect us from patriots," Palenzuela said. Again the woman's voice: "Andres, are you ready?"

  "Am I ready," the chief said, not to Rudi Calvo, maybe to himself.

  Chapter Five.

  THE WHORES IN HAVANA FUENTES said to Tyler, won't take money from the common Spanish soldier, the sol dado raso, who's paid next to nothing. What they do, they charge one hundred Mauser cartridges to go to bed with them, which to the soldier is like getting it for nothing. Fuentes said the whores gave the cartridges to the insurrectos and this was one of the ways they got bullets for their Mausers, the rifles they took from Spanish soldiers they killed. Tyler said, "You know it for a fact?"

  "Maybe not asking so many bullets," Fuentes said, "but it happens, yes."

  The soldiers were in every street, in groups or pairs, boys in blue-striped seersucker and straw hats with regimental badges, like tourists taking in the sights of the city. Many of these boys, Fuentes said, from Andalusia and the Canary Is lands. The somewhat older men in light gray uniforms were Guardia Civil. They stood about with thumbs hooked in their black leather belts waiting to be noticed, or daring you to look them in the face. That was the feeling Tyler got seeing them again on the street and remembering how they would ride into the mill looking for a fugitive--a man who might have committed only a minor crimemransack the workers' living quarters, chase down suspects and sympathizers and beat them. They threatened to shoot his dad one time, when he tried to keep them off the mill property.

  They walked past a pair of Guardia posing on a street corner and Tyler said to Fuentes, "My dad called them barbarians, thugs, I forgot what else. What do you call them?"

  "Usually," Fuentes said, "I call them sir. The Guardia are known for their loyalty, devotion to duty and lack of feelings. Imagine an insensitive brute having absolute power over people he considers his inferiors. Since they see themselves as infallible, I have no reason to antagonize them."