Havana Black Read online

  Before entering his cubicle, the Count took a deep breath and surveyed his appearance: blue jeans mudstained from bottoms to knee, shoes that might be any colour from brown to black and his shirt, spattered with earth, had lost a button. But he went in without knocking and smiled, as if he were very happy, when he saw the faces of Miriam and Fermin turn round to look at him.

  “And you can tell me now . . .” Fermín began aggressively, and the Count was quick to squash him.

  “I can tell you lots and lots of things, and you and your sister can tell me lots too. To begin with, I can tell both of you that you are officially under arrest and investigation for homicide. Your status,” he pointed to Miriam, “will be communicated to the North American consulate, so no need to worry about that. As you see, you are under arrest until your innocence is proven or you rot in a jail,” and he looked at the ex-convict Fermín Bodes, and noticed he flinched slightly as he acknowledged what the notion of rotting in a jail might mean. “Got that clear?”

  “But why now?” asked Miriam, and the Count saw her eyes didn’t have their usual glint.

  “On suspicion of murdering Miguel Forcade . . . Because for starters, I now know what your husband came to Cuba for . . . And right now we are investigating the authenticity and value of a gold Buddha that was buried under the patio of your house.”

  “A gold Buddha?” Miriam’s surprise seemed real and Fermín’s silence in keeping with his style.

  The Count averted his gaze, and lit up.

  “You didn’t know? A Buddha more than a thousand years old weighing in at thirty pounds of gold? A statue worth several million dollars?”

  “I didn’t know, no, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she denied, her eyelashes fluttering for a reason the Count couldn’t pin down: fear, confusion, or disappointment, perhaps. The policeman tried to be credulous and believe the woman to be in nervous shock at the confiscated fortune he’d told her about. But he pulled the rug . . .

  “Miriam, I can’t believe you didn’t know. Please, stop telling me lies; I can’t stand liars, and even less those who play me for a sucker.”

  “But I didn’t know . . .” she insisted, tears about to fall from her eyes, as she tried to get her brother’s attention. “What’s this man talking about, Fermín? What Buddha is it?”

  “Tell her, Fermín,” suggested the Count, and the man glared: his eyes firing classic sparks of hatred as he said, “It must be something worth a lot of money that your idiot husband wanted to take out of Cuba. But I didn’t know what it was or where it was.”

  “Do you think I’m going to believe that?”

  Fermín bared his fangs once again and seemed to recover some of his poise.

  “You can think whatever you want, but that’s the truth: I never found out what it was or where it was . . . I’ve just found out from you.”

  “My God, a gold Buddha, gold . . .” whispered Miriam, but the Count preferred to scrutinize the man and thought he might be telling the truth. It would be in keeping with his character and that of his partners if Miguel had kept his secret to the end, as the best defence against a possible betrayal that might snatch his fortune away. But any excuse was likely from those professional liars, he told himself, fearing now that neither was Miguel Forcade’s murderer and that the case might be slipping from his grasp once more. Then he decided to change tactic, hoping he might glean a grain of truth.

  “Let’s see,” he suggested, looking from one to the other, until his gaze settled on Fermín. “If you didn’t know what your brother-in-law was after in Cuba and you didn’t kill him, you are free of any charges. It is no crime to plan a secret exit from the country. And as for you, Miriam, if you didn’t know about the gold Buddha either and you simply accompanied your husband to Cuba, you haven’t done anything heinous either and you can go and cry in Miami as soon as all this is cleared up. But listen for a moment: if you want me to believe this, you will need to have something really convincing to tell me and I don’t think either of you is about to spill that kind of story, or are you?”

  “When Miguel stayed in Spain, the idea was that my sister and I would leave later in a boat. I was to find the money to buy the motor, the launch and everything we needed and Miguel would send a letter telling me where he had hidden something that would make the three of us rich. And although Miguel was always a tricky customer, I knew he wasn’t going to pull a fast one: we’d known each other a long time, we’d worked together and he’d trusted me enough to tell me that he was going to stay in Madrid when he came back: and that was something so serious most people wouldn’t even tell their shadow; not even Miriam could have known. But it was then I had that problem and was jailed. Afterwards Miguel told me he almost went mad when he found out, although he had no choice but to wait and what he did was to take Miriam out of Cuba with a visa he’d got from Panama. As you can imagine, the ten years I was inside felt like five hundred, because I knew that if I’d been outside, if I’d got to the United States, I could be living the life of a millionaire, because whatever Miguel wanted to get out of Cuba had to be worth millions: you can’t imagine some of the things that passed through his hands, and whatever it was must have been much more valuable than anything he had in his house. In order to resist without going mad I spent ten years doing exercises and behaving like a model prisoner, so as to earn the right to a reduction in my sentence, until they finally released me three months ago. Then I called Miguel and he told me that as soon as they gave him the humanitarian visa he’d requested he’d get on a plane and come to help me organize my departure again. And that’s what he did. When he got here we sat underneath the oleander in the patio of his house and he told me he’d brought enough money for me to buy a launch and for us to leave Cuba with whatever it was that was worth millions. I asked him what it was and he told me it was something very close by and worth at least five million dollars, but he couldn’t tell me until everything was ready. It was then I suggested we find a third person to help. I explained that as I’d been inside and because of the precautions being taken after they’d caught police involved in drug trafficking and more besides, I might not have much freedom of movement and it would be safer if someone else was responsible for getting the launch, motor and whatever else was needed. On top of that, I reminded him it was a risky business crossing the Straits of Florida alone, however good the boat. He was convinced by the argument about crossing the sea solo, and although he didn’t like the idea of involving somebody else we reached an agreement: the value of what I was going to take out would be shared out at fifty per cent for him, forty per cent for me and ten per cent for the man I contracted. If what he told me was true, I’d still be getting some two million dollars and I wasn’t bothered about giving half a million to someone else. We were agreed and I told him who I was thinking of: Adrian Riverón . . . I knew they’d had their quarrels a time ago; I was also sure he was the only person I could trust, because I’ve known him almost since he was born, and he was Miriam’s first boyfriend. Also, as a lad he’d been a rower and he’d lived for a while in Guanabo, he knew something about sailing and had friends on the beach who would get him a good yacht. Miguel really didn’t like the idea, because of the rivalries over Miriam, and Miguel was always jealous of Adrian. And there was also the business of the dirty tricks he played on Adrian to get him out the way when they were working in Planning. You know about that? Well, Miguel wrote a report saying Adrian was a Catholic and wasn’t to be trusted. And a statement like that, signed by him, was enough to disappear anyone in this country. They sent him off to Moa, as was the custom then, to be purified among the workingclass. And he knew Adrian hadn’t forgotten that, as he hadn’t forgotten Miriam either. Precisely for that reason I even thought if he was given the possibility of being near her, in the United States, Adrian would be up for anything, because he was head over heels in love with her and because he never got another important post despite being a respected economist . . . Well, it wasn’t eas
y, but Miguel finally accepted Adrian could be the third man in the plan and we agreed I’d talk to him. I explained to Adrian what we wanted to do and he accepted, without a moment’s hesitation. He said he knew people in Guanabo who could sell him what we needed for us to leave Cuba and we agreed to see Miguel at Adrian’s house last Thursday night . . . But something very strange happened: we’d agreed nine o’clock and Miguel didn’t appear then or ever. As he’d told Caruca he was going to see Gómez de la Peña, I called Gómez just after nine and the old man told me Miguel had left his house at around half past seven, saying he was off to see a relative of his about an important matter. Although it was late, we thought he’d arrive any minute, but he still hadn’t appeared at ten thirty and that was when I rang Caruca again and she told me Miguel hadn’t come home. You know, it was as if the earth had swallowed him up . . . although later we discovered it was the sea that had devoured him. Are you convinced by my story? Or do you still think that I killed him because I already knew about the Buddha and was such a stupid shit that I left it where he’d hidden it, in spite of the risk you or someone like you would end up finding it? Just think for a moment, Lieutenant, because I don’t consider myself a sucker either . . .”

  And he thought: of course not, you’re nobody’s sucker, but he resisted giving his verdict. He thought it delightfully cinematic that there should be a third man, particularly as he’d always enjoyed that dark, sordid film so full of twists, like the story he was mixed up in . . . And the Count thought on and thought it would make no sense to ask Miriam what her present relationship was with the omniscient Adrian Riverón: the woman, who had stopped crying while listening to her brother, would rattle her eternal armour and give the first reply to come to mind, and it would be sketchy and implausible. So he thought on and on and was disturbed by what he was thinking: between the perennially duped Gómez de la Peña and the only ever half-informed Fermín Bodes stood Adrian Riverón, rent with hatred and jealousy accumulated over years, to whose house Miguel Forcade should have got to, but never did? Another hunch, the policeman told himself, but sharper now, drilling painfully into his chest, just beneath the left nipple. These bastards will be the death of me, he concluded and stood up.

  “Wait here,” he told brother and sister and, addressing the policemen, “Crespo, you come with me. Greco, you stay here.”

  He went into the corridor, looking for the nearest door. He opened it and went in the archive, proclaiming: “I need to use your telephone,” and dialled Major Rangel’s number. It rang three times before his old chief said “Hello, Hello,” as he always did. “It’s me, Boss. I’ve got a question for you.”

  “Out with it then, where’s the pain now?”

  “The chest, beneath the left nipple.”

  “And? Could it be a heart attack?”

  “No, I’ve got a hunch that’s really hurting my chest. What do you advise for real pain?”

  “You’ve got two options: either go to a cardiologist or follow your hunch.”

  “I’ll take the second. Thanks for the advice. I’ll see you later and remember it’s my birthday,” he said, hanging up. But the pain was still creasing him up, and he began to seek relief. “Crespo, go downstairs and ask for a warrant to search Adrián Riverón’s house. Then find someone who can stay with little brother and sister and tell Greco to come with us. I’ll ring Manolo. But we’ll leave in ten minutes, got that?”

  “Of course, Conde. Hey, you really in pain?”

  “I swear on my mother I am. Right here,” and he touched the spot where his strong hunches pained him.

  The city seemed to be on a war footing or the eve of a carnival. Or were the wondrous vessels of the Royal Fleet returning to the town of San Cristóbal de la Habana, laden with gold and luxury? The latest news spoke of the imminent arrival of hurricane Felix, which at that very moment in the afternoon was gusting across the seas south of Batabanó and, in all certainty, would lash the island capital the following morning, with blasts of more than a hundred and twenty-five miles an hour and soddening deluges that would begin in the small hours, according to the radio channels, which sandwiched their message between festive guarachas and tearful boleros. Workplaces had finished off at two p.m., so people could get home ready to receive as best they could that meteorological curse that held them in its unerring sights.

  A tempest culture, acquired over centuries of coexisting with those predatory weather phenomena, surfaced whenever a hurricane came near the country. Ever since Columbus heard about them, and heard the name uttered by the jittery Arahuacan Indians that month of October in 1492, thousand of tempests had swept the Caribbean, changing its topography, destroying the works of gods and men, altering the configuration of their coasts, transforming fertile fields into interminable lakes, and people had learned to live with them as you do with a bad neighbour it’s impossible to be rid of. Every year Cubans expected a tempest just as they expected winter colds and summer diarrhoea: it was something certain, inevitable and cyclical, with which you must spend a few days, out of pure and immutable geographical fatalism. The recurrence of these phenomena had the singular virtue of reviving the bad memories of people prone to forget the slightest incident: and they recalled the visitation of the mythical 1926 hurricane, the horrific 1944 hurricane, and the unforgettable Flora, thanks to which there was a reduction in coffee rations they were still living with twenty-five years later. But no hurricane, after all, had been able to sweep the island away – as some dreamed – or change the character of its people – as others would have wished. And so people even relished the rather festive atmosphere, the morbid expectancy before the hurricane hit, and they shouted at each other in the streets: “Hey, you, where you going to spend the hurricane?” as if it were like choosing somewhere to dine on Christmas Eve. The devastation would be inevitable, that they already knew, and had learned from their ancestors’ rehearsal of the lessons of history, and the Cubans tried to extract from the hurricane’s visit the strongest possible dosage of emotions they shared as a society. Later would come the time to bewail losses and forget hurricanes till the next round.

  Without a doubt, the macabre carnival seemed to have begun: some people, on their roof terraces, strapped down the lids on their water tanks; others cut down trees, with a furious intensity that anticipated the hurricane’s; others preferred to shore up mattresses, televisions, drawers full of things in the slim hope they might save something that otherwise would take them years to recover, and they did so with incredible broad smiles on their faces; and others took sensible precautions that grated on Mario Conde’s nerves, buying up the stocks of rum in markets and liquor stores, convinced that drowning their sorrows in alcohol was the best way to await Felix, or whatever this year’s blasted tempest was called. Everything was done at a frantic pace and, while his car advanced towards Adrian Riverón’s house, in the old neighbourhood of Palatino, the Count recalled his father’s visceral fear of hurricanes. It was an irrepressible fright that had apparently infected him from the cradle (so they said), because ten days after he was born the city was swept by the 1926 hurricane, the most memorable in all the city’s chronicles of meteorological catastrophe. Grandad Rufino would recount how the wooden house where they lived had been lifted clean out of the ground by the force of the wind and the family was saved thanks to a small shed driven far into the ground, which he had built to store maize for his fighting cocks and feed for the pigs he also reared. The Count had always tried to imagine that tiny space giving shelter to his two grandparents, their six children, two dogs, twenty handsome roosters, the milking goat, pack-mule and three pigs, while outside the refuge the hurricane changed the face of the earth and left them homeless.

  “Of all the terrible tempests there are in all the seas of the world, the worst are those in the seas around these islands and Tierra Firma,” wrote Padre Las Casas, half a millennium earlier, astonished by the onslaught of the first Caribbean cyclone described by a European, and the Count thought the f
riar was right: the tropical hurricane reigned supreme over other terrible storms; it was so persistently hard-hitting, stubborn and predictable . . . And I feel you coming, he told himself, because he felt it coming, inside and out, and he wanted it here now: “Get here now, for fuck’s sake,” he repeated softly as he lit up a cigarette.

  They found an external peace in Adrian Riverón’s house that was alien to the tragic festivities of the preparations for the hurricane. As they approached the front door, the Count wondered again what exactly he was hoping to find there, and he still couldn’t find an answer. Something, he thought, as he opened the door and Adrian Riverón flashed a smile seasoned with a cough at the sight of the four policemen. Although the wind already lashed, drenched and gusted, the fellow wore only shorts and seemed calm and relaxed, when he said: “And what are you doing in these parts, Lieutenant?” and he coughed again, as persistently as ever, which made the Count doubt once more whether Adrián was a fully paid up member of the select club of non-smokers.

  Mario Conde looked at him almost tenderly: a feeling of relief spread across his chest, though he would be sorry if Adrian Riverón turned out to be Miguel Forcade’s executor. In his heart of hearts, his skin and even his toes, he’d have preferred to put the blame on a character like Gómez de la Peña or, if that proved impossible, someone like Fermín Bodes; both carried a burden of age-old guilt they’d never atoned for. And what about Miriam? He hesitated for a moment and decided he preferred her to her eternal suitor, the victim of an ancient passion. Unjust justice.

  “We’ve come to search your house,” he finally replied, and Adrian Riverón’s smile withered at the policeman’s words.

  “And what’s it all about?”

  “According to Fermín Bodes you were preparing a clandestine departure from the country. We want to see whether you’ve begun your shopping. Look, here’s the search warrant. And two neighbours are coming as witnesses.”