Hard Currency

NINE

Colonel Snitkonoy was dressed in mufti. This was, as his staff knew, very unusual. His perfectly fitted dark suit had been painstakingly ironed by his housekeeper only an hour before, as had his white English shirt and serious blue-and-red-striped tie. His black shoes were military shined, and his hair had been perfectly trimmed by the same housekeeper, who had been his aide-de-camp when both were spreading Soviet dominance in the days not so long gone.

The Gray Wolfhound pulled out his antique gold pocket watch. “I have,” he said, “exactly five minutes before I must leave for my presentation on the alleged murder of the Kazakhstani foreign minister.”

“We understand,” said Karpo, who, along with Sasha Tkach, stood in front of the colonel’s desk.

“I am to meet with the Council of Deputies for Internal Security in the Kremlin,” the colonel went on.

There was a long pause while the Wolfhound sat erect in his chair facing the two detectives.

“I have your report, Emil Karpo,” he said, holding up an envelope. “I have contradictory laboratory findings. I am walking into a room of important people who want irrefutable evidence.”

And, he thought, a room in which, if this report is correct, several of the people around the table may well be parties to the murder of Foreign Minister Kumad Kustan. Some facts were quite clear. The foreign minister had been in Moscow two days before his death. An overweight, surly man with a mop of white hair that matched Yeltsin’s, he had conducted his search for Russian support in a rumpled suit. Things seemed to have gone well, so well that an announcement had been made by both the Russian foreign minister and Kustan that a new era was about to begin. Kustan died in a lounge at the Hotel Russia following a small reception, which only a dozen members of the government, both pro- and anti-Yeltsin, had attended. Security had been tight. Kustan had died. Now it seemed he might have been murdered. The murderer was likely to have been at the highest level of government. But why kill the foreign minister? To stop the agreement and embarrass Yeltsin? Or to protect Yeltsin? But why? Had the talks fallen through? It was not impossible that the murderer of the Kazakhstani foreign minister would be sitting in the room where Colonel Snitkonoy was going to make his report.

“We cannot be wrong, Emil Karpo,” said the Wolfhound, putting the report down in front of him and folding his hands on his shiny dark desk. “Have you noticed that there are few dogs in the police kennel? Food is scarce. Luxuries are few. Those who produce survive. Those who do not are eaten.”

“We are not wrong,” said Karpo.

Colonel Snitkonoy nodded. He knew he had no choice but to go to the meeting and present the evidence. He had rehearsed his presentation for forty minutes before the mirror in his bedroom. He hoped it would go well.

It would be a difficult morning. He glanced out the window. At least the sleet had stopped and the sky held a gray hope of light.

“Speak, Inspector Karpo,” the colonel said. The Vampire was one of the few people he knew who made him truly uncomfortable.

“We have developed a plan,” said Karpo, “which we believe can result in the resolution of Case 341.”

“Tahpor,” said the Wolfhound.

“It will require the services of the Metro Railway security forces,” said Karpo.

The Wolfhound nodded and looked at Tkach, who was doing his best to hold back a sneeze.

“It will also require one week of round-the-clock shifts by perhaps one hundred armed officers and as many as fifty decoys who will have to look as if they are approximately twenty-two years old.”

Employing self-control developed through four decades of service, Colonel Snitkonoy simply nodded for Karpo to begin.

Karpo outlined his plan and the Wolfhound listened.

Three minutes later, the colonel stood up, put the report on the Kazakhstani minister in his black Samsonite briefcase, and said, “I can ask for a day or two, perhaps three, but a week is out of the question. Can you narrow this down to a day or two with reasonable certainty that we will get 341?”

“No,” said Karpo, “but …”

“I’ll see what I can do,” said the colonel. “As for the decoys …”

“That will be our responsibility,” Karpo said.

The Wolfhound’s eyes met and held Karpo’s, which revealed nothing.

“Very well. Go. I will let you know.”

Karpo nodded, and he and Tkach turned to leave.

“Attend to that cold, Deputy Inspector,” the Wolfhound said.

“I will,” answered Tkach, anxious to escape so he could let out the cough that he had choked down.

When the two detectives had gone, the Wolfhound considered whether he should indicate to the council that a plan had been suggested to catch the man who had murdered at least forty people in the past three years. He would then be placing not one but two distasteful decisions before them. If the council agreed to assign officers and Karpo’s plan failed, the council would know it quickly, for he would be expected to follow up with a report. If he did not report and word of it got back to any of the men in that room, he would have to explain why he had not done so. There was no help for it, he concluded, but to face the possibility of failure on two fronts of his besieged operation.

Though he usually enjoyed being the focus of attention, Colonel Snitkonoy did not walk into his outer office with the enormous confidence he usually projected.

When the colonel’s door opened, the startled Pankov rose quickly from behind his desk. He bumped his knee as he made a useless effort to pat down his hair.

“I’ll be gone two hours,” said the Wolfhound. “I want Major Grigorovich in my office at three-fifteen this afternoon. Also, put in a call to Inspector Rostnikov in Cuba. I want a full report from him in writing before the end of the day. He can dictate it to you.”

“Yes,” said Pankov, his hopes dashed for an easy day of paperwork.

“Havana is a city of misleading surfaces, you know?” said Antonio Rodriguez, taking off his thick glasses to wipe them on his shirt.

Rostnikov looked at the little man at his side. They were stopped at a red light on the Prado, a street whose broad median strip had benches, ornate iron railings, and stone lions at the corners. But the buildings that had once clearly been spectacular were all falling to ruin. Atlantis, thought Rostnikov. It is like Atlantis risen from the sea.

Rodriguez squinted into the afternoon sun, put on his glasses, and looked startled, as if the world had magically changed in the time it had taken to clean his glasses.

Rodriguez had been waiting at the hotel when Rostnikov returned from his workout, had greeted him saying, “Change your clothes quickly. I have something to show you.”

Rostnikov had gone to his room, showered and dressed, and returned to the excited little man, who urged him out into the street and into an automobile pitted with acne.

Rodriguez looked at the light, which was now green, and carefully changed gears on his 1954 Chevrolet. The car moved forward with a shake of metal. In a few places, the floor below Porfiry Petrovich’s feet was worn through with age and rust. It was disconcerting and fascinating to watch the brick street pass beneath him. Rodriguez talked excitedly.

“There,” he said. “That white house was Batista’s capitol. Now it is the headquarters of the Cuban Academy of Science. See there, right there, across from the ballet? That statue? Saint Martí. I was here the night in the 1950s-it was summer-when some U.S. Marines climbed on the statue. The people tried to kill them.”

“Have the Russians climbed any statues?” asked Rostnikov.

“Worse,” said Rodriguez. “They piss on the statues.”

A familiar red bus, the same kind of bus that traveled the Moscow streets, passed them quickly going in the opposite direction. Rostnikov looked up at the street signs carved into the building at the next corner. They were at the corner of Colón and Agramonte.

“There,” said Rodriguez. “You must look. Big white building. It was the Presidential Palace. Now it is the Museum of History. And here …”

He pulled the car over to let traffic pass and pointed to a small park surrounded by a dark iron fence. The park was cluttered with an odd assortment of gray-green trucks, jeeps, two airplanes, and a small boat.

“This too is a museum of the revolution,” said Rodriguez. “The boat is the Gramma, the ship Fidel used to come to Cuba to begin the revolution. Nobody knew what Gramma meant. They thought it was Latin or something. It means abuela, ‘grandmother,’ in English. We have a newspaper named Gramma, lots of things named Gramma. Those vehicles were used to storm the palace, and the airplanes fought the Americans at the Bay of Pigs.”

“Fascinating,” said Rostnikov. “But, Antonio Rodriguez, you did not snatch me from a few hours of rest to show me the sights of Havana.”

“We are a bit early,” the little man answered, putting his finger to his nose. “I wanted to be dramatic, you know. But, let’s go.”

He pulled the car back onto the Prado, made two left turns, and found a parking spot.

“We are lucky,” he said, backing into the space with a grinding of worn-out gears. “Tourists-Germans, Canadians-usually take all the spaces.”

When they got out, Rodriguez said, “This way.” Rostnikov followed him to a corner where they stood in front of a bar.

“La Floridita,” said Rodriguez proudly. “Hemingway’s favorite bar, where the daiquiri was invented. They have keeped it up for the tourists. Don’t get anything to eat. Just a drink. Overpriced. Next door is a good Cuban restaurant if you want to eat. That’s overpriced too, but not like La Floridita.”

Rodriguez led the way inside and they were met by the sound of an accordion playing “Fascination.”

To the left was a bar with a line of white-seated stools before it. The array of amber, white, and green bottles in front of the bar mirror was the most extensive Rostnikov had ever seen. On the wall was a large photograph of Ernest Hemingway. The small round tables in front of the bar were red with metal chairs around them. The metal chairs had white plastic seats and Rostnikov saw that the back supports for each chair were upright metal arrows.

The floor beneath their feet was black with small white squares embedded in it. To their right, the windows were closed, and each had a box in front of it filled with plants.

“As it was when Hemingway himself he sit on that very stool,” said Rodriguez. “I saw him myself in here one time. Or I think I did. Who remembers when history, memory, and wishes come together. You know?”

“I know,” said Rostnikov.

The accordion was joined by a violin and a bass. Rostnikov could see the musicians on a small platform in the next room, the room he assumed was the dining room of La Floridita. There were a few other people in the bar. Rodriguez moved as far from them as he could and indicated one of the small tables to Rostnikov. The moment they were seated a waiter dressed in white with a red tie appeared before them.

“Daiquiris,” said Rodriguez. “El mismo que bebió Papá.”

When the waiter had gone, Rodriguez adjusted his seat and said, “So?”

“So, indeed.”

“Tomorrow I take you to the Miramar,” said Rodriguez, looking around the room. “Used to be very exclusive in the 1930s, even the 1950s. Then the Russians took over. Russians and Bulgarians.”

Rostnikov sat stoically looking at the little man, who grinned back at him.

“I’m joking,” said Rodriguez. “Teasing. Forgive me. Our Cuban sense of humor it grows strange in isolation.”

“As ours has grown strange with the opening of borders,” said Rostnikov. “Why are we here?”

“The band,” Rodriguez said, leaning forward to whisper.

“They are adequate, but hardly memorable.”

“Wrong,” whispered Rodriguez. “Look at them.”

The trio were blacks with more than a trace of both Spanish and Indian blood. The violinist was a man of about forty with a round smiling face and a full mustache. The accordion player was a woman about the same age with very long, dark hair pulled back in a knot. The bass player was tall, perhaps fifty, with a flat African nose. Both men wore gray slacks and white short-sleeved shirts with black ties. The woman’s dress was colorful, a splash of orange, yellow, and red.

“I have looked,” said Rostnikov, turning to Rodriguez.

The trio launched into a spirited version of the Beatles’ “Norwegian Wood.”

“That, the bass player, is Manuel, the babalau, the father of Javier who threatened to kill Maria Fernandez.”

Rostnikov looked again at the man playing the bass fiddle. The man turned his gaze to the detective, and when their eyes met Rostnikov was sure that Manuel knew who he was and why he was there.

The waiter returned, placed the daiquiris in front of Rostnikov and Rodriguez, left a check, and disappeared without a word.

“And,” said Rodriguez with great satisfaction, “you have just met Javier.”

Rostnikov looked at the pale drink before him and said, “The waiter?”

“The waiter,” Rodriguez confirmed. “How you like that? Javier works here. He gets his father to fill in with his group once in a while.”

Rostnikov looked at Javier, who was waiting on a quartet of tourists-two blond couples who looked Scandinavian.

Javier was tall and light-skinned. His hair was cropped short. He had a clear, handsome face with a sculpted nose quite unlike the nose of his father. Rostnikov was sure that beneath the uniform was a strong, sinewy body. Nothing in the man’s face or dark eyes betrayed anything he might be feeling or thinking.

“You want to meet them?” Rodriguez asked.

“Very much,” said Rostnikov.

Rodriguez began to rise, but Javier, who had returned, leaned past Rostnikov and collected the Canadian bills Rostnikov had put out. He did not look at Rostnikov as he picked up the money and departed.

“You won’t get change,” said Rodriguez. “How you like the drink?”

Rostnikov hated the frigid, sour-sweet liquid.

“It is interesting.”

“You hate it,” said Rodriguez. “Russians always hate it. Americans pretend to love it. They even order a second. Americans. They think they’re going to return and turn us into a Disneyville.”

“Do you like daiquiris, Antonio Rodriguez?”

“They taste like frozen goat piss.”

“You’ve tasted frozen goat piss?”

“When pushed to the wall and thirsty,” said Rodriguez with a straight face.

“But you just drank one.”

“It is the thing to do in La Floridita. Wait here. I’ll talk to Javier.”

“No,” said Rostnikov.

“I thought you wanted …”

“I changed my mind,” said Rostnikov. The band moved to something Latin but without heart. Rostnikov stood up.

Rodriguez shrugged.

“Russians make no sense,” he said, following Rostnikov to the door.

At the door, Rostnikov turned to look at Manuel the bass player. There was no expression on the face of either man but their eyes met once again.

Rodriguez drove back along the Malecón, past the monument to the victims of the Maine. He also pointed out the American Embassy Building and the statue of Antonio Maceo on horseback in front of the Hermana.

“There, that building used to be the National Bank. Still has vaults, still has Cuban money in it, but now is a hospital, best hospital in Central America, even your big shots come here.”

Rostnikov looked but he was not really listening. He kept his hands folded in his lap and wondered why his leg was causing him so little trouble. He resisted the urge to reach into his pocket and read the note that Javier had slipped into it.

The twenty-story-high Soviet embassy in Havana stands behind a seven-foot-high iron fence. The embassy itself is a modern brick monolith surrounded by lower buildings and ample lush grounds. It culminates in a tower that looks like a squat letter T. At one corner to the right as one faces the embassy a faded red flag hangs waiting for the wind.

Next to the embassy is a Catholic church, its spire matching the height of the embassy tower in an uneasy contest for dominance of the street.

Major Sanchez, in full blue uniform complete with blue baseball hat, parked his white Lada on the nearly empty street in front of the embassy gate and looked out of the curbside window past Elena Timofeyeva.

“Impressive, eh?” he said in Russian. “Just a year ago it would have been impossible to park on this street. Cars, trucks, people in and out. Now, empty. Fidel has a house near here. It is said he can see the tower of the embassy from his bedroom window when he wakes up.”

Sanchez’s face was inches from Elena’s. When Sanchez had picked her up that morning, they had breakfasted on toast, oranges, and bananas in the rooftop cafeteria reserved for guests of the hotel. Their conversation moved from Russian to Spanish and back to Russian again for no reason that Elena could perceive.

As they ate, Sanchez had asked Elena how she became a police officer. Elena told him about her aunt Anna, who had been a Moscow procurator, and about her father, who had been in military intelligence. Throughout the conversation, Elena had been acutely aware of the major’s eyes scanning her, watching her, saying something without speaking.

Now, as she felt his breath on her cheek, she had no doubt about his eyes and his body language. Elena suspected that the major behaved in the same way toward all women. She had no illusions about her looks. Her face was oval, clear-skinned, and healthy-looking. Her hair was short, brown, and straight. Her body was not yet heavy, but it was certainly ample, and her condition, from a strenuous routine of running and exercise, was excellent.

Sanchez and Elena got out of the car and moved to the iron gate.

“Who knows how many millions it cost to build it?” Sanchez said, pressing a bell in the gate. “You have anything like it in Moscow?”

“Nothing this new,” she said. “Many things this large.”

The gate clicked open.

“You people are impressed by size,” he said, holding the gate open so Elena could step inside. “Russians think the bigger something is-a statue or a building-the more it will impress. They are right, but their mistake is in equating beauty with size alone.”

Elena counted the twenty-eight serpentine marble steps as they moved upward toward the embassy entrance.

“And Cubans, what do they find impressive and beautiful?” she asked as they approached two massive wooden doors at the top of the steps. Each door was studded with vertical rows of wooden spheres.

“Intricacy, music that makes one weep, the remembered shape and touch of a woman’s body, paintings that burst with color and life,” he said, looking at her with a smile.

Elena had worn her suit-gray skirt and matching jacket-with an off-white blouse. The suit had belonged to her aunt, with whom she lived in Moscow. A neighbor had miraculously altered the suit to fit Elena, for Anna Timofeyeva was significantly larger than her niece.

The door opened and a tall, thin man with unkempt white hair stood before them. The man needed a shave and looked pained by the brightness of the morning sun. He wore a blue shirt only partially tucked into his matching blue trousers. He wore black socks and no shoes.

“Qué hora es?” he said in heavily accented Spanish.

“Seven-ten,” Sanchez answered in Russian after checking his watch.

The white-haired man brushed his hair back with his long fingers and stepped back to allow them to enter.

“You are Major Sanchez?” the man asked in Russian. He closed the door behind them. “And you are Assistant Inspector Timofeyeva from Moscow?”

“Yes,” Elena said.

Their voices echoed through the empty corridors and the three-story entryway as the man shook his head.

“Prahsteetye, forgive me,” he said. “We used to have so many people answering phones and doors, making appointments.” He looked around the room in search of the departed and then turned to shake hands with both Elena and Sanchez.

“Gleb Tarasov, deputy attaché,” he said. “One of the ghosts who still walks the corridors of what was once the heart of Soviet benevolence in the Americas. Sometimes I think we have been forgotten by Moscow. Sometimes that is fine with me. Prahsteetye, forgive me again, I’m rambling.”

“No need to apologize,” said Elena.

Tarasov nodded again, considered apologizing for his apologies, caught himself in time, and turned his back on his visitors to lead them down a darkened corridor. As he walked he tucked in his shirt.

“I must confess,” Tarasov said as they passed empty desks and silent offices, “I had a bit to drink last night. Till a few hours ago. My wife is Cuban. She is partial to vodka. Second wife. First wife was partial to young men.”

He put his hand to his mouth. After padding a little farther down the corridor he removed his hand and said, “Can’t stop babbling. Can’t stop begging your pardon. I’m afraid I will be a sad source of information for you. Here we are.”

He stopped at an office door, pushed it open, and stepped inside. Sanchez and Elena followed.

Though the office was bathed in morning light through two large windows, Tarasov hit a light switch. Elena watched the deputy attaché move behind a steel desk on which a computer rested.

“Please, please,” he said, “have a seat. I can find someone for coffee if you …”

“No, thank you,” said Elena. “We won’t take much of your time.”

The two chairs in front of the desk were chrome with black leather seats and backs. Elena and Sanchez sat.

“I have not been to Moscow in five years,” Tarasov said. He had seated himself behind the desk and was looking out the window in the general direction of Moscow. “It is hell here. I hear it is worse there.”

“We have been through a great deal in a single year,” said Elena. “And there is more we must endure.”

“There is always more, young woman,” Tarasov said, rubbing his gray-stubbled chin. “There is always more to endure, more to sacrifice. More … You came about an embassy employee, the one who was arrested.”

“Igor Shemenkov,” she said, taking her notebook from the bag she had placed on the floor.

“Igor Shemenkov,” Tarasov repeated softly as he scratched the back of his right hand. “Losing his hair, shaped like an egg. Dresses badly, but at the moment who am I to talk?”

“Yes,” said Elena. She looked at Sanchez, who seemed amused.

“Let’s see,” said Tarasov, rubbing his eyes. He blinked and reached over to turn on the computer. The machine emitted a tone, chugged softly, and let out a low ping to announce that it was ready.

Tarasov’s long fingers began to dance over the keyboard as he looked at the screen in front of him. The computer clacked steadily and Tarasov was transformed-a borderline alcoholic with a hangover had become a wizard of the electronic landscape.

“Coming,” he said, eyes still on the screen. “Ask questions if you have them.”

“Whatever you have,” said Elena. “Friends, relatives, activities.”

Tarasov nodded. He reached over to hit a button on a white box without breaking his rhythm on the computer.

“Printing in the next office,” he said. “It is a long document. Seventeen pages.”

“Is that unusual?” asked Elena.

“No, many are much longer. Ask.”

“Friends,” said Sanchez.

“Acquaintances,” answered Tarasov. “None in the embassy or in his apartment in the Sierra Maestra. He does not make friends easily.”

“His job?”

“Documents processor. Coded dispatches from the embassy to Moscow and from Moscow to Cuba. Important, but routine. Takes no intellect.”

Tarasov’s fingers were no longer dancing. A single finger hit a button to scroll the open file before him.

“Work record is very good. No problems, at least not since he came to Cuba. No-”

“And before he came to Cuba?” Elena asked.

Tarasov looked up as if seeing Elena for the first time.

“Before,” he said, and turned his eyes back to the computer screen. “Twice arrested for assault following fights in Odessa. Suspected of black market activities. But that is common. Considered to be loyal, without great intellectual resources, a natural gift with computers, drinks a bit much on occasion. So did his father. So did my father and so do I for that matter.”

“What else?” asked Elena.

Tarasov looked at Sanchez and then back at Elena, who said, “Go on.”

“Shemenkov has a wife and two children in Odessa. He also has an inclination toward Cuban prostitutes. He has been warned about this many times and has been treated on four occasions for sexually transmitted diseases. Because of this inclination, Igor Shemenkov has been considered a security risk.”

Tarasov looked at Major Sanchez and so did Elena.

“He means,” said Sanchez, “that your embassy believes that Cuban prostitutes have been used to get information from embassy employees and pass it on to security forces in the Cuban government.”

“Believes?” asked Elena.

“Believes,” said Sanchez. “But I would say there is far more reason to believe such a tale than there is to pray to the saints or expect the Communists to rise again and reunite the Soviet Union.”

“Anything else?” asked Tarasov. “I have plenty of time.”

“No,” said Elena. She stood up. “Just a copy of the report.”

“Other room,” said Tarasov, standing up also.

After they had obtained the report from the printer and Tarasov had put on his shoes and accompanied them to the gate, Elena got back into the Lada with Sanchez.

“And now?” the major said.

“Back to the hotel. I’ll read the report and take it to Inspector Rostnikov.”

Sanchez did not start the car.

“A suggestion,” he said with a small smile. “We go to your room and make love.”

“No.”

“I am an accomplished lover,” he said. “And you are very inspiring.”

“No,” she said again. “You have a job to do, Major. It is not to make me uncomfortable and distract me from the investigation.”

“How do you know?” he asked, putting his right hand on the back of her seat very close to her face.

“Know?”

“That my job isn’t to make you uncomfortable and distract you from the investigation,” he said.

“I do not know and I do not care,” she said. “I wish to go to the hotel.”

“Servidor de usted,” he said, moving his hand, sitting back, and starting the car. “But it is a waste of two perfectly healthy bodies.”

Major Fernando Sanchez drove into the empty street.