Havana Bay

Chapter Three

Not that she would tell Renko, but Ofelia Osorio had once worked on a Cuban factory ship built by the Russians and complete with Russian advisers, so she was not only practiced in dealing with overbearing "big brothers" from the north but skilled in fending them off with a gutting knife. Earlier, as an idealistic Young Pioneer she had served as a delegate to a World Youth Conference in Moscow and toured Lenin's Tomb, Lumumba University and the subway. She remembered how subway riders drew in their faces at the sight of someone black. Cubans only touched their forearms to indicate someone dark. Russians recoiled as if from a snake. At least, at home. At sea, they were willing enough to experiment.

It wasn't only Russians. Vietnamese investigators came to Havana and Ofelia trained both men and women. When she visited Hanoi she discovered that her best female students had been relegated to typing and that after dinners of international solidarity the plates Ofelia used were washed twice.

What was interesting was that when European and Asian men met Cuban girls in Cuba they were like gluttons in a candy store. Decent family men became animals the moment they landed. Cartoons posted on the streets warned girls to be sure their tourists arrived with condoms. There were vice squads, usually run by detectives putting together their own strings ofjineteras. A great word, jinetera. Jockey, especially descriptive of a girl astride a bouncing pig. In addition to Ofelia's homicide caseload, and with half-hearted official support, she had put together an operation of her own against corrupt police. At any rate, she was mentally armed for a visiting Russian investigator, the worst of all possible combinations.

She lived in a solar, an alley of one-room apartments, aptly named for the way it soaked in the heat of the day. In spite of the late hour, Muriel and Marisol, her two daughters, were spread languorously on the cool of the floor intent on a television show about dolphins. The girls were eight and nine with dark hair flocked with gold, and the blue glow of the screen lapped up to their chins like a coverlet. Her mother tipped on the rocking chair pretending to be asleep, a silent reprimand to Ofelia for coming home so late, letting rice and beans simmer on the burners. Two could play at that game. It was a scandal that the mother of a PNR detective would spend the day running errands for everyone in the solar, going for cigarettes for one house, standing in line for a pair of shoes for another.» Hustle or starve," the old woman would respond to protests.» With your big pay and our family rations, your daughters will eat two days out of three. You know the joke, 'What are the three achievements of the Revolution? Health, education and sports. What are the three failures? Breakfast, lunch and dinner.' They say Fidel tells that joke. Why?" Ofelia only argued to a certain point because her mother was right. Besides, there were so many other things to argue about with her mother. The week before, Ofelia had come home to find that a portrait of Che had been moved to make way for a picture torn from a magazine of Celia Cruz. Who would displace the greatest martyr of the twentieth century with a fat, old traitor from Florida? Her mother, without a second's hesitation.

Ofelia wrapped her belt around her holster, stripped and folded her uniform neatly on a hanger. As a detective she could go in plain clothes or not, but she enjoyed the reassurance of the blue pants, the gray shirt with PNR shield on the pocket, the cap with its own embossed shield. Also, wearing a uniform saved on her clothes, which were basically two pairs of jeans. She slipped through the curtain into an alcove that served as bathroom, vanity, and shower stall, automatically turning on the Walkman that hung from a string. The radio was a prize found on the Playa del Este on a family trip. She had told her girls to ignore the "love couples" of jineteras and their tourists, but after Muriel had stumbled upon something as incredible as a radio the size of a clamshell she and her older sister watched the beach like vultures, ready to search the sand for treasure as soon as any "couple" left.

Water came in lukewarm rivulets, but it was enough. It ran over her forehead and neck and trailed from her hands. She was secretly pleased with her hair, which was cut short and as soft as a cap of Persian lamb. The music was insinuating and percussive. Your cigar fell down. You told me how good it was and how all the women liked your big cigar. We hardly started smoking and your cigar fell down. Ofelia let her shoulders relax and roll to the beat. Water ran out the drain between her feet. In the mirror above the sink she saw herself begin to fog. A thirty-year-old woman who still looked like a black cane cutter's daughter. Although she wasn't vain she hated a tan line-better to be the same brown all over. She leaned forward to let water run off her hair like threads of glass.

The detective in her wondered about the dead Russian they found in the water. She would have expected much more interest from his embassy and the fact that they seemed ready to dispose of him like a dog hit on the street was practically proof that he had obviously been up to no good. The bay, after all, was a perfect vantage point for smuggling, infiltration, to spy on shipping. As the Comandante himself said, there was no more vicious enemy than a man you had once called friend.

The new Russian was a bit of a contradiction. The plush coat was a sure sign of corruption, while the poor state of the rest of his clothes indicated a complete disregard for appearance. One moment he seemed a reasonably alert investigator, and the next he disappeared into some private train of thought. He was pale but with eyes deep-set in shadow.

The soap was a sliver her mother had obtained from a friend who worked in a hotel and so luxurious that Ofelia drew out the shower, the most private moment of the day despite the voices from other apartments in the solar. One song's worth was what she allowed herself to save the batteries.

Dressed in a pullover and jeans, she ladled rice to Muriel and beans to Marisol and an obscure, deep-fried gristle that her mother refused to identify. From the refrigerator she took a plastic Miranda soda bottle filled with chilled water.

"On the cooking show today they showed how to fry a steak from grapefruit skin," her mother said.» They turned a grapefruit skin into steak. Isn't that amazing? This is a revolution that is more amazing all the time."

"I'm sure it was good," Ofelia said.» Under the circumstances."

"They ate it with gusto. With gusto."

"This is also good." Ofelia sawed into the gristle.» What did you say it was?"

"Mammalian. Did you meet any dangerous men today, someone who might kill you and leave your daughters without a mother?"

"One. A Russian."

It was her mother's turn to be exasperated.» A Russian, worse than a grapefruit skin. Why did you join the police? I still don't understand."

"To help the people."

"The people here hate you. You don't see anyone from Havana who joins the police. Only outsiders. We were happy in Hershey."

"It's a sugar-mill town."

"In Cuba, what a surprise!"

"You can't move to Havana without a permit. I'm an expert in police work. They want me here and I want to be here and so do the girls."

This was one issue where Ofelia could always count on her daughters' support.

"We want to be here."

"Nobody wants to be in Hershey. That's a sugar-mill town."

Her mother said, "Havana is full of girls from sugar-mill towns without official permits, and they're all making dollars on their backs. The day is going to come when I'm looking for condoms for my granddaughters."

"Grandmother!"

Her mother relented, and they all quietly sawed the meat on their plates until the old woman asked, "So what does this Russian look like?"

It struck Ofelia.» Once in Hershey you pointed out a priest who was defrocked for falling in love with a woman."

"I'm surprised you remember, you were so little. Yes, she was a beautiful woman, very religious, and it was a sad story all around."

"He looks like that."

Her mother mulled it over.» I can't believe you remembered that."

Just when Ofelia thought that family tension had subsided enough for a pleasant evening meal, however late, the phone rang. Theirs was the only phone in the solar, and she suspected her mother of using it to run the neighborhood lottery. The illegal Cuban lottery was rigged to the legal Venezuelan lottery, and the bet takers with phones had a great advantage. Ofelia rose and moved slowly around the girls' chairs toward the phone on the wall to let her mother know she wasn't going to run for anyone's nefarious business. Her mother maintained an expression of innocence until Ofelia hung up.

"What was it?"

"It's about the Russian," Ofelia said.» He killed someone."

"Ah, you were meant for each other."

When she arrived at the apartment, Captain Arcos was slamming down the phone and telling Renko, "Your embassy cannot provide you protection. There will be expressions of anger from the Cuban people to those who have sold them out. To those who plant the Judas kiss on us for thirty pieces of silver. If it were up to me, I would not let a single Russian on the street. I could not guarantee the safety of a Russian, not even in the safest capital in the world, because Cuban anger is so deep. You crawl to the camp of the enemy and you warn Cubans we better do the same. That history has left us behind. No! Cuba is master of history. Cuba has more history to make and we do not need instruction from any former comrades. That's what I told your embassy."

Arcos had worked himself into such a rage his face balled like a fist. His black sergeant Luna stood by, slouching, ominous and bored at the same time. Renko sat calmly wrapped in his coat. Rufo sprawled in his silvery running suit, his gaze aimed at a syringe clasped in his left hand. What amazed Ofelia was the lack of technicians. Where was the normal bustle of video and light operators, the forensics experts and detectives? Although she didn't question the authority of the two men from the ministry, she made a point of loudly snapping on surgical gloves.

"The captain speaks Russian, too," Renko told Ofelia.» It's a night of surprises."

Arcos was in his forties, Ofelia thought, exactly the generation who had wasted their youth in learning Russian, and been bitter ever since. Not an insight she'd share with Renko.

"He has a point, though," Renko told her.» My embassy does not seem inclined to help me."

"This is the unbelievable statement he gives us," Arcos said.» That Rufo Pinero, a man with no criminal record, an honored Cuban sportsman, a driver and interpreter for Renko's own embassy, approached him with the intent to sell cigars, was told 'no' and, anyway, returned to this apartment here and, without warning or provocation, attacked Renko with two weapons, a knife and a syringe, and in a fight accidentally drove a needle through his own head."

"Are there any witnesses?" asked Ofelia.

"Not yet," Arcos said, as if he might dig one up still.

Ofelia had not worked with the captain before but she recognized the type, better at vigilance than competence and promoted well beyond his natural abilities. She couldn't expect any help from Luna; the sergeant seemed to regard everyone, including Arcos, with the same dark disregard.

She unzipped Rufo's running suit and found that under it he was still completely dressed in the shirt and pants he had been wearing at the ILM. In warm weather that made very little sense. In his shirt pocket was a plastic case and passport-sized ID that read: "Rufo Perez Pinero; Fecha de nacimiento: 2/6/56; Profesion: traductor; Casado: no; Numero de habitation: 155 Esperanza, La Habana; Status Militar: reserva; Hemotipo: B." Glued in a corner was a photo of a younger, leaner Rufo. In the same case was a ration card with columns for months and rows for rice, meat, beans. She emptied Rufo's pockets of dollars, pesos, house and car keys, handling everything by the edge. She thought she remembered his having a cigarette lighter, too. Cubans noticed that. For some reason she also had the conviction that the Russian had already gone through Rufo's pockets, that she wasn't going to find anything that he hadn't already.

"Has the investigation started now?" Renko asked.

"There will be an investigation," Arcos promised, "but of what is the question. Everything you do is suspicious: your attitude to Cuban authority, reluctance to identify the body of a Russian colleague, now this attack on Rufo Pinero."

"My attack on Rufo?"

"Rufo's the one who is dead," Arcos insisted.

"The captain thinks I came from Moscow to attack Rufo?" Renko asked Ofelia.» First Pribluda and now me. Murder and assault. If you don't investigate that, what exactly do you people investigate?"

Ofelia was unhappy because basic protocol was to work a crime scene as soon as possible and Luna had done nothing. She stepped back for a wider view and saw a knife lodged chest-high in the side panel of a wooden cabinet yet not a book in it disturbed, not even Fidel y Arte, which was a heavy presentation book with valuable plates. Neither a chair broken nor a bruise on Renko, as if the confrontation had been over in an instant.

"Your friend is a spy and you are a murderer," Luna laid into Renko.» This is intolerable!"

Without dislodging it, Ofelia examined the knife in the cabinet. The weapon was of Brazilian manufacture, spring-loaded with an ivory handle and silver butt, the blade double-edged and sharp as a razor. Driven into the wood was a black thread.

Arcos said, "I. told the embassy, Renko is like any other visitor, he enjoys no diplomatic protection. This apartment is like any Cuban apartment, it does not enjoy extraterritorial protection. This is a Cuban matter, completely up to us."

"Good," said Renko.» It was a Cuban that tried to kill me."

"Don't be difficult. Since the facts of this matter are so cloudy and you are alive and no harm done, you should consider yourself lucky if you are allowed to leave Havana."

"You mean leave Havana alive. Well, I missed tonight's flight."

"There will be another in a week. In the meantime, we will continue to investigate."

The Russian asked Ofelia, "Would you consider this an investigation?"

She hesitated because she had found in the lapel of his black coat a narrow cut in the wrong place for a buttonhole. Her pause incensed Arcos.

"This is my investigation, run as I see fit, considering many factors, such as whether you surprised Rufo, stabbed him with the needle and, when he was dead, placed it in his hand. It could still have your prints."

"Do you think so?"

"Rigor mortis has not set in. We'll look."

Before Ofelia could stop him, the captain knelt and tried to bend Rufo's fingers off the syringe. Rufo held tight, the way dead men sometimes did. Luna shook his head and smiled.

Renko told Ofelia, "Inform the captain it's a death spasm, not rigor mortis, but now he'll have to wait for the rigor to come and go. Depending on how much he wants to wrestle with Rufo, of course."

Which only made Arcos pull harder.

She took Renko back to Pribluda's flat on the Malecon for lack of a better place for him to stay. He didn't have the money for a hotel, the embassy's apartment was now a crime scene, and until he officially identified Pribluda he would only be staying in the flat of an absent friend.

For a minute she and Renko stood on the balcony to watch a solitary car sweep along the boulevard and waves lap against the breast of the seawall. Out on the water lamplights spilled from fishing boats and neumdticos.

"You've been on the ocean before?" Ofelia asked.

"The Bering Sea. It's not the same thing."

"You don't have to be sorry for me," she said abruptly.» The captain knows what he's doing."

Which sounded hollow even to her, but Renko relented, "You're right." He was wrapped in his black coat, like a shipwrecked man happy with the only article he'd rescued. She felt a conspiracy of sorts between the two of them because he hadn't mentioned to Arcos and Luna the earlier visit to Pribluda's flat.

"The captain doesn't usually investigate homicides, does he?"

"No."

"I remember newsreels of Castro's first trip to Russia. He was a dashing revolutionary hunting bear in a beret and green fatigues while our Kremlin Politburo stumbled through the snow after him like a pack of fat, old, love-smitten tarts. It was a romance meant to last forever. It's hard to believe that Russians are now hunted in Havana."

"I think you are in a confused state. Your friend dies and now you are attacked. This could give you a very distorted view of Cuban life."

"It could."

"And be upsetting."

"Certainly distracting."

She didn't know what he could mean by that.

"There were no other witnesses?"

"No."

"You answered the door and Rufo attacked you without warning."

"That's right."

"With two weapons?"

"Yes."

"That sounds implausible."

"That's because you're a good detective. But do you know what I've found?"

"What have you found?"

"I have found from my own experience that-in the absence of other witnesses-a simple, resolutely maintained lie is wonderfully difficult to break."