Cuba (64 page)

“What is happening”…”…Vargas demanded,

turning in that direction. “Where are the soldiers?”

He saw heads climbing the- stairs, many heads,

then a mob of people in civilian clothes and army

uniforms poured through the doorway, forcing their way in.

The room filled rapidly.

People in the doorway stood aside for two men who

walked through together, one a tall, rangy young man and the

other of medium height, wearing a one-piece faded

prison jumpsuit.

They stopped in front of Vargas.

Hector’s voice was plainly audible to every person

in the room when he said, “Alejo Vargas, I

arrest you in the name of the Cuban people for the murder of

Raiil Castro.”tilde Vargas’s hand darted

inside his jacket for a pistol, but before he could get

it out a dozen hands reached for him, pulled him to the

floor, and took the weapon from him.

Maximo Sedano spent the night aboard his yacht

in Havana Harbor. He heard the planes and the

explosions of bombs falling around La Cabana

Prison, but he didn’t go ashore. He had worked

until night fell hunting for the gold that he was

sure lay on the floor of Havana Harbor.

He found a great deal of junk and trash, but no

gold.

As the bombs were falling he drank some rum, idly

studied the skyline, thought about gold.

Thirty-seven tons of gold. My God, what a

man could do with a fortune like that! Cars, yachts,

women, all the good things hi life.

He was filthy from the muck and pollution of the harbor.

The water tank on the boat was not large, so he

sponged off as best he could and- resolved to take a

shower ashore at the first opportunity.

The next morning he began diving as soon as the

sun came up. Boats came and went and Maximo

worked steadily. He changed tanks once.

The work was maddening. The most probable location for the

gold was the marina anchorage, where Fidel and Che

must have spent the nights they were anchored. Here is where

they must have dumped the gold overboard!

Yet it wasn’t on the floor of the harbor. He

thought mud and sediment might have covered the ingots, but

even when he dug, he could find nothing.

He wasn’t being systematic enough, he decided as

he lay exhausted on the deck of his boat, his

broken fingers aching like bad teeth.

He knew he couldn’t go on today, so he took the

dinghy and motored ashore. He had his empty

tanks along for the harbormaster to fill.

Tired, working one-handed, Maximo took several

minutes to get the small boat tied up and the empty

air tanks onto the dock. He picked them up and

carried them toward the harbormaster’s shack.

The man was sitting inside reading a newspaper.

“Can you fill these”…”…Maximo asked.

The harbormaster looked up to see who was asking, then

brightened. “Senor Sedano, of course. I am so

delighted to hear about your brother. Congratulations.”

“What?”

The look of surprise on his face must have shocked

the harbormaster, who held out the newspaper.

“Surely you knowea”…he said. “Your brother Hector

is the new president of Cuba.”

Maximo took the paper, sank down into the only

empty chair, stared at the headlines.

“What a nightff”…sd the harbormaster, beaming like the

sun. “History in the making. Hector and El

Ocho, what a team!”

“Amazing.”

“And look! The newspaper published a letter from your

sister-in-law, Mercedes. Forty years ago

Fidel hid the peso gold under the floor of the

presidential palace. It’s still there, every ounce of

it. Sixty

tons of gold

the nation owns, eh! Isn’t that amazing?”

The gray U.s. Navy ammo ship anchored in the

bay and put a launch into the water. The coxswain

brought the small boat around to a gangway. In a

few minutes the trill of a bosun’s pipe could be

heard, then a series of bells over the ship’s

loudspeaker.

A group of officers and sailors in white uniforms

came down the gangway and climbed aboard the

launch.

The town of Antilla, Cuba, lay baking in the

sun. The

waterfront was lined with fishing craft. The only

ships at the pier were two small coasters, about a

thousand tons each. The launch maneuvered against the

pier and Rear Admiral Jake Grafton stepped

ashore. Gil Pascal and Toad Tarkington

followed him onto the pier.

“That’s the warehouse over thereea”…Toad said, and

pointed.

Jake just nodded. He waited as a knot of

Cubans came walking out on the pier toward him.

“Where”…ness the translator?”

“Right here, sirea”…sd an enlisted man, who

stepped forward beside Jake. He too was togged out in

his best white uniform.

After the usual diplomatic greetings, Jake,

Captain Pascal, and the translator went with the

Cubans toward the warehouse, leaving Toad alone

on the pier.

Tarkington strolled along, looking here and there, his

arms folded behind his back.

He was standing near the head of the pier when he heard a

noise. He stepped to the edge, leaned over.

A man in a black diving suit covered with muck

and slime was dragging his gear out from under the pier into the

sun.

“I was wondering where you guys wereea”…Toad said

conversationally.

“Some days you’re the pigeon, some days you’re the

statueea”…the navy SEAL said. “Three days we’ve

been living under here like harbor rats, watching that

warehouse. We searched it the first night, Commanderthe

warheads were in there. And they’re still there; the Cubans

haven’t taken anything out.”

“Where’s your partner in crime?”

“Over on the other side of those coasters. He’ll

be along in a bit. Think we could get a ride out

to the ship? I’ve been dreaming of a hot

shower, a hot meal, and a clean bunk.”

“I think that can be arranged.”…Toad reached down,

helped lift the diving gear onto the pier.

When the SEAL was standing on the pier beside him, dripping

onto the splintered boards, Toad said, “How’d you

like your Cuban vacation?”

“I want better accommodations for my next

visit.”

As the president of the United States feared, the

aftermath of the second Cuban missile crisis, as

the press called it, was a political disaster in

Washington, with howls of outrage from the press and

demands from frightened senators and congressmen for

investigations and the resignations of everyone in the

executive branch.

The president watched General Tater Totten

retire from a distance, didn’t go to the small

Pentagon ceremony, let the White House

spinmeisters whisper that Totten was somehow partially

responsible for the journey to the brink of the abyss.

Sensing that he couldn’t win a whisper war, Totten

kept his mouth shut and departed with dignity.

Amid the impassioned breast-beating and public

denunciations, the director of the CIA decided that

he too had had enough of Washington. He had

a final conversation with the president in the Oval

Office after he submitted his resignation but before the

White House announced his departure.

“Sorry to see you goea”…the president muttered

politely, not meaning a word of it. The director

nodded knowingly.

“Don’t know if this congressional investigation can be

derailed or notea”…the president said, not willing

to look the director in the eye. “A lot of what

happened will be classified forever, so I don’t

really see what they stand to gain by stirring through the

ashes.”

“They’ll investigate anywayea”…the director

predicted gloomily. “That’s what I want

to talk to you about. At one of those meetings during the

crisis you asked for the name of our top man in

Cuba, and I wrote it down for you. I don’t know

if you ever looked at that name, but it would

be absolute disaster if that person’s name were revealed

to a congressional investigator.”

“After you wrote it down, I looked at the nameea”…the

president said, speaking slowly. “Not at the

meeting, but later. Didn’t expect to recognize

it, but then was amazed that the last name was the same as the

priest who was thrown in prison.”

“Mercedes Sedano was Castro’s mistress and an

intelligence treasure. She told us of drug

deals, Vargas’s blackmail files, Fidel’s

secret bank accounts…. When she wanted the

tape made of Fidel naming Hector as his

successor, there wasn’t time to go through the usual

drops and cutouts, so she went directly to the

American Interest Section of the Swiss

embassy. None of this must come out, Mr.

President. If the Cubans find out she was

whispering to us, Hector Sedano’s government might

fall. And she might lose her life.”

“That sheet of paper no longer existsea”…the

president said. “I suggest you destroy the

files.”

A few minutes later as the director was preparing

to leave, the president said, “I have never understood

spies. Why did that woman betray her country?”

The director blinked like an owl. “I don’t know

that she didea”…he replied, and walked out of the Oval

Office for the last time.

On a Wednesday morning in November Tommy

Carmellini parked his car in a large parking garage

in downtown Denver and got his backpack from the

trunk.

The weather was gorgeous, a sunny, mild day with

air so clear the peaks of the Rockies looked

close enough to touch. Autumn leaves lay packed in

gutters and windrows waiting for tomorrow’s wind to blow them

around.

Carmellini walked two blocks to the Sixteenth

Street mall. While he was waiting for a free

shuttle bus he bought a copy of the

Denver Post

from a vending machine. Like so many of the young people, he was

dressed in tennis

shoes, faded jeans, and a threadbare pullover

sweater. An unzipped windbreaker was tied around his

waist. A backpack hung over one shoulder. The

shuttle bus stopped at the end of every block to let

people on and off. Hanging from a strap, Carmellini

kept his backpack pressed against the rear window of the

bus.

At the western end of the mall Carmellini let himself

be swept along with the flow of people into the regional bus

depot. He found a bus to Boulder, climbed

aboard, and dropped the fare into the change box, then

eased into a window seat five rows behind the driver.

He kept his backpack on his lap.

The bus filled quickly. In minutes the

driver closed the door and pulled out of the station.

Tommy Carmellini opened the newspaper and

examined the front page. All U.s. sanctions

against travel and commerce with Cuba were lifted, and the

U.s. was opening an embassy in Havana. There

was a photo of the president of the United States

shaking hands with Hector Sedano at a news

conference in Washington.

Tommy flipped through the paper. On page four he

found a short item reporting a Florida grand

jury indictment of El Gato, a Cuban exile

living in Miami, charging him with selling unnamed

equipment to the Cuban government in violation of the

laws existing at the time. According to the newspaper, El

Gato was the only person indicted.

Carmellini folded the paper and tucked it in the seat

pocket in front of him.

Cuba was long ago and far away. Of course he still

read the news and classified summaries, and heard

people talking about Cuba and the people he met there.

Microsoft and Intel were building big factories

in Havana, and Phillip Morris was buying one

of the oldest cigar companies for beaucoup bucks.

Rear Admiral Jake Grafton was now an

assistant to some bigwig in the Pentagon,

Commander Toad Tarkington went with him as an aide,

and Toad’s wife, the newly promoted Commander

Rita Moravia, was the exec-

utive officer of a fighter squadron. Hector

Sedano was doing an enviable job running Cuba, and

some fighter pilot nobody ever heard of named

Carlos Corrado had been promoted to general and

put in charge of the Cuban Air Force.

.life goes on.

Most of the seats on the bus to Boulder were occupied.

The sun coming through the windows and the motion of the bus were very

pleasant, and many people dozed. The seat beside

Carmellini was empty, so he relaxed

las

grip on the backpack and closed his eyes.

He was awake when the bus crossed Davidson

Mesa into Boulder, roaring down the turnpike at

seventy-five. He marveled at the upthrust

granite slabs of the Flatirons which formed a

spectacular backdrop behind the town.

As the bus cruised by the university on its way

downtown, Tommy Carmellini walked to the door

by the driver and waited. He got off at the next

stop and stood looking at the red stone buildings of the