In Flames (6 page)

General Armando Arbusto's office was in a sprawling Spanish colonial villa. No reception hall, so we club members waited our turns outside on a long porch with a view over my Xy Corp. harbor workplace. The pile driver on the barge out on the water pounded away,
clang boom, clang boom,
and in the distance, El Cristo Redentor, the island's blindingly white concrete savior, gleamed in sunshine.

Black soldiers in camouflage uniforms set up folding chairs for us. We were on the veranda barely a minute when General Arbusto and the police major entered the building. As the door opened for them, we could hear computer keys clicking away in the offices. A soldier came out and motioned for Elaine to come first. The general appeared in the doorway, and I heard him murmuring as he took her arm and led her inside. “…regrettable business, all this, sorry to take your time, señora, such a sad day. My condolences…have to clear things up, get it over quickly.”

In less than ten minutes, she was back out, calm as a clam. Without a word or a glance in our direction, she walked down the front steps and headed toward her car.

Again a soldier stepped out on the porch. “You, señor.” He pointed to Jimmy Padgett the golf pro, who turned and winked at us. Five minutes later, Jimmy was strolling back out on the porch. He smiled in our direction and walked to the parking lot, a jaunt in his step.

Old Copper Skin, Jerry Klauer, the straight-faced poker player, asked a soldier for a glass of water, and then leaned over to me, his voice quiet. “She was the general's lover. That's why this is all so…convoluted.”

I didn't respond. Nothing appeared coherent, nothing much made sense. I shifted restlessly in my chair and waited my turn. Klauer went in and a few moments later he was leaving, and I could hear the police major. “You're sure, then, no one left the party between one and three…Gracias, señor.”

I was the last one on the porch, when the major poked his head out once more. “You again? Okay, c'mon, let's go, my friend, do your bit.”

Inside the villa, the banging of the harbor pile driver was muted, and after the glare outside, corridor darkness revealed little more than shadows within shadow. I entered the general's office, a long room, at the far end a cocktail table covered in tall glasses, air-conditioning squeezing the air. An indistinct figure sat with his legs crossed, the light through blinds shining on him in stripes. I needed a few seconds for my eyes to adjust to dimness.

The police major said, “General, this is Señor Daniel Shedrick, about whom I was speaking…”

The general didn't stand or offer me his hand. He waved to a chair for me to sit down. He was a trim man in his early fifties, hair already white, skin latte-colored. Unlike the soldiers who staffed the villa, the general wasn't in combat fatigues. He wore a crisp short-sleeved tan uniform that looked as if he changed it several times a day, not a sign of perspiration. “Can you believe, señor, I went to Princeton too. Woodrow Wilson School, a doctorate in strategic defense. I liked it up there…” His voice sounded friendly in the way of men who enjoy their power. My eyes adjusted to gloom, and I caught a glimpse of four gold star inlays embellishing ivory handles on a pair of nine-millimeter Glocks, the pistols snug in polished leather holsters on the general's hips. On each of his epaulets, and each of his collar points, he sported four more golden stars. The general exuded a comfortable, confident air of command, his message,
I don't have to throw my weight around, my word is law here
. His eyes held an assured aspect, alternating between the momentarily amused, as if to signal,
I know what's going on, Shedrick, you can't put anything over on me
, to what I could only decipher as a pitying expression, as though he, general and vice president, lived on a higher plane of enlightenment where, to his everlasting regret, the likes of me would never gain entry. “Señor Daniel Shedrick, architect, interesting profession, very creative. Calls for a lot of imagination. Would señor architect like a cold drink…” He lifted his hand, and a soldier brought me a glass of fruit juice. The rum in it tasted like a double, nice and stiff. “Tell us again, señor, what brings you to our country, just what in God's name could possibly attract…an artist like you.”

Throughout my explanation, the general didn't blink, listening with mannered deliberation, a brooding knob of tongue slipping around inside smooth cheeks, large hands clenching, unclenching, head shaking in disbelief or nodding in confirmation, and as he crossed and uncrossed his legs, his leather holsters creaked.

“Xy Corp., señor, God help us. If they and the oil company paid us every royalty and commission they owe here, they'd go belly-up.”

“I didn't know that about Xy Corp.”

“Yes, and they're always so optimistic, so few signs of resignation in you Americans. And this, I regret, is not a compliment. Okay, nobody's perfect, and I'm sorry if I sound like a cynic now, but I can only see things as they are here, not as they might have been. Your embassy pretends it's not really involved in this country, your people always above the fray, and that's why none of you ever understand San Iñigo.”

“I'm only here on a one-year contract.”

“Then don't get the wrong impression, señor, my country isn't always wallowing up to its ass in scandal. Problem is too many people here now are furious about Delgado Vinny, he was a very popular person, even if he was irresponsible. Same old questions to ask about Vinny, what did he know and when did he know it. Well, it's simple, Vinny knew everything, always. Except he never knew when to shut up. And by the way, señor, if you intend to stay at the Saint Ignatius for your year in my country, you must take care, be discreet. You understand, our investigation reveals some uncomfortable inconsistencies there…” He paused to reassess me, and he seemed to like, or at least trust, what he saw. “Indications so far are Señora Ferguson could have killed Vinny. There's proof, yes, almost but not quite enough to go to trial. Her possible motives present us—shall we say?—with certain evidentiary problems. We found the cartridge casing, fired from the shotgun Señor Ferguson used for trap shooting off the yacht harbor dock. More ice in your drink, señor? It melts quickly in this heat…”

I was at a loss for words. I could barely shake my head to decline more ice. For a moment it didn't occur to me the general might be bluffing about Elaine. He was strong enough to speak what he considered truth, he had no need to lie, certainly not to me, he didn't have to impress me. Still I found it almost impossible to believe he was talking about the same woman, the woman he'd released after a mere ten minutes of questioning. If he suspected her, why let her go, and I recalled Klauer's words…
She was the general's lover.
That's why this is all so…convoluted
.

“It's complicated, señor, and you're confused, understandably, but she's the perpetrator, we're pretty sure. And now our hands are tied, that clown was too popular. The only real inequality in our country is between the living and the dead. And now that Delgado Vinny is gone, people feel robbed of an important part of their equality, they demand justice for losing him, he was one of theirs, they believed he belonged to them, and they insist on compensation for their loss, they want fairness. But my job is security, and security is the art of making nothing happen. Inertia is my professional ideal. And if anything does happen—especially something like this—then I'm in trouble. My work is the opposite of yours, señor architect, you're creative, you build, you make things come to be. A new army base, new harbor. If unexpected things happen on my watch—anything new and different—then I'm a failure. You see my point? So from now on we have to keep a close eye on her. If she makes a wrong move, then we'll be forced to act. We'll have no choice. But you know what really confuses me here is…Señora Ferguson is a smart woman, she's not naive, so why, what made her do this?”

And why me now
…I was amazed he was telling me so much, why couldn't they simply let me go after a few minutes, like all the others. Like her
.
It might have been exciting to take on the jumble of causes and consequences in all this confusion, but clarity, like coherence, was fleeting in San Iñigo, more of a transitory mood than all-embracing knowledge, as if experiencing or recollecting so many colorful clusterfucks sparked off powerful painkillers in the brain, tranquilizing everyone in the tropical paradise. Confusion became routine, numbness normal, leaving me with a conviction I was falling into the deepest, most deadening morass of all.

“It's so sad.” The general stroked his chin. “And I'm so shocked, how could she possibly get herself into this…”

I held my puzzled gaze on the general's face, a disturbingly easy thing to do as he remained imperturbable, clear-eyed, attentive. And why not, I was his lunch.

Tell us again, señor, what brings you to our country, just what in God's name…

A good question, the general nailed it. Up in Princeton it was almost springtime, back at Cottage Club they were getting ready for a week's break, off to Bermuda or Barbados, but never to a San Iñigo.

“Why'd Dan go down there?”

“Lucky fucker, what an adventure…”

And that was how they talked.
Ubi Amici Ibidem Sunt Opes
, the club motto, where there are friends, there are riches. And although I might have once reveled in memories of stateside friends, at this point I rejected them as a source of help. They were then, they weren't now, and the present was turning upside down with sickening rapidity.

Returning from my interview with the general, I sat out on the bar terrace at the club, my stomach churning. Foothills and mountains were impenetrably green, sea crystalline blue, the setting and weather perfect for adventure. Yes, I was a Princeton man, but unmentioned was that after graduation I was broke, couldn't find a job in my profession, didn't have enough money to join friends for nights out on the town in New York.

At my table under the palms on the edge of the club terrace, I felt a strange amorphous anxiety as though seated on the rim of an abyss where I couldn't move in any direction without falling deeper in darkness, into bewildering involvement.

She was the general's lover.
That's why this is all so…convoluted
.

Perhaps the general nursed an underhanded motive for accusing her. I listened to the sounds of the club, cooks in the kitchen, gardeners on lawns, and I grew giddy at the edge of an abrupt decision, so sudden it startled me. Snatching at audacity, I launched a plan. Elaine was alone behind the bar.

“I'm thinking,” I said, walking over to her, searching for an opener, “maybe I should see a little more of the island and go up to the mountains next weekend. They look gorgeous…”

An indecipherable smile enlivened her lips, nothing more, as though my voice reached her across immeasurable distance. She paid me no further attention. She walked around the bar, checking her work list, issuing orders to kitchen staff, exercising determined domination, tough and unpredictable.

Pissed off, I went back to my table and pretended to read a month-old
Sports Illustrated
left lying on a chair. I was too excitable to summon any inner repose, I felt unavoidably drawn to dramatic gesture. I motioned to her to come closer.

“Listen, Elaine, I think you ought to know. They found a shell casing.”

“Sure.”

“Really. From the round that killed—”

“I heard you the first time.”

“And? That's it?”

“So.”

“You ought to watch out, that's all.” I didn't mean to threaten her, only shake her, shatter the smug self-control.

“Jorge!” She turned her back to me and called over a server, who trotted out on the double. “Set the tables, Jorge.”

I had difficulty suppressing a tight grin. I didn't want to believe her cool, it was too disturbing, and I turned my head so she wouldn't notice. She was extraordinary, so relaxed and blunt, moving about freely and confidently among the blacks on her staff, even speaking dialect with those who didn't have enough English, giving them orders as if she'd been in command there all her life.

Other club members showed up for supper. Jimmy Padgett. Klauer and his poker pals. No one would have guessed they'd all recently attended the funeral of an old friend, and then sat through a police interrogation involving a murder that occurred mere yards from where they were now downing drinks while waiting for dinner. The mood that evening wasn't much different from nearly every other evening at the club, except the diners' voices were lowered, the laughs muffled. And I felt as if I were the most stifled member at the Club Saint Ignatius, keeping General Arbusto's allegations all to myself.

Long after dinner ended, I lingered at my table, pretending to read the month-old magazine. Jimmy the golfer left early. Klauer and his poker partners adjourned to the card room for an hour or so, before drifting out to the parking lot. Servers cleared the dinner tables and swept the terrace. And all this time I hadn't glanced again at Elaine. We were the only two left, and I savored a strange feeling of intimacy. Back in my room I'd found some of Ferg's belongings that she'd placed on my bed without a word of explanation, a few mildewed Stephen King novels and a tax accounting textbook, along with a couple of graphite tennis racquets. Elaine was nothing if not unpredictable. She stayed behind the bar, locking up liquor bottles.
Could she read my mind
…Had she been catching quick glimpses of me all evening.

Young Jorge came out. “All done inside, señora.”

“Fine, you can go to bed.”

And then abruptly all the lights went out, another San Iñigo power failure. Elaine turned on a flashlight, and I stood, unsure of what I'd do as I approached the bar. Before I reached her, she left with the flashlight.

“You coming?” she said to me. And all I could do was follow her back toward the owner's suite, watching her bare legs and the outline of her hips swaying under the clinging dress. She stopped at the door to her suite and handed me the flashlight while she took out the key.

“Elaine…” What the hell should I say, I felt like a kid making a pest of myself for something I wanted badly.

Elaine stood half in shadow as she opened the door and turned around. She took the flashlight from my hand and let me in first, closing the door quietly behind us. “What do you want from me, Dan?”

“I want…” I reached my hand out and touched her clingy dress, but hesitated to wrap my arms around her. She didn't push my hand away. She stood stone still.

“You're going up to the mountains, Dan? For the weekend? You don't know what the hell you're talking about. Get in bed…”

She pulled her dress up over her head, nothing underneath, and she bent over to plump the pillows, her bare bottom touching my middle. She checked the sheets for spiders and scorpions, and then hopped in ahead of me as if the two of us had done precisely this a thousand times before. She put out a hand and touched my cheek, and through her fingertips I could almost feel her nerves. She'd never caressed me like this before, my face always part of some forbidden territory of tenderness, and now the transparency of her gesture moved me. I concluded the general was a liar after all, only out for spite and vengeance.

“C'mon, honey,” she said, “turn off the flashlight.”