Naked Came the Manatee (7 page)

Back in the office, Britt Montero, an emotional wreck, collapsed at her desk. She had not rested since Jake Lassiter's call. Her mind was screaming. She tried to gather her thoughts as she took a sip from her Daffy Duck Christmas mug. Coffee was the only thing she knew could calm her. She had already drunk two espressos and one cafe con leche at the Beach, but she needed more. Britt had served herself a mug of freshly brewed Colombian supreme blend from Publix. As she breathed in the aroma, feeling it filtering her thoughts, she wondered: Of all the reporters in town, why had Jake Lassiter called her? She wasn't the only one who could have identified that head, the head.

But she didn't dwell on that point. She wanted the story. She was dying for the story. Castro dead! It could lead to riots. Too much was at stake; she had to be sure.

As she refilled her Daffy Duck mug, Britt considered the loose threads, mulling over all the questions. Was this really Fidel's head? For that matter, was it anybody's head? The thing she'd seen in Jake's canister looked human to her, but maybe she hadn't looked at it closely enough. And how about the stale aroma of cigar smoke that had wafted up from the canister after Jake had opened it? Hadn't she read somewhere that Fidel had quit smoking? It was all so confusing. She needed more coffee.

Britt tossed back her wavy hair, away from her forehead; she needed to lay out a plan. The caffeine finally kicked in, and the hive on her left arm began to itch. It always itched when she was deep into a good story.

Suddenly, she decided what to do. She picked up the phone and dialed the number—a number everyone wanted and only she possessed. Just like the man whose number it was: Big Joey G., pudgy and bald, yet unassailable. Last seen coming out of the house of his private masseuse off Biscayne Boulevard. If this was as big as she thought it was, he would know something, she thought. And he owed her one.

It only took three international calls and two beeper pages for him to answer her on his cellular. He wouldn't divulge much, yet she was sure he knew more than he let on. But he did say something that jolted her. There wasn't one canister, he'd heard, there were two. And Big People were after them. He wouldn't explain any more, but he warned her to be careful.

Britt thought it was just like Big Joey G., always saying just enough, never completing the picture. That was his modus operandi: leave them curious.

After hanging up, Britt immediately called Jake.

"Lassiter, this is Britt. I need to see you and Deal ASAP."

"Deal is out," answered Lassiter.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean he's out. We won! The city was afraid of a big loss, and settled his suit for nine point two million. Deal took the deal."

"Did you say nine million?"

"That's what I said. Anyway, he decided this other thing was a bad omen—he doesn't want anything to do with it. He left it with me and wouldn't even tell me where he was going."

"Incredible. Where was his sense of civic duty?" said Britt. "In any case, I have news for you. Can you come down to the office?"

"No, I'm too far. Give me thirty minutes and I'll meet you at the Fishbone Grill, in the Grove," said Lassiter.

"I'll give you forty-five."

Britt hung up the phone, distraught and exhilarated at the same time.

Forty-five minutes gave her just enough time to stop at the city morgue first. She had an idea. But as she grabbed her purse, the phone rang.

"Montero, Miami News."

"Is this Miss Britt Montero?"

"Yes, can I help you?" answered Britt impatiently.

"Miss Montero, this is Fay Leonard. You don't know me well, but I have something to tell you. It's about—a head."

This was getting to be a busy night, Britt thought. She sat down to listen.

7. THE LOCK & KEY—Evelyn Mayerson

Britt found Fay Leonard in the back of the Fishbone Grill beside a chalkboard that announced Chilean salmon as the catch of the day. Except for a few grizzled men with creased and sunburnt necks speculating on the depths to which Pat Riley would ream out the Heat, the restaurant was empty.

Fay rapped her rugged nails on a polyurethane table. She and Britt knew each other slightly through their pioneer families. The difference between them was one of strata. While Fay's mother and father were able to trace their Miami roots respectively to a wrecker who had created his own wrecks by placing decoy lights and to a carpenter who had fashioned driftwood coffins, Britt's claim to founder status was only matrilineal.

"I thought it would be better," said Fay, "if we did this before Jake got here. He complicates things, if you know what I mean. It's all that busted cartilage. Whenever he moves, he clicks. It's distracting when you're trying to have a conversation."

Britt slung the wooden chair away from the table and sat astride it. "You sounded pretty frantic, Fay. What is it you want to tell me?" And weren't you supposed to be kidnapped? she thought to herself.

"My ex is missing."

"I'd say that's good news."

Fay looked around her, then leaned across the table. "This is serious, Britt. Before his disappearance, Phil told me that he was afraid that Cubans were coming after him."

"Tell him to stop renting leaky flotilla boats."

"It's nothing like that. Phil is afraid of Cuban Cubans. The last time I saw him, he was talking crazy about karate-trained guys in black shirts and some kind of business deal gone sour. I know what you're thinking, it sounded crazy to me, too. Except that what he did to me was even crazier."

The pieces of Fay's abduction suddenly came together like metal filings on a magnet. "Wait a minute. You mean it was your ex-husband who kidnapped you?"

Fay leaned back. "How did you find out that I was kidnapped?" Her eyes narrowed. "Of course. Jake. I should have figured. Look, Britt, it's a long story. Let's just say that I have this head that came out of a canister. And it resembles Castro. My grandmother's got it on ice, but it's beginning to thaw. She says she saw another one just like it, but I don't know whether to believe her. Old people get confused. On the other hand, I retrieved another canister myself. Whatever it's all about, it's big. Miami could lose half its population. And dummy Phil is somehow connected. I'm scared. I'm scared for Phil."

Britt struggled to maintain a poker face, hoping that her eyebrows had not given her away. Big Joey G. was right. There really were two canisters. But that was the least of it. Britt had seen more gore and carnage than most doctors. She had heard more startling confessions than most priests. But this one had grabbed her right in the throat. It was a minute before she could make herself say anything. She wanted it to sound as hard-boiled as possible.

"People usually want to give me a story. It looks like you're here to get one."

Fay bit open a cellophane package of oyster crackers. "I can scuba-dive to three hundred feet, Britt, but I'm over my head with this. I didn't know who else to talk to. I thought of the cops, except with Phil's rap sheet, they'll drag their feet and that could get him killed. And it all sounds so bizarre."

"Can you trust your grandmother not to talk?"

"My grandmother is very closemouthed. She's kept more secrets about Miami than a scow has barnacles."

"Exactly how do I come into this picture?"

"You're on the street, Britt. And Jake trusts you. I was hoping you would know what to do."

Britt knew only that the safest course was to play it out, see where it led, treat the whole scary series of events as a developing story. She collected her facts. Joey G. had also said there were two canisters. Britt had seen a head herself. Was it the same head, or were there two?

The evening was warm. Britt rolled the sleeves of her T-shirt, revealing slender yet well-muscled arms. "And a manatee found it, right?"

"Yes," said Fay. "Sort of a pet. We call him Booger. Poor guy got tangled up in it. He's always into one jam or another. The way we met, Booger swam west through a canal and got trapped in the Everglades. My grandmother strong-armed the water management people to slow the current of the canal. That's how he was able to retrace his swim back into Biscayne Bay." She paused. "Britt, how could there be two heads of Castro?"

"Two heads that look like Castro," Britt corrected. "Castro has at least two doubles."

Fay removed the rubber band from her ponytail and shook her hair free. "If you were going to kill Castro, why would you need to kill his double?"

"Maybe you didn't want his double to capitalize on his death."

"And," said Fay, "why preserve the heads in canisters?"

Britt shrugged, then stood and slung her purse over her shoulder. "Actually, when you called I was on my way to the morgue to see if there were any headless bodies."

"You think… "

"I don't know what I think. Follow me in your car. It's easy to find, One Bob Hope Road. You can't miss it."

Britt turned to the blackboard, picked up a piece of chalk, and beneath the catch of the day wrote: "JAKE, MEET US AT THE MORGUE. TRY NOT TO THROW UP LIKE YOU DID LAST TIME."

Jimmy's Bronx Cafe was packed to the gills and rocking. Fidel Castro sat at the head table, threw up his hands and smiled. "Life changes," he said, and the crowd roared.

When it was over, his aides whisked him away to a stretch. He waved as the car pulled out. "I love these people," he said. "Fat cats snubbed me, true. But I took my case to the people. Angela Davis, Danny Glover, Mortimer Zuckerman, Ramsey Clark, Spike Lee, they can't all be wrong."

"And that lawyer woman. Don't forget her," said the aide beside him.

"Is she still here?"

"We can't get her to leave."

"Charm can be a burden. What about the other matter?"

"There are difficulties, Jefe. The cargo is missing."

"Missing? You mean like Che's hands?"

"Something like that."

"Don't talk missing! Don't use that word. It's been thirty years since Che was captured and killed. I will never forget the photograph of that beautiful, restless Argentine, the bloody desecrated stumps of his hands."

The aide felt sweat running down his shirt. "The situation of the misdirected items is temporary, Fidel. Let me assure you that we expect immediate retrieval."

"Must I do everything myself?" Fidel pounded his chest with a sharp rap. It hurt. He reminded himself of what the doctor had said, that now that he was close to seventy, chest pounding could lead to arrhythmia. Life changes, he thought.

He remembered that The New York Times had called him a Cold War apparition, and he sulked while the limo snaked its way through gridlock. Then he said, "I'm going to Miami."

The man next to him turned in surprise. "Fidel, Comandante en jefe, with all due respect, are you crazy? To Miami? How would you go?"

"The way I went before. Incognito."

"You mean the Lubavitch rabbi suit?"

"Don't be stupid. You expect me to wear that long black coat in the tropics? And you can forget about the fur hat."

"That's precisely my point. So what does that leave?"

Fidel's eyes shone. "It leaves the people. We'll do as we just did in the Big Manzana. By day, we'll stay in Overtown, or in Liberty City. Whatever. I'll shave my beard. By night, we'll blend. Find out the name of that Chinese restaurant I heard about in South Beach, the one with the transvestite waiters. I particularly want to see the one they call Shelley Novak. I always admired Kim Novak. For a gringa, she was very Cuban. You couldn't see the mustache, but you knew it was there."

Fidel Castro waved his hand. "But the most important thing is, what shall I tell El Maniz about the missing cargo? Save me from these gringos with their missions. If Senor Peanut wants to get away from his wife, tell him to get a divorce. Involving himself in complicated matters of state… " He reached for a cigar. "If we could somehow put him together with the one who won't leave me in peace, what a pair, no?"

Jake Lassiter entered the windowless, brightly lit morgue. His swollen knee hurt. He tried not to limp. Overhead, a buzzing fluorescent was starting to go. Jake didn't know how Britt did it. He could never get used to the smell of formaldehyde or the partially masked odor of rotting flesh.

In the center of the room, Britt and Fay stood beside a metal table where a waxen cadaver lay over a trough. The women were talking to a medical examiner wearing steel mesh gloves, who was weighing a liver on a scale.

Jake brightened; the pain in his knee subsided. Attractive women and the pursuit of truth were not mutually exclusive and it was good to hone one's skills.

Fay heard him first. "Jake is coming," she said. "He's like the crocodile in Peter Pan. "

"I never saw the movie," said Britt. "I was too busy hating my mother."

Jake strode toward the women, then stopped abruptly, legs spread apart like the Colossus of Rhodes. He averted his eyes from the fluids running down the trough of the metal table, looked up instead at the buzzing neon light. "That's the second time you stood me up, Britt." Getting no response, he dropped his voice. It was low and husky. Women liked its sound. "You here to find a match for the head?"