A whisper in Russian. "Are you from Sergei?"
"Yes."
"Where have you been? Where has he been? I was here all day last week and I've seen this film once already today."
"How long has this film been playing here?"
"A month."
"Sorry."
"I would think so. I'm the one who's taking all the chances. And this film is for cretins. It's bad enough I'm doing this, but to treat me this way."
"It's not right."
"It's debasing. You can pass that on to Sergei."
"Whose idea was it?"
"To meet here? It was my idea, but I didn't intend to pass whole days here. They must think I'm a pervert." On the screen the gangster chief pulled on a glove equipped with a power drill and demonstrated it on a luckless henchman. "Actually, in the old days this was the best porno theater in Havana."
"What happened when they switched to karate films?"
"We brought our girlfriends and screwed. The Chinese never paid attention to what we did."
It was dark, and Arkady didn't want to examine his companion too obviously, but what he could see sideways was a bureaucrat in his sixties with a gray mustache, eyes bright as a bird's.
"So you have spent a lot of time here."
"I suffer from a certain personal history. Surprised to see Chinese in Cuba?"
"Yes."
"Brought in when the slave trade closed. There's no smoking," the man said to explain why he was cupping his cigarette. He switched briefcases and, using the cigarette as a little lamp, dipped his head into the one he'd taken from Arkady to count the money, the same hundred-dollar expenditure Pribluda had paid every week. "You understand, I am under extraordinary pressure. If I had known what buying a car would entail, I never would have agreed to any of this."
"You can buy a car?"
"Used, of course. '55 Chevrolet. Original leather." On the screen, gangsters marched into a studio where the girl had just finished sculpting a dove in white marble. As they broke off the statue's wings her brother flew through the studio window on a motor scooter. "Where is Sergei?"
"Not feeling well," Arkady said, "but I'll tell him you wished him a quick recovery."
The monk was a whirlwind, dispatching hoodlums with a variety of leaps and kicks. With every blood-spraying kick Arkady's head throbbed, and when the gangster chief pulled on his glove Arkady stood.
"Aren't you staying?" his friend said. "This is the good part."
Ofelia was late for the meeting with Muriel's teacher.
She rushed because she was convinced that the Italian with Hedy was slaughtered simply because he resembled Renko. She had gone to the medical clinic in time to find Lohmann, the salesman from Hamburg, still being examined and he truculently answered yes, his friend Franco had bumped his head a few days earlier on one of those stupid low doorways in Havana Vieja. Poor Hedy had not been too bright to begin with, and place, time, looks, names, a simple scrape on the Italian's head, everything had conspired against her.
Also Ofelia wanted to shower. She felt death lying like a film on her skin. If other people couldn't smell it, she could.
A footbridge led from the Quinta de Molina to the school, modern and airy with pastel walls covered with self-portraits of students in their maroon uniforms, skirts for girls and shorts for boys, and murals on the theme of "Resistance!" featuring children with rifles downing hapless American jets.
Muriel's class had recently visited a banana plantation, and the classroom walls were decorated with paper bananas. Ofelia wondered where they got the paper. The school had one book for every three students, no new books in the library for three years, no chemicals for chemistry. "They learn in the abstract," as her mother put it caustically; nevertheless the school was clean and orderly. Ofelia made profuse apologies to Miss Garcia, Muriel's teacher, an older woman with eyebrows as thin as spider legs.
"I'd almost given up on you." The brows lifted to indicate exasperation.
"I'm so sorry." Was there anything more self-abased than a parent meeting with a teacher? Ofelia wondered. "Is there something special you wanted to talk about?"
"Of course. Why would I have asked you in?"
"There's a problem, no?"
"Yes. A great problem."
"Muriel has not been turning in homework?"
"She turns in her homework."
"It's good?"
"Adequate."
"She misbehaves in school?"
"She behaves normally. That was the reason she was allowed to go on the trip. But deep in her, in the soul of this little girl, is something rotten."
"Rotten?"
"Festering."
"She hit someone, she lied?"
"No, no, no, no. Don't try to get off easy. Deep in her heart is a worm."
"What did she do?"
"She violated my trust. I took only my best students to the farm. To learn of the struggle in the countryside. Instead, she revealed herself as an anti-revolutionary and a thief." Miss Garcia set a paper bag on her desk. " On the way back on the bus this fell out of her shirt. I heard it fall."
Ofelia looked inside the bag. "A banana."
"Stolen goods. Stolen by a daughter of an officer of the PNR. This is not going to end here."
"Actually, a banana skin, no?" Ofelia lifted it from the bag by its unpeeled end. The skin was brown and blotchy, ripeness on the edge of rotting.
"Banana or banana skin, it makes no difference."
"She had eaten it or not?"
"That doesn't matter."
"You heard it fall. It's not likely you would hear an empty banana skin fall on a moving bus."
"That's not the point."
"Whose custody has it been in? There could be more than one person involved, there might be a whole ring involved with this banana. I will test it for fingerprints inside and out. We can do that. I'm glad you brought this to my attention. Don't worry, we'll get them all, each and every one. Do you want me to?"
"Well." Miss Garcia sat back, and her tongue dabbed at the corner of her mouth. "It was in my custody, of course. I don't know how it got eaten."
"We can investigate. We can make sure the perpetrators never show their faces in this school again. Is that what you want?"
Miss Garcia looked aside, the eyebrows settled, and she said in an entirely different voice, "I suppose I was hungry."
Now Ofelia felt even worse. There was no pleasure to be had in cowing a teacher who didn't even recognize she was slowly starving. Miss Garcia's problem was her revolutionary purity, she had to be the only person Ofelia knew who didn't have some small enterprise on the side. Next the poor woman would start hallucinating and see Che wandering the halls. Ofelia was so ashamed she couldn't wait to get her hands on Muriel.
Arkady opened the briefcase and laid the contents on Pribluda's desk, photocopies that were in Spanish, naturally, every word. If he'd only studied Spanish at school instead of English and German, which were only good for sciences, medicine, philosophy, international business, Shakespeare and Goethe. For sugar, Spanish seemed to be the key. Arkady tried anyway:
• A document with the title "Negociacion Russo-Cubano" with lists of names, Russian for the "Ministerio de Commercio Exterior de Rusia" (Bykov, Plotnikov, Chenigovskii), Cubans for the Cuban "Ministerio de Azucar" (Mesa, Herrera, Suarez) and a third of Panamanian mediators from AzuPanama (Ramos, Pico, Arenas).
• A "Certificado del Registro Publico Panameno" for AzuPanama, S.A., including a list of "directores" with the same names as the mediators, Sres. Ramos, Pico, Arenas.
• A "Referenda Bancaria" for AzuPanama from the Bank for Creative Investments, S.A., "Zona Libre de Colón," signed by the bank's "Director General," John O'Brien.
• Face pages of Cuban passports for Ramos, Pico and Arenas.
• Cubana airline tickets from Havana to Panama for Ramos, Pico and Arenas.
• Room vouchers for Ramos, Pico and Arenas from the Hotel Lincoln, Zona Libre, Colón,
billed to the Cuban Ministry of Sugar.
• A long list of Russian commitments in funds and cash equivalents totaling $252 million for Cuban sugar.
• A revised list after mediation by AzuPanama for $272 million.
• A deposit slip of $5,000 in the name of Vitaly Bugai at the Bank for Creative Investments, S.A., Zona Libre, Colón, Republica de Panama.
In other words, the mediators Ramos, Pico and Arenas were Cuban, and the neutral AzuPanama was a creation of the Cuban Ministry of Sugar and the Bank for Creative Investment. Arkady's Spanish was nonexistent, but his math was fair. He understood that Cuba had defrauded Russia of an extra $20 million, one beggar stealing from the other. He also understood that the Cubans' silent partner in crime was the pirate who owned Capone's boat.
Close up, Muriel's dark eyes had irises like solar flares, frightening glimpses of the eleven-year-old soul. Her interrogation was brief because she admitted to worse than her teacher claimed. She had bought the banana.
"The workers at the farm were selling them. I had a dollar from Grandmother. We bought a bunch."
"A bunch? Miss Garcia found only one banana."
"Everyone in class hid a banana. She only found mine."
Ofelia's mother ticked on her rocker. "We got all the others, don't worry."
"That's not the point," Ofelia said. "You've turned my daughters into profiteers."
"A lesson in capitalism."
"They're not supposed to sell bananas at a state farm like that."
"A lesson in communism."
Marisol, the younger sister, said, "My class is going to see baseballs made. I can get baseballs."
Ofelia's mother said, "Good, maybe we can cook them."
In her mind Ofelia saw the militant Miss Garcia looming over her two beautiful daughters, and her mother defending them like a hen in a housedress, the family universe embattled within and without.
"I'm taking a shower."
"Then what?" her mother asked.
"I have to go out."
"To see that man?"
"He's not a man, he's a Russian."
Arkady found that he had been expecting the detective, with her inquisitor's glare, informal shorts and pullover, straw bag and gun. All the AzuPanama documents were out of sight, and Osorio could swing her gaze all she wanted.
"Did you find a picture of Pribluda today?"
"No."
"Well, I found a picture of you." It was plain she relished the surprise. "Do you remember Hedy?"
"How could I forget Hedy?"
Osorio told him about the two bodies at the Casa de Amor, Hedy Infante and an Italian national named Franco Leo Mossa. She described the condition of the room, positions of the bodies, nature of the wounds, time of death.
"Machetes?" Arkady asked.
"How did you guess?"
"Statistics. There was no outcry?"
"No. The murderer also used something round and sharp to puncture the Italian's throat so he couldn't call out."
"Like an ice pick?"
"Yes. At first, I thought of an extortion turned violent. Sometimes a jinetera goes with a tourist and when his pants are down a so-called boyfriend shows up and they rob him."
"We know who her boyfriend is."
"Then I thought the dead man looked like you."
"There's a compliment you don't get every day. Was he the man we saw her with on the street the other night?"
"I'm pretty sure. Did you dance with Hedy?"
"No. We were only introduced. By Sergeant Luna."
"You talked to her?"
"Not really. She wasn't completely sober, and later, of course, she was possessed."
"After the santero's, Hedy cleaned herself up and returned here. We saw her, you and I. At the time I wondered why. I mean, everything was over. The sergeant was gone and this was not the usual place she picked up tourists. I think the reason she was here was you."
"I'd only met her."
"Maybe she wanted to meet you again."
"She would have known the difference between a well-dressed Italian and me. Why even think of me?"
"This was in the room." She showed him the picture.
A camera had the photographer's eye and it was always odd to see yourself as others imagined you. If they were dead, Arkady thought, that lent a certain finality to what had been a simple snapshot. Arkady saw cars, baggage, heavy coats, a Russian herd at SheremetyevoAirport. Only he was in focus. He had delivered the colonel a farewell smile but no embrace sprinkled with vodka and tears, their history was too complicated for that. Perhaps what Pribluda wanted, finally, Arkady thought, was someone who knew him that well and would still see him off. The photograph reminded him of the empty frame he had found in Pribluda's bureau drawer.
"Pribluda took this when I dropped him off at the airport. He said he'd use it for target practice for old times' sake. This was in the room?"
"Hedy was not a mental giant. She was probably still in a daze from the santero's. I think maybe someone gave her that to help her pick you out."
"You think the man in this picture could pass as Italian?"
"In the dark some people are hard to tell apart. Did I tell you that the dead man's name was Franco?"
"Yes."
"If a European called Franco looked like Renko, his name sounded like Renko, she met him outside Renko's apartment and his head had a cut the same as Renko's, he was probably Renko enough for Hedy. I think it's possible the murder of this Italian was a second attempt on your life."
"This happened two nights ago?"
"Yes."
Luna had said he would be back to fuck him up, Arkady remembered, and the libidinous Franco Mossa sounded as thoroughly fucked as a man could get.
"Does Sergeant Luna know about the correct identification of the body?"
"He does now. He and Arcos took over the investigation."
Luna would be back again. The days of grace were over.
Arkady asked, "Why kill Hedy?"
"I don't know."
"Why leave the photograph on her?"
"He didn't, he flushed it down the toilet."
"Then how did you get it?"
"The picture was trapped with toilet paper." She described the deeply petaled slashes, the blood-smeared sheets and blood-soaked air that had been baking in the sun for a day and a half, and confessed to her nausea. "It was unprofessional of me."
"No, it's an occupational disease," Arkady said. "The reason I left the autopsy was to be sick. See, we share a common weakness. I feel like smoking just hearing about it."
"Dr. Blas has never been sick."
"I'm sure."
"Dr. Blas says we should welcome smell as information. A body's fruity bouquet might indicate amyl nitrate. The hint of garlic can be arsenic."
"He'd be a delightful man to have dinner with."
"Anyway, I've showered."
"Showered and took the time to paint your toenails. A lot of detectives wouldn't bother to do that. You took a chance."
More than taken a chance, he thought; by removing the picture the detective had altered the crime scene, tacitly admitting that she suspected Luna as much as he did. Sharing the picture was the first real step forward on her part, painted toes and all. Now it was his turn, that was the etiquette. He could hold on to his scraps of information until he was safely back in Moscow, where the contents of the briefcase he had picked up at the Chinese theater might mean the hook for Bugai and an exchange of red-faced accusations between the Russian Ministry for Foreign Trade and the Cuban Ministry of Sugar. Over money, of course. Once back in Moscow, though, he'd never find out what happened to Pribluda.
"Have you ever heard of a Panamanian sugar company called AzuPanama?"
"I've read about it." Her eyes cooled. "In Granma, the Party newspaper. There's a problem with the Russians over the sugar contract and AzuPanama is supposed to help."
"Mediate?"
"So I understand."
"Because Azu
Panama is neutral."
"Yes."
"Panamanian?"
"Of course."
He led her to the office, opened the green briefcase and emptied its contents item by item on the desk.
"Copies of participants' lists from Russia, Cuba and AzuPanama. A list of company directors for AzuPanama and, for those same names, Cuban passports, Cubana tickets and hotel receipts. Plus a Panamanian bank reference from John O'Brien, residing in Cuba, and a deposit slip from the bank for Vice Consul Bugai, also here."
It seemed to be going well, Arkady thought. Next he could introduce the concept of O'Brien and George Washington Walls, then their involvement with Luna and Pribluda. Osorio cleared her throat and sorted the items more neatly, touching them the way a person did when handling fire.
"I thought you were getting a picture of Pribluda for Dr. Blas," she said.
"Oh, I am. I happened to come across these first."
"Where did they come from?"
"Why don't you look to see what they are?"
A slight hiss developed in Osorio's Russian. " I can see what they are. What they are is very evident. Documents manufactured to embarrass Cuba."
"You can see by comparing names on this certificate of registration with the passports that AzuPanama isn't really Panamanian at all. AzuPanama was set up in Panama by Cuba with the help of a bank controlled by the American fugitive O'Brien. That's what Pribluda was after when he died. So far, AzuPanama has cost Russia an extra $20 million. Men have died for less."
"Of a heart attack?"
"No."
"Dr. Blas says so."
"Anyway," Arkady went on, "we can make a positive match of the names from AzuPanama with a roster from the Ministry of Sugar. That's what Pribluda would have done next."