Bombs bursting in air, I said to myself.
U sually, at sea, I sleep the sleep of the innocent. Maybe it’s the gentle pitching, the faint whoosh of water against the hull. On the other hand, I sleep the same way in the woods or in a mountaintop cabin. So maybe it’s the sense of detachment, of being removed from the bustle of everyday life. So ordinarily, I am a two-hundred-twenty-six-pound slab of concrete in my bunk. Not tonight. I could have been worried that this was my last night on the planet Earth. And I was. But I also was sharing my bunk with a hundred-eighteen-pound lady who was lithe and warm and giving. We kissed and held each other, and I stroked the slopes and curves of her. We maneuvered into positions that stretched the cruciate ligaments of my bad knee, and she laughed when I fell with a thud to the deck. But she welcomed me back, and later, much later, I held and kissed and nuzzled her as the orange light of morning streaked through the porthole.
What would you eat for breakfast if you thought it was your last? Steak? Caviar and smoked salmon? I had huevos rancheros because that’s what was served in the small galley. Then Lourdes and I stood on the deck, watching the Florida Keys to our west. I recognized Big Pine, Bahia Honda, Molasses, and Fat Deer Key as we continued northeast in the Straits, keeping the Great Bahama Bank well to our east. It was a hot July day with wispy clouds on the horizon. It didn’t seem to matter if I got a touch of sunburn.
Lourdes and I were standing at the rail as we passed close to Sombrero Key where the earliest European to live in Florida made his home. Hernando d’Escalante Fontaneda was shipwrecked in the Keys around 1545 and spent the next two decades mapping the islands he called the Martires, or martyrs. He identified one Tequesta village called Guarugunbe, the place of weeping, and another, Cuchivaga, the place of suffering. Happy campers, those Tequestas. Soto would probably consider the Spaniards to have been plundering colonialists. And, of course, he would be right.
In the afternoon, Lourdes talked to her father, who stood sullenly on the bridge. When I tried to join them, a crewman waved a military. 45 under my nose and gave me the impression I wasn’t wanted near the controls. Through the glass, I watched Lourdes argue with her father, gesturing with both hands. He listened grimly, shaking his head, occasionally saying something I could not hear. Then he turned his back to her and spoke to the captain. She flung her arms in the air one last time, then rejoined me on the deck.
“I guess you didn’t convince him to give up his ideals and join the Hialeah Rotary,” I said.
“This isn’t funny. I pleaded for your life and his.”
“What did he say?”
“That his life wasn’t worth saving.” She looked away. “He asked if I loved you.”
“To which you responded…”
“I told him no…”
Until now, I had always appreciated candor in a woman.
“… But that I liked you, that you were a good man who was not his enemy. He said you are meaningless as an individual but important as a symbol.”
I watched a wad of sea grapes and other flotsam ride the midget waves into the hull of the freighter. I watched the water change color from bright turquoise to deep indigo as the depth changed along our route. I watched three dolphins jump in unison off the starboard side where motor yachts and oil tankers crisscrossed the Straits.
I allowed myself some heroic imaginings. If life were a B-movie, I would break a mirror and, holding it to the sun, bounce messages to a Coast Guard cutter just waiting to rescue a few billion dollars in art and a halfway honest lawyer. But I didn’t know Morse code. Or I would dive off the side and swim to shore. Maybe two or three miles, nothing to it, except a couple of jellyfish stings. But my protectors would gun me down before I hit the water. Or I could overpower Soto and hold him hostage. But he would order his crew to blow us all up. That’s what he was going to do anyway, right? But what about Lourdes? Wouldn’t he want to save her? Maybe, but what had Soto said? Individual lives are meaningless.
“Jake, I’m sorry. I really am.”
Maybe it was the wind, but Lourdes had tears in her eyes. “It’s not your fault,” I told her.
“Not just about this. About ever getting involved with Yagamata and Foley. I did things…”
She let it hang there. So I helped her out. “You did what your father asked you to do.”
“Yes, he had this planned all along, I’m sure, that somehow he would help Fidel. So Papi asked me to provide him with information while I worked for Yagamata. And when the operation was threatened, when it appeared we would be stopped inside Russia…”
Again she couldn’t continue. Just like her father, she puzzled me with her riddles, the words unsaid. Sometimes the best way to get a reluctant witness to talk is to ask a pointed question. But often, it’s best to just remain quiet. Let the silence invite an answer to the unspoken question.
“I had to help,” she said. “I was there when it unraveled. I knew he would ruin everything unless he was stopped, and when…”
Who was he? She didn’t say.
Unless he was stopped. Okay, let’s count the bodies, going backward.
One potato. Kharchenko, of course, but Foley did that.
Two potato. Eva-Lisa, who wasn’t a he.
Three potato. Crespo, dispatched by Kharchenko.
Four. Vladimir Smorodinsky.
… He would ruin everything unless he was stopped, and when…
I grabbed her by the shoulders, pulled her close, and looked her hard in the eyes. “The reason you offered to help me in the Crespo case was to make sure I wouldn’t get too close to the truth-”
She turned her head away.
“-And to report to Yagamata if I got too smart. Of course, if I did, you could always run me down with a forklift.” I took a deep breath. “Just like you did to Vladimir Smorodinsky, who would ruin everything unless he was stopped.”
As I spoke, I pictured it. Lourdes and Yagamata watched from the offices overhead as Crespo lay unconscious on the floor of the warehouse and Smorodinsky, battered and woozy, headed for the exit. Lourdes raced down the stairs, hopped onto a forklift, and chased Smorodinsky down, spearing him like a fat olive on a toothpick. Oh, she can handle that forklift, all right. She could have killed me if she had wanted to. But she didn’t. It was her father who would have that honor.
“You and Yagamata cooked up those phony affidavits,” I said, “not to save Crespo, but to keep him quiet, to protect you. When it didn’t work because I wouldn’t use fabricated evidence, and when Crespo looked like he would crack, you had him killed.’’
She began sobbing. “Not me, Jake. Yagamata ordered Kharchenko to do it. You must believe me. Yagamata did it for the money and his obsession with the art. Kharchenko did it for his politics. I only followed orders. To me, it was just a job.’’
She collapsed in my arms, seeking comfort and forgiveness. Still holding her shoulders, I gave her a shove. She landed on her bottom, looking up at me with disbelief. “That only makes it worse,’’ I said.
27
The freighter stayed wide of Fowey Rocks and came up along Key Biscayne. I caught sight of the lighthouse at Cape Florida just as the sun was setting. Music blared from the outdoor bandshell at the marine stadium, and a score of boats skimmed across the bay and into the open water. By the time we crossed Government Cut between Fisher Island and the southern tip of Miami Beach, it was dark, and the water was crowded with boats angling for good views of the fireworks. Offshore, half a dozen freighters and a cruise ship lined up, waiting for tugs to take them into port in the morning.
The two crewmen with sidearms had been my shadows for the past three hours. One stayed on each side of me wherever I went, except to the head, where one went in, and the other stayed outside the door.