I turned off the radio. “Now do you get it? If we don’t leave now, we’re going to be stuck here for weeks until they get this mess straightened out. I promised your dad I would get you back to the city. Once you’re there you can do whatever you want. You can get on the next plane and come back to join all your revolutionary amigos, for all I care. Although I have a feeling they won’t wanna have a junkie yanqui on their side just now.”
“Papi, listen to the man,” said Raquel. “Please.”
“So either you come willingly or I’m going to have to do it the hard way,” I added.
David rubbed his face with his hands as though in deep concentration — or disgust. “All right, all right, you win. Let’s go.”
“Oh, papi, you are so good!” said Raquel, hugging him to her chest. I looked away, opened the front door.
“Vamos.”
At Marina Barlovento, Esteban was jumping around the trawler as though the deck was on fire. He waved his raggedy porkpie hat at me when he saw me trooping down with David and Raquel.
“C’mon, c’mon, chico, they’re here already!” he said, hurrying to cast off the dock lines.
“Who?”
“The muchachos from the Directorio, they’re trying to stop people from leaving. Look at those guys over there.”
He waved his hat at a group of men with rifles and machine guns boarding a large yacht three piers away. “They’re checking all the papers, they say nobody can leave without authorization. Por suerte, the harbor master is not here, so once we’re out in the water... Coño, what the hell is wrong?” The engine stopped its chug-chugging, coughed, then died. “Carajo!” cursed Esteban as he opened the engine cover by the stern and peered into the well. He cranked the engine, which let out a wet, sloshing sound.
“What was he saying?” asked David.
“Fidel’s people are trying to stop all the Batista people from leaving; they’re checking papers and whatnot... What’s wrong with the engine, Esteban?”
The captain shook his head in desperation, slamming the motor with his hat. “Jodida mierda, coño,” he cursed, “this piece of shit just flooded. I can smell it.”
He raced over to the controls by the wheel, turned off the choke, then returned to the engine well, opening the throttle. He cranked the engine, which sputtered but refused to turn over.
“We’ve gotta go, tell him we’ve gotta go right now,” urged David.
“I know, I know, what’s your sudden hurry?” I asked.
“Jesus, are those them, those guys?” He pointed at a group of four men approaching the pier, led by a skinny redhead who looked familiar. That couldn’t be him, I thought.
“Yeah, I suppose, what’s the problem? Aren’t you in good with these guys?”
“I gotta go, I gotta go,” said David, terrified. He moved as though to jump in the water but I grabbed him, wrestled him down, pinning his shoulders with my knees.
“Jesus, will you fucking settle down?”
“You don’t get it, do you? I didn’t come here to help Fidel’s people; I came here to bring weapons to Batista!”
“What?”
“Yeah, you moron. The State Department froze all arms shipments to Cuba last fall. Through a friend of mine I got ahold of some old surplus rifles and brought them down here. The Directorio people found out and they’ve been looking for me for the last week. What the hell did you think I was doing hiding out at the Shanghai?”
“But before—”
“I was whacked out of my mind, idiot. I couldn’t tell my ass from a hole in the ground. But now I know what’s coming and I don’t want it!”
I let go of him and sat down on the deck, thinking fast. Then: “Hurry down below. I’ll handle this.”
David scurried away on all fours, slamming the door to the cabin behind him. I got up, whispered quickly to Raquel, and walked out to the dock, just in time to be greeted by my now old friend Cubela.
“Nice day for a cruise, Mr. Blue,” said Cubela, while his four minions craned their heads, looking around the boat. Soon their eyes were fixed on Raquel, who walked out to the bow, where she proceeded to strip off her dress and sunbathe in her underwear.
“That’s exactly what I was thinking, Rolando.”
“You know, strangely enough, after we parted, I received information from my compañeros that the gentleman you are escorting back home is wanted by our people.”
Out on the bow of the boat Raquel turned and displayed her best assets to the gunmen, who walked up to her and began a no doubt learned conversation on buoyancy, Archimedes, and fluids displacement.
“Really? I didn’t know Dr. Castro was so concerned about drug fiends.”
“Well, Dr. Castro is concerned about the welfare of all people. But he is particularly interested in arms smugglers who help Batista’s torturers.”
Now even Cubela himself sneaked a look at Raquel, distracted by her charms. As though constrained by ecdysiast duty, she stood and removed her top.
Esteban glanced up from the engine well, gave me a furtive thumbs-up. I nodded. He cranked the engine, which awoke with a roar.
Cubela turned his head back to look at Esteban, but at that very instant I grabbed the machine gun out of his hand and threw my left arm around his neck in a stranglehold. Placing the barrel of his gun on his shoulder next to his neck, I fired a warning shot over the heads of his men. Cubela squealed from the noise in his eardrum and the burning hot barrel against his skin.
“Tell your men to throw their weapons in the water, now!”
A moment passed, a gull flew by, and I wondered, Is this all there is? Cubela nodded, gave the order. The men cast their rifles into the bay, the weapons bobbing in the water for a few seconds before starting their descent into the blue-gray depths.
“Now tell them to move back up to the pier. Slowly.”
“You know we will find you,” warned Cubela as the men passed by us, hissing with contempt.
“I’ll be waiting. But first, you and I are going to walk to the boat very slowly and you are going to board with me. Understood?”
“Perfectly.”
We took small steps to the boat, then, with the barrel of the tommy gun still to his neck, we stepped onto the splintered deck of the Buena Vista.
“Cast off, Esteban.”
“Yes sir, Mr. Blue.”
The boat shuddered and trimmed in, still powerful even after forty years of service. The pier quickly receded as we headed out for the open water.
“What are you going to do with me?” asked Cubela.
“I haven’t decided yet,” I said, letting go of him to hold onto the gunwale momentarily as we bumped into a wave.
“Well, I have!” said David, who had come out from the cabin upon realizing we were heading out. Without warning, he pushed Cubela off the stern into the water. David stood on the transom, waving his fist at the bobbing head of the revolutionary. “Go get fucked, you damn Commie!”
I glanced back at the pier and saw that another group of Directorio people had come down from the dock. One of them raised a rifle.
“Get down! Get down, you fucking idiot!” I shouted, just before the sharpshooter fired and the bullet tore through David’s windpipe, slamming him to the deck.
“No, no! Dios mío, no!” cried Raquel, who threw herself on the boy with the voracity of the lonely and the dispossessed. I bent down, took a cold look. I’d seen a lot of people like him in Inchon, when the Chinese attacked our positions and the guys fell like flies. There was nothing anyone could do to stop him from dying, he was choking on his own blood.