"Quit therapy?" he asked. He didn't look upset. "Yeah-I guess that's what I meant."
"That's one way to handle it, isn't it?"
"You think I want to run away from the truth?" He shook his head. "What do you think?"
"I'm not sure I want to say."
"Hey! Come on, Doc! I'm paying you fancy money. Don't hold out on me.
You got something-hand it over." She liked the way she sounded-a tough young woman who didn't take any shit. "Leaving therapy means leaving me."
"Of course."
"That means killing me."
"I don't see that."
"If you don't come here to see me anymore, Gelsey then I'll be as good as dead for you, won't I?"
"I suppose… in a way."
"Kill me and you kill your father." She looked him square in the eyes.
"What are you talking about?" He smiled at her, his sly, therapeutic smile. Then, very quickly, he stuck out the forefinger of his right hand and drew it swiftly across his throat.
"Kill therapist! Kill father!" He leered at her suddenly, in a way she'd never seen before. "Aha!" He nodded vigorously. "The equation's simple.
The king is dead!"
Out on the street, she felt that, indeed, Dr. Z had given her something special. She felt unburdened, although she wasn't certain of exactly what. Perhaps, she thought, she was free for a time of the weight of carrying around her dream-sister on her back.
Looking about her, she took in the tranquillity of the street. Two children were playing jump rope. A repairman, tool box in hand, was stepping out of his panel truck, double-parked a few houses up. A mother was wheeling a baby carriage toward the corner of Columbus Avenue. The sun glinted off the well-washed windows of the row houses.
From one of the apartments she could hear someone playing a piano, awkwardly practicing scales.
West Seventy-first was quiet, residential, a street of urban professionals like Dr. Z, who had bought up the old town houses, renovated them and by so doing created an island of serenity.
How I wish I could live on a street like this, Gelsey thought, where everything is so subdued and sweet. Instead of in a loft on top of a mirror maze beside a deserted old amusement park that doesn't amuse anyone anymore, least of all myself.
Tania i:.!
Janek, awakened by loud knocking, opened his eyes. For a moment he was surprised to find himself in his hotel room. His body still ached from the beating, but the bed was soft and he didn't feel much like leaving it.
"Yeah? Who's there?" he called.
"Police." The response was delivered in a surprisingly gentle voice.
Janek shook his head. Maybe they think they made a mistake. They've come to take me back- He wrapped a sheet around his body, went to the door and opened it. The corridor was dark. A short, slender midthirties Cuban, dressed in a neat white shirt and a wellpressed pair of slacks, peered at him through wire-rimmed spectacles.
"Lieutenant Janek?"
Janek nodded. The young man smartly saluted.
Well… this is a change. Janek examined the visitor's ID. His name was Luis Ortiz. He was a lieutenant in the Homicide Bureau of the Havana Urban Police.
"I have been assigned to assist you."
"With what?"
"Your investigation of the Mendoza case. You are an esteemed visitor, sir. All the facilities of my bureau are at your disposal."
Janek gazed at the man, then gestured him into the room. Ortiz entered, looked around, warmly shook Janek's hand.
"Aren't you laying it on a little thick?" Janek asked.
"Excuse me?" The young officer stared at him, confused. "You're the first person around here to call me ', ' "
Ortiz shook his head. "A mistake was made, sir. I am here to set it right. I have located Senora Figueras and have discussed the matter with her. She is waiting for us now." Ortiz peered around the room, then continued, more relaxed. His English, Janek noted, was excellent, although his accent was unmistakably Cuban. "At first she did not wish to speak with you. But when I explained that you had come a long way and that your presence here had become a matter of"-he smiled shyly-"state security-well, she will be very pleased to answer your questions, Whether she will be truthful, I cannot guarantee." Ortiz paused, squinted at Janek, smiled again, cupped his hand to his ear and pointed at the ceiling. Then he gestured toward the windows.
The message was clear: They could not speak freely in the room; it would be better to talk outside.
"All right. Give me fifteen minutes," Janek said. "I'll meet you in the lobby."
After Ortiz left, he went into his bathroom, dropped the sheet and inspected his body in the mirror. There were some bluish marks on his flanks and thighs from the kicks, but the tenderness was dissipating fast. He looked at his face, saw the eyes of a man who had been humiliated and abused. Recalling his feelings of the night before-of gratitude and purgation-he was angry at his captors but even more furious with himself. Am I so weak it only took them a couple of days to betid my mind?
"The segurosos are shits," Ortiz said as soon as they were out on the street. Now, suddenly informal, the Cuban policeman turned to him, large, brown, bespectacled eyes flashing outrage. "They had no business arresting you.
Some heads will roll, I believe. But perhaps not. They protect one another, cover each other's-how do you say itass?" "Yeah, that's how we say it," Janek said. He thought: This guy's pretty funny.
"Is it not precisely the same in New York?" OTtiz asked.
Yes, that, too, was true, Janek agreed.
Ortiz guided him to a small black Russian car parked around the corner.
It was identical to the car in which Fonseca had picked him up under the arcades three mornings before. Ortiz unlocked the passenger door, held it open for him, closed it, then came around to the driver's side and got in.
"Are you all right, sir?"
Janek stared at him. Ortiz's concern seemed genuine. His manner conveyed a younger cop's respect. He thought: Isn't it amazing how quickly my situation's changed?
"I'm okay," Janek said. "They didn't hurt me. They just wanted to get into my head." "But you saw through them." Ortiz smiled, then lightly bit his lower lip. "Torture does not exist in Cuba. It is the law. It is forbidden." His irony, which verged on bitterness, was unmistakable, but Ortiz did not continue to project it. Rather, he shook his head to dismiss the subject, started the car and pulled into the street.
"We have many problems here, Lieutenant. The segurosos are only one of them. Colonel Fonseca told me they thought you were someone else. They often make such mistakes."
Janek studied Ortiz as he drove. He liked the efficient way he handled the little car, wheeling elegantly around a traffic circle, then merging smartly behind a convoy of military trucks. But can I trust him? he asked himself. Couldn't all this affability be part of some complicated scam?
They passed a food store with a long line in front. Ortiz gestured toward it. "They have bread today. Not much else.
"So, we're going to be partners," Janek said.
"It will be an honor to be your partner, sir."
"Partners should get to know one another."
"I agree."
"Call me Frank, Luis-I'd appreciate that. You have a family?-"
"A wife and two daughters." Ortiz grinned. janek turned back to the street. A billboard loomed ahead. The words were in Spanish, but he had no difficulty understanding them: SOCIALISMO O MUERTE-"Socialism or Death."
"Are you a Communist, Luis?"
"I am not a counterrevolutionary." He glanced at Janek. "And you, are you a capitalist, Frank?"
Janek smiled. "Where I come from cops don't accumulate much capital."
"Nor here… if they are honest."
"And you're honest, is that what you're telling me, Luis?"
The answer, when it came, was a good deal more serious than Janek expected. "In these difficult times that is the only thing I can hold on to," the young man said gravely.