Soon the bullet wound was forgotten, as were the queer events of recent days and the fading clamor of Coconut Grove. Together the two sea cows struck out across the silky waters, breaching and diving in tandem. Booger knew of a little out-of-the-way place on Virginia Key, a quiet teardrop of a harbor where friendly human shrimpers occasionally tossed crispy heads of lettuce to visiting manatees.
It was a helluva first date.
The yacht of Juan Carlos Reyes was anchored in a gentle chop a mile east of North Bimini. Even for Hector it was easy to find: a gleaming 107-foot Feadship called Entrante Presidente.
Reyes greeted them in a navy blazer, cream-colored slacks, and dainty Italian loafers. The yacht's salon reeked of cigars and heavy cologne. Britt and Fay instantly became sick. Reyes ordered them taken to a private cabin and handcuffed to a bedpost. Hector eagerly volunteered, but Reyes told him to sit down. One of Reyes's bodyguards, a weightlifter type with a pearl nose stud, escorted the women away.
Juan Carlos appraised the Castro impersonator. "The real one was heavier in the belly," he said, circling, "but overall, my friend, you're not bad."
"Thank you," said Mickey Schwartz. He had a routine to go with the getup: a bombastic and humorously convoluted tirade against Yankee imperialists, capitalism, and blue jeans.
Juan Carlos Reyes wasn't interested in hearing it. "You must be Lilia," he said to the elegant older woman. He attempted to kiss her hand, but she pulled it away.
"Little fool," she scoffed. "Cuba will never take you back."
"We shall see, puta."
Lilia bent over (for she was a full six inches taller than Juan Carlos Reyes) and slapped him smartly on the face, dislodging the smoldering nub of his cigar. Hector sprang forward, raising the stubby Uzi, but Reyes waved him off.
"Fidel is ten times the man you'll ever be," said Lilia Sands.
Reyes smiled. "Your precious Fidel is dead, old woman. Croaked. Cacked. Deceased. Checked out. Whacked. Eighty-sixed. Muerto.Your amor isno more."
With frost in her voice, Lilia declared, "I do not believe you, enanillo!"
"Ah, but my sources are impeccable." Juan Carlos
Reyes plucked the cigar off the carpet and relit it. "The highest of connections in Washington and yes, Havana." He turned to Hector. "Do you have it?"
Hector nodded, fished in a pocket. He brought out a wispy lock of dark hair, tied in a red and gold Montecristo wrapper. He handed it to Reyes, who examined it as if it were a rare jewel.
"In a cigar box," Hector said, "in her bedroom."
Reyes chuckled. "Ironic, no?"
Lilia glared defiantly. Mickey Schwartz deduced it was not the appropriate moment to mention his fee. He stared down at his black military boots, crusty with salt from the boat ride.
Juan Carlos Reyes held up the tuft of hair as a trophy. "Proof!"
Lilia spun away. "You're a fool. Fidel is not dead." She felt a comforting hand on her shoulder the impersonator. A harmless fellow, she thought. And not a bad kisser.
Carefully, Reyes slipped the lock of hair into an inside pocket of his blazer. "Hector," he said. "Bring me the prize. Bring me the key to my destiny!"
"Cuba'sdestiny, you said."
"Whatever. Go get the damn thing."
Reyes himself cradled the Uzi while Hector retrieved the red cooler from the speedboat, which was tied to the yacht's stern. He brought the Gott into the salon and set it ceremoniously before Reyes' s delicate loafers.
Lilia Sands and Mickey Schwartz had no idea what they were about to see. Excitedly, Juan Carlos shoved the machine gun butt-first at Hector, and flipped open the cooler. He removed a stainless canister the size of a hatbox, and placed it shiny and perspiring from the ice on a beveled glass dining table.
"Where was it?" Reyes asked breathlessly.
"Hidden in the woman's boat," Hector replied. "The blonde's."
The stumpy millionaire chuckled. "Lost and then found. Fate, no? That's what brought him to me. Fate in the form of wild women." He stepped back from the canister. "Open it, Hector."
"St."
"Let the bastard out!"
"OK, OK." Hector grappled with the canister's vacuum lock until it surrendered with a burp. Cautiously, he opened the lid.
"Take it out," Reyes commanded.
Hector hesitated. By nature he was not a squeamish man, but ...
"Take it out!"
Hector grabbed a gray mossy handful and lifted the staring head from the canister. He held it like a lantern, his arm outstretched toward the two captives. Mickey Schwartz's mouth turned to chalk. Lilia lowered her eyes.
Juan Carjos Reyes was trembling with pleasure. "Senor Castro, how nice of you to join us! You're looking very jaunty this evening wouldn't you agree, Miss Sands?"
Without comment Lilia collapsed into Mickey Schwartz's arms. "Swell," he said with a grunt.
Reyes produced a gold-plated cuticle scissors and snipped a thatch from the severed head. "Hector," he said, "keep an eye on our guests. I'll be in the galley."
The DNA expert had been waiting three hours; a Harvard doctor, the best. "This is very exciting," Reyes said to himself, hurrying with the twin locks of hair out of the salon.
Hector kept the Uzi trained on his captives as he refit the Castro head in its container. Mickey Schwartz arranged the unconscious Lilia on a leather sofa. He pointed at the canister. "That's him, isn't it? The real deal."
"Shut up," said Hector, feeling creepy Fidel's ugly face, everywhere he looked. He returned the canister to the red Gott cooler.
The bodyguard with the pearl in his nose appeared in the salon with Fay and Britt. Firmly, he placed them on tall stools at the bar. The women still looked queasy.
Mickey Schwartz said, "You missed quite a show."
Promptly, Hector whacked him with the back of his hand. "I told you to shut up." *
Mickey shut up. He felt the yacht begin to rock under a freshening northern breeze. The slap of the waves, grew louder against the hull.
Britt cynically motioned toward the red cooler. "How's the head?"
"What head?" said Hector with a wink. "Nothing but Snapples in there. Kiwi-flavored."
Fay looked up. "Randy, what's going to happen to us?"
Randy was the bodyguard with the nose stud. He furrowed his tan brow and blinked intently at Fay's question.
"Randy doesn't know what's going to happen to us," Britt Montero said wearily. "Randy barely knows how to dress himself."
Randy ambiguously clicked his teeth. Hector sighed.
"Sweetheart, there's lotsof things Randy knows how to do, and he'll show you one in particular if you don't shut your fat trap."
Britt fell silent. Fay laid her head on the bar. Mickey Schwartz rubbed his jaw, and Lilia Sands stirred on the couch. Not a word was spoken for a long time, until Juan Carlos Reyes returned in an ebullient glow.
The human head for which Marion McAlister Williams had been paid close to a million dollars, and for which she had eventually been murdered, belonged not to Fidel Castro but to one of his Cuban doubles, a man named Rigoberto Lopez.
The purchaser of the head had been well aware it was not Castro's. The purchaser worked free-lance for the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. His first name was Raymond; his last name was unknown, even to his own team.
Raymond and his people had been given to understand that a serious problem threatened the administration's top-secret plan to replace the Cuban dictator. The scheme dreamed up at the NSC, presented in Havana by former president Carter, and ultimately endorsed by the ailing Castro himself had been to trick Castro's enemies into believing he was dead by using a fake head. In exchange for leaving Cuba, Fidel had been promised a safe and secret exile, the best cancer specialists in the world, and a cash departure bonus equivalent to that paid to Baby Doc Duvalier, when he fled Haiti.