“The best place on the entire base was the pilots’ quarters,” Basulto said. “Very nice, I’m telling you, at least by comparison to how the others lived. They used to call it the Hilton. They had their own showers, their own mess.”
“Harris was there the entire time?”
“No. He would come and go. Sometimes he’d stay for a few days, but never any longer than that, until the very end.”
“He was running the recruiting station in Miami at the time,” Trotter said. “They had quite a setup. Doctors, nurses, the whole nine yards. It was an open secret.”
“It was a big joke,” Basulto said. “We used to laugh about it.”
“Who was your boss when Harris wasn’t around?” McGarvey asked.
“Pepe San Roman was the top man, but Erneido Oliva was the deputy commander. If there were any problems, he was the one we went to first.”
“But there were other Americans there, CIA people?”
“Coming and going all the time, especially after the runway was finished,” Basulto said.
He stayed at the camp for a very long time, and every few months Basulto would get so frustrated with the isolation he would slip down to Guatemala City to raise a little serious hell. Sometimes he’d go alone, sometimes he’d take a few friends from the Hilton along for the ride. They’d start at one end of the town and work their way to the other, through all the bars and whorehouses, going strong twenty-four hours a day until they couldn’t take any more. Sated, they’d head back to the base where they would get back to work.
“No one ever missed us, they were so disorganized,” he said.
“Did you ever run into anyone in Guatemala City during your forays?” McGarvey asked.
“Sir?”
“Baranov or his crowd, or perhaps the American you’d seen him with in Mexico City.”
Basulto shook his head.
After a short pause, McGarvey took another sip of his drink. “Then came the invasion.”
“It got really crazy around there in the last couple of months. No one was allowed off base. They started to watch us pretty closely.”
“What was your job to be? You were expected to go with them, back to Cuba, weren’t you?”
“You bet, even though I didn’t want to go back. I knew damned well it was going to fail. But Roger was there. He was coming along.”
Green Beach was east, Red Beach was back up into the bay at Playa Larga, and Blue Beach was just east of the town of Girón. Basulto came ashore at Blue Beach, along with Roger Harris and a heavy contingent of Cuban exile troops who had been trained in Helvetia. The fighting had already begun.
“It was a mess, let me tell you,” Basulto said, lighting another thin cigar. His hand shook. “There was a lot of shooting, parachutes were coming down, aircraft buzzing all over the place. We heard later that at least two of our ships had been sunk … one right off our own beach and the other up the bay somewhere. One of our planes went down too, up by Jagüey Grande. We didn’t know any of that at the time, of course. We were too damned busy trying not to be killed.”
Basulto paused for a long moment. He turned and looked at the fire. His skin seemed to be stretched taut around his mouth and across his cheeks. Day had his legs crossed, his coffee cup balanced on one knee. Trotter sat forward. He was staring at Basulto.
“It was very strange, Mr. McGarvey, let me tell you,” the Cuban picked it up without turning back. “All hell was breaking loose. A lot of our paratroopers were going down north of Girón, but there was nothing but swamps up there. Christ, if I told them once, I told them a thousand times, they would have to watch the wind. They’d have to pinpoint their landing. Someone was supposed to have gone out to the airstrip to lay out the signals, but they never showed up. Roger was mad as hell, but he kept saying he had a job to do, and we’d do our part.”
They were called the brigade, and Basulto said their first operational headquarters were set up within the tiny town of Girón, several hundred yards inland from the resort cottages near the beaches. In town, but closer to the beach, a medical station was set up for the wounded, and directly across the street was the radio post.
“They were intercepting a lot of our traffic, but there wasn’t a goddamned thing we could do about it. There wasn’t a lot of time for coding and decoding. It was all happening so fast.” Basulto turned back, a strange, haunted look in his eyes. “And then I saw him.” He shook his head in wonder. “I turned around and there he was by the door of the radio shack. He was talking with Roger, just like they were long-lost friends. I mean, he was wearing battle fatigues, just like the rest of us, with a Thompson slung over his shoulder. He said he had just come down from the rotunda up on Red Beach. There was a lot of fighting going on. They were going to need some help.”
“Just a minute,” McGarvey said. “Who are you talking about here?”
“The American … the one from Mexico City who was pals with Baranov. Who the hell did you think I was talking about? What the hell do you think I’ve been talking about all fucking morning?”
“Easy now,” Trotter cautioned.
“Harris knew him?” McGarvey asked.
“Presumably,” Trotter replied.
“Did he know it was the one from Mexico City?”
“No, goddamnit,” Basulto shouted. Then he shrugged. “At least I don’t think so. He didn’t act as if he knew it was the same one. But I was goddamned scared. Here he was, the double agent. It was real.”
“You’re sure it was the same one?”
“Damned sure, Mr. McGarvey. It’s a face I’d never forget.”
“Who was he?”
“I didn’t know. I didn’t know that until six months ago.”
“Havana?” McGarvey asked, holding himself in check. It was coming now. The part they had brought him here to listen to was coming.
“Miami,” Basulto said, looking at his hands.
“Wait up,” Day interjected. “We’re getting ahead of ourselves again.”
“He killed Roger,” Basulto said defiantly. “And there wasn’t a thing I could do about it. Roger just took off with the bastard before I could say jack shit. Bam! He was gone.”
“What happened then?” McGarvey asked carefully. “Did you follow them?”
“You’re goddamned right I followed them, but it was too late,” Basulto said, and in this it seemed as if he were appealing for their belief and support. “It was less than five minutes from the time Roger left with him until I found a jeep and took off. But it was too late.”
Roger Harris was shot to death. At close range, two soft-nosed bullets into his face. Basulto found his body lying beside the jeep about ten miles north of Girón alongside the beach road.
“There was a lot of traffic all up and down the road. Aircraft overhead. It was a zoo, but no one stopped. No one gave a damn.”
“You’re sure it was Harris?” McGarvey asked. “You said his face was shot away. Could you be sure?”
Basulto threw up his hands. “What kind of a question is that? I knew it was Roger. I just knew it!”
“No sign of the other one?”
Basulto shook his head. “I was really scared then, you know. I figured if Roger could be taken in by the bastard, I wouldn’t have a chance. There was no one I could trust. I mean, who was I supposed to take my story to? The so-called invasion was falling on its ass. And I’d be a sitting duck.”
“So he ran,” Trotter said.
“So, I got smart.”
“Where? Where did you run?”
“Up to Santa Clara that night,” Basulto said. “I took the jeep, stole some ID off a dead government soldier, and drove up there.”