Havana Twist

by Lia Matera

  “So … Señor Emilio has asked me to be of service to you,” the warden explained in rapid mumbling Cuban.

  “In what way?” I asked her.

  “As may suit you?” She seemed to be asking her smiling companion, seated beside and just behind us, for direction.

  “May we interview Myra Wilson?” What else could the Yum King have had in mind, sending us here? “I’m told her family asked my mother to check on her. Do you remember my mother’s group at all? Members of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom?”

  “No, I am sorry. We have very many groups coming to study our methods of rehabilitation and retraining.” She looked nervous. “But we are glad to bring Myra here. Then you may question her directly.”

  While they did, I brought Don up to speed. He looked puzzled.

  Why did Señor Emilio want this aspect of our inquiry speedily concluded?

  Myra Wilson was led into the room by a woman in fatigues. Wilson wore a dress resembling a wraparound hospital gown, cinched in front with frayed ties. The bleached part of her hair had been snipped off. Though the cut was short and unattractive, she looked better without two tones. Her eyes were red and puffy, but she showed no outward signs of abuse.

  She seemed surprised to find the room full of people.

  The warden said, “Myra, come and sit here.” She indicated a chair beside her desk. “These Americans have asked to interview you briefly. They are looking for someone. This has nothing to do with your crime, and you should not be afraid. They are asking only for your help.” To us, she said, “Is that not correct?”

  I shifted into English so that Don could follow. I was certain the smiling woman understood it well.

  “My mother came here with a tour group almost six months ago. She didn’t come back.” I watched Wilson. She just sat there, her expression glazed. “In the course of searching for her, I went over her phone bills. Before she left for Cuba, she called your house—the house you used to live in. She phoned the doctor who bought the house from you.”

  Wilson’s voice was tiny and girlish. “Ernie? To ask him questions about Cuba? Is that right?” Her words were slow. She looked at the warden as if for approval.

  “My mother is a radical socialist,” I explained. “It wouldn’t be like her to seek out someone … whose views of Cuba were negative, who considered himself an exile.”

  “Ernie’s not an exile.” Wilson looked confused. “He didn’t have any family left here, that’s all. He left to find his aunts and uncles. They were over there.” It sounded like something she’d memorized, maybe even learned to believe. In this environment, it must be hard to be a gusano’s girlfriend.

  “I assumed because he came over on Mariel … Anyway, his maid was murdered when I went to San Diego to talk to him.”

  “His maid?”

  “Alicia Mendoza. Did you know her?”

  She shook her head. Her posture was so bad I ached just looking at her.

  She must be medicated. Nobody could hear such news, hear the name of a distant lover, with so little emotion. During my two months in the San Bruno Jail, the mere mention of the name Edward—Edward Hershey had been my boyfriend then—would bring tears to my eyes.

  “The man I was traveling with,”—it still hurt to think about it— “he was killed in exactly the same way as the maid.”

  Her face twitched and her eyes seemed to flash. It was as if something endeavored to crack through.

  I glanced at Don. He’d turned his attention to the warden, studying her reaction.

  “We tried to talk to Ernie,” I continued. “He was on a dive boat, about to dock. He jumped overboard so he wouldn’t have to see us.”

  She just blinked. “He likes to scuba dive.”

  I tried again to get through. “When I went to see him, his maid and my companion ended up with their throats cut. Don’t you find that strange?”

  “Yes.” She sounded like she was answering a question in a pop quiz, hoping the answer was correct.

  Don said, “What were you arrested for?”

  “Drugs.”

  “Smuggling?”

  She twined her fingers, looking down at them.

  “How did you meet Lidia Gomez?”

  She seemed to stop breathing. She looked over my shoulder at the smiling woman. I turned quickly, hoping to catch her without a smile. No such luck.

  “I don’t know that person,” Wilson said. Her voice was a slow warble, as if we were hearing it underwater.

  “Lidia Gomez used your passport to go to Mexico,” Don said.

  The warden stood abruptly. “What are you asking?” she demanded. “You are discussing people, I am hearing the names of people … Why are these names being introduced? Myra is not here to be tormented by you.”

  I switched to Spanish. “We’re asking her questions about her passport. Is there a problem?”

  “As warden, I am here to protect my charges, as well as to rehabilitate them. I cannot allow you to prod at her without limit. You must understand that?”

  “Fine,” I agreed. “We won’t ask her anything that’s not relevant.”

  “But look at her!” The warden’s voice was tinged with outrage.

  I looked. Wilson sat there in bovine confusion, plaiting and un-plaiting her fingers.

  “She’s too sedated to care what we ask,” I pointed out.

  “No, no,” the warden assured me, “she is not sedated.”

  In English, I asked Wilson, “How often do you take pills?”

  The warden flashed her a look. She said to the woman who’d brought her in, “Please take poor Myra back to her cell. We won’t have her confused and distressed in this way. It is not humane.” Myra didn’t seem surprised to find herself shuffled out of the room.

  The warden dropped back into her chair, glancing behind me. What the hell: I turned to the ever smiling woman. “Who are you?”

  She offered a name.

  “No, I mean, why do you give the orders here? What’s your rank, what’s your position?”

  “I am only the prisoners’ advocate, trained as a nurse. When there is to be contact with them, I am here as a helper. For humanitarian reasons.”

  The warden interrupted. “If there is nothing else I can do for you, I have another appointment.”

  At this time of night? Sure.

  Our minder appeared at the door then, ready to return us to Havana.

  I had no idea if we’d learned anything from the trip. Except, of course, what I already knew, that Myra Wilson was kept drugged.

  In American prisons, inmates were heavily sedated if they posed a threat to the guards. If they only menaced and maimed each other, they were pretty much left alone.

  Here, who knew?

  More to the point, why had this trip been arranged at all? Because we were likely to request it anyway? So we wouldn’t try to come on our own?

  Surely, in his arrogance, Señor Emilio didn’t believe we’d be assuaged by this? He couldn’t think the highest-ranking detective in San Francisco wouldn’t notice Myra Wilson was too drugged to offer real information?

  So what was the point?

  I felt like Emilio’s catnip mouse, his jingle-toy, batted here and there for reasons I was in no position to fathom.

  On our way back to the car, Don managed to whisper a single sentence to me.

  “She’s bait,” he said.

  28

  We were driven to Havana’s tourist district for dinner. Teresa made it clear she’d join us while our driver waited. He cast her an envious look, but she didn’t seem especially glad to be coming along. She scowled down at her plain skirt and high-heeled mules as if she were Cinderella after midnight.

  And well she might—she was stopped at the door by the maître d’. She’d have been turned away ha
d she not been with tourists. Her voice, therefore, was a little brittle when she informed us, “Here, Ernest Hemingway ate many times.”

  The place had a hardwood bar, small tables, and lots of palms in brass pots. It looked like a movie set.

  Teresa asked for the table in the corner. When I said I’d rather sit nearer the door to catch the breeze, she ignored me. So did the maître d’.

  I guessed we were getting the special table with the bugs.

  The one time Teresa was forced to leave us because nature called, Don said, “We’ve got to go back and figure out a way to talk to Wilson again.” I knew he was speaking for public consumption. “She obviously has a lot more to tell us.”

  “How do we do that?”

  “I’d say bribery’s our only option.”

  “The driver?”

  “Let’s hope,” Don said.

  He was making wet rings on the tabletop with his mojito glass, frowning down at the Olympic patterns.

  He’d whispered to me that Myra Wilson was bait. Were we going to pretend, then, to be drawn into the mousetrap?

  Though I blessed Don for helping me, as soon as we were alone, I had to let him know I didn’t even want to feign illegal activity here. I didn’t want to end up like Myra Wilson, no way.

  Teresa returned, and we went back to uncomfortable socializing, all of us too leery to enjoy anything but the frequent and lengthy silences.

  After dinner, we found the driver leaning against the side of the car, admiring the Old Spain square like a man in valet-parking paradise. As he held the door to let us in, Don bumped up against him as if he’d had a couple too many mojitos. The driver steadied him, almost reeling backward with him.

  When Don got into the car, I could tell by the grim set to his mouth that he’d accomplished his mission. He’d slipped the driver some dollars. The fact that the driver hadn’t protested told me we had a date with him later.

  Don hadn’t even asked me how I felt about it. I guess I’d been a little too macha back at Jamieson’s. I guess he’d actually believed me about not being a wimp.

  I got so tense on the car ride back—the sanctioned route along the Malecon, of course—that I had to keep reminding myself to breathe.

  I’d believed Don had a plan. Despite his protestations, I’d let him fill me with false hope. But my mother couldn’t have hidden here for this many months. She must be dead. And because neither government would admit it, I was going to walk into a trap and spend the next several years of my life in a foreign prison.

  I felt trapped already, claustrophobic, barely able to control an impulse to leap from the car and run, just run, gasping for air and flailing my arms. When we got back to the hotel, our minder escorted us in, chatting as if she’d had a sudden second wind and simply had to finish her pointless story. I was so sick of her by the time we reached the room, I practically slammed the door in her face.

  Then I collapsed onto the bed with a heartfelt “Uncle!”

  Don laughed. Then he looked up at the light fixture, saying, “I’ve been waiting all day for this.”

  He closed the window shades. Then he clicked off the overhead light and sat on the bed, bouncing as if to see whether it squeaked. It didn’t.

  But I should have known I wasn’t about to get lucky, as they say. He rose quietly, pulling me by the hand. I followed him into the bathroom.

  He closed the door behind us, leaving the light off. The window was still open. There was no one visible at the bottom of the air shaft.

  “I don’t want to do this,” I whispered. “I don’t want to be accused of anything. I don’t trust anyone here.”

  “I understand that. But they don’t need the grief of arresting us. And it’s no accident they gave us a room with an exit.” But he looked apologetic. “Believe me, I’d rather stay in the room. But it’s no use being in Cuba if we don’t do everything we can.”

  He was being reasonable, which just made matters worse. I didn’t know what to do with my anger. No use directing it at my mother. And no use blaming myself for being a big chicken—I’d be an idiot to feel comfortable doing this.

  I bent to peer group pressure. Don went first, perhaps to prove he could fit through the small window. For a few minutes, it seemed iffy. But he made it. And the ivy held him.

  I had to follow. But I’d have rather shaved my head or nailed my ear to the wall.

  Never having climbed down ivy before, I was surprised what a strong grip the vines had on the wall. It was easier than I’d assumed it would be. Most ways to get into trouble are.

  Don was waiting at the bottom to help me down. A small utility door was locked from the inside. Don began prowling, looking into windows. One was half open. He stared in, then shoved it all the way up, climbing inside. I followed, much more clumsily. We were in a room full of folded sheets and napkins, bins of tiny soaps, and trays of silverware. Sign-out sheets listed the numbers of units. Apparently supervisors literally counted the spoons before workers left for the day.

  Don cracked the door leading out. A sliver of light filtered in. He didn’t move or make a sound for what seemed like five minutes. Then he slipped through, closing the door when I followed. We were in some kind of utility corridor. The floors were filthy and sticky. Apparently they didn’t waste any soap on parts of the hotel the guests didn’t see.

  We were quick—and lucky—making our way outside. A side exit opened out to a dimly lighted corner. We crossed the street, walking as quickly as we could into the neighborhood.

  As soon as we were far enough away to speak without whispering, I vented: “What are we doing? We stand out like, like … Americans in Cuba! Why are we—”

  He grabbed my shoulders as if to shake me out of hysteria. “The building,” he said calmly. “The one with the tunnel entrance. I want you to show me where it is. I just want to see it.”

  “Did you bribe Emilio’s driver? Are we meeting him tonight?”

  “Yes.” His fingers dug deeper into my shoulders. “I know he isn’t really bribed. I know it’s some kind of trap. But walking into it is the only possible way to find out what it’s about.”

  “Oh god.” His words offered little comfort.

  “If we just stay nice and safe in our room tonight, we end up with nothing. We don’t learn what they expect from us, or why they’re trying to put Myra Wilson in the middle of it.”

  “That’s why you called her bait.”

  “They seem to want us to think this revolves around her and Lidia Gomez. And I’m afraid— Look, I know this is going to be hard to hear, but I’m afraid that’s what those two murders in San Diego were about. Neon arrows saying look this way, look at Wilson, look at Gomez, look at Hemingway the gusano.”

  “And don’t look at what?”

  “That’s what we need to find out.” He let go of my shoulders, putting his arms around me.

  He was a good fit, as if I’d had him made to measure somewhere. But this wasn’t my idea of a dream date.

  “Successful killers succeed through luck or misdirection,” he continued. “I don’t see why that wouldn’t apply to governments, as well.”

  “Theirs or ours?”

  “Both. I want a look at that building. Can you point us in the right direction?”

  No easy feat in a city with sporadic and dim lighting, a city I’d spent just a few days in months before. I tried to recall some detail of the boulevard where the theater was. Unfortunately, the bus I’d boarded (taking Cindy’s place) hadn’t traveled from the theater straight to the hotel. It had barreled out of town to a citrus grove.

  We could hear voices now, a man and a woman ambling along engaging in a mild flirtation. “Paco wouldn’t like to hear you saying that, I think!” he said. To which she responded, “And I suppose Maria knows what you do with your hands?”

  I called out to them, trying t
o mumble my s’s and n’s like a good Cuban, “Where is the theater?”

  The man called out a street name, telling me to turn left.

  When I didn’t say thanks, he added, “The street is behind you, but I hope you aren’t planning to walk!”

  Not planning to walk? It must be miles away. And in a while we had a date with self-sacrifice, my least favorite dance partner.

  But within a block of turning onto the correct street, I saw the theater. The Cuban obviously had a sense of humor. “The other building must be up that way. Look for a metal grille garage door.”

  It took about fifteen minutes, but we found it. Behind the closed grille, a light shone. There was a movement of shadows.

  I stated the obvious. “We’re not going to get past a closed metal grille and whoever’s inside.”

  “There wouldn’t be much point, anyway. We can’t just follow the tunnel hoping to run into your mother.”

  My relief must have been apparent, because he smiled. “I just want to know what the building is.”

  We walked around to the front. It was a square high-rise with lights burning in several windows, though the rest of the neighborhood, even adjacent buildings, were blacked out.

  I read the words chiseled above the door. “It’s the Interior Ministry.”

  “Well, that makes sense. You’d want to be able to get your politicians out fast when the bombs start dropping.”

  “Or the riots start happening.”

  “Do you think your mother might have come here with some proposal or comment?”

  He’d certainly seen her at San Francisco’s police headquarters often enough, picketing and leafleting and generally making free with her advice. But if she’d come here, it had probably been to compliment the revolution and offer to cut cane for the general welfare. Or perhaps to ask if there was some way she could further violate American law and funnel dollars into Cuba’s ailing economy.

  “Are you thinking she might have come here and stumbled across the tunnel entrance?” Even if she had, she’d have lauded the Cubans for guarding against senseless aggression from their northern neighbor.