by Jose Latour
She frowned, then asked, “What’s OFAC?”
“OFAC is Treasury’s office in charge of enforcing the embargo on Cuba. They suspect IMLATINEX of violating the embargo.”
“Have you? That’s a stupid question. Why did I ask it? You don’t have to answer it.”
“Not on my watch. What happened before I joined the company is not my concern.”
“Right. You are not legally responsible for what happened before 1995.”
“I know that. But if they find any questionable transaction between then and now, the company will be fined and Plotzher and I could be sentenced to prison. You may find yourself dragged into deep water. The press would report it. Even worse: Some lifelong anticommunists could accuse me of being a Castro agent and beat the shit out of me, or arrange a hit on me. That would be even deeper water. Suppose you are by my side when I get beaten or shot at.”
“You are grossly exaggerating things.”
“Right. I’m drawing a worst-case scenario because I want you to take a long, hard look at our future together.”
“Hold it, hold it. What does that mean?”
“It means that sharing your life with me may be risky, and if you want out, I’ll understand. It’s not what I want, but I’ll understand.”
“Is that so?”
“Don’t make up your mind right now. Think it over. Take a week, a month, as long as you want. And factor in my reluctance to make daily reports on every single thing I do or risk I take, because I won’t. Okay?”
Fidelia sprang to her feet. “You are insufferable tonight. I’m turning in.”
“Sweet dreams, Fidelia.”
“Elliot, you are not good at sarcasm. Shut your yap.”
…
In her Bay Harbor residence courtyard, beneath the green-and-white striped canvas, sitting in the cushioned armchairs and nursing drinks, Jenny Scheindlin and Samuel Plotzher were concluding a long and interesting conversation. As a pause unfolded, the old Jew contemplated his surroundings through gold-framed bifocals. The garden looked regal, as if in tribute to the deceased caretaker. Framed by the spectacular purple bougainvillea that bordered the property, the flower beds in full bloom created a splendid palette of blues, greens, reds, pinks, and yellows. Perfectionists would argue that the lawn could use a mowing, Plotzher thought. A gentle breeze wafted the scent of flowers, trees, seawater, and wet earth through the community’s yards. The ripples it caused on the swimming pool reflected the setting sun and conjured a succession of blinding flashes that forced humans, and the sparrows and hummingbirds nesting in the Roman-tile roof, to blink more than usual.
In her chartreuse, three-sizes-too-big top, Jenny brought to mind a skeletal adolescent playing grown-up in her obese mommy’s clothes, but oversize was the trend. She also had on slim, citron-colored pants, mule boat shoes, and designer sunglasses. Jenny took a sip from her gimlet—classic drinks were back in vogue and Chris mixed great cocktails. In the lambent light, with her hair gathered in a satin ribbon, she looked so beautiful that Plotzher stared. He was wearing frayed jeans, steel-toe work boots, and a long-sleeved blue cotton shirt, cuffs folded up to his elbows. His tumbler held Scotch on the rocks. They made quite a contrast: glamour and practicality, art and industry, naiveté and politics, future and history. In reality, though, the business partnership between Sam and Jenny’s father, shared cultural values, and secret undertakings in the last three years had forged a close bond between the fashion model and the old man.
“I miss him so much,” Jenny sighed, her gaze lost in the light blue sky.
For an instant, Plotzher considered what to say next. “I never thought I would love a man. And I loved him,” was what he came up with.
“Mom was like …” Jenny hesitated. “Well, you know. She had great business sense and yet … basically she acted as if her world of sun, fun, and housekeeping would … like … crumble if she had initiative. Know what I mean? Then, when she started to come out of her cocoon after Dad passed away, that sonofabitch killed her. Why did he, Sam?”
“I don’t know,” he said. He suspected why, but did not know.
Jenny glanced at the flower beds and heaved a sigh. “I miss her a lot, of course, but I miss Dad even more. He taught me guiding principles, like, you know, ‘study men, save your money, be strong, go after what you want.’ From the age of three or four, he talked to me about Israel and the Jewish people with such devotion that I kind of, you know, fell in love with my ancestry. My pride in being a Jew is the result of his teachings and my time spent in Israel.”
Plotzher nodded approvingly. “It would’ve made him happy, and proud, too, to hear you say that. What would’ve pleased him most, though, is to see how well you follow in his footsteps.”
“He was always saying to me: ‘Consider carefully what you should do, then act on it. Talk is cheap. To have practical value, talk has to be backed up with deeds.’”
“And you are doing great,” looking her in the eye, elbows on the arms of the armchair, holding the glass with both hands. “Your report on the Saudi Arabian sheikh was much praised by Tel Aviv. But let me remind you of something, just to make my final point today. You are in a business in which people retire young, right?”
“Right.”
“So, while you pursue your modeling career, bear in mind that five, ten, or fifteen years from now, fashion designers and photographers will no longer pamper you. Don’t hold your breath, though. I will be long gone when you reach that stage in your life, so I—”
“Oh, Sam, don’t say that,” she said, with genuine grief in her expression.
“Don’t ‘Oh Sam’ me. Ruben died, you got over it; your mom died, you’ll get over it; I’ll die, you’ll get over it even faster because one learns to accept death. If I haven’t died by the time you quit modeling, I’ll be sitting in a wheelchair, drooling and shitting in my pants, God forbid. So, the point I want to make is this. Other models, when they reach that crossroads, marry a rich geezer or become high-paid whores. Not you. You won’t have to take shit from anybody. You’ll be even richer than you are now. Know what I mean?”
“Sure,” remembering that, despite being intrigued, she shouldn’t knit her brow. Where was Sam taking her now?
“When your modeling career is over, you will have options; for instance: ‘Why should I trouble myself with the firm? I’ll sell it and be free to do as I please, go wherever I want to whenever I want to.’ Well, it’s your life and, of course, you can do what you deem best. But I want you to consider that if you sell the firm, you’d be selling something vital to the security of Israel. We don’t ask you for money, we don’t ask you to quit your chosen profession; you don’t have to ask our permission if you want to marry, have children, divorce, stay single. We’ll never ask you to change your lifestyle or expose you to danger. What we ask of you, for the security of Israel and for the good of the Jewish people, is to hold on to your firm and get ready to manage it. Now, would you do this for Israel and its people?”
“Of course I’ll do it, Sam.”
“Do you believe this in your heart of hearts or are you just giving me peace of mind?”
“I mean it, Sam.”
“Then you have to start moving in that direction. The things you have to master can’t be learned in a year or two. So, I suggest that as soon as possible you get close to Elliot Steil, learn from him as much and as long as you can. Whenever you can spare a day or two, please call Elliot, go to the firm, ask questions …”
“Why should I depend on Elliot? I’ve got you.”
“You should depend on him for two reasons, for three reasons, in fact. The first is, he’s the manager. I know little about paperwork and he knows shit about the logistics of the business. We complement each other. But in a few years Elliot will know everything there is to know about IMLATINEX,’ cause I’ll teach him the logistics. The second reason is that he’s a born teacher. He’s got the ability to make people understand rather complex issues in a short tim
e. And the third reason is that he’s clever and honest; honest to the point of being naive, know what I mean? Now, cleverness and honesty are two great qualities, as long as they are in the right proportion. Excessive honesty is harmful for business. Watch out for Elliot’s honesty, but absorb all you can from him.”
“I will.”
“When you take the reins of the firm, you’ll begin a new life: the businesswoman’s life. Ruben’s blood will make you love it. Only then you’ll realize why the most valuable Israeli secret agents are those who operate in the world of business. You are doing fine. But this Saudi Arabian, and others who approach you now, see in you little more than a gorgeous woman they want to take to bed. They make comments in passing, if at all, because they are not thinking politics or business in your presence; they are thinking romance or sex. They underrate you and that is wonderful. Eventually, they’ll see in you a very attractive, middle-aged, and rich businesswoman who can negotiate deals, quote prices from memory, meet with government officials, and, after hours and over drinks, discuss current world events. Then, Jenny, you will be in a position to extend the legend of your father, who was one of Mossad’s most valuable agents of all time.”
Jenny breathed deeply and let her eyes roam over the garden. The thoughts her handler had just planted in her mind, like Jack’s beanstalk, sprung up out of proportion. She saw herself walking the corridors of financial and political power, entering the most famous artistic salons, attracting the admiring glances of elegant, cultivated, and rich men who would vie for her company and affection. She would be the status symbol other models now were. The class of women billionaires exhibit at the most exclusive places. This would serve to gather information for the Hebrew people, to protect their hard-won homeland. She would most certainly extend the Scheindlin legend.
“I saw you grow up, I love you, I want the best for you,” Plotzher said after a few moments, having considered beforehand that the conversation should end on a very intimate and personal note. “You’ve lost your father and your mother and I want to know this: Who is your closest living relative, Jenny?”
Her smile was the most beautiful he’d ever seen.
“You are, you old goat. Who else?”
“It’s what I thought, so hear this piece of advice. I see only two things that could frustrate your brilliant future: drugs and alcohol. There’s no harm in sniffing a line or downing one of these,” lifting his glass. “The problem begins when you have to snort the coke or drink the drink because your brain demands it, know what I mean? When that happens you are in trouble. So, always keep a close watch on yourself. The day you feel you need a drink or a line or a pill or a smoke or whatever is trendy in the market, you are in trouble. Seek help then, from whomever you figure can help you best. Know what I mean?”
“I know, Sam. Don’t worry.”
“Good.” Sam Plotzher placed his glass atop the cocktail table, grabbed the arms of the armchair, and pulled himself up. “Well, dear, let’s call it a day,” he said.
Jenny quickly got to her feet. “Stay for dinner, please.”
“You want the old lady to close me out tonight?”
“Oh, Sam. Don’t say that. Esther is the sweetest woman I know.”
“Your friends will keep you company. Fags, aren’t they?”
“Sam … C’mon, don’t be homophobic. A guy like you? They are fine people.”
“Every generation has their value system. For mine, fags are perverts. I’m too old to change, Jenny. Walk me to the door.”
She slid her arm in his and they took the gray granite path that led to the sliding door.
“I think I’ll sell this house, Sam. Too many bad memories,” Jenny said, her gaze roving about the courtyard.
“I understand.”
Crossing the living area, the old man smiled and nodded to Valerio when he stepped out of the kitchen to ask if they wanted something. Jenny thanked him and said no. By the front door, the model went misty-eyed when she kissed Plotzher’s cheeks before turning the lock.
The handler of Ruben Scheindlin for over twenty-five years, of Jenny Scheindlin since 1999, the man who wrote the anonymous letter that put the FBI on Maria’s trail, got in his car and drove off as the sun set.
…
Col. Enrique Morera (cryptonym Bernardo), deputy chief of the General Directorate of Intelligence and head of its USA Department, had lived a largely unpredictable life ever since adolescence. As often as not, when almost everybody was at work, he was sound asleep at home, and vice versa. At midnight on December 31, 1999, as 99.9 percent of healthy Cuban adults, his relatives and friends included, were lifting their glasses to toast the New Millennium, he had been drafting an urgent message to an illegal. Such dedication had exacted a heavy toll on his family life. His first wife had divorced him after five years and their only son, now thirty-eight, was an alcoholic and exhibitionist kept out of prison by his father’s friends in police circles.
In 1974, a few weeks after his second wife gave birth, Morera began to make efforts to prevent the same hardships from recurring. When in 1998 their daughter, a microbiologist, married and moved to Sancti Spiritus, he promised his wife that every time he could take a break, they would go see a movie, have a drink, or just sit on the Malecón wall to gaze at the sea and talk a while. Morera had already reached the conclusion that he had lived a dog’s life, and for a lost cause at that.
His wife, a retired judge, was now a full-time housewife. Once or twice a month, when she least expected it, the phone would ring and her husband would ask if she felt like letting her hair down. Invariably she jumped at it, hung up, changed, applied lipstick, and boarded the colonel’s Lada when he gave a toot on his horn in front of their nice Casino Deportivo residence.
At 5:19 on the afternoon of May 23, a Thursday, Morera and his wife entered a movie house at Twenty-third Street between G and H, Vedado, to watch an Italian film. They sat in the lower level, fifth row of seats counting from back to front, and waited for the matinee to start. Fifteen minutes into the picture a middle-aged woman changed seats to one in the fourth row, behind and to the right of the colonel. The third reel was playing when Morera slowly extracted an 8cm CD in a plastic case from a pocket of his slacks. Holding it with his thumb and forefinger, at no time taking his eyes from the screen, he crossed his legs and rested his arm on the back of the seat to his right, in what seemed a natural change of position. The middle-aged woman reached for the case and dropped it into her purse.
The instant the picture ended, as credits rolled on, the woman hurried out of the still dark theater. She hastened down G Street with long steps, turned right onto Twenty-first, and pulled open the passenger door of a 1953 Studebaker parked between G and H. Having scooted over the front seat, she opened her purse and surrendered the case to the young man with coal black hair and plastic-framed glasses sitting behind the wheel. The driver turned the ignition and pulled away. The woman abandoned the jalopy at the corner of Artola and Vista Hermosa, Jacomino. That evening the young man surrendered the CD to the cleaning lady of the Havana branch office of a Brazilian company. The next morning she gave the disk to the firm’s manager.
Five days later, on May 28, Efraim Halevy, head of Mossad, read two messages from his priceless Cuban agent. One dealt with the Micaela case; the other listed the names of nineteen CuIS officers working under diplomatic cover at the Cuban UN mission in New York and in Washington’s Office of Interests. Halevy signed an order transferring twenty thousand dollars to the Liechtenstein numbered bank account where the Cuban colonel’s greenbacks went.
Recruited in 2000, Morera was the man responsible for the extended honeymoon that Mossad and the FBI were taking. Well aware that Mossad served simply as intermediary, to whet the end user’s appetite and in exchange for fifty thousand dollars, in March 2001 Morera had fingered the DIA analyst recruited in 1985. When Mossad’s official representative in Washington passed on the information to the bureau’s liaison officer, the man chuckled i
n his face. “Check it out,” the Israeli had said. The honeymoon really took off when the FBI corroborated the unimaginable: Castro had ears and eyes at the Defense Intelligence Agency.
To make the intermediary happy, Morera denounced Pola Negri in May 2001. It had been embarrassing for Mossad to discover that Maria’s security clearance in 1975 had failed miserably. Those involved had retired or died, so they couldn’t be called to account. Ruben Scheindlin, one of their best agents, spent twenty-six years married to a communist spy who had given birth and raised a promising young woman that behaved as a real Sabarit. It was comforting to remember that Scheindlin had been extremely cautious and discreet. He probably never revealed anything of significance to his spouse. Based on Morera’s reports, Mossad had instructed Samuel Plotzher, Ruben Scheindlin’s handler, to send an anonymous letter to the bureau giving away the agent’s wife.
Now Morera was demanding half a million, safe passage, relocation, and to be included in the bureau’s witness protection program, in exchange for the Pitirre network. Halevy felt sure the Americans would gladly fork over five hundred thousand for dismantling what Morera described as the oldest, most efficient Cuban spy network, which included agents “nobody could dream had been working for Cuban Intelligence ever since the 1960s.”
The logistics to smuggle out a guy like Morera and three relatives had to be particularly complicated, Halevy pondered. As the Directorate’s second-in-command, the Cuban had to report his whereabouts at all times. Maybe while Morera and family were on vacation. Were he given the job, Halevy mulled over, he would slip a submarine in the dead of night into a deep, wide Cuban harbor lacking port facilities on the southern coast—Bay of Pigs, for instance. But that was not his problem; he just had to serve as go-between. Halevy pressed a button to call his adjunct.
“Take this down, Yossi,” he said after a man carrying a notebook entered the office. “Memo to Washington. Please forward to friends list of Cuban diplomats in the United States who …”
