Havana Harvest

by Robert Landori

  “I cannot give you the letter you want.”

  “Then you'll have to face the consequences, Jim.”

  “Which are?”

  “A full board of inquiry hearing about my past, present, and future, lots of bad publicity in the press, not to mention the wrath of Senator Smythe.”

  “But you have no proof of his involvement.”

  “Jim, what kind of a jerk do you think I am?”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “I was wearing a body wire during the meeting with the old man.”

  “You what?” Morton was appalled.

  “You heard me. I've got the whole meeting on tape. You should hear the quality of the sound. It's excellent.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Sunday

  Miami, Florida

  Captain Fernandez could not believe his good fortune. The CIA was fnished with him and they were going to let him go! Moreover, they were going to enroll him in the witness protection program to enhance his chances of living out his natural life.

  At frst they'd given him a very hard time. After that obnoxious Mr. Bob or whatever his name was had grilled him all day Sunday they had turned off the air conditioner and left him to rot for four days. Finally, on Friday, Reyes Puma had come to see him. Apparently, he'd had to apply for a writ of habeas corpus before they let him visit.

  Fernandez thanked God he'd had the good sense to consult with him before turning himself in. Reyes Puma sure knew the ropes; that they would call in the CIA once they'd heard his story had been a foregone conclusion. And that bastard Mr. Bob and his colleague were CIA for sure, he could smell it. But why hadn't they followed up on his story? Why had they left him to sweat for four days? Maybe to soften him up.

  Fernandez couldn't understand what was happening. OK, so they had wanted to lean on him a bit to make him more cooperative, but Mr. Bob never came back, never followed up. Instead, the INS had handed him over to the CIA. The Agency's case offcers had then made him write out his life's story in the greatest of detail four times.

  This took almost a week during which, he had to admit, the CIA had accommodated him in a luxurious safe house with garden, pool, servants, good food, and video movies at night. He'd then spent another four days answering questions about his career in the military while they tried to poke holes in his story and to confuse him.

  Ungrateful bastards. He was handing them the scoop of the century, the lever with which to dislodge Castro from control of Cuba, the story that would discredit the Revolution. And what did they do? They had let him cool his heels for twelve days during which he had to answer questions about just about everything, except about details concerning the drug-running operation.

  Then Reyes Puma, who really did seem to have a lot of clout, had managed to get to see him again and the day after, on Friday, they had said they'd let him go. But good old fat and perspiring Reyes Puma wouldn't let them do that without compensation for what he had done to help the United States's cause against Cuba. He had demanded money and adequate arrangements for his physical safety.

  Another week had gone by while his lawyer-cousin bargained with the INS. His biggest ace in the hole of course had been the photo Reyes Puma had arranged to have taken of him at the Immigration and Naturalization Offce just before he had turned himself in. Nice, sharp picture, with the calendar in the background, a uniformed immigration offcer on one side of him and Reyes Puma on the other.

  In the end the INS and the CIA had come through. They had given him back his carry-on bag containing his clothes and his million bucks and added a million more to it. The money was no longer in cash. They had given him bankers' drafts in hundred thousand dollar denominations and a nice letter explaining that these were, at his request, in payment for some Canadian stock called INCO he was supposed to have sold on the Toronto Stock Exchange. The letter said the money was net of taxes.

  They also gave him a hundred thousand bucks in cash of which he would give his cousin half, for services rendered. But the best part was the way the INS had fxed him up with a complete set of papers: social security card, driver's license, credit cards, even a U.S. passport, all made out in the name of Raul Hernandez (conveniently similar to Fernandez), born in Oaxaka, Mexico, but now a naturalized U.S. citizen.

  He was ready to leave. Where the hell was Reyes Puma anyway? Late, as always.

  Reyes Puma, who'd fled Cuba a year after Fidel Castro's revolution triumphed and who'd been blackmailed by Castro's agents in Miami into working for them, had good reason to be late. As the most senior member of Cuban Military Intelligence in Florida, he was busy editing and encoding an “eyes only” message to Cuba's Minister of the Revolutionary Armed Forces. The handwritten message had to be ready in time for pickup before noon by one of Compay Secundo's musicians, who thought he was doing Reyes Puma a personal favor by delivering a letter to a mutual friend in Havana. The letter looked innocuous and the addressee happened to be the man in charge of issuing exit visas to musicians planning to travel abroad as part of Cuba's worldwide cultural exchange.

  Reyes Puma could never understand how the United States, hell-bent on bringing down the Castro regime, would allow Cuban artists to travel with no restrictions to, from, and within the United States. Did the Americans not realize they were handing the Castro an unparalleled opportunity to spy and subvert?

  Reyes Puma found his position very rewarding. The descendant of once wealthy landowners, he had arrived in Miami penniless. He had worked his way through college and within six years become a member of the Florida bar. In the year of his admission he was approached by Cuban Military Intelligence to join up in return for a generous stipend for his aging, widowed mother whom he'd been forced to leave behind in Havana, and who, at the time, was living in very strained circumstances. Reyes Puma accepted without hesitation, and was then told to specialize in immigration law.

  It had taken him three full years to develop the contacts and acquire the experience that made him one of the most sought-after practitioners of his specialty in Miami. As his reputation grew and his clients became more numerous and prosperous, so did his usefulness to Cuban Military Intelligence. By the time of Fernandez's defection he was their number one intelligence agent and reporting to the minister directly, which only added to his stress.

  Reyes Puma could find only one way to escape the constant pressure—by eating. And the more he ate the more he wanted to eat.

  Fernandez's story had not been news to Reyes Puma. He'd heard rumors about the operation before, and from none other than his puppet, Acting Director Smythe, whom he had been blackmailing on behalf of the Castro government for a couple of years now. Under the circumstances Reyes Puma wanted to be certain his report was carefully worded and covered every aspect of the Fernandez situation and the arrangements he had made to keep his cousin in sight after his liberation.

  In spite of these elaborate preparations he was only a half-hour late for Fernandez's release hearing at the INS offce. The judge, put out by having to work on a Sunday and then made to wait, was mercifully brief. In no time Fernandez was clutching the Stars and Stripes and taking the Oath of Allegiance. He was then handed an envelope with instructions on how to start his new life and told to get out of town for his own safety.

  He paid Reyes Puma ffty thousand dollars for his services on the spot and then asked to be dropped off at the nearest car rental agency.

  “And then?” his cousin asked.

  “Hell, I don't know. I'll drive north or west and take a few days to look around, fnd a bank, buy clothes—”

  “How will you keep in touch with your family?”

  “What family, Filberto? I'm an orphan, I'm divorced, my kids are grown up and married. I have no grandchildren and the rest of the family living here in Miami barely remembers me.”

  “Still, your kids ought to be able to contact you.” Reyes Puma kept pressing. He wanted to double check on what Smythe had told him about Fernandez's new identity. “In case o
f an emergency for example.”

  “I thought about that quite a bit.” Fernandez gazed out the car window pensively. “I'm almost ffty, and I have been granted a reprieve, a new beginning. I have money, I'm free of my past and I can do whatever I please. I don't want to fuck this up.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “I just want to disappear. Go somewhere and start fresh. Travel a little perhaps, maybe fnd a new wife.” He let his voice trail off.

  “OK, so where do you want me to drop you off?” It was clear that his cousin would confde in Reyes Puma no further.

  “Right here will do.” Fernandez pointed at the hotel they were just passing. “I'll grab a cab and be on my way.” He turned to his cousin, obviously moved. “Thank you for everything you've done for me.”

  Reyes Puma stopped the car, and they got out. “Don't mention it, mi primo, it's all right. I did no more than my duty to a client.” He gave a short, bitter laugh. “And a damned well-paying client at that, whom I'm at the point of losing forever.” They embraced warmly and, out of breath, Reyes Puma climbed back into his SUV specially built to accommodate his bulk. “Take care of yourself Paco, d'you hear,” he yelled through the open window, “and remember; if you need something, all you need do is call.”

  “You take care of yourself too, and watch that weight of yours.” Fernandez shouted back. “Eat less and get some exercise.”

  Almost in tears, Reyes Puma waved good-bye and drove off.

  He had been forced to choose between saving his mother's life and that of his cousin.

  He couldn't stop shaking.

  Fernandez walked to the hotel's main entrance and took the frst cab in line. “Take me to Alamo Car Rentals,” he said to the driver.

  “There's no need for that,” the man replied. “They have a desk right here in the hotel.”

  In less than twenty minutes he was at the wheel of a comfortable car, on his way to Bertram Yachts in Coconut Grove.

  It never occurred to him to check for pursuit. He felt safe: safe from Casas and the army, safe from De la Fuente and his gang at the Cuban Ministry of the Interior, safe from Castro, and safe from the most dangerous of them all, the minister of the Revolutionary Armed Forces.

  After all Fernandez was now a citizen of the United States of America.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  Monday and Tuesday

  Naples, Florida

  Having spent a pleasant afternoon looking at boats, checking prices and evaluating bargains at the yacht broker, Fernandez booked into the Coconut Grove Hotel and got laid by a high-class hooker who'd picked him up at the bar downstairs.

  The next day he drove across the Florida peninsula, arriving at the Ritz in Naples a few minutes before noon, and took immediate possession of his very comfortable cabana, which he'd reserved in advance. He spent part of the afternoon organizing his finances at a branch of the Florida Federal Savings Bank after which he went for a twenty-lap swim in the hotel's Olympic-size pool to get the kinks out of his body. Feeling better than he had for weeks, he took a nap and, after a lavish gourmet meal at the hotel's elegant dining room, retired to his room to relax and start planning his future.

  It was one of those fragrant and lush nights for which Southern Florida is justly famous: waves quietly lapping at the sandy shore, the sea like a mirror from afar, reflecting the silver dish of a full moon frolicking in the water.

  Fernandez felt almost at home. The beaches along Florida's west coast were similar in texture, smell, sound, and atmosphere to the beaches of his youth along Cuba's Costa Habanera, las Playas del Este. Sitting on the veranda of his rented cabana, he looked out over the sparkling, velvety sea, and allowed the tensions of the last two years to ebb out of him.

  Then he shuddered, remembering how he had murdered the clerk in Grand Cayman. He went back into the cabana to fix himself another stiff Cuba Libre with real ron añejo and real Coca-Cola.

  Yes, the girl had definitely been the key to moving the money. Because the Cubans were charging a thousand dollars per kilo for drugs passing through their territorial waters, the Colombians could get a ton of the stuff into the States in exchange for the up front payment of a million bucks. They would transfer the money to one of the Cayman bank accounts a few days after a ship, laden with the drugs, left their country and would then wait for word from the ship's captain advising that he was approaching Cuba. The Cuban Coast Guard would allow the ship to enter Cuban territorial waters, but would not allow unloading or departure without permission from the army's liaison officer.

  This officer, who was also the army's liaison officer with the Ministry of the Interior, was none other than Fernandez, who coordinated operations from a special communications unit.

  Once the drugs were in Cuban waters the Colombians would telephone the girl in the stationery store and give her a series of numbers—the relevant bank account and passport numbers—which meant nothing to her, but which she would inscribe under the front dust cover flap of a copy of A Businessman's Guide to the Cayman Islands. She would then wait for someone with the right password to show up and ask for the book.

  The Cubans, advised of the ship's name via shortwave radio, would watch for it and dispatch a courier to Grand Cayman on the day before it entered Cuban waters. Thus, on the day the ship entered Cuban “territory,” Castro's people would be in a position to take control of the money in the Cayman bank. If the Cuban side would then refuse to let the drug ship discharge its cargo into the cigarette boats that came blasting out of Florida to meet it, the Colombians could take retaliatory measures in Grand Cayman against the Cuban courier. But since the schedule called for two drug shipments per month neither side wished to see the operation discontinued. There was just too much money at stake.

  Fernandez figured that, by now, the balance in Department Z's Panamanian bank account must exceed thirty million dollars.

  Remembering, Fernandez shook his head in disbelief and took another sip of his drink. Twenty four million dollars a year or more they could have made for years and years if someone hadn't gotten greedy. Why could the big shots not sort things out amongst themselves? Why did they have to involve me, a lowly captain?

  The trouble had started about three months after he'd taken over running the logistics of the show. They had successfully completed eight transactions without major problems and everything seemed to be pointing toward a long and profitable business relationship with the Colombians when the shit hit the fan and the minister had sent for him.

  He had gone to the top floor of the Ministry of the Revolutionary Armed Forces with trepidation, but with a clear conscience. Proud of his work, he had been certain the minister wanted at best to commend him for his efforts, at worst to get more detailed information about what was going on.

  Before allowing him to enter the minister's office, they had frisked him, taken his sidearm away, and X-rayed him to make sure he had nothing on him that he could use to harm Cuba's second most powerful man. They had then escorted him into the great man's office. The minister did not greet him, which emphasized the difference in rank between them.

  “I see you've been working for General Casas for over three years,” the minister had said, flipping through Fernandez's personnel file on his desk. “He has given you four citations during those years: two for bravery and two for exceptional service to the nation.”

  “That is correct, Comandante,” Fernandez had replied, looking squarely into the eyes of the short, pockmark-faced man sitting opposite him. The minister had nodded at Fernandez's escorts who withdrew.

  The minister's demeanor had immediately changed. He became affable. “Sit down, Captain. Make yourself comfortable. Would you like a cup of coffee? Or a soft drink?”

  “No thank you, Comandante. Nothing.” All Fernandez had wanted was to get through the meeting quickly and to get the hell as far away as possible from this dangerous little man who was being too solicitous by half.

  “Very well then. I hear you'v
e continued the good work by concentrating your logistical talents on reorganizing a new operation in Department Z.”

  “That is also correct, Comandante.”

  “I don't want to know any details, so stop fretting,” the Minister had then said, thereby adding to Fernandez's discomfiture. “All I want to know, Captain, and without a hint of a doubt, that the money, all of the money, generated by this little caper finds its way into the coffers of the government and nowhere else. Am I making myself clear?”

  “Yes, Comandante,” said Fernandez automatically though not sure what his superior was hinting at.

  The minister continued as though he had read Fernandez's thoughts. “I want you to work with me on this directly, Captain. I repeat, I need to know how the money flow is being handled and that there's no hanky-panky.”

  Fernandez had been mystified. “But surely, Comandante, the comrades at the Ministry of the Interior are already doing this. They have the setup, the checks and balances, to make sure everything is as it should be.”

  “Do you think I have not taken this into consideration?” The minister had looked at Fernandez over his half-moon glasses. “Do you think you'd be sitting here if I was sure these people were doing their job properly?”

  “Do you mean to say, Comandante, that the Ministry of the Interior—”

  “Captain, do not speculate. That's an order.” The voice had no longer been solicitous, not even friendly. “Here is what I want. First, a detailed written report about the money flow, and second, a rough calculation of how much money has been generated so far. Get your report done within the month and submit it to me directly. Keep your mouth shut about this meeting, and remember, it is possible in our army to skip a rank when being promoted.” The minister had allowed himself a fleeting smile. “Do you take my meaning?”