"So she had to die. This woman, twenty years old."
Castillo made no response.
"Did Pablo make you do it?"
"No. It was my decision."
"Yours? Was it easy for you?"
"It had to be done."
Her voice broke. "How can Anthony speak to you after what you did?"
Castillo said, "He knows how it was."
They had reached the low wall marking the end of the beach. "How ugly this is. How horrible. I'm sick of thinking about it!"
"People in this country don't have to think about it. You're lucky." His voice was sad beyond measure. "Be seeing you." He disappeared into the darkness.
Fifteen minutes later, halfway across the channel from Fisher Island, Gail reached into her bag for the film that Rebecca had dropped to her.
It was gone.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Listening to Jeffrey Hopkins, watching his face turn pink with indignation, Gail wondered if he was deliberately insulting Thomas Nolan. Provoking him. Expecting him to leap up and scream across the desk, Who do you think you are, the fucking Metropolitan Opera? I'm out of here. Replacing the star of an opera to open in two weeks would not be, Hopkins might reason, as difficult as suffering the consequences of keeping him.
Tom Nolan sat impassively, looking back at the general manager from under the sharp ridge of his brows. He seemed perfectly at ease. Legs crossed. Hands clasped loosely on his lap. But Gail could see the vein that pulsed in his hollow temple.
Pausing for breath, Hopkins jerked his chin to one side as if his green paisley bow tie were too tight.
Nolan said quietly, "The answer is yes. Of course I want to stay."
"Then you will make a statement to the media." Hopkins planted an elbow on his desk and counted off his fingers. "First, you will apologize to the Cuban exile community for your insensitive remarks. You will confess your ignorance of their history and their current political situation. You will beg forgiveness. You will have no—absolutely no—further contact with any reporter whatsoever outside my presence."
A chuckle resonated in Tom Nolan's chest. "Are you serious?"
"It's your decision. We can use the understudy."
"He isn't good enough for this role."
"At this point, Mr. Nolan, I do not care." Hopkins's eyes narrowed. "Ms. Connor, explain our legal position."
With no more than a shift of deep-set blue eyes, Thomas Nolan looked at her.
Gail said, "You have exposed us to potential losses of thousands of dollars per performance in additional security costs. Before your interview on television, I was confident that the controversy had died down. This morning I received a phone call from the city manager, who said that in view of your remarks the city of Miami cannot waive its demands. Radio commentators are calling for a mass demonstration on opening night. It's my opinion that we have grounds to fire you for cause. However, we hope that some intensive PR will mitigate the damage. We're willing to try, but unless you assure us of your cooperation, we have no choice but to replace you." She added, "One point your attorney should consider. If you sue us, the lawsuit would be filed in Miami—with a Miami judge and jury."
Jeffrey Hopkins made an elaborate nod.
Nolan shifted in the chair. Pulled his fingers through his ponytail. Let out a breath. "I've never made a statement to the press. What do you want me to say?"
"That's up to you," Hopkins said. "Jot down some ideas over your lunch hour and let me see them. The reporters and cameramen will be here at five o'clock."
"Rehearsal isn't over till six."
"I've spoken to the director. You'll finish early and come straight here. Do we understand each other?"
"Yes. All right." At the door Tom Nolan turned stiffly around. "This is so damned unprofessional. You could have worked this out with my manager. The tension is going to affect my voice."
Hopkins gave him a mean little smile. "Be a trooper, Tom."
Hurrying after Thomas Nolan in the corridor that led to the theater, Gail heard him before she saw him. He was vocalizing, the sound coming through his nose. Ying-yang-ying-ing-ing. Then his voice dropped to the bottom. He sucked in some long breaths, hands on his hips. Then arpeggios. Ah-ah-ah-AH-ah-ah-ahhh. Up an octave, then down in a different series of notes, then another, then down again, then a change of key, going faster. His voice leaped and soared and reverberated on the concrete walls and against metal doors.
"Tom!"
Still walking, he glanced at her. "What is it? I have to get to rehearsal." He dug his fingers into the back of his neck and rotated his head.
"I'm sorry we had to do this," she said.
"Please do not preach at me."
"No, Jeffrey did that already. I thought you might want some help deciding what to say to the media."
"Probably. Yes."
"They'll ask questions, too, and we should discuss some responses. When you break for lunch, call me at my office."
"Thanks." He pinched his nose. Waa-waa-waaaa.
Gail waited for two men to pass carrying a sheet of plywood. "Tell me, how was the party last night at Lloyd Dixon's place?"
"Oh!" Nolan abruptly stopped walking and pulled her away from an open door. He leaned closer. "You won't guess in a million years who was there. Octavio Reyes."
"What?" Gail let her eyes go wide.
"As God is my witness. I didn't want to say anything in front of Jeffrey back there, because Lloyd Dixon said he would talk to him today. Reyes is a customer of Lloyd's." When Gail nodded, Nolan made a small laugh of surprise. "You're aware of this? What is going on?"
"I don't know, Tom. Tell me what happened. Did you speak to Reyes yourself?"
"No, he and Lloyd went into another room to talk, and five minutes later Lloyd came back in and said Octavio Reyes had gone. He was, quote, insulted by my presence. I didn't take offense because it was funny, in context. Reyes came expecting a business dinner, and he got me. Lloyd said that Reyes had promised to take it easy on us from now on, though, so it turned out all right. His commentary today didn't mention me or the opera. We're not in such bad shape as Jeffrey makes out."
"Except for the other four or five radio commentators that want to lynch you," Gail said. "What do you mean, Reyes expected a business dinner? Who were those men you sang for? What did they talk about?"
"They were . . . businesspeople. They have money. I don't know who they were."
Gail looked away, thinking, then said, "Have you seen Felix Castillo?"
"No. Why?"
"I'm trying to find him. He hasn't returned my calls."
"Mine either. Where is he? I could be shot dead on my way home tonight. Come on, they're
expecting me in the theater."
Opening his mouth as if in a yawn, then setting his teeth together, he let his voice drop to a dark rumble. He glanced at Gail. "That was about an E. I can't do it in performance. My bottom note is a G. It's the high register that kills you, but I've got good technique."
They walked down an incline, the corridor opening up to the backstage area. The double metal doors were propped open, and beyond them Gail could see scaffolding and lights, everything painted black. The lights were on, harsh white illumination coming straight down. A woman with a clipboard backtracked and came out. "Tom! Where've you been? Martin's looking for you."
He waved a hand at her. "Be right there." To Gail he said, "Martin's the director. Do you want to watch for a while? I'll take you out front." He led her along a narrow passage to a carpeted area, then to a door that opened noiselessly into the auditorium.
The red-upholstered seats seemed to stretch upward to infinity, with boxes on the sides and an immense spiraling chandelier in the ceiling. The house lights were on. About halfway back a table had been set up over the seats to hold a computer and microphones. There was no orchestra, only a pianist in the pit talking to a chubby woman in black jeans leaning over the edge of the stage.
The woman looked at Tom N
olan and tapped her watch.
"Coming!"
Onstage the lights brightened, then dimmed. A bluish spotlight illuminated a two-story set with a red tile roof and an ornate balcony outside someone's window.
Gail asked what they would be rehearsing.
"We'll skip around, but we'll start with act one, scene one." Thomas Nolan extended his arm toward the stage. "Nighttime, outside the house of Donna Anna. Giovanni is inside, and his manservant, Leporello, is pacing back and forth with a lantern, waiting for him. Suddenly Giovanni appears at the door, pursued by Donna Anna, screaming that he has seduced her by force. Traditore! Betrayer! The lady's father, a commandant in the army, comes out and demands that Giovanni defend himself. They draw their swords. They fight. The old man dies. So the opera begins with a rape and a murder."
"Murder or self-defense?"
Tom Nolan smiled. "Spoken like a lawyer. Whatever it was, the Commendatore comes back from the dead to give Giovanni one last chance to repent. Giovanni refuses and demons drag him down to hell."
Gail said, "I remember. You sang that part with one of your students in the stairwell at the School of the Arts."
"A good memory." Nolan glanced toward the stage. "Well, if you'll excuse me—"
"Wait. I have one more question."
"If it's fast."
Gail came closer, speaking quietly. "You told me you saw Lloyd Dixon in Havana." Nolan nodded. "It wasn't just that one time at the Hotel Las Americas, was it? Dixon says that you and he flew to Costa Rica. What's the story on that?"
"The story?"
"Why did you and Dixon go to Costa Rica?" She got a blank stare. Nolan said, "What's that got to do with anything?" "I don't know. And that's my problem with it. If you'd told me everything from the beginning, we wouldn't be in this mess."
He smiled. "Gail, this isn't your concern."
"Lloyd Dixon says you picked up a suitcase in San José that you didn't take through Customs on the way back." Gail dropped her voice further. "What were you doing, Tom? I have a right to know. I'm not likely to tell anyone, am I?"
His cheeks became concave when he pursed his lips. "It wasn't mine. It belonged to a friend."
"Who?"
She counted off four long seconds before he said, "Miss Wells. My former piano teacher. She'd been in Costa Rica a few years ago doing missionary work, and she accidentally left it there. I called her and asked if she'd like me to pick it up for her."
"Really. Who paid for the jet fuel to Costa Rica and back?"
"I did. It was extravagant, but I had the money."
Gail closed her eyes. "That is such BS."
Someone shouted from the stage, "Places, Tom!"
"All right!" He looked back at Gail. "I'll call you at your office at noon." He strode toward the stage door, discernible in the wood paneling only by virtue of its hinges and doorknob.
Gail followed. "What was in the suitcase?"
"Oh, a few kilos of cocaine." He opened the door, then stopped and looked around at her. "It was clothing. What did you expect?" The door closed behind him.
That afternoon Gail spent an hour with a reporter from the New York Times who had flown down to do an article on the controversy for the Sunday magazine. When he finally left, with photographer, her head felt like somebody was driving a chisel into her eye sockets.
"Oh, God," she moaned to her secretary. "Aspirin." She went into the tiny kitchen, took two extra-strength, and pressed a glass of ice water to her temple.
Miriam had some papers for her to sign. The complaint for injunction in the federal lawsuit had been printed out on crisp white paper. There was a summons for Albert Estrada as city manager. Estrada had called her with his regrets. Not a bad guy. He had suggested it would be good to get all this out in the open. The media would be at the courthouse at ten in the morning to film the festivities. Gail expected that the emergency hearing would take place the next day, or the day after. She hoped that Thomas Nolan's interview would help. She had decided not to be at the opera this afternoon, but to watch the press conference on television from home. Her presence might suggest that someone was holding a gun in his ribs.
He had called at noon, as promised. Not being much help. Expecting her to do it. Long silences, then Gail suggesting this or that phrase, and Nolan saying sure, sure, whatever. At one point she had yelled at him. This is supposed to sound sincere, dammit. And he had laughed, that deep chuckle. Don't worry. I make my living onstage. Gail had given the notes to Miriam. Miriam had typed them up, then faxed the statement to Jeffrey Hopkins. Done.
Sitting in the extra chair in Miriam's office, Gail slid the signed papers for the federal lawsuit back across the desk.
She tapped the pen in a rhythm and stared at the telephone. She had left four beeper messages for Felix Castillo, progressively more irate. The first had been on the Fisher Island Ferry last night, asking if he had noticed a film canister that might have fallen from her bag when he grabbed her and pulled her into the bushes. Assuming he hadn't been able to get to a phone, she had let it ride until midnight, then called him before going to bed, asking if he had received her previous message, and please call no matter how late. By morning, she wanted to know, Where is the film, Felix? Driving to the opera, she had spoken through clenched teeth. I want the damned film.
And where might it be now? Her anger was fueled by knowing exactly where it was. Converted to four by six prints already, in a photo finisher's envelope on Anthony Quintana's desk. If she called him, he would deny it.
Gail rubbed her forehead with the heel of her hand, then picked up the telephone. She had another call to make.
Information gave her the number of Ransom-Everglades High School, the main office. When someone answered Gail said who she was, a former graduate of the school with a question about the teaching staff. "Do you have in the music department a teacher by the name of Wells? A woman. She's probably around fifty. . . .No, I'm sorry, I don't. Just Wells. . . . Perhaps back in 1979? She would have been a classically trained pianist." Gail held on while the woman went to ask someone else, a person who had been in the office at Ransom for thirty years. She heard voices. Footsteps coming back. The woman said that no one by the name of Wells had ever taught at the school.
Gail thanked her and hung up.
From the copy machine Miriam asked, "What was that?"
"I'm on the trail of a suitcase from Costa Rica." Without getting into the details, Gail explained that Thomas Nolan had picked it up two years ago and delivered it—so he said—to his piano teacher, whom he still visited whenever he came through Miami.
Miriam laid out copies on her desk and picked up her stapler. "Why do you care about it?"
"Because he's lying to me, chica, and with everything else going on, it makes me nervous. I hate to be lied to. I thought she might have taught at Ransom-Everglades. They say they never heard of her."
The stapler bit through the copies. Click. Click. Click. "I bet we could find her."
"I bet we could," Gail said. "How does one find a piano teacher? She could be retired. Call the music schools. They might have professional associations—"
As she wrote a list, the front door opened. The bell tinkled on the counter outside the small frosted window, and Miriam slid back the glass. Gail heard a male voice say he had a delivery for Ms. Connor.
Miriam let him in, a muscular man in walking shorts and sunglasses. There was a pen stuck in his Afro. The cardboard box was about two feet square. It did not seem heavy when he dropped it onto the work table, but Gail felt a tremor of skittish, irrational fear, imagining a package bomb. "Who's it from?"
"Says here Quintana. I picked it up at a law office in Coral Gables."
The man whipped out his pen and Miriam signed the receipt. When the man was gone, Miriam rushed back to the box. Her brown eyes sparkled. "Is it a present?"
The box was sealed tightly with tape. Marked Personal, Gail Connor only.
Gail picked it up. "I don't know, Miriam. I
'll take it home and find out."
"Aren't you going to open it now?"
"No." She headed for her office.
"Why not?"
"Miriam, please." The tone had been too sharp. "I'm sorry. I'll be in a better mood when all this is over." Gail shoved her door closed with her foot. She didn't have to open the box to guess what it contained.
For several minutes she stared at it on the end of her desk. Finally she used a letter opener to slit the tape. She folded back the flaps. There was an envelope on top, which she set aside. She saw her brown cashmere sweater, neatly folded. A negligee, a pair of jeans, some lacy underthings she had only worn at his house. Cosmetics and shampoo in plastic bags. Her hair dryer. Some paperbacks. A pair of shoes at the bottom. And throughout, the faint scent of his bedroom, his closet, the cologne he used.
Pressing her lips together, she took a big breath. Then another, refusing to cry.
The business-size, cream-colored envelope was sealed. Ferrer & Quintana, Attorneys at Law, PA. Her name written in black ink, a line under it. Gail.
She slowly tore the unopened envelope and the note inside into pieces.
Karen had a soccer game at seven o'clock. At 6:10, Gail was sitting on the edge of her bed tying her sneakers when she heard the TV anchorman mention the words Miami Opera.
Gail stood up and pointed the remote to raise the volume.
There was the recorded image of Thomas Nolan, talking about how sorry he was. He was magnificent. His deep clear voice, the carefully enunciated words. Like many others in this country I was unaware of the tragic history of the exile community . . . the anguish of a people divided, brother from brother . . . a country betrayed . . . if this could bring understanding . . .
A perfect combination of dignity, shame, and repentance. When the reporters shouted questions, he was thoughtful and patient. The brow furrowing just right. There was a snippet of interview with Albert Estrada, then some on-the-street quotes from citizens, Hispanic and otherwise. Most of them said the issue was an embarrassment. One woman said Nolan should be put in jail.
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