I folded the letter carefully, reinserted it inside the envelope, placed the envelope inside the leather folder, then put the folder inside the waterproof pouch in my flight bag. Manny Gutierrez, Sanchez, or whoever the damn Peruvians were wouldn’t give a damn about a historic letter between foes in the greatest grudge match of the last century. Nor would Gunner. And it wouldn’t help us get out of Cuba, either.
“Knock, knock,” Ray said.
With my reverie broken, I looked back between the seats through the fuselage to see him outside the hatch.
“Who’s there?” I said.
“Bearer.”
“Bearer who?”
“Bearer of bad news.”
He looked pale, even in the low light of dusk that faintly lit the basement chamber through the open barn doors.
“Now what?”
“The Beast’s starboard engine. Remember I said the prop was turning so I assumed the cylinders were okay?”
I just stared at him.
“It may not be that simple.” He took a long breath. “It’ll spin, but I removed the plugs, which look okay, but a few of the cylinder heads have metal shavings inside them. A lot of shavings.”
I closed my eyes.
“When the plane hit the ground it must have jarred the crankshaft. I can’t tell if there are some broken pushrods, lifts, a cracked head, or something else.”
“What are you telling me, Ray?”
He rubbed a grease-covered palm over his face, which left a streak over his forehead, nose, and cheeks.
“I need access to a machine shop, or the Beauty ain’t going anywhere.”
I slumped back down on the floor. We’d captured the PNR guard, gutted Betty, made our presence known to Gutierrez and God knows who else, and put Señor Maceo and Nina at risk. All for nothing.
I dropped the flight bag on the floor, walked past Ray, climbed out of the Beast, up the ladder, and out into the evening.
“Buck, wait up!”
I walked in the farmhouse’s back door to find Nina and Señor Maceo in the kitchen. The smell of chicken and herbs permeated the air. Tarragon, I think.
“I was just about to come find you,” she said. Her eyes narrowed as she studied my face. “What’s the matter?”
“The Beast’s engine is shot—”
“We don’t know that for sure,” Ray said.
“Well, the cylinders have metal shavings in them, which means if we crank it over, whatever damage that exists will get worse.”
I sat down next to Señor Maceo, whose expression had not changed since we entered the kitchen. He just stared from me to Ray and back again. I’d expected Nina to pepper us with another outburst of Spanish, but she turned back toward the stove and flipped the chicken.
“My brother’s a mechanic,” the old man said. “He can rebuild anything.”
“Tio Luz?” Nina said.
“I don’t think some amateur mechanic—”
“Amateur?” The old man laughed. “We’ve had the same American cars for fifty years, and Russian ones for thirty. Most Cubans are able to fix things out of necessity, but Luz is ingenious. He can make any part to fix any car.”
“Does he have tools to hone out cylinders, or—”
The old man waved a backhanded wrist at Ray and made a “ppff” sound.
“One engine is the same as any other. Maybe the parts are bigger, but I tell you, Luz is a genius. People come from all over Cuba for him to make them parts for cars, and appliances too.”
“He’s in Havana, Papi. The Secret Police may be here at any time.”
“So, you take the truck and lead these men to his shop.” The old man gave his granddaughter a hard look. “Or we wait for Colonel Gutierrez.”
We all looked at each other. Finally Nina shrugged. She was resigned to the worst, so this was just another step in that direction.
“We need hydraulic fluid, brake fluid, and aviation fuel, too,” Ray said.
“If he doesn’t have it, Luz can get it for you.”
Sometimes you just have to keep going. When all is lost, whether as a result of being on the run and trying to fix an ancient plane to fly you out of a hostile country, or your wife has left you and taken your home and what little money you had left, or your parents are killed in an car accident in a foreign land and the police there suspect it was murder and think of you as the culprit, or your plane is shot down by your arch enemy who would love nothing more than to string you up by the nuts, there’s nothing to do but keep going.
“Are the keys in the truck?” I said.
“I’ll get started removing the engine,” Ray said.
The old man stood up. “I’ll help.”
Nina turned the stove off.
“So much for dinner.”
38
“Glad you called, Betty the Widgeon,” Truck said. “Got some news for you.”
I twisted the dial on the Maceo’s radio a hair to the right to try and eliminate the crackle. “What news, Sea Lion? That you changed your mind and we’ll see you soon?”
“No such luck, Betty.” Truck paused and his voice sounded different. Something was wrong. “Got visitors on board. Came to take care of the dude with the booboo on his leg.”
“What kind of visitors, Sea Lion?”
“Orange stripes—get the hell out of here! I’m still the captain of this ship, damnit!”
I heard rustling in the background, then a loud bang—the sound of a wood hatch slamming shut.
“Sons of bitches. Just cause they have orange damn stripes, they think they can run my ship.”
The Coast Guard must have sent a crew to take care of the wounded Peruvians and to ensure Truck made it home.
“Have you mentioned anything about us to the orange stripes?” I said.
“No, man, but they sure been asking about you. Seems your old buddy from the FBI’s in Key West raising hell. Says you must have been the ringleader of the Atocha theft and run off with the rest of the shit. Got warrants out for you and everything.”
“What’s he basing that on?” I expected he’d mention the video, if he knew.
“Told Nardi he hid a tracking device on your plane so he could follow your every move. He thinks you went to the Bahamas, then threw away the phone he gave you and flew to Panama to recover the treasure on the Sea Lion, dove on Gutierrez’s boat wreck to recover something else, then flew to Cuba.”
The muscles in my neck stiffened. “You’ve got to be kidding me!”
“Wish I was, my brother.”
“The orange stripes buy that?”
“My South American pals here are pretty good evidence that it ain’t true, but only if they feel charitable. Considering how you left them, they might not be too helpful, and if they figure out the angle Booth’s taking, they might just dump on you too.”
My worst fears had been exceeded. I was a man with no country. Booth must be beside himself. That was his tracking device? Had he been feeding my location to Gunner?
“All right, Sea Lion. We’re still working Plan B here, but it’s a long shot. How long until you’re back at home port?”
“Couple days, still. The orange stripes are keeping it quiet so there ain’t no opportunists with crazy ideas coming at us. When we get back, I’ll be on TV, man, and I’ll tell the Feds they’re wrong about you. Should be a helluva party, bro, so get your ass back here, ‘cause there would have been nothing to celebrate without you. Hell, I’d probably be dead by now.”
“I’m working on it, Bubba. Later.”
THE ROAD WAS QUIET, but since it was nearly midnight, that wasn’t a surprise. Nina drove, Ray was asleep in the bed of the truck on top of the tarp that covered the big radial engine with a pile of freshly cut tobacco plants as bedding. My mind drifted back to a time just after e-Antiquity had made its first big find. A cache of Mayan ruins in Guatemala, filled with artifacts, tools, and elements that shed new light on their customs and rituals. It made our company known worldwide, and a
s the president, founder, and point man, I was the toast of Wall Street and museums around the world.
That wasn’t even ten years ago.
“Are you awake?” Nina said.
I nodded my head. “Just thinking. You okay?”
“That was nice, what you did for the fishermen.”
“I hope they find it. I may never get the chance.”
“Where did you get those maps? They looked very old.”
“Some are over five hundred years old.”
“Did you steal them?”
“What makes you ask that?”
“The Secret Police are after you, and Juan Espedes said your plane was shot down.” She kept a straight face while eviscerating me. “And your presence at our farm will cause much bigger problems then Papi’s silly plane.”
My tongue felt paralyzed.
“I have a right to know, Buck.”
I swallowed and thought of how I’d held out on Ray. She did have the right to know, but in order for it to have context, I went back to the e-Antiquity days and gave Nina a selective summary during the two-hour drive to Havana. Hitting it big, marrying the super model, losing it all when the market crashed. I even included the latest wrinkle, that I was adopted. It was the classic American success story, wiped out by classic capitalist greed. She listened patiently, asked the occasional question, and I could tell by her quick glances, sharp intakes of breath, moans, and even a shiver that she soaked it up. Karen was the only other person I’d shared all that with since the bankruptcy, and it took several months for her to squeeze it out of me, but that was romance. This was survival—I knew I’d never see Nina again once this was over, so I could spill my guts without recrimination. Plus I needed her help.
I studied her profile in the scant light off the truck’s instruments. Her full lips, aquiline nose, dark brows, and a wave of sun- streaked hair made a striking combination. She wore no jewelry of any kind. I could still smell the fruit scent of her hair from when I held her in the kitchen.
“What are you looking at?” She kept her eyes on the road.
I felt like a teenager caught peeking at the neighbor girl through her window.
“Yeah, well, the U-Boat on that map for the fishermen was sunk not far off the northwestern coast, probably a little further west of Puerto Esperanza. I got the records from German naval files after I learned about the shipwreck in a Hemingway biography.”
“He’s still a hero here,” she said.
“For hunting subs?”
“For accepting his Nobel Prize for Literature as a Cuban. The Old Man and the Sea. It’s a part of our history now, mandatory in all the schools.”
I knew that.
“How much gold is on the sunken submarine?” she said.
“The German records said it had five hundred pounds of gold, which in 1945 was worth a little over a quarter million dollars. It was supposed to be used to fund their espionage activities throughout South America, but the Nazis tried to hide it all in Argentina as the war came to a close.”
I left out that it came from the teeth of Jews killed in concentration camps.
“Two hundred fifty thousand dollars back then would be worth—”
“Close to ten million today.”
“And you just gave that to the fishermen?” She glanced over, her brows pushed low over her eyes. “Ten million dollars?”
“Don’t you think they’ve earned it? It’s worthless to me if we don’t make it out of here. They needed some incentive to keep quiet as long as possible. If they lose their boats and homes, at least they’ll have something else to fish for. Provided your Papi can get it to Juan before someone spills their guts to Gutierrez.” A breath caught in my throat. “And my plane’s gone anyway, so my salvage days are over.”
She laughed and I could see the flash of teeth, and the crooked one in front. “But you’ll have Papi’s Beauty when we get her back together!”
“I think of her as the Beast.”
“Beauty or Beast, it will depend on her heart,” she said.
I bit my lip and stared at Nina for a long moment.
“A woman’s heart is very complicated,” I said. “ A man is never quite sure what makes it tick.”
“Tick?”
“Beat. What makes a woman’s heart beat, or how to make it beat faster.”
“My guess is you know how to make a woman’s heart beat very fast, Buck Reilly.”
I bit my lip again, but this time to hold back the smile.
39
A loud tap on the back window nearly launched me through the roof, but it was just Ray. He pointed to the side of the road, Nina pulled over, and we all got out.
“Be right back,” Ray said as he headed into the dark pine forest next to the road. The moon had climbed into a sky full of brilliant stars.
“Do you ever look into the stars and wonder about the future?” Nina said.
“All the time,” I paused. “See any answers up there?”
“Only mysteries. Quiet, peaceful, sparkling mysteries. I think of the stars as the souls of the dead.” She pointed to one just below the Big Dipper. “I think of that one as my parents together. Their shared souls burn the brightest.”
“That’s Polaris, the north star,” I said. “It’s right above the North Pole. Sailors have used it to navigate for centuries.”
I couldn’t read her reaction in the darkness, but I thought I heard a sigh.
“Maybe that’s why I look to it for guidance.”
“What does it tell—”
“Whew!” Ray said. “I thought my bladder was going to explode.”
Nina and I laughed.
“How much further to Havana?” Ray said.
She pointed to a distant glow on the horizon. “About forty-five minutes.”
Ray joined us in the front of the truck this time, with me in the middle. When Nina shifted the gears her hand brushed my thigh. It was purely by accident, but I felt that touch of her fingers against my bare leg throughout my body. I renewed my vow not to flirt with her, but it was getting more difficult.
“So, Nina, how come you’re not married?” Ray said as we approached the outskirts of the city.
“I have no interest in marriage.”
“Ah, a Cuban feminist?”
“No, just a worker doing my part.” Her lips puckered as if from a sour candy. “At least, that’s the response we’re expected to make.” She glanced at Ray, then me. “I like men, and there are no shortage of interested ones, but marriage, children, these things would keep me from getting what I really want.”
I looked at Ray, who seemed to have run out of questions.
“Your grandfather said you aspire to run the Ministry of Agriculture,” I said.
“He told you that?”
“So you couldn’t have a husband and still—”
“Papi is the only man in my life. At least, the only one I like being around for more than a weekend. Besides, with the farm I’m too busy for the distraction romance causes. Farmhands and jealous vaqueros are of no interest to me anyway.”
Absorbed in the conversation, I hadn’t noticed we were now on a city street. I sat up straight.
“Are we in Havana?” Ray said.
“Marianao, just a little west of the city. Tio Luz lives not far from here, near the Necropolis, Cristobal Colón.”
“Necropolis?” Ray said.
“Graveyard,” I said.
Ray shivered. “I hate cemeteries. They’re full of dead people.”
Nina and I laughed.
It was still dark when Nina turned down a narrow alley behind a decrepit old building in a block of gray, four-story structures. A dog scrambled from a recessed doorway and ran ahead of us with his tail between his legs. Nina pulled to a stop at the end of an alley facing a roll-up door.
“I hope Papi was able to reach Tio Luz—”
The garage door suddenly lifted, and a man stepped out.
“Nina!”
; They hugged, already talking in rapid-fire Spanish.
“Hope you got some sleep, Ray.” I said. “Tio Luz may be great at improvising parts for old cars, but I doubt he’s ever seen a radial engine this big.”
I was relieved when Ray smiled—it was a challenge he was excited to meet. Of course, working with another gear-head, they’d either be fast friends or disagree on everything.
Luz had Nina drive the truck in, then closed the roll-up door to the garage. He was a small and wiry, somewhere in his late sixties. Dark stains covered his palms and the old guayabara he wore, but he had an air of confidence that made the grease and oil stains seem irrelevant.
He held his hand out to Ray, then me.
“Mucho gusto, mucho gusto. Welcome to my garage. Antonio said you would be here at four a.m., and you were almost right on time.”
“Antonio?” Ray said.
“That’s Papi’s first name,” Nina said.
Luz and Ray stood close together, studying the engine and discussing how to proceed. To my delight, the older mechanic showed no trace of intimidation during the examination of the jumbo-sized patient. Nina and I drifted to the rear of the “shop,” which seemed to be the gutted back area of what had been a café.
There were an amazing number of tools hanging from the floor joists, leaning in corners, or hung on the walls. I couldn’t imagine that anyone other than Luz would know what each tool was for. I started to feel a sense of optimism but held it in check so the surely inevitable disappointment wouldn’t be as painful.
Nina was at work in a dark corner of the garage, and the smell of strong coffee hit my nostrils just before she brought me a small cup of high-test brew. I savored the smell, but the taste was even better. Moments later, Ray and Luz came over, and I braced myself.
“Luz is the real deal, Buck. He has everything major we need to pull this off, and he’s totally confident. He thinks we can make any parts we need. This guy’s unreal!”
“How long will it take?”
“We’re going to tear it apart right now. Depending on what we find, it could be done after lunch, so keep your fingers crossed.”
Luz spoke with Nina, whose reaction wasn’t anything like Ray’s. In fact, she said something that caused Luz to take a step back, raise his palms, and launch into a calming voice, combined with some body language that bordered on dance moves. This elicited a “humph” from her before they turned to us.
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