Private House

by Anthony Hyde

  Lorraine said, “It’s very good. And you?”

  He put down his knife and fork. “It’s so rare for us, red meat.”

  His teeth glittered in the candlelight. His teeth were perfect, regular, and white, quite unlike President Carter’s, or Phil’s, on the landing below Hugo’s room. Lorraine said, “You’re not dyeing your hair?”

  He touched it, self-consciously; and at once this brought back a gesture of Hugo’s, and she remembered—it seemed the kind of memory your mind would throw up in this place—someone telling her that all such gestures, patting the hair, stroking a tie, were masturbation, sublimated. She smiled at him; what fun it must be, if you were Freudian. “Murray liked it blond,” he said.

  Lorraine thought of the picture in the wicker frame on his bureau. She said, “You and Hugo are so alike.”

  He smiled. “But Hugo is one year older!”

  Coffee came. Bailey said, “I’m going to go whole hog,” and had a brandy. Adamaris smoked another cigarette. At her elbow, confidentially, Almado murmured, “Tomorrow, I’m going to my mother, in Matanzas.”

  She mumbled, “Your mother . . .”

  He leaned toward her. “What is that?”

  “Nothing. Your mother—” It seemed bizarre—his mother!

  “Yes. But we could meet on Monday . . . about our business?”

  “My plane leaves at three.”

  “I’ll call you in the morning, then.”

  They descended the great staircase, feeling their way down by the light of the single bulb, and then stepped into the full dark night. Almado shook hands all around. “It is too bad—very bad—Hugo didn’t come. I’ll walk over there and see. Perhaps he is in his room.”

  Adamaris, astonishingly, took his arm. “I am walking too. We can go together. You will be my . . . escort?”

  Almado laughed agreement.

  Lorraine thought, I have had too much wine.

  Bailey found a cab.

  3

  It was inconvenient, the way taxis couldn’t quite come up to the hotel, and Lorraine had insisted on walking by herself to the door. Mathilde felt guilty, not going with her.

  She sat back and Bailey’s arm slipped around her. It was very dark; the whole city, like the entrance to La Guarida, seemed illumined by a single bulb. Lorraine disappeared, and Bailey’s arm cupped her shoulder now, squeezing lightly: the sensation transferred itself, a wave, a crest, a wave, another crest, from her breast to her sex and she felt herself swell there. She closed her eyes. She felt heavy, sleepy, weighed down with desire. All evening, in the restaurant, she’d felt this building. She’d felt it as a kind of pride; after all, the only man was hers; and in that bizarre room, he was like a black prince come in the night; and then, too, Adamaris had watched her all night long with desiring eyes, and like a river’s tributary her desire had flowed into her own, increasing its current, raising its levels, until it seemed only a matter of time before it spilled over its banks. She knew that if Bailey were to touch her now between her legs, she would come. He said, “I think you should go with her.”

  Mathilde stuck out her tongue. “You are a bastard. I knew you were going to say that.”

  “Something’s going on. She’s very upset, real upset.”

  “She’ll be all right.”

  “I don’t like thinking about her on her own. I don’t want to worry about it. I don’t want you to worry about it—and don’t say you’re not. It’s almost like she’s afraid.”

  “She is afraid.” She thought, She’s afraid Almado has killed Hugo. But she said, “She doesn’t want to give him the money, really. Almado.”

  “A real creep,” said Bailey. He looked at his watch. “It’s five of eleven. I’ll stay here until fifteen after. Twenty after. If she goes up to bed—maybe she’s already gone—just come back here. Otherwise I’ll go home. We still have tomorrow.”

  “Merde. You know what that means?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “Get out of the car,” she said.

  She opened the door and got out herself, and Bailey followed. Mathilde turned her back, leaning against the car. The hotel rose above the smaller nearby buildings like the hull of a ship looming above the shed of a dockyard. She said, “I want a kiss at least.”

  He kissed her. In a way, it was the opposite of romantic; complete, but easy and almost casual: not like a “last kiss,” but as though he could kiss her anytime he wanted to. When he let her go, her knees were weak. She managed to say, “In a few minutes, I hope.”

  She walked right past him, having to make her legs work with her mind and not daring to look back. San Ignacio and Armagura made a crossroads; during the day, people were always passing, this way and that. Now only a lone policeman stood guard and the street was dark except for a spill of light through somebody’s doorway, a television flickering inside. She went into the hotel. It too was dim: but there was light from the bar and the television, Spanish CNN, was babbling away. Lorraine had not gone up. She was sitting at a table, the bar’s only customer; the barman was building her a drink. He looked up as Mathilde came in but Lorraine didn’t notice her until she slipped into the other chair at the table. Before Lorraine could say anything, Mathilde said, “Bailey was worried.”

  Lorraine was about to say something but then seemed to change her mind. “He is a very nice man.”

  “Yes.”

  “You should be with him.”

  Mathilde smiled, but left her fervent agreement there. She said, “You’re worried about Hugo, aren’t you?”

  But then the waiter came with a daiquiri for Lorraine. “I like this kind,” she said, “with the ice.”

  Mathilde resigned herself: Bailey would be going home alone. She might as well have something frozen herself. “Please bring me one,” she told the barman. When he went away, Mathilde looked at Lorraine, who kept moving her eyes away.

  Lorraine said, “This is terrible. But I think that Almado has killed Hugo . . . murdered him, I mean.”

  “Because he didn’t come?”

  “I didn’t tell you. Yesterday morning, I went to where he’s staying . . . I walked there from the gallery. I left him a note. He knew how important it was to come.” And then she said, “He probably didn’t get it. He was probably already dead.”

  “All the same . . . What did Almado say in the restaurant? You didn’t seem to talk to him much. Did he press you about the money?”

  Lorraine leaned forward to reach the short straw sticking out of the icy drink, and shook her head, then sipped. She let the straw go. “Not really,” she said. “But that’s not important.” She looked at Mathilde directly. “It’s the passport he wants—I suppose the visa too—and I think he’s already got it. He killed Hugo to get it. You have to understand, they look so much alike. The money would just be icing on the cake.”

  “Are you sure, Lorraine? They can’t be that much alike.”

  “Oh yes they are. Almado even knows about makeup. He dyes his hair. He was a blond but he’s letting it grow out—”

  “I noticed that.”

  “Well, you see, Hugo’s dark—dark hair. His passport picture will show that. Almado even had eyebrow makeup on, I’m sure. He looks like Hugo, and he can make himself look even more like Hugo.”

  Mathilde sat back. She’d guessed this, but now it was out in the open. She knew how hard it must have been for Lorraine to admit this to herself, let alone confess it to someone else. And her fears couldn’t be dismissed. In the restaurant, for a single moment, she had caught Almado giving her a look of appraisal, sizing her up: he’d already taken her camera—what more could he get? It had been a predatory look and it was clear he would take everything he could, that there were no limits. That was it—no limits. They didn’t exist for him. She looked at Lorraine. “I can’t tell you that you’re wrong. You know, Bailey said to me the one thing he had in common with other Cubans is that he would kill for a passport, a way to get out.”

  “Almado has killed, I’m sure of it. And i
t’s all my fault.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous, Lorraine. Don’t be so Christian, if you’ll permit me to say that. You are responsible for Hugo and Almado coming together. But that’s all. You should blame Murray, if you’re going to blame anyone. He got you all into it. And he was the one— if you look at it from Almado’s point of view—who put the idea into his head. He held out the temptation.”

  Lorraine pushed her drink away. “You’re quite right. I’m feeling sorry for myself, and that’s not being Christian at all.” She smiled. “You’re right about Murray, as a matter of fact. Did I tell you? I don’t remember. But he was going to sponsor Almado as an immigrant and bring him into the country.”

  “Yes. You told me. That’s what I mean. And that makes it more plausible, I must say. It was already a plan. He is just carrying it out in a different way.”

  “I was thinking that, too. You see, the money is only a bonus. Of course he’d like it. But that’s not really what he’s after.”

  “All right, but the question is, what do you do? Do you want to go to the police?”

  “I don’t know. It’s seems too much—too much for me, anyway. How could the police check? I thought of going to the embassy, but how could they check? Where does Almado live? I don’t even know that. Besides . . .”

  Lorraine’s doubt hung in the air for a moment, and then Mathilde said, “Yes, what if you’re wrong?”

  Now the barman brought Mathilde her drink, and she put her hand around the cold, smooth glass; when the barman went away, she repeated, “That’s it, isn’t it. What if you’re wrong?”

  Lorraine nodded. “I suppose I worry about that because I’m also suspicious of my motives. Tonight, in the restaurant, I was thinking to myself, he’s a pervert—I’m so angry. What a word! But maybe it is what I feel.”

  “Don’t be silly. He’s a creep—that has nothing to do with sex. He’s a thief, I’m sure of that.”

  “I wonder what Adamaris thinks of him.”

  “I noticed that too—she thought something, certainly. They are rivals in jinterismo, as they call it . . . ‘riding the tourists.’ In some ways, they are the same, after all. They are both out for what they can get . . . all they can get.”

  “Because they have nothing themselves. You can’t forget that.”

  “But now you’re making excuses. Look—what can you do? Go to the police. This makes all kinds of difficulties and probably doesn’t accomplish very much. You can simply do nothing. Why not? You’re not required to do anything . . . except give him the money. So do that.”

  “But that’s awful. I can’t bear that.”

  “What do you care about the money?”

  “Well—”

  “So why make a point of it? But forget that. What about this: tomorrow, we will all look for Hugo, me and you and Bailey— his Spanish is good enough, whatever he says. We’ll go to Hugo’s place—you say you know where it is. We’ll see what we can find. Perhaps he’ll turn up, you never know. At least we may be able to prove that he truly is missing.”

  Lorraine looked at her and smiled. “You shouldn’t say this, Mathilde. Tomorrow is your last day. You want to be with Bailey.”

  “It won’t take all day. And it will settle your conscience, at least. And mine—I admit that. I don’t know what’s happened, but I agree with you, there’s something wrong with Almado. And I don’t just mean he’s a thief. It could have happened—what you say.”

  Before Lorraine could reply to this, there was an interruption: Mathilde’s cell phone began to ring, inside her bag. It took her a second to think what it was, but then she dug it out and answered, “Hello?”

  “This is Adamaris. I am speaking to you from a public telephone.”

  “Yes?”

  “Are you there?”

  “Yes. Where are you?”

  “I am—”

  “Just a minute.” Mathilde held the phone to her breast and said to Lorraine, “It’s Bailey, saying good night.” She got up from the table and moved a little away. But she turned her back and kept her voice low. “Go on,” she said.

  “I walked with Almado . . . you remember? From La Guarida—”

  “Yes, we could not understand why.”

  “I will tell you. I know you don’t like him and I was sure, somewhere, I had seen him and the way he talked as we went together, in Spanish you see . . . It was strange. I thought, He is not Cuban, he is Colombian.” Something about this syllable, Col, as in Coca-Cola seemed perfectly adapted to her mouth, allowing it total expression.

  “Colombian?”

  “I must not say that. But I thought, He is not Cuban. I knew something was going on. You understand? He left me in Centro, he didn’t want me to come with him, but I followed. He walked to the Malecón, very far. He found a boy, a black, and picked him up. They are in a coco taxi. I was close enough to hear them and he told the driver, Aguacate and San Isidro, which is in Belén. I thought you would like to know this.”

  “When?”

  “Now.”

  Mathilde thought a second. “Aguacate and San Isidro?”

  “Yes. Is it all right that I called?”

  “Yes. Thank you. Call me tomorrow.”

  Mathilde pressed the hang-up key and turned back to Lorraine. “I should go.”

  Lorraine smiled. “I think you should, too.”

  “But we’ve agreed, about tomorrow?”

  “All right. If you’re sure.”

  “I’m sure. And you should go to bed. You must promise me.”

  “I promise.”

  With that, Mathilde gathered her things, gave Lorraine a kiss, and walked straight down the steps from the lobby and left the hotel.

  It was pitch black outside, or very near. A young man walked down Armagura Street, watched by the bored policeman. He vanished. Mathilde turned the other way, down San Ignacio; but only as far as the cross street with the water tank. Even in the dark, it stank, but perhaps the street was less muddy. Despite the hour, people were still hanging about. Three women in their nightdresses, their hair up in curlers, were talking together by the fence on one side of the road, while a fourth, a cigarette dangling from her lower lip, filled her bucket, resting her foot on the tap as the water ran in. And the bicycle taxi was where it often was, up against the fence, but the driver was nowhere in sight. Small boys were playing marbles in the centre of the road; they were no more than nine or ten—up late on Saturday night— but an older boy, tall, in flip-flops, floral shorts and an orange basketball shirt was standing to one side, watching. Mathilde got a peso from her bag and went over to him. “Where is the man who runs the taxi?”

  He looked uncomprehending, then shrugged. “Asleep.” He shook his head. “Over.”

  “Fifty pesos—tell him.” And she flipped the coin in the air. “For you, if you find him.”

  His eyes went wide. “Fifty pesos. . . . Where in the taxi?”

  “Aguacate and San Isidro. Tell him. But hurry.”

  He took two steps away, and then turned, sliding another step. “Wait,” he said. And then he went over to the women talking by the fence. He said something to them and they glanced at Mathilde, and the woman by the tank looked her way too, and took her cigarette out of her mouth and called something to the others. Mathilde watched; the boy seemed to be arguing. And then he himself went to the bike, and pushed it around, away from the fence, into the street. A short, dumpy woman now detached herself from the others and came toward her, wiping her hands on her sides. She had a dark face, her small features crumpled into her fleshiness. “Señora,” she said.

  “Buenas noches.”

  She smiled then. “Sí. . . . Fifty pesos?” When Mathilde nodded, she held out her hand, and nodded her head to the boy behind her. “He take you.”