Best Kept Secrets

by Rochelle Alers

  Samuel smiled as Everett pushed far enough back from the table to loop one leg over the opposite knee. The cuffs of his suit jacket were slightly worn, as was the collar of his white shirt, but the shabbiness in no way detracted from the overall appearance he presented as a formidable negotiator.

  “Correct me if I’m wrong,” Everett said softly. “You plan to address the issues of health and social inequities by raising shipping costs to offset United Fruit’s efforts to establish a network of hospitals and housing for your workers.”

  “You are correct,” Nigel stated emphatically.

  Everett’s golden eyes glittered dangerously. “Why don’t you use a portion of your profits? And don’t tell me you’ve been losing money, since I was summarily discharged because you couldn’t stand to work with a black man who knew more than you.”

  Nigel cast his gaze downward.

  Trevor drummed his fingers nervously on the surface of the table. “We have stockholders to answer to.”

  “How unfortunate for you,” Samuel replied sarcastically. “Fortunately for Cole International, Limited, we answer only to ourselves. And I’d like to inform you that United Fruit isn’t the only company interested in soybeans nowadays.” He’d lied, but said it with such conviction that he almost believed his own lie.

  Everett picked up on Samuel’s untruth. “I’m certain you two gentlemen remember Mr. Marcus Garvey’s visit to Limon back in twenty-one.”

  Trevor Richards shook his head. “Mr. Cunningham was assigned to meet with Mr. Garvey.”

  “What was your impression of Mr. Garvey, Mr. Cunningham?”

  Nigel fixed his gaze on a pencil beside his right hand. “I heard he was quite satisfied with the results of his visit here. Mr. Garvey told the workers that the work given them by the United Fruit Company meant their bread and butter. They would receive the same respect as United Fruit once they had farms, railways and steamships of their own and showed that they could operate them.”

  Everett inclined his head. “Did he not say that in order to operate such an enterprise they must have money and that in order to get money they had to work?” Trevor and Nigel nodded.

  “There is another group of men,” he continued smoothly, “who are of the same belief as Mr. Garvey.”

  “Who are these men?” Nigel asked.

  “I cannot reveal their identity,” Everett said, his expression closed, and it took all of his self-control not to laugh in the faces of the two greedy North Americans. “However, Mr. Cole is a member and an officer of this organization that has become the cornerstone of a vision for black economic independence. The corporation was created with the goal of supporting businesses that would employ African-Americans and produce goods to be sold to black consumers. They have black-owned factories, retailers, services and other businesses. The result will be a network strong enough to empower and sustain an all-black economy with worldwide significance.

  “If you intend to raise the shipping costs for goods handled by Cole International, Limited, then we’ll be forced to pull out completely and turn everything over to this organization.”

  “But…but you can’t!” Nigel sputtered.

  “But we can,” Samuel said quietly. “Have you forgotten the clause in our contract that our prevailing shipping costs are fixed for the next five years? However, if you want out, then you’ll have to pay me….” His words trailed off as he met Everett’s amused stare. “Mr. Kirkland, have you come up with a figure that would satisfy us for this breach of contract?”

  “At least one million.”

  “You’re crazy if you believe United Fruit will give two niggers a million dollars!” Nigel shouted.

  Schooling his expression not to react to the slur, Samuel glanced around the large room. “Who are these niggers you speak of, Nigel?”

  Everett wasn’t as successful in reining in his temper. “If you ever utter that word in my presence again you’ll find yourself picking up your teeth with a rake.”

  Trevor’s open palm came down hard on the table. “Gentlemen, please.” He glared at Nigel. “Leave us, Cunningham.”

  Nigel blanched. “Trevor, you can’t take their side.”

  “I’m not here to take sides,” he countered. “I’m here as vice president of the United Fruit Company. In case you’ve forgotten, our role is to protect the company. I’ll take it from here.”

  Samuel lowered his head rather than let the others see the smirk stealing its way across his face. Nigel and Trevor were both from the American South, but that was the only similarity. Nigel had worked as an accountant for the owner of several West Virginia coal mines before he signed on a merchant steamship heading for Central America, whereas Trevor left Alabama to escape his tyrannical banker father.

  Waiting until the door closed behind Nigel, Trevor turned his attention on the two men who’d managed to shake the accountant’s composure. The skin around his soulful-looking brown eyes crinkled when he smiled.

  “I’m sorry about Nigel. There are times when he forgets himself during the heat of negotiations.”

  “There’s no need for you to apologize,” Everett said harshly.

  Samuel placed a hand on Everett’s sleeve. “Everett, let’s hear what Mr. Richards has to say.”

  Trevor inclined his head. “Thank you, Samuel. May I call you Samuel?”

  Samuel nodded. “Yes.”

  Trevor smiled at Everett. “Everett?”

  “Yes, Trevor.”

  Clasping his hands together, Trevor stared at the shiny surface on the oak table. “Gentlemen, I need to take something back to my superiors that is palatable. Are you willing to help me out?”

  “Do you smoke, Trevor?” Samuel asked.

  His light brown eyebrows lifted. “Cigarettes?”

  “No. Cigars.”

  The middle-aged man smiled, the gesture making him appear years younger. “I like a good cigar.”

  Reaching into the breast pocket of his jacket, Samuel withdrew a cigar and handed it to Trevor. “Try this one, and let me know what you think.”

  Three minutes later Trevor, leaning back in his chair, blew a series of blue-gray smoke rings, his eyes widening in surprise. Removing the cylinder of tightly rolled tobacco leaves from his mouth, he shook his head.

  “Nice.”

  “You like it?” Samuel asked.

  Trevor nodded. “It’s the best cigar I’ve ever smoked. Where did you get it?”

  “Cuba.”

  “A lot of cigars come from Cuba.”

  “That’s true,” Samuel conceded. “What if I arrange for the exportation of Cuban cigars to this region in exchange for a small percentage of the profits you’ll derive from their sale? We can begin with a small quantity, and if the demand increases so will the supply.”

  Everett picked up quickly on Samuel’s new scheme. “Your company’s stockholders never have to know about the cigars. The profits can be used to offset the costs for your hospital and housing projects.”

  Trevor’s features became more animated. “Let me talk to my boss. Do you happen to have another one for him to sample?”

  Reaching into his pocket, Samuel took out the last two remaining cigars and handed them to Trevor. “When will you get back to me?”

  Trevor sucked in another mouthful of sweet tobacco. “Can you wait?”

  “How long do you want us to wait?” Samuel asked.

  “Hopefully, I can get back to you before the end of today.”

  Samuel checked his watch. The end of the day wouldn’t come for another two hours. “Contact me at my hotel.”

  “Where are you staying?”

  “The Casa del Caribe.”

  The meeting ended with the three men shaking hands, and when Samuel and Everett stepped out into the brilliant sun, their smiles were triumphant.

  Samuel rested a hand on Everett’s shoulder. “What made you come up with that secret organization hoax?”

  “Those two hillbillies have been away from home too long
to concern themselves with black men seeking to change the status quo. Are you serious about the cigars?”

  Samuel nodded. “Quite serious. M.J.’s father is a cigar manufacturer. We can export the cigars without a broker.”

  Everett’s eyebrows lifted a fraction. “Do you think they’re going to accept it?”

  “They’re too greedy not to.”

  Everett hoped Samuel was right, because it was a scheme wherein United Fruit’s owners stood to make a lot of money without having to share the profits from the sale. They were known for exporting bananas, not importing cigars.

  Samuel dropped his hand. “A word of caution, Everett. Never show your opponent your weakness.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “You got personal and lost your temper when Nigel called us niggers. If Richards hadn’t stepped in when he did, then we’d be going home with nothing.”

  Smarting from his boss’s reprimand, Everett clenched his jaw. “It will not happen again.”

  Samuel patted his cheek. “Now let’s go get something to eat.”

  “I thought we were going back to the hotel,” Everett said when Samuel started out in the opposite direction.

  “Patience, Everett,” he said in a soft voice.

  Patience, he repeated to himself as he followed Samuel to a restaurant frequented by tourists.

  Samuel and Everett sat on the sand and toasted each other with Jamaican rum. They’d returned to their hotel to find a typed letter signed by Trevor Richards. The executives of Puerto Limon’s United Fruit Company were willing to negotiate with Cole International, Ltd., for the importation of Cuban cigars.

  “You’re a genius,” Everett said reverently.

  “No, I’m not,” Samuel countered. “It’s called appealing to one’s greed.”

  “Hola, Americano.”

  Everett glanced over his shoulder to find the woman he’d slept with while he waited for his photographer lover’s return, smiling at him. Petite, dark-skinned and very pretty, Paullina Michael was an expert when it came to pleasing a man. Her tightly curling hair floated to her shoulders like a dark cloud.

  Both men rose unsteadily to their feet.

  Everett nodded. “Hello, Paullina.”

  Her gaze strayed to Samuel before it returned to Everett. “Would you like company?”

  Everett stared at Samuel, who nodded his approval. He wanted to stay and celebrate with his boss and he wanted to go with Paullina, because it’d been too long since he’d lain with a woman.

  “Samuel, this is Paullina Michael. Paullina, Mr. Samuel Cole.” The two shook hands, exchanging the perfunctory greetings. “Would you like something to drink?” Everett asked the garishly dressed Paullina.

  She sat down, gesturing to the bottle of rum. “I’ll have what you’re having.”

  Samuel signaled for a waiter under a makeshift bar to bring another glass. He was ready to retire for bed. He’d been headed there when Everett suggested they go out and celebrate their unexpected windfall. They found a little shack less than a hundred feet from the ocean, ordered a bottle of potent Jamaican rum, and sat silently drinking and watching the sun sink lower and lower.

  His mind, before the onset of drunkenness enveloped him, was filled with plans on how he would approach Jose Luis to have him sell a portion of his cigar production to his son-in-law to export to Costa Rica; and he still had to weigh the advantages of having the cigars shipped directly from the Pinar del Rio factory.

  Samuel hadn’t realized that he’d closed his eyes until Everett shook him roughly. “What is it?”

  “Paullina wants to know if you want a friend.”

  He squinted at the beautiful face awash in the red-gold glow of the setting sun. “Friend?”

  Paullina smiled, displaying small, white, even teeth. “Yes. I have a friend who would like you very much.”

  Weaving slightly, Samuel affected a wide grin. The rum had dulled his senses. “How much?”

  “For you—only a few American dollars.”

  All he had in his pocket were a few American dollars. He’d left most of his money and his gold watch in a safe at the hotel. Dressed in his favored guayabera, slacks and sandals, he could be taken as local—until he opened his mouth.

  Demon rum, the tropical heat, the sound of a trio playing steel pans, and because he’d bested the United Fruit Company in their scheme to breach their contract, made him euphoric, cocky and reckless.

  “Ish…is she clean?” His words were slurring.

  Paullina’s eyes widened. “Of course she’s clean. She would never lie with a man without a rubber sheath.”

  It took two attempts before he was able to come to his feet and stand unaided. He did not remember leaving the beach, or in which direction Paullina had led him and Everett.

  He did not remember the face of the woman whose talented mouth left him moaning in the most exquisite pleasure he’d ever experienced.

  He did not remember how he’d gotten back to the hotel or who’d put him to bed.

  What he did remember fourteen hours later when he sat on the side of his bed was that the woman who had suckled his penis while he ejaculated was not his wife.

  Chapter 14

  Drunkenness is simply voluntary insanity.

  —Seneca the Younger

  Samuel paid the taxi driver and walked up the path to his home. He unlocked the door, moved into the entryway and left his luggage on the floor beside a small bench. He’d been away nine days, although it felt longer.

  The house was quiet even though it was the middle of the day. M.J. couldn’t have gone far because his car was still in the driveway. Streams of bright sunlight glinted off the tables. The house was spotless.

  Samuel found his wife in her garden. Crossing his arms over his chest, he smiled at the figure she presented in a pair of slacks, one of his shirts and a battered straw hat. Kneeling, she used a trowel to loosen dirt around a flowering rosebush.

  “Hola, mi amor.”

  “Sammy!” M.J. dropped the trowel and launched herself at him, her arms going around his neck. Picking her up, he fastened his mouth to hers and spun her around.

  “Why didn’t you let me know you were coming home early?”

  He’d sent her a telegram indicating he wouldn’t be home for another week.

  “I needed to see you. I needed to feel you. I needed to smell you.” His voice and gaze lowered as he stared deeply into the dark eyes filling up with tears.

  M.J.’s lower lip trembled with an emotion that made drawing a normal breath difficult. Her gloved hands cradled his stubbly cheeks. “I love you, I love you, I love you,” she whispered against his mouth.

  She’d confessed to Samuel that she loved him, but his absence had forced her to face her true feelings. She had married Samuel Cole for all the wrong reasons; he’d offered a freedom the men in Cuba couldn’t, and for that she was grateful. But what she felt for her husband wasn’t gratitude. It was love, a love that made her look forward to the next sunrise, a love that left her with a sense of fulfillment and peace that made her able to face any obstacle.

  After her aborted Wednesday bid whist luncheon she’d kept her distance from the other women. She’d instructed Bessie to inform Peggy that she wasn’t accepting visitors when she’d come to see her. She didn’t blame Peggy for Winifred’s behavior, but she had expected her new friend to at least chastise the pompous Mrs. Mansfield for her insults. And like a coward she’d waited two days to come to offer her apologies.

  Marguerite-Josefina Isabel Diaz Cole did not need Winifred, Peggy, Edna, Shirley or any of the other heifers, as Bessie tended to call them, in their so-called exclusive residential enclave. All she needed was her husband, Samuel Claridge Cole.

  She smiled, her dimples deepening. “I’ve missed you so much.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, really,” she said, wrinkling her delicate nose.

  “Do you want to show me how much?”

  Her smile fade
d. “I’ve told you. How can I show you?”

  His expression mirrored confusion. Samuel didn’t know why, but there were times when he forgot how young and inexperienced his wife actually was. Tightening his grip under her knees, he left the garden and reentered the house.

  “It looks as if I’ll have to show you how much I’ve missed you.”

  M.J. let out a small shriek when he carried her into the bathroom. It took less than a minute to relieve her of her clothes and remove his own. Standing under the spray of a warm shower, they reunited and reconciled in the most intimate way possible.

  Samuel luxuriated in the water spilling over his body, washing away the residue of salt clinging to his hair and skin, and his hardness moving in and out of his wife’s body eradicated the memory of another woman who’d taken him into her mouth when he refused to penetrate her. Passions spent, they lay motionless, waiting for their heartbeats to resume a normal rate.

  “Is this what I can look forward to whenever you return from your business trips?”

  “Not for a long, long time.”

  Her smooth brow wrinkled. “What are you talking about?”

  “I’m taking you with me when I go to Tallahassee, then to Cuba.”

  “When are we leaving?”

  “Tomorrow.”

  M.J. screamed in childish delight, then placed tiny kisses over his stubbly cheeks.

  Samuel had booked passage on a tanker sailing from West Palm Beach to Mobile, Alabama. It’d rained nonstop and he and M.J. were forced to spend the trip in a cramped cabin no larger than their bathroom.

  By the time the ship sailed into the warmer water of the Gulf of Mexico, the rain had tapered off to a light drizzle. They disembarked at Apalachee Bay, where he hired a driver to take them north to Tallahassee.

  He’d followed through on Everett Kirkland’s hunch and withdrawn half of his savings from the bank. The manager of the West Palm Beach branch of the Sun Trust wanted to know if anything was wrong with their services, if any of the employees had displeased or insulted him in any way, but Samuel reassured him that everything was well, and that he planned to loan the money to a relative to start up a new business. He’d secured the money in a waterproof case, then in a canvas bag.