Without Honor

by David Hagberg

  “I don’t know who had more patience, him or you,” she said.

  The next week they found an apartment together and she learned just how impatient he really was.

  A taxicab pulled up in front of the Hotel Del Prado, and Basulto, wearing a collarless gray sport coat, the sleeves pushed up nearly to his elbows, a small black overnight bag clutched in his left hand, got out and went inside. It was fifteen minutes after ten. McGarvey remained seated on the park bench in plain sight. The morning was already beginning to get warm, and traffic had picked up. Behind him a couple of banners from last night still hung in the trees. By tonight there would be another demonstration here, but by then he figured he would be long gone and this business finished. He had been in other cities like this before. Cities under stress, cities in crisis. Santiago came to mind. He didn’t speak Spanish, but no one seemed to mind. Keep a low profile when the bullets start to fly and you’ll be all right. Strange advice for an assassin, he’d always thought. But then it was war; and one country’s holy mission was another’s terrorist attack.

  The two doormen in front of the hotel were talking with each other when Basulto came back out. They didn’t bother looking up. He walked to the curb and looked across the street directly at McGarvey. He started to wave but then thought better of it, turning instead and hurrying to the corner. The light changed and he crossed the avenue.

  McGarvey watched him coming, watched him trying to maintain an air of nonchalance. But it was obvious the Cuban was excited. McGarvey could see it in his walk, in the way he held himself like a boxer ready to dodge the next jab, and in the way he kept looking around, his eyes always moving, watching for a tail. But there was no one behind him. No one watching them, no one to care, yet.

  “Is it so good meeting out in the open like this?” Basulto asked nervously, coming up.

  “Sit down, Artimé,” McGarvey said, not bothering to look at him.

  Time, he thought, like truth, was such a precious commodity and yet everyone seemed to abuse it, to squander it. Once it was lost, there was no going back. The same with truth. He was short on both just now.

  “You called and I came. I’m here. Are we going to burn him now? What’s the plan?”

  “Tonight. He should be down here by morning at the latest. Him and his pal Baranov.”

  “Why here?”

  “It’ll be just like old days.”

  “Why not Washington? Just shoot the bastard. Or arrest him. Why here?”

  “His wife is across the street just now. She’s going to telephone him at nine. Tell him that she’s here waiting for him. That you’re here, too, and want to make a deal.”

  McGarvey glanced over at Basulto, whose eyes had grown wide. He looked as if he would jump off the bench at any moment and run, screaming, out into the street.

  “What wife?” he squeaked.

  “You might have to talk to him on the telephone. Convince him that you mean business. Convince him that you want to trade. But when he gets here, you’re going to kill him instead.”

  “You’re crazy. He’s got no wife.”

  “Her name is Evita.”

  “Never heard of her.”

  “You knew her from the old days, Artime. She didn’t think much of you. Thought you’d been working for Batista before you signed on with Yarnell and Baranov.”

  “She’s lying. I swear to God, Mr. McGarvey.”

  “I don’t think so,” McGarvey said quietly. He wanted to be almost anywhere but here.

  “What can I say or do to convince you … ?”

  “It doesn’t matter. When Yarnell gets here tomorrow, you’re going to have to kill him. I’ll give you the gun.”

  “What about you?”

  “I’m going to kill Baranov.”

  “I don’t need this shit,” Basulto said starting to get up.

  “Where will you go?”

  “I got friends.”

  “So do I,” McGarvey said, looking up. “And so does Yarnell. He knows you fingered him. Just like you fingered your case officer, Roger Harris.”

  Basulto stood very still, as if he were afraid he would break something if he moved so much as a muscle. The morning sun glinted on his forehead and pomaded black hair. His eyes were filled with fear.

  “You knew Darby Yarnell in those days. You knew who he was, and you knew that he worked for Baranov. But when Roger Harris came to you looking for a fellow agency officer who had turned traitor, it wasn’t Yarnell he was after. It must have come as a big shock to you all. A big relief.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “I think you do. I think that Baranov told you to lie. You were all biding your time, waiting for the right moment to get rid of Harris.”

  “I swear to God …”

  “I know all about it, Artime. So do Trotter and Day. But our deal with you still stands if you’ll cooperate. Nothing has changed. We still want Yarnell. After all, it was he who actually pulled the trigger on Harris. Not you.”

  Tears began to fill Basulto’s eyes. He sat down. “I loved Roger Harris. He was a good man to me.”

  “He just got mixed up with something that put him in over his head,” McGarvey suggested.

  “They knew about me.”

  “Who did?”

  “The Russians. Baranov. They were going to blackmail me. There was nothing else to do, nowhere to run.” He shook his head. “I should have went up into the mountains with Uncle Fidel when I had the chance, you know. Maybe it would have been different for me. There were a lot of heroes.”

  “Dead heroes,” McGarvey said.

  “They had respect.”

  “So you told them about Harris?”

  “Yeah, I told them.”

  “Did you ever know the name of the man Roger Harris was really looking for?”

  “No. I swear to—” Basulto stopped. He shook his head. “No.”

  “Did Baranov or Yarnell?”

  “I think so. They were excited about it.”

  “Frightened.”

  Basulto managed a slight smile. “No. Not Valentin. Nothing frightened him.”

  “Then what happened? I mean after the Bay of Pigs?”

  “I ran, just like I told you.”

  “Into the hills?”

  “Yes.”

  “But Cuba and the Soviet Union were allies. You must have known that Baranov would come looking for you.”

  “They weren’t allies at first. Besides, I hadn’t done anything wrong in their eyes. And Valentin told me that I could get out any time I wanted. So I did.”

  “And he never came looking for you?”

  “Never.”

  “Not even nine months ago? He didn’t look you up, which at this point would have been very easy for him. He didn’t look you up and tell you that he needed your help? ‘Just one more little job, Comrade Basulto.’ He didn’t tell you to get yourself caught?”

  “No,” Basulto said.

  “But if he had, you would have gone to work for him, like in the old days?”

  Basulto’s anger flared, but then he held himself in check. He lowered his head. “Probably. But it didn’t happen, and I was sick of it. All of it. Living that way. I wanted out. I want out now.”

  The Cuban had not told the truth before, and there was no reason to believe that he had told the entire truth this time. But McGarvey had a feeling that this version of the story was a lot closer to the truth than the others. Yet there was something missing. Something else. Something beyond his understanding, still, and he suspected beyond the understanding even of Basulto, who after all had been and continued to be nothing more than one of Baranov’s pawns in a very large and complicated game.

  “Not yet,” McGarvey said, “Not quite yet.”

  With a strange intensity, Basulto threw up an arm. “I’ll do it, Mr. McGarvey. Whatever it is you want of me. Because I’m tired and I want it to end. All the years. Cristo. You can’t know. If you want me to kill him, I will. Ju
st get me out. As one man to another, I’m asking you, just get me out.”

  McGarvey got to his feet, suddenly ashamed of himself without admitting why. “Come on,” he growled. “I want you to meet someone.”

  The sun shone in her hair from the open window, making it seem almost as if a halo surrounded her head. She turned, and McGarvey could see the shock of recognition in her eyes as she saw Basulto. Last night and this morning she had seemed vulnerable. At this moment she seemed diminished.

  “You,” she said as if it were an indictment.

  “It’s all changed, I swear it,” Basulto said from the doorway.

  She laughed. “Don’t you know? Nothing changes.”

  McGarvey thought she looked beautiful just then, and tragic. A lost soul barely hanging on to her sanity and her life.

  “I’ll be here for you,” McGarvey lied, looking into her eyes.

  “We’ll manage,” she said. “We’re old friends.”

  “By tomorrow it will be over.”

  “One way or the other.”

  It was getting late. Time to go, and yet McGarvey was having a hard time leaving her. He was getting old, he decided. And soft in the head.

  “Call at nine tonight,” he said. “Put Artime on if you think it’s necessary.”

  She said nothing. They’d already gone over this. “I’ll be here,” he said unnecessarily.

  Basulto had been standing just within the doorway. He backed out. Evita said something to him in Spanish and he smiled, his eyes narrowing a bit.

  He replied. “Si.”

  She nodded, and Basulto turned and disappeared down the corridor to his own room.

  “He is genuinely frightened,” she said.

  “I think so.”

  “So am I.”

  McGarvey felt like a bastard leaving her like this. He didn’t know where this story would end, but he knew that he would have to see it to whatever the conclusion would be. They would all have to see it to the end. He took out his pistol, laid it on the table, and then crossed the room and took her into his arms. “They’re the bad lot, not us,” he said.

  She looked up into his eyes. “I’m not so sure,” she said. “Are you?”

  30

  His bill was ready. McGarvey crossed the lobby with his overnight bag in hand, stopped at the desk, and took out his wallet. The bill was for a lot more than it should have been, and the clerk refused to look up at him. McGarvey paid it without comment. There was a lot of activity in the hotel this morning. A lot more than there had been yesterday, or even last night. There were, however, very few foreigners around. A lot of military officers had come in, but no one paid him the slightest attention. He was a nonperson. The pile of newspapers at the end of the counter was gone. Across the lobby a group of civilians were gathered around a television set. They seemed very nervous and tense. He picked up his bag.

  Out on Avenida Juárez he got a taxi immediately, though the driver didn’t seem very happy that his fare was a norteamericano. Traffic was light for this time of day. More banners had been strung up, and at some of the intersections they passed crews putting up even more. “Libertad!” “Heroísmo!” “Reforma!” The city was taking a holiday. Most of the shops were closed, big placards in their windows. McGarvey could only guess at some of the words and slogans, but the overall meaning was clear. A big break was coming between Mexico and the U.S., and the Soviet Union was expecting to pick up the pieces. It was frightening everyone silly.

  A military roadblock was set up on the entrance ramp to the international terminal at the airport. Traffic was backed up several hundred yards in front of the barricades. Everyone was being stopped and their papers scrutinized. Only a few cars were being allowed through; others were being turned back and still others were being shunted off the road onto a large grassy field. A shuttle bus seemed to be going back and forth between the barricade and the terminal about a mile away. McGarvey paid the cabbie and walked up to the soldiers. He held out his U.S. passport.

  “My plane leaves at 1:25,” he said.

  A young lieutenant with a pockmarked face took his passport and closely compared the photograph with McGarvey’s face. “Your ticket,” he demanded.

  “I have only reservations.”

  “Impossible,” the lieutenant snapped hostilely. He handed McGarvey’s passport back. “The airplane is full. All the airplanes are full.” He rested his hand on his holstered gun.

  McGarvey put down his bag, pulled a hundred-dollar bill out of his pocket, and stuffed it in his passport. The lieutenant watched him through pig eyes. His lips were wet with spittle.

  “It is important that I leave on that airplane,” McGarvey said, handing his passport back to the officer. “You will see that my passport is in order.”

  The lieutenant glanced over at the captain, whose back was turned to them at that moment. He slipped the bill into his pocket. “I could have you shot, senor,” he said, a slight smile baring his teeth.

  McGarvey said nothing.

  The officer handed his passport back. “You will have to hurry to catch your airplane. The shuttle will take you.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Don’t return to Mexico,” the lieutenant said, and he swaggered off.

  McGarvey picked up his bag and started around the barricade. The shuttle was returning from the terminal. Half a dozen other people were nervously waiting for it to arrive. Several soldiers, their automatic rifles slung over their shoulders, were watching them. A military helicopter swooped overhead from beyond one of the big maintenance hangars and headed toward the city.

  It was late now, nearly one o’clock. There was a distinct possibility, he thought, that his reservations had been canceled. A lot of people, it seemed, wanted to get out of Mexico at this moment.

  “Alto!” someone behind McGarvey shouted.

  He kept walking. The soldiers looked around. One of them unslung his rifle, though he seemed uncertain.

  “Alto!” the man shouted again.

  This time McGarvey stopped and turned back as the burly captain, brandishing a pistol, raced up from the other side of the barrier. He looked angry; his face was red as he squinted into the harsh sun. His khaki uniform was wet with sweat. The lieutenant was nowhere in sight.

  “Your papers! Your papers!” the captain shouted.

  McGarvey smiled reassuringly. He calmly handed over his passport. The other people waiting for the shuttle bus studiously avoided looking over. “Your lieutenant already checked my passport.”

  “Well now I’m checking it, too.” The captain flipped through the passport. “What is your destination?”

  “Washington.”

  “Your tickets. Let me see your tickets.”

  “My tickets are in the terminal.”

  “You do not have tickets? You cannot go through. Impossible.”

  McGarvey stepped forward a little. The captain’s hand tightened on his pistol. “This has already been taken care of. What are you doing to me?”

  “What are you saying?”

  “The five thousand dollars. I gave it to your lieutenant. Didn’t you get your share? Christ, talk to him, but I’ve got to be on that plane.”

  The captain grinned. “Five thousand dollars. What do you take me for, that I would fall for a little trick like this? …”

  “Bullshit,” McGarvey swore, raising his voice. “You keep the goddamned passport. Just take me to your colonel. Right now. We’ll see what he’s got to say. Maybe he’ll want a piece of the action!”

  The captain was suddenly alarmed. McGarvey made a move to step around him and go back to the barricade, but the captain handed back his passport.

  “I don’t want any trouble here, señor. You have tickets at the terminal, then you shall go.”

  For just a second McGarvey refused his passport, and the captain practically pressed it on him.

  “Leave now. Your bus is waiting. Just go, señor, and—”

  “I know,” McGarvey said, pock
eting his passport. “Don’t return to Mexico.”

  There were no problems with his tickets; McGarvey picked them up at the airline counter and boarded his plane immediately. They were delayed taking off for nearly an hour, but once they were airborne the pilot told them that most of the lost time would be made up in the air. No one really cared. Everyone was simply glad to be out of Mexico.

  McGarvey ordered a drink, and when it came he sat back in his seat and closed his eyes. He tried to think about his sister, about Kathleen, and with guilt about poor Evita behind him in Mexico City. Each time his thoughts returned, unbidden, to Marta waiting in Lausanne. She had been the strong one, but he had not recognized it, and now he was sorry.

  Tonight Evita would telephone her ex-husband at his home in Georgetown. Now that he had set his plan into motion, he wasn’t so sure that it would work. She was to say that she had come to Mexico City at McGarvey’s orders, but that she wanted it to be like it was in the old days. It was too dangerous now for them in the States. Especially now with Soviet missiles along the southern border. If need be Basulto would be there to support her story. He knew everything from the old days. He knew about Harris and about the other one Yarnell was working with in the CIA. That was the key finally. Yarnell might have been the superstar within the agency at one time, but he was on the outside now. He spoke with presidents and was friends with Donald Powers, but the real harm was being done by whoever was inside. Someone Baranov was grooming as early as the late fifties to take over for Yarnell someday. Surely Baranov had seen how brightly Yarnell’s flame burned in those days. Certainly he knew that it could not last, that Yarnell was bound to burn out—more likely sooner than later. Someone had been waiting in the wings even then. Someone young. Someone who twenty or twenty-five years later would take up where Yarnell had left off. A steadier hand perhaps. Someone from the East Coast. Old family? Money? The right schools?