by Paul Monette
“Whatever you’re makin’,” said Tony.
“Call me Frank, Tony. Everybody calls me Frank. My little league team—the monsignor—even the prosecutors. They all call me Frank.” He turned with two glasses of smoky Irish whiskey on the rocks. He handed one to Tony, then waved his hand at the bar, as if to indicate that the others could get their own. He took a deep drink, clapped Tony’s shoulder, and led him toward the terrace. Tony still held the suitcase.
“Omar tells me good things about you boys,” said Frank.
“Yeah. Omar.”
“Not to mention the job you did for me at Fort Chaffee,” Frank went on. Tony was thrown. The shock must have shown on his face, because Frank laughed. “You didn’t know that was for me, huh? That sonuvabitch Rebenga killed my brother. Fuckin’ commies. They ruin the world, ya know? Anyway, Tony, I’m grateful to you.”
Tony set the suitcase on the floor. He took a swallow of his drink. “Don’t mention it,” he said. “I enjoyed it.”
“And about last night, Tony.” Here Frank sighed and shook his head. It sounded like he’d been thinking about this stuff all day. “Never shoulda happened. We shoulda checked ’em out better.”
Tony said nothing. The two men drank and looked out at the city. When Frank spoke again, his voice had deepened further. The preliminaries appeared to be over. It was amazing how little attention was paid to the six kilos. Half a million dollars worth, and it seemed just then like nothing more than a ticket to bring these two men together.
“I need a guy with steel in his veins,” said Frank. “I need him close to me. Guy like you, Tony. Most o’ these guys, they’re fuck-ups.”
“Yeah, well . . .” Tony shrugged, as if to say he couldn’t decide a thing right now. But he knew inside it was the interview he’d been waiting all his life to happen. He said: “This is the kinda business I been lookin’ for. It’s like I got a feel for it.”
“I know you do, Tony. I could tell that the minute I saw you.” He clapped Tony’s shoulder again. In some way or another, they had stated the parameters of a deal. “Okay, let’s take a look at the stuff.”
He snapped his fingers at Ernie and pointed at the suitcase. They weren’t taking anything away from Tony. It was purely a matter of summoning a servant. Ernie picked up the suitcase and hauled it over to the dining room table. Frank beckoned to Omar and Manolo, introducing himself to the latter with the flash of a grin and a firm handshake, but treating him too like a hired hand. Omar he paid less heed to than the girl who scrubbed his toilet. Only Tony did he treat as an equal. They stood in a half-circle around the table, and Ernie lifted the lid of the suitcase and stepped back. Frank felt one of the plastic bags with a practiced hand, as if to check the texture of the drug. He sighed and looked up at Tony.
“Men get killed for a thousandth of this,” he said. “You know what I’m saying? There’s a thousand dead men in this suitcase.” He shook his head sadly, not expecting a reply. “You’re a real pro, Tony. You didn’t have to bring it all in. I was only buying two keys. You coulda kept the rest. I never woulda known the difference.”
“Stuff’s no good to me,” said Tony dryly. “What do I want to piss it away in the streets for? You’re the one with the system.”
Frank raised his glass. “You stay loyal like that, you move up in this business. You move up fast. Salud!” Tony lifted his own glass and nodded curtly. The two men drank. Nobody else did. Frank laughed: “Then you find your biggest headache’s figuring out what to do with all the cash.”
“I hope to have that problem real soon,” said Tony.
“Sooner than you could ever imagine, Tony. In your wildest Cuban dreams.” He seemed to be somewhere else for a moment, even as he smiled at Tony. Then he shook himself and bellowed at Ernie: “Where the hell’s Elvira? Go get her, will ya.”
As the bodyguard padded off down the interior hallway, Frank stepped away from the table. Tony followed him back to the terrace. Omar and Manolo were left to their silent cocktail. Tony had no idea where Frank came by the paternal attitude toward him, but he didn’t much care. He knew he could use it. Frank gave an exasperated grunt and said: “She spends half her life gettin’ dressed, the other half gettin’ undressed. What does that say, huh?”
“I guess you gotta catch her when she’s naked.”
Frank laughed richly. Tony couldn’t figure him out, and he hadn’t been able to discover much about Frank Lopez, not in Little Havana. The hustlers and dealers of Calle Ocho only knew Lopez as a figure of mythic proportions. He’d fled to Florida at the start of the revolution. Then he got right into heroin, from the street up. Now he was solely into coke, being one of the first to see that the clientele was a whole lot classier, besides which they paid their bills, besides which they weren’t mugging old ladies to feed their habit. Frank was one of the men who made drugs look clean—as clean as any other business anyway. Yet Frank Lopez had always lived aloof from Calle Ocho, even when he lived there. Nobody really knew him. It was said he was responsible for the key contact in the police department that made the rise of the coke trade possible.
“How long you been here, Tony?”
“Month.”
“Well, see,” said Frank with a swell of pride, for all the world like the president of the Chamber of Commerce, “you made it this far already. There isn’t one in a thousand gets this far.”
Tony shrugged. “No time to waste. Hell, Angel thought he had a hundred years.”
There was a commotion down the hallway, a woman’s voice swearing a blue streak at Ernie. Tony could hear them approaching, the clack of the woman’s heels on the parquet floor, but he didn’t dare turn around till Frank did. Frank seemed almost hypnotized by him as they stood looking out at the view. Tony had never had a father, but he’d felt a queer tightness in himself ever since he and Frank started talking. It was as if someone was trying to mold him.
“I don’t see the Duchess of Windsor,” said a woman’s voice behind him, icy with contempt. “Who’s so important I gotta hurry, huh?”
Frank and Tony turned around. She was so beautiful Tony almost winced. White-blonde, her hair tumbled to her shoulders, framing the perfect oval of her face. She was wearing a burgundy silk dinner dress that cost about two grand. She was long and lean, and she’d clearly been seducing men since she was in the cradle. So quintessentially American she made the rest of them look like kitchen help.
“It’s ten o’clock, honey,” said Frank, ignoring her cussedness. “We’re gettin’ hungry.”
“You’re always hungry,” she replied wearily, as if the whole subject bored her to tears. “You should try starving for a while, like the little children in India. Be good for you.” The voice was lower class and rich at the same time. You couldn’t pin it down. She walked and talked like a gun moll, but she carried her head like a princess.
“Want you to meet a friend of mine,” said Frank, reaching out to take her hand. “Tony Montana, this is Elvira.”
“Hello,” she said, her eyes flicking over him, quick and disinterested. She looked down at Frank’s hairy hand clasping hers, then went on half to herself: “Tony Montana. Sounds like something with Cagney in it.”
“No,” said Tony quietly. “Bogart.”
She glanced up, surprised. A fleeting smile rippled across her lips. They locked eyes for a moment, and the room was suddenly filled with silence. She broke it herself, quickly, as if she couldn’t bear it. “So where we going?” she asked.
“I thought we’d head over to the Babylon,” Frank said. He had just pulled a wad of cash from his pocket, and he fluttered it like a deck of cards, as if to make sure that he had enough for the evening.
Elvira sighed. “That’s where we always go,” she said to Tony. “Anyone wants to kill Frank, they can always find him at the Babylon. Right, Frank?”
“Yeah, go get your coat, huh?” Frank returned the roll of cash to his pocket as Elvira drifted across the room to a large buffet. She pulled open a drawer
and drew out a beaded handbag. She checked out her looks in the gilded mirror above the buffet, darting a split second’s glance at Tony. Tony didn’t think Frank had heard her remark about the killing, but when she sauntered back to them he drew her close and kissed her neck. “As long as it’s in your arms, darlin’, I’ll go out seein’ stars.”
“Here, put this on,” she said, as she pulled a stream of diamonds from the purse. Frank took the necklace and stood behind her to clasp it in place, and all the while she stared into Tony’s eyes, as if to say “Can you do this?”
An ink-green Rolls Royce was waiting for them in the driveway outside the building. Frank drove, with Elvira beside him. Tony and Manolo and Omar were lined up in the back seat. There was no room for Ernie, so they drove away unguarded. Not unarmed: every single one of them packed a gun, Elvira included. Frank kept up a running commentary as they drove through Coconut Grove, talking to Tony in the rearview mirror. He seemed to know some millionaire or celebrity on every block, and he pointed to their various houses with pride, as if they were all members of some exclusive club Frank Lopez ran. Perhaps they were all his customers.
Twice during the ten-minute drive, Elvira drew a small vial of cocaine from her purse. She tapped the powder out on the back of her hand between her thumb and forefinger, and then she snorted it. The first time she held the vial over her shoulder after she was done, offering it to anyone who wanted it in the back seat. None of the men in back made a move. They acted as if they didn’t even see it. The second time she didn’t offer.
At the Babylon Club they trailed past a long line of cars in the driveway, every one of which seemed to be a Porsche or a Bugatti or a Corniche. The public was not invited. When Frank turned the keys to the Rolls over to the carhop, Tony recognized the man as an ex-con from Havana. The carhop recognized Tony too, but as Tony didn’t acknowledge that fact, the carhop didn’t so much as smile. Tony was higher up than he. The gulf could only be bridged from Tony’s side, and Tony had all his bridges full right now.
They went up a wide staircase, Frank and Elvira in front, regal and swank and very much a couple now that they were in public. Tony half expected a brace of photographers to appear at the top of the steps to record their entrance. The doorman, all braided in gold, addressed Frank by name. As soon as they entered, a man in a tuxedo approached them. He and Elvira kissed cheeks, then he shook Frank’s hand. Omar and Manolo and Tony hung back in a clump, as if they were intruding.
The interior was built to have the feel of three or four plush apartments running together on several levels. The angles were daring, the walls awash with mirrors. From where they stood in the foyer, they looked through a jungle of tropical plants to a swimming pool with a dance floor cantilevered above it. Bars were perched on several balconies, and in every spare nook and cranny were video games, slot machines, and pinball. The tuxedoed man led Frank and his party through a garden of earthly delights toward the restaurant.
The Babylon Club appeared to be the nighttime capitol of South America. The crowd was a mix of Caucasian and Latin, mostly young, mostly rich, mostly coked to their eyeballs. The twenty-piece band was playing to a heavy black beat—“Partying Down Tonight.” The waitresses wore little pillbox hats, sequined halters, and the barest hot-pink shorts over black net stockings and heels. Rich young men, a lot of them Cuban, huddled in groups of three and four, putting deals together. They seemed to be trying to outdo one another with the gold chains and the diamond rings.
Altogether, it made the Havanito Restaurante look like Howard Johnson’s.
They were shown to a table on a balcony above the dance floor. As soon as Elvira sat down, a woman across the way waved to her and rubbed her nose. Elvira excused herself, and she and the other woman walked off to the ladies’. Frank ordered two bottles of champagne, Dom Perignon ’64, so they wouldn’t have to wait when they finished the first one. Then he ordered three ounces of caviar. The music was much too loud for them all to talk in a group, so Omar and Manolo were left to themselves on the dance floor side of the table. Manolo ogled the girls miserably, wishing he could put down his glass and cut in. Frank leaned back in his chair against the wall and motioned Tony to do the same. It was easier to talk flat up against the wall. There was a dead space or something.
“All right, Tony,” said Frank with a smile, “now I’m gonna tell you who the big guys are.” He nodded across the room to a large table near the bar. “That guy in the purple shirt, that’s Ronnie Echeverria. Him and his brother Miguel they got a huge distribution setup. Controls every gram that goes into Houston and Dallas. Then over there, with the redhead”—he nodded toward the end of the bar, where a hulking man had his hands all over a gorgeous girl—“that’s Gaspar Gomez. Very bad news. He’d kill his own mother if the price was right. Stay away.”
Tony took it all in as they went around the room, shifting his gaze from one drug king to the next, filing it all away. He couldn’t figure out why Frank was telling him all these things, but he knew it was a rare opportunity. There was something curiously modest about Frank as he detailed the names of the dozen or so men who controlled the cocaine traffic. He seemed to be making a statement about the limits of his own power. Each man had his territory. Nobody sought to be king of kings.
“. . . the fat guy with the chicas—over there, with the eyepatch—that’s Nacho Contreras. El Gordo. Wouldn’t know it to look at him, but he’s got more cash than anybody in here. A real chazzer. You know what a chazzer is, Tony?”
“No, Frank, what’s a chazzer?”
“It’s Yiddish for pig. It’s a guy he’s got more than he needs, so he don’t fly straight anymore. You hear what I’m sayin’?”
“Yeah, I hear you.”
“Too many chazzers in this business, Tony. They’re the ones you gotta watch out for. If they can cheat you out of an extra dime, they’ll rip you and flip you and crack your skull with a stick, for the pure pleasure of it.” Tony could not remember when he had heard anyone speak so intensely about life. Then he did remember: his grandfather. This was like his grandfather. “See it all comes down to one thing, Tony boy,” said Frank, and it didn’t sound patronizing either, “don’t ever forget it. Men are greedy. Not all of them, but the ones who are get all twisted up inside. They can’t get enough. They’re so hungry they’ll gnaw off their own fingers.”
“Enough of what?” asked Tony.
“Enough you name it. Toot. Cooz. Money. Lesson number one, huh?”
Frank reached over and squeezed Tony’s hand. The grip was intensely strong, yet there was something trembling in it. Again like his grandfather, Tony thought, though Frank could hardly be older than forty-five. What was he doing sounding like an old man?
“Lesson number two,” said Elvira, and they looked up to see her standing beside the table, one hand on her hip and looking saucy. “Don’t get high on your own supply.” She paused for a beat. The two men said nothing. Then she said: “Isn’t that right, Frank?”
“Whatever you say, baby,” retorted Frank, not really paying attention.
“Course, not everybody follows the rules,” Elvira added, sliding into the chair beside Frank. She held up her empty champagne glass, and the headwaiter fairly leaped across the room to grab the bottle and fill it for her. Out of the corner of one eye, Tony saw Ernie standing on a balcony above and to the right of them.
Frank spoke to the headwaiter: “How much does this stuff go for, Calvin?”
“Five hundred fifty a bottle, Mr. Lopez.” Calvin sounded proud.
“Imagine that, Tony,” said Frank, one hand scratching the gray at his temple. “For a bunch of grapes. It’s like toot, for Christ’s sake.”
Elvira leaned across the table and tapped Tony’s hand with her cigarette lighter. “In France it costs a hundred,” she said, “but don’t tell anyone in Miami.”
Frank laughed. “Yeah, well it costs a little more to serve it to this crowd.” And he waved a hand around the gaudy room at the royalty of t
he coke trade. Then he picked up his glass and toasted. “To old friends and new friends,” he said with feeling.
They all drank. Tony and Elvira stared at each other over the rims of their glasses. A glittering young man was passing the table and bent down and whispered something into Elvira’s ear. She turned with a laugh, and the two of them huddled together, gossiping. He looked like a faggot. Frank paid no attention to him but leaned back once again in his chair. Tony followed suit.
“So how do you like the high life, kid?”
Tony took a swallow of champagne. “I may never drink Thunderbird again,” he said.
Frank guffawed. “Hey, wait till we get you some new threads. You think you like five-hundred-dollar wine? Try a fifteen-hundred-dollar suit. You feel like you own the world.”
“I never thought bein’ rich could be so expensive.”
Elvira now stood up and walked away to dance with the young man. They continued to laugh uproariously at some private joke between them. Frank drew a cigar case from his breast pocket and offered one to Tony. “Cuban,” he said. Tony took one and let Frank light it for him. Frank didn’t seem to look at Elvira at all. Tony couldn’t stop looking.
“I’d like you to handle some stuff for me, Tony,” Frank said, and immediately Tony grew alert. “Work with Omar here, I know he’s a putz, but he’s tough when he’s gotta be. We’re doing a pretty big deal in a couple weeks. Running a bunch of mules out of Colombia. You ever done mule work?”
“Sure,” said Tony, not wanting to reveal his ignorance, and figuring he had a couple of weeks to learn.
