William Heffernan - Red Angel

He leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. God, how he hated these people. How he hated everything they stood for, everything they were. And most of all he hated that he was part of it, part of them, and always would be.

He placed his hands over his face and tried to console himself. At least it wasn’t treasonous. He didn’t care about the Cubans. He believed in his heart they deserved whatever they got. What stuck in his craw was the way he had allowed these Mafia bastards to entrap him. Him. All wrapped up in this insufferable web.

“Bastards,” he hissed aloud. “Goddamn bastards.”

You still don’t trust him, do you?”

Adrianna was seated across from him at the small terrace table, their light continental breakfast only picked at. Behind her, Devlin watched the people hurrying along the Prado, the steady line of “camel” buses jammed with morning travelers on their way to work. Cuba was beautiful and sensual, just the way the tropics were supposed to be, he thought. And it was constant chaos, the very antithesis of everything he had been taught to expect. It was the sultry Caribbean with a touch of madness.

“No, I don’t trust him,” he said. “I feel like we’re being manipulated into something, and I haven’t got the slightest idea what it is.”

Adrianna stared down into her coffee. “I don’t care about any of that, Paul. I just want to find my aunt. Just find her body and see that she’s buried.”

“I know that. I want that, too.”

She looked up at him, as if questioning the truthfulness of his words, then looked back into her coffee as if the answer might be there.

Devlin reached out and took her hand. “I love you. And I’ll do anything to keep you from being hurt. I just have to know what’s going on. And right now I don’t.”

“Maybe you never will. Maybe all this insane voodoo can’t be understood. At least not by us.”

“Maybe.”

Devlin watched an old man moving past the hotel. The man had been there ever since they arrived on the terrace. He just walked back and forth along the sidewalk, an ancient thermos bottle cradled in his arm, as he called out the word “ cafe ” to prospective buyers-the same, solitary word, over and over in a monotonous, pleading voice. Behind him an old woman followed his trail, two worn, already read copies of Granma held out in each hand, calling out the newspaper’s name; hoping someone would buy them and read them again. “Cafe.” “Granma.” Morning songs that might put food on their tables.

Martinez had told him that the highest pension a Cuban could get at retirement-no matter what his rank or position-was two hundred and fifty pesos a month. At the current rate of exchange, that translated into fourteen U.S. dollars.

He looked back at Adrianna. “There are a lot of things about this workers’ paradise that I don’t understand. And Martinez and your aunt, and everything they believed in, are at the head of my list.” He glanced back at the street, at the old man and the old woman. “Until we understand those things, I don’t think we’ll get close to solving this mess.”

A figure caught the corner of his eye and he looked up and found Martinez smiling down at him.

“Perhaps I can help,” the major said.

“With what?” Devlin asked.

“The great mystery of Cuba that you were just discussing.” He gave Adrianna a small bow, then turned back to Devlin. “People of your country have been trying to solve this mystery for years. But they have failed, because they have never asked the right question.”

“What’s the right question?”

Martinez gave him his Cuban shrug and sat down. He was still smiling. “The question is: Why do we love it so?”

“Okay. Why?”

Martinez glanced at Adrianna, then back at Devlin. “The people,” he said. “All Cubans love each other. And this island is the heart of all of us. All the people. So we love it as if it was one of us. Because it is.”

Devlin shook his head. The man was unbelievably exasperating. He even talked with a shrug. “And Castro?” he asked. “Does everybody love Fidel?”

Martinez nodded emphatically, smiling now at the edge in Devlin’s voice. “Yes. Everyone loves Fidel. He is a great hero, who loves the people even more than we love each other. And if he had died ten years ago, Cuba would be a better place today.”

Devlin was startled by the statement. “I see a prison cell with your name on it, Major.”

Martinez laughed. “No, that will not happen. At least not for speaking ill of Fidel. He knows people are angry with him. He simply believes we are children, and he knows what is best for us. If I go to prison, it will be for other things.”

“Like helping us?” Adrianna asked.

He looked at her and shrugged again. “ Si. Maybe that could be a problem. And, again, maybe it will be a problem for Colonel Cabrera.” He turned back to Devlin. “There is an old joke about Cuba. It tells of God creating the world. In the north, He created beautiful mountains and valleys, wonderful lakes of clear, clean water. Then he told Saint Peter that he must put in something bad so it would not be perfect. So he added cold and snow and ice. Very bad, muy malo, no? Then he created the southern lands, with lush tropical forests, and wonderful food just growing from the trees. And Saint Peter said, ‘God, this is perfect.’ So God added dangerous animals and poisonous snakes. Again, very bad.”

The smile on Martinez’s face widened. “Then God created a magnificent island. A paradise with beautiful beaches and warm weather. Fruits that you could pick from the trees. No dangerous animals. No poisonous snakes. Perfect. And Saint Peter said, ‘But, God, you have forgotten something bad. This island is too perfect.’ And God said, ‘No. It will not be perfect. On this island I will put Cubans.’”

Adrianna smiled for the first time that morning. “So you’re telling us that Cubans are difficult.”

Martinez nodded in mock gravity. “Very difficult. But also very loving, and very tolerant of each other. You see, we only want two things. We want to remain Cuban, and we want to live decently. Fidel gave us both.” He paused. “For a time.” His smile turned regretful. “After the revolution, for the first time in our history, we lived without two things that had always been part of Cuban history. Foreign domination and an oligarchy that kept the masses poor and sick and ignorant.”

He waved away an objection he knew Devlin would make. “Oh, I know. You will say our socialist experiment was dominated by the Soviets. But to us, it was a matter of manipulating the Soviets into giving us what we needed.” He laughed. “And, remember, my friend, at the time no one else, and certainly not the United States, wanted to give us anything at all. So we had little choice. We knew what the Soviets wanted, and we knew we would never give it to them. Instead we played the Soviet game, and they gave us everything we wanted. And today, we have the highest literacy rate in all of Latin America. Today, eighty percent of our people own their homes. Today, there is free medical care for everyone who needs it. And, in the end, I think you will agree that the Soviets”-he paused to give Devlin another Cuban shrug-“well, the Soviets, they got nada , nothing at all.”

Devlin raised his chin toward the street. “This is not paradise, my friend.”

Martinez shook his head. “No, it is not. The world has changed, and Fidel has been unable to change with it. He is like an old horse who keeps returning to the same pasture because once there was grass there. But there is no more grass in this old pasture of ours. And the people know this, and realize that we must be part of this new and different world. But we must also keep what Fidel has given us, what Cuba has fought so hard to get. We must remain a Cuba for Cubans. And we must never again allow an oligarchy to oppress the one thing that makes Cuba worthy of existence-its people.”