Martin Smith - Havana Bay

"You have to take care of yourself, chica."

To begin with, Teresa submitted with silent grimness, but after a minute her neck started to roll with the strokes. Hair like this warmed up with brushing, especially on a hot day, polished up like silver with a little attention. As Ofelia lifted the hair from the nape of the neck she could feel Teresa soften to the touch. Fourteen years old? Alone for two days? Frightened for her life? Even a stray cat needed to be petted.

"I wish I had hair like this. I wouldn't need a pillow."

"Everyone says that," Teresa murmured.

"That's looking better."

As Teresa relaxed, though, her shoulders began to shake. She turned to Ofelia and revealed her whole face wet with tears.

"Now my face is a mess."

"I'll cheer you up." Ofelia put the brush into her bag.» Let me show you what else I have."

"The stupid swimsuit?"

"Better than a swimsuit."

"A condom?"

"No, better than that." Ofelia brought out the Mak-arov 9-mm pistol and let Teresa hold it.

"Heavy."

"Yes." Ofelia took the Makarov back.» I think all women should be issued guns. No men, just women."

"I bet Hedy wished she had something like this. You know my friend Hedy?"

"I'm the one who found her."

"Cono," Teresa said more in awe.

When Ofelia put the gun away, she stayed kneeling and lowered her voice as if they didn't have the whole skyline of Havana to themselves.» I know you're afraid the same thing is going to happen to you, but I can stop them. You have an idea who did it or you wouldn't be hiding, no? The question is, who are you hiding from?"

"You really are police?"

"Yes. And I don't want to find you like I found Hedy." Ofelia let the girl contemplate that for a moment.» What happened to her protection?"

"I don't know."

"The man who protects you and Hedy, what's his name?"

"I can't say."

"You can't because he's in Minint and you think this will get back to him. If I get to him first, then you'd be able to leave this roof."

Teresa folded her arms and shivered in spite of the heat.» I didn't really think some turista was going to come here and marry me. Why would he want to take home some ignorant black girl? Everyone would make fun of him. 'Hey, Herman, you didn't have to marry your whore.' I'm not stupid."

"I know."

"Hedy was really nice."

"You know, I think I can still help you. You don't have to say his name. I'll say his name."

"I don't know."

"Luna. Sergeant Facundo Luna."

"I didn't say that."

"You didn't, I did."

Teresa looked away, as far as the angels that balanced on the theater. A breeze lifted her hair the same as it seemed to do to the angels'.

"He gets so mad."

"He has a temper, I know. But maybe I can tell you something that can help. Did you sleep with him?" When Teresa hesitated Ofelia said, "Look me in the eyes."

"Okay, once. But Hedy was his girl."

"When you slept with him-"

"No details."

"One detail. Did he keep his drawers on?"

Teresa giggled, the first light moment since Ofelia had found her.» Yes."

"Did he say why?"

"He said he just did."

"All the way through?"

"The whole time."

"Never took them off?"

"Not around me."

"Did you ask Hedy about it."

"Well." Teresa bobbed her head from side to side.» Yes. We were really good friends. He never did with her either."

"You know, chica, it wouldn't be a bad idea to stay here for another day, but actually I think you're probably pretty safe."

"What about Hedy?"

"I'm going to have to rethink that." As Ofelia gathered her bag and stood she kissed Teresa on the cheek.» You helped."

"It was nice to talk."

"It was." Ofelia started down the ladder and paused midway.» By the way, did you know Rufo Pinero?"

"A friend of Facundo's? I met him once. I didn't like him."

"Why not?"

"He had one of those mobile phones. Mr. Big-Time Jinetero, always on it. No time for me. So you really think I'll be okay?"

"I think so."

Because the question for Ofelia ever since Sergeant Facundo Luna hadn't killed her right off at the Russian Center was whether he was Abakua. It was hard to say about a member of a secret society. The PNR had tried to infiltrate the Abakua and the result was the opposite: the Abakua had penetrated the police, recruiting the most macho officers, white as well as black. Identifying them had become an art. An Abakua might hijack a truck from a ministry yard, but he would not steal even a peso from a friend. Never allowed an insult to go unanswered. Might murder but never informed. Wore nothing feminine, no earrings, tight belts or long hair. There was one conclusive identification: an Abakua never showed his bare behind to anyone. He never pulled his drawers down even for making love. Ofelia thought of it as a kind of Achilles' ass.

One more thing an Abakua never did.

He never hurt a woman.

Arkady returned to Mongo's room in the back of what had been Erasmo's boyhood house. An empty house today, enervated by heat. After a courtesy knock on the door Arkady reached to the upper lip of the frame and found the key.

Not much had changed in the bedroom since Arkady's first visit. Shutters opened wide enough to take in the curve of the sea, fishing boats trolling against the current, neumdticos wallowing in their wake. Not a cloud in the sky or a wave in the water. Dead still. The coconuts, plastic saints and photographs of Mongo's favorite fighters were just as Arkady had seen before, and whether a sheet was tucked in the same manner he couldn't tell, but a different disc topped the CD stack, and the swim flippers that had hung from a hook on the wall and the truck inner tube that had been suspended above the bed were both gone. Arkady returned to the window to see three different groups of neumdticos listlessly paddling, each group at least five hundred yards apart from the other.

Arkady went down to the street and walked a block west to a cafe of cement tables set in the shade of a wall with the sign siempre- Siempre something because bougainvillea had taken root and smeared the rest of the slogan with magenta. Arkady was not surprised that Mongo would venture out on the water. Mongo was a fisherman. He had probably been warned away from Erasmo's repair shop while a Russian investigator occupied the apartment above. Where better to hide than on the water? If he was out on his tube, sooner or later he would have to come in, somewhere along Miramar's First Avenue or the Malecon, too much ground for Arkady to watch. But it seemed to him that he could lower the odds by remembering that what a man with an inner tube needed most of all was air. From his table he had a view of a gas station with two pumps under a canopy styled with a modernistic fin, blue once, now the off-white found on the lip of a clamshell. It was a station on his Texaco map. By the office was a faucet and an air hose.

Cars came and went all afternoon, some struggling like lungfish up to the pump and then crawling away. Neumdticos had to deal with a garage dog that accepted some and chased away others. Arkady sipped his way through three Tropicolas and three cafe cubanos, his heart tapping its fingers while he sat, invisible in the shadow of his coat. Finally a skinny asphalt-black man approached the station office with an inner tube that was going limp in his arms. He threw the dog a fish, went into the office and came out a minute later with a patch he applied to the tube. When he felt the adhesive had set, he added air to check the repair. His clothes were a green cap, loose running shoes and the sort of rags a sensible man would choose for floating in the bay. Balancing the tube with its net and sticks and reels on his head, he lay his flippers over one shoulder and a string of rainbow-sided fish over the other. When he saw Arkady cross the intersection, the neutnatico's red, salt-stung eyes looked for an avenue of escape, and but for his inner tube and the day's catch, he no doubt could have easily outrun someone in an overcoat.