Philip Kerr - If the Dead Rise Not

I touched the brim of my hat just to check that my head was still working, and said, “Hello.” I spoke in English, too, which probably left her even more confused. Thinking she must have forgotten my name, I was on the point of removing my hat and thought better of it. Perhaps after all it was better she didn’t remember my name. Not until I’d told her the new one.

“Is it really you?” she whispered.

“Yes.” I had a lump in my throat as big as my fist.

“I thought you were probably dead. In fact, I was sure of it. I can’t believe it’s really you.”

“I have the same problem when I get up in the morning and limp toward the bathroom. It always feels like someone must have stolen my real body in the night and replaced it with my father’s.”

Noreen shook her head. There were tears in her eyes. She opened her handbag and took out a handkerchief that wouldn’t have dried the eyes of a mouse. “Perhaps you’re the answer to my prayer,” she said.

“Then it must have been a Santería prayer,” I said. “A prayer to a Catholic saint who’s really just a disguise for some kind of voodoo spirit. Or something worse.”

For a moment I held my tongue, wondering what ancient demons, what infernal powers would have claimed Bernie Gunther as one of theirs, and nominated him as the dark, mischievous answer to someone’s idle prayer.

I glanced around awkwardly. The fawning American tourist was an overweight lady of around sixty, wearing thin gloves and a summer hat with a veil that made her look like a beekeeper. She was watching Noreen and me carefully, like we were all in a theater. And when she wasn’t watching Noreen and me perform our touching little reunion scene, she was glancing at the signature in her book, as if she couldn’t quite believe that the author had inscribed it.

“Look,” I said, “we can’t talk here. The bar on the corner.”

“The Floridita?”

“Meet me there in five minutes.” Then I looked at the book clerk and said, “I’d like to charge this to my account. The name is Hausner. Carlos Hausner.” I spoke in Spanish, but I was sure Noreen understood. She always had been quick to understand what was going on. I shot her a look and nodded. She nodded back, as if to reassure me that my secret was safe. For now.

“Actually, I’m done here,” said Noreen. She looked at the tourist and smiled. And the tourist smiled back and thanked Noreen profusely, as if she’d been given not an inscribed book but a signed check for a thousand dollars.

“So why don’t I just come with you now?” Noreen said, and threaded her arm through mine. She escorted me to the door of the bookshop. “After all, I wouldn’t want you to disappear now that I’ve found you again.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Oh, I can think of any number of reasons,” she said. “ Señor Hausner . I am an author, after all.”

We came out of the shop and walked up a gentle slope toward the Floridita Bar.

“I know. I even read one of your books. The one about the Spanish Civil War: The Worst Turns the Best to the Brave. ”

“And what did you think?”

“Honestly?”

“You can give it a try, I suppose, Carlos .”

“I enjoyed it.”

“So it’s not just your name that’s false.”

“No, really, I did.”

We were outside the bar. A man jackknifed off the hood of an Oldsmobile and bowed into our path.

“Taxi, señor? Taxi ?”

I waved the man away and let Noreen go into the bar first.

“I’ve time for a quick one, and then I have to go. I have an appointment in fifteen minutes. At the cigar factory. It’s business. A job, maybe, so I can’t break it.”

“If that’s the way you want it. After all, it’s only been half a lifetime.”

THERE WAS A MAHOGANY BAR the size of a velodrome and, behind it, a dingy-looking mural of an old sailing ship entering the port of Havana. It might have been a slave ship, but another cargo of tourists or American sailors seemed a more likely bet. The Floridita was full of Americans, most of them fresh off the cruise ship parked next to the destroyer in Havana Harbor. Inside the door, a trio of musicians was setting up to play. We found a table, and I quickly ordered some drinks while the waiter could still hear me.

Noreen was busy checking out my shopping. “Montaigne, huh? I’m impressed.” She was speaking German now, probably getting ready to ask me some awkward questions without our being overheard and understood.

“Don’t be. I haven’t read it yet.”

“What’s this? Hobby Center? Do you have children?”

“No, that’s for me.” Seeing her smile, I shrugged. “I like train sets. I like the way they just keep on going around and around, like one single, simple, innocent thought in my head. That way I can ignore all the other thoughts that are in there.”

“I know. You’re like the governess in The Turn of the Screw .”

“Am I?”

“It’s a novel by Henry James.”

“I wouldn’t know. So. Any kids yourself?”

“I have a daughter. Dinah. She’s just finished school.”

The waiter arrived and neatly set out the drinks in front of us like a chess grand master castling a king and a rook. When he was gone, Noreen said, “What’s the story, Carlos? Are you wanted or something?”

“It’s a long story.” We toasted each other silently.

“I’ll bet.”

I glanced at my watch. “Too long to tell now. Another time. What about you? What are you doing in Cuba? Last I heard, you were up before that stupid kangaroo court. The House Committee on Un-American Activities. The HUAC. When was that?”

“May 1952. I was accused of being a communist. And blacklisted by several Hollywood movie studios.” She stirred her drink with a cocktail stick. “That’s why I’m here. A good friend of mine who lives in Cuba read about the HUAC hearings and invited me to come and live in his house for a while.”

“That’s a good friend to have.”

“He’s Ernest Hemingway.”

“Now, that’s a friend I have heard of.”

“As a matter of fact, this is one of his favorite bars.”

“Are you and he…?”

“No. Ernest is married. Anyway, he’s away right now. In Africa. Killing things. Himself mostly.”

“Is he a communist, too?”

“Good grief no. Ernest isn’t political at all. It’s people that interest him. Not ideologies.”

“Wise man.”

“Not so you’d notice.”

The band started to play, and I groaned. It was the kind of band that made you feel seasick as they swayed one way and then the other. One of the men played a witch doctor’s flute, and another tapped a monotonous cowbell that left you feeling sorry for cows. Their sung harmonies were like a freight locomotive’s horn. The girl yelled solos and played guitar. I never yet saw a guitar that I didn’t want to use to drive a nail into a piece of wood. Or into the head of the idiot strumming it.

“Now I really do have to go,” I said.

“What’s the matter? Don’t you like music?”

“Not since I came to Cuba.” I finished my drink and glanced at my watch again. “Look,” I said, “my meeting’s only going to take an hour or so. Why don’t we meet for lunch?”

“I can’t. I have to get back. I have people coming to dinner tonight and there are things I have to get for the cook. I’d love you to come if you could.”

“All right. I will.”

“It’s the Finca Vigía in San Francisco de Paula.” Noreen opened her bag, took out a notepad, and scribbled down an address and telephone number. “Why don’t you come early-say, around five o’clock. Before the rest of my guests arrive. We’ll catch up then.”