James Grippando - When Darkness Falls

“He may come here from Cuba, but he is not Cuban.”

“How do you know?”

“I watch the television this morning. They show film from the last time, when the police take him down from the bridge over to Key Biscayne. He is yelling in Spanish, cursing at the police when they arrest him and say he can’t speak to Mayor Mendoza’s daughter. That is not Cuban Spanish. I have an ear for these things. Trust me. Ese hombre no es Cubano.”

That man is not Cuban.

Abuela was not always right on the money, but Jack knew one thing. When it came to all things Hispanic, her word was gold. Falcon was not Cuban. Jack could take that one to the bank. “Thank you,” he said.

“Of course. Is nothing.”

She obviously thought he was talking about the food, which he wasn’t.

“No,” he said as his gaze drifted up the barricaded boulevard in the general direction of the mobile command center. “I have a feeling that this is definitely something.”

A licia rushed home, not to her Coconut Grove townhouse, but to the walled and gated Mediterranean-style villa in which she’d grown up. The Mendozas had lived in the same house since Alicia was seven years old. It wasn’t a palace by any stretch, especially compared to the new ten-thousand-square-foot McMansions that seemed to blanket South Florida like the dreaded red tide, but it was a great old house. Twin pillars covered in purple bougainvillea stood like sentries at the driveway entrance. Beyond the wrought-iron gate was the circular driveway where Alicia had learned the hard way that it was a very bad idea to roller-skate on Chicago brick.

She parked beneath the largest of several sprawling oak trees that shaded the property, then made her usual entrance: one ring of the doorbell to warn anyone inside who might be walking around in their underwear, and then she let herself in with her key. She was passing through the kitchen when her mother greeted her.

“Alicia, I wasn’t expecting to see you today,” she said with a warm smile. Graciela Mendoza was actually a striking Latin beauty who took excellent care of herself, but today she was sporting the Marjorie Stoneham Douglas look, dressed in a floppy straw sunhat and blue jeans stained at both knees with rich black potting soil. Gardening was her passion.

Alicia said, “This is sort of unexpected from my end, too.”

“Did they resolve that hostage situation?”

“Not yet. I have to get back, but I need to check on something quickly.”

“Here?”

“Yes.” She knew that she couldn’t possibly explain, so she didn’t even try. “Is all my old stuff still in the bedroom closet?”

“Yes, of course.”

“This probably sounds weird, but there’s something I need to find.”

“What is it? Maybe I can help.”

“No, that’s okay. It’s sort of official police business.” Sounding weirder by the minute, Alicia realized.

“Okay,” her mother said. “Holler if you need anything.”

“Thanks, Mom.” She turned and went straight to her old bedroom, which no longer resembled the shrine to Alicia that had existed for years after she’d left home. Her parents had finally turned it into a home office, though it was still decorated with a few of her adolescent touches, including a message board filled with names and phone numbers that were so vitally important to a teenager and not even remotely a part of her present life. There was no time to reminisce. She went to the closet, which was like a time capsule filled with awards, toys, school yearbooks, and other mementos. Her search was very narrow: she was looking for Manuel Garcia Ferre.

Ferre created some of the cartoon favorites from her childhood. Not many Americans knew of his talents, except for a few foreign-film buffs who might recall that his animated film La Manuelita was Argentina’s official entry to the 1999 Academy Awards. Truth be told, surprisingly few Argentines even knew that bit of movie trivia. Alicia was no expert on her ancestry, but it had long been her passing observation that Argentina showed too little enthusiasm for its own contributions to culture. Argentines didn’t even embrace the tango (born in bordellos) until it caught on in Paris, and the country continued to revile its greatest tango composer, Astor Piazolla, even as Europeans hailed him as a genius. Argentina had a history of being equally standoffish about local films, many of which were of first quality but lagged far behind Hollywood blockbusters and European films at the Argentine box offices. But Alicia’s father, thousands of miles away from his native country, made sure that his daughter knew Ferre’s work, which for decades has delighted Spanish-speaking children. He’d supplied her with comic books and videotapes of cartoons that had once aired on Canal 13-Buenos Aires and other Argentine television stations. It was his way of connecting her at a young age to her homeland and to her parents’ native tongue.

Alicia went from top shelf to bottom in search of the right box. Naturally, it was in the last place she checked. She pulled it off the shelf and laid it on the floor, then unfolded the flaps and peered inside. Another era was staring back at her. The comic books were on top. Her favorite was Las Aventuras de Hijitus, the adventures of an orphan kid who fought the forces of evil. Simply by saying magical words, Hijitus could transform himself into Súper Hijitus, a boy in a blue suit who is propelled through the air by a little propeller atop his head.

Alicia gave a little nostalgic smile and laid the comic books aside. Wouldn’t it have been nice if Vince had simply called Hijitus?

Beneath the comic books, she found the videotapes, packed across the bottom of the box like spine-out books on a shelf. Alicia couldn’t recall ever having made a conscious decision to save them all these years, but she suspected that somewhere in her heart lay a plan to share them with her own children. She allowed herself to wonder for a moment if Vince would be the father, and it saddened her to think that he would never see any of this. She cleared her mind of such thoughts, however, as it had nothing to do with her mission. The important thing was that her old favorites were still there. She ran her finger lightly across the titles, searching for one of particular interest. She didn’t find it. She checked again, knowing that it had to be there.

It was gone.

She felt a slight chill, but her suspicions were not yet confirmed. Maybe she’d loaned it to a childhood friend and forgot about it. Maybe for some reason she’d decided not to save this one. Neither of those possibilities seemed likely, however. She guarded her collection like gold.

Her gaze swept the room and settled upon the PC that her parents had set up in the corner of the room. It was running, and the screen saver of bright blue sky and puffy white clouds beckoned. She went to it, clicked on the Internet browser, and typed a few pertinent words into the search engine. It came back with exactly what she needed. She opened the link and went straight to the Web site.

On screen, a pitch-black background transformed itself into impenetrable night sky with flashes of lightning and a blanket of twinkling stars. To one side, a dead, leafless tree shivered. The vacant eyes of two orange pumpkins flashed back and forth from white to black. A creepy old Victorian-style house soon took center stage, the doors and windows of irregular shapes, as if the whole structure were in danger of collapsing at any moment. A black bat fluttered in the wind, between the house and the old tree. And in bright orange letters, the title appeared against the black sky.

La Covacha de la Bruja Cachavacha.

Finally, in a high-pitched, scary voice that still gave Alicia the shivers, the witch-la bruja-said, “Bienvenidos a mi casa.”