Warren Murphy: Cold Warrior

"Who were they?"

"An Anglo. The other was Asian. They were not dressed like FBI or any other government person I could name."

Zorilla frowned. "Hmmm. Who might they be?"

"They said they would comb Miami for jou, Comandante."

"There is no need for them to go to that trouble," said Comandante Leopoldo Zorilla. "Have them brought here."

"Is that wise?"

"We are too close to B-Day to allow the authorities to interfere with us."

"They did not look like authorities," Pepe pointed out.

"All the better. Have them brought here. Now."

"Si, Comandante."

After Leopoldo Zorilla hung up, he unbuttoned the back pocket of his camouflage pants. He took out a sealed pack of chewing gum. It was decorated with the cartoon head of a mouse. The mouse reminded Zorilla of home. Even though it was an American mouse, TeleRebelde regularly showed his famous cartoons to all of Cuba. First by means of old preRevolution films, and later, as the technology changed, by downlinking transmissions from U.S. TV satellites. Fidel had boasted of his ability to pirate U.S. TV without subjecting Cubans to annoying commercials, but never mentioned that the people were forced to watch Soviet TV sets that often exploded without warning.

He could remember how unhappy the copyright owners of the cartoon mouse had been. They explored every avenue of legal recourse open to them. But American lawyers were not welcome in the Cuban Revolutionary courts and they were reduced to sending impatient letters demanding payment, and warning of the accumulating charges that would be presented to the Cuban government if it ever rejoined the free world.

Zorilla smiled at the memory. Now that the time approached, the copyright owners would finally collect. With interest.

For now, he placed the pack of chicle in his blouse pocket where it would be handy. It promised to be a long night, and filled with uncertainties. With unknown snoopers coming, he might well need it.

Leopoldo checked his watch. It was near eleven. Time for his injection.

He cursed the business of the needle and what it contained, but there was no help for it. Years of living in Cuba had brought his once invincible body to this sad state of affairs.

He opened a drawer and charged the needle from a stoppered bottle. He used a rubber band to block his arm veins. They bulged up blue and thick, and he discharged the contents of the needle into the most wormlike of them. He swabbed the pinprick wound with a bit of cotton dipped in alcohol.

It stung. With the stinging, he lavishly cursed the Leader of the Revolution, who had made him so dependent on the needle.

The prisoners arrived after midnight.

Comandante Leopoldo Zorilla went out to greet them. He clasped his hands behind his back and addressed the pair.

"You have sought me, and I stand before you now," he said simply.

Then he got a close look at them. The Anglo appeared quite ordinary, except for the exceptional thickness of his wrists. He had a lean, hard look about him. His nationality was difficult to ascertain. The Mediterranean was stamped on his moderately handsome features and lurked in his dark eyes. But his skin was pale.

There was, as he had been told, an Asian. He had not been told the Asian's age. He looked .. . advanced. Surely, Zorilla thought, these were not agents of any government who disagreed with what had been planned.

"Who are you two men?" he demanded, as they stood before him.

Weapons were trained on them. The pair seemed oblivious to their dark-mawed threat.

The Anglo looked around. He saw the dummies on the posts, with their blank white faces spilling cotton stuffing like bleached brain matter.

"Looks like we've found our Cuban invasion force," he remarked to his Asian companion.

"For once," the other murmured, "you have hatched a plan that has worked." Then, looking at the uniform Zorilla wore, he asked, "What are you supposed to be?"

Zorilla drew himself erect. "I am a soldier of the Americas!"

The Anglo asked the Asian a foolish question. "What's that supposed to mean?"

The Asian said, "He is a Spaniard. They are very proud. In the days of the Spanish kings, the soldiers boasted that they were soldiers of Spain. This one has fallen from that lofty perch, like a haughty eagle that has grown too fat for the branch, so now he is a mere soldier of this mongrel continent."

"You insult me?" Zorilla demanded.

"The uniform does that," the Asian sniffed.

"Who sent you to seek me?" Zorilla asked tightly.

"Uncle Sam," replied the Anglo with cool insolence.

Leopoldo Zorilla blinked. "Truly?" he asked.

"Definitely," the Anglo said.

"Por que?"

"That means, 'Why?' " interjected the Asian.

"Because he's not happy with the way things are going down Havana way, that's why," said the Anglo.

Comandante Leopoldo Zorilla then lost command of himself.

"It was unforeseen, what happened!" he said quickly. "Our scouts landed with the dawn, when the sentries are less alert. Nevertheless, they were captured. It was regrettable. We did not know that Fidel would respond so harshly. But that is the nature of the man. Please tell Uncle Sam for me that Ultima Hora remains firmly on the agreed-upon timetable."

The Anglo took this with less grace than Comandante Zorilla expected.

He and the Asian exchanged blank looks, and then the Anglo said, "You telling me that Uncle Sam put you up to this?"

"You know this. For he sent you."

"Yeah, but the Uncle Sam who sent me didn't know anything about any Cuban operation," the Anglo insisted.

"He did not?"

"In fact, he specifically asked me to find out who was behind the operation."

"Uncle Sam asked this of you?" asked Zorilla.

"Maybe it was a different Uncle Sam," the Anglo offered.

"What other Uncle Sam is there?" Zorilla shot back.

"Good point," said the Anglo, frowning. "I know of just the one."

Comandante Zorilla grew concerned.

"What is your name?" he demanded.

"Call me Remo."

"Ah, Remo. A good Spanish name."

"It is?" the one called Remo said, surprised.

"It means 'oar,' " the Asian whispered.

"It does?" Remo said, astonished.

The Asian nodded sagely. "In Italian, as well."

"Who would name his son 'Oar'?" Remo wanted to know.

"A parent who would then leave his son on a doorstep," Chiun countered.

"You leave my parents out of this!"

"Why not? They left you out of their lives."

Comandante Leopoldo Zorilla looked to his men, who held their FAL rifles on the bickering pair. They shrugged, as if to say, "We do not understand these strange ones, either."

Zorilla shrugged in reply. He listened as the argument grew loud. Loud and harsh on the Anglo's side, and loud and squeaky on the Asian's. Zorilla studied them carefully. These men had said they had been sent by Uncle Sam, but they were not dressed in the business suits of the agents of Uncle Sam. They were cool, nearly oblivious to the threat of the weapons arrayed around them. Perhaps they were stupid, Zorilla thought.

Then, as the argument lapsed into a tongue Zorilla neither recognized nor understood, he began to wonder if it was possible they were not who they claimed to be.

"You will cease this noise!" he thundered.

The argument went on.

"Hombres! Quiet them!"

The rifle barrels were poked between the men, as if to separate them. The pair argued on, unconcerned.

Then the rifles were used to prod the two arguing ones.

Hands so fast they left no blurs in the night air rendered the weapons useless.

This was how Comandante Leopoldo Zorilla saw it:

The rifle muzzles were poked forward.

They never touched the bodies they were intended to prod. Instead his soldiers jumped back, as if startled by the unexpected sound that came from their muzzles.