North of Havana Read online

  The girl misinterpreted my reticence. She began to unbutton her blouse. Maybe I wanted to watch. I got a quick glimpse of pinecone breasts and belly scar before I touched her shoulder and said in Spanish, “Señora, I will not help you do this to yourself.” I left her standing there as I walked out of the bushes and found Carlos sitting on a bench. He had his face buried in his hands. Again in Spanish, I asked, “How old is the child, friend?”

  First there was the cornstarch, then her scarred stomach.

  Carlos was talking before he realized who had spoken to him. “Two years old and she is very sick—” Then he stopped, looking up at me. I watched him teeter between fear and anger—maybe I was some kind of undercover cop. He thought about it before he asked, “Why did you pretend? You understood everything we said.”

  I didn’t reply.

  His tone took on a pleading quality. “The only reason we did it is to get money for the child. The things she needs, we can get them only on the black market, but we have no—”

  I was shaking my head. I didn’t want to hear his sad story. If you allow it, the private tragedies of the Third World will worm their way into the cerebral core and drag you into a vacuum of that world’s own despair. Tomlinson doesn’t agree, but most emotional entanglements are pointless. It pleases me when he says that I am unfeeling—just as it irritates me when he says that I often lie to myself, implying that I am more empathetic than I really am.

  I took four more bills from my pocket and stuffed them into Carlos’s shirt. “I didn’t touch her. With that, maybe no one will have to.” I took him by the arm and steered him toward the bushes. I remembered the little shove he’d given Lena, now did the same to him. Told him, “Go get your wife.”

  It was sunset by the time I got back to the Havana Libre.

  No one I’d spoken with had ever heard of Tomlinson. Same with Rita Santoya, a.k.a. Julia DeGlorio.

  Dewey was still out by the pool, sitting in a lounge chair positioned to catch the sun’s last rays. She had a bottle of Hatuey beer in her hand and was speaking animatedly with a squat, bearish man. The man had pale red hair and an incongruously dark mustache. He had a thoughtful, professorial style of nodding. Probably his way of showing that she had his full attention.

  Dewey’s corner of the deck was the only busy corner in the pool area. A small but intense coterie of men sat or stood or moved around her, apparently waiting for the red-haired man to finish so they could have a turn. Spaniards, mostly. A couple of Germans and maybe a wealthy African. Same with the white-shirted waiters. Each man demonstrated his interest by being pointedly indifferent as he peeked at Dewey, taking her in with his eyes, probably sending the red-haired guy telepathic messages to get the hell away from her.

  I thought: Good-bye closet, hello world.

  Not that I was surprised that Dewey had drawn a crowd. Her wet hair was darker, combed back. She had a copper-colored scarf wrapped around her waist, sarong-fashion. Very stylish. The two silk swatches of bikini top hung on her as if held by a mild breeze. She looked stunning, but that’s not why I wasn’t surprised. Undressed, or in any partial stage, Dewey’s body and her mannerisms would awaken in men what therapists might refer to as the Tarzan Syndrome. Because there was no hint of self-consciousness in the way she moved—yawning, scratching, knees thrown wide apart as she leaned to grab her beer—her physical language communicated a primal acceptance of all body functions… a primitive, welcoming sexuality to any male strong enough… a form of muscle-and-marrow primal challenge.

  It made me smile, watching men compete for her; a very old and intricate drama indeed. But it also made me a tad uneasy. I knew they’d never understand or appreciate why they were among the very few men who had seen her undressed the way she now was. Doubted if they would accept or sanction the inner conflict that had prompted her to buy and wear a tissue-sized swimsuit. Mostly I thought: God help the guy who actually tries to make a move on her.

  I stood there for a couple of minutes, but she was way too involved for me to get her attention. So I took the elevator to our room, showered, changed into T-shirt and running shorts, and went back down for a swim. This time she saw me and waved me over, still listening to the red-haired guy but looking at me as I approached. I watched her mouth speak a private message to me: “He knows…” somebody. Couldn’t decipher it. Then, when I was close enough, heard her say to the man, “Here’s Doc.” Then to me: “Doc, this is Lenny Geis.”

  The man was standing, extending his hand as she added, “Lenny was just telling me that he knows Tomlinson.”

  Geis was a couple of inches under six feet, probably weighed a little over two hundred pounds. Had one of those pulling-guard bodies, a layer of fat over pounds of muscle. Heavy chest and shoulders covered by a pelt of Viking hair and balanced on a set of spindly bronc-buster legs. He looked a little like a grown-up version of Mayberry’s Opie: the jaw, the hair, the perceptive collie eyes. Probably in his mid to late thirties, but already had the handshake and the poise of the successful businessman. Not self-important, but city-smart, easy to talk to. A difficult impression to communicate without the executive’s tailored-suit uniform, but Geis—wearing only green trunks and thongs—pulled it off without much effort.

  “Doc, I was telling this beautiful lady. My week here? I went from the outhouse to the penthouse, just like that.” He was smiling, being familiar as if we were old friends, as he repositioned chairs at a nearby table—“You guys be more comfortable here?”—and signaled the waiter. “Didn’t I say that, Dewey? A place like this, meet one gringo a month, you’re lucky. Especially around the holidays. Who’d want to spend Christmas in Havana? But first I meet Tomlinson and Julia, now you two. Man, I’m telling you, it’s like being in jail and getting visitors. Just to hear someone speak English, you know?”

  Dewey said, “Lenny’s Canadian. He works in Havana a month on, a month off. He’s got an important meeting tomorrow or he’d be up north and we’d’a missed him.”

  Geis said, “The Cubans do stuff like that on purpose.” Set up meetings on Christmas Eve, that’s what he apparently meant.

  Dewey said, “So we’re lucky I ran into him.” She was standing behind me, massaging my shoulders, being affectionate—maybe her tourist act, maybe not—letting the men watching know that the game was over, her guy was here. I took an absurd and adolescent pleasure in their disappointment. Thought to myself, You’re as bad as they are, aware that Lenny Geis appeared unaffected, like he was just as happy to see me.

  I said, “Where in Canada?”

  “Montreal,” he said. “I’ve got an office there and my backers have offices in Toronto. Poor Dewey, she had to sit here and listen to the whole story.” He looked at her so Dewey could smile and shake her head—she didn’t mind. He said, “At first, it sounded like a great assignment. Spend every other month in Havana making contacts, setting up joint ventureships. That’s my specialty. You know, laying the groundwork for when the Cuban economy switches to the free market. It has to happen, right? That’s when Havana’s gonna boom. The first people in, the ones who’ve done their homework, we’re going to make a mountain of money.” His tone was confident but his expression was boyish, vulnerable, as if he’d just about reached the end of his endurance but couldn’t let himself quit. He said, “I believed that eighteen months ago and I still think it’s true. But, man, my time in Havana goes slower and slower and the months I spend at home just fly by. I’ve got a fiancée up home.” He looked at Dewey again—he’d already told her about his girl. “We’re supposed to get married in June. Big wedding, catered with an orchestra, the whole works. So I about go nuts missing her, but with this shitty phone system we only talk maybe once a week and most of the time the phone patch doesn’t work. Nothing against Cubans, ay? I like the Cubans a lot. But living in Havana is like living on another planet.”

  I listened to the rounded French vowels and the way he said, “ay?” as if it were an aut
omatic question mark. I said, “You’re the one who helped Tomlinson telephone me.”

  He was nodding. “He needed to call somebody, yeah. I met him out in front of the Hotel Nacional. Took one look at him and knew he was either Canadian or American— the difference might mean a lot in Quebec or Detroit, but not a darn thing down here. I liked him right away. He’s an… unusual kind of guy, but nice. He told me about his trouble with the boat and I tried to do what I could.” Geis’s tone was fraternal—we North Americans have to stick together, right?

  Noted the way he said “Quebec”—K-beck. Noted the nearly new Rolex Submariner watch on his left wrist. No rings but a necklace with a thin gold cross around his neck. Religious, perhaps; he was drinking pineapple juice while we sipped beers. I said, “Do you know where Tomlinson is?”

  “Wish I did but I don’t, sorry. He went somewhere but wouldn’t tell me.”

  “Left Havana, you mean.”

  “That’s what I couldn’t figure out. Not many other places in Cuba for an outsider to go. Varadero Beach, maybe. They’ve got hotels there but very expensive. Pinar del Rio or maybe the Isle of Pines. Anyplace but a tourist area, Tomlinson and his girl wouldn’t even be able to get food, because it’s all rationed. There’s not enough beans and rice for the Cubans. I told him that, but he still wouldn’t say.”

  “Didn’t tell you, or wouldn’t?”

  Geis said, “He wouldn’t, so I didn’t press it. Truth is, it was none of my business.”

  “Maybe he took the girl and went and stayed on his boat.”

  “No-o-o-o, I doubt that. The boats they impound, they keep them under guard out west of the city; this big harbor where they can keep an eye on them. No… he went somewhere, but it wasn’t to his boat. Like I said, I tried to talk him out of it.”

  “But he went anyway, knowing you thought it was a mistake.”

  Geis smiled, trying to lighten things up. “I’m beginning to think it’s a mistake for anyone to come to this island.”

  He was joking, but his eyes—weary and a little frantic—said he meant it.

  Geis told me he was surprised that Tomlinson had left because he and the girl had planned to check in at the Havana Libre. I sat at the table knee-to-knee with Dewey and listened to him say, “Two days ago—yeah, it was Saturday—he came around asking if I could talk to the manager, maybe get him a special rate. Spaniards run this place”—he was talking about the hotel—“so at least it’s clean even if the restaurant can’t offer much of a menu. The manager works a monthly deal for me; he’s become a buddy of mine, so he gave Tomlinson a pretty good discount and I thought everything was set. But early yesterday morning I was in the bar eating breakfast and your friend shows up looking very nervous, like he hadn’t slept and maybe was a little hungover. He told me that he had to split. That’s what he said, ‘split.’ And that he needed some money. In the way he talks, like a hippie. I gave him a couple hundred U.S. Figured sooner or later he was good for it.”

  I asked, “Was the girl with him?”

  Geis said, “Julia? No. But I got the impression she had something to do with it. The thing that was upsetting him, why he had to go.”

  “Tomlinson told you that?”

  “Uh-uh.” Geis was thinking about it, apparently not sure himself. “When I asked what’d happened—I asked a couple of times—he put me off. Finally, he said, ‘Turns out God has assigned me to help Rita,’ which didn’t make sense to me. Still doesn’t, unless Rita’s a nickname for Julia.” He looked at Dewey. “Is it?”

  I told Lenny Geis, “We’ve never met Julia,” wondering what had motivated the woman to tell Tomlinson her real name, Rita Santoya. Watched Geis lift an eyebrow, cock his head—a visual comment: he’d met her but would remain noncommittal unless asked. So I asked.

  “She seemed… okay, fairly nice,” Geis said. Being diplomatic about it. “Much younger than him and attractive in an… in a plain sort of way. No makeup, very short hair. That type. Always stayed in the background, didn’t say much. Was always on the go; didn’t hang around with your friend much. I only saw her twice.”

  “I get the feeling you didn’t like her, Lenny.”

  His smile was an attempt at deflection. “After a month in Havana, I like anybody who’s from the States.”

  “Okay, you liked her but didn’t trust her much.”

  Geis shrugged.

  I said, “Lenny… Tomlinson’s one of my oldest friends. Maybe you couldn’t tell but he’s not in the best of health. I’m not asking you to judge the woman, I’m just trying to get a sense of what’s going on.”

  Geis thought about that for a little bit before he said, “Like I mentioned, I didn’t talk to her much. I know what it is you’re after… yeah, worried about an old friend, but…” He was wrestling with it. Finally, he put his elbows on the table and leaned toward me. “Know what it was? They didn’t seem to fit together. Simple as that. You know how certain couples fit? Like my fiancée and me. We fit. You and Dewey, you two fit. But they didn’t. It wasn’t just her age. It was, well… Tomlinson is so open and outgoing, and she was so… silent. But she didn’t miss anything. Always very alert, but it was more than that. Like she was always on her guard. I got the impression that she let Tomlinson do all the talking but, when they got back to the room, she’s the one who made the decisions.”

  Dewey said, “Like she was using him.”

  Geis said quickly, “I wouldn’t say that. I really wouldn’t. It’s just an impression I had, and I’m probably making too much of it. But you asked, and I really would like to cooperate—” He finished his pineapple juice; noticed our empty bottles, and began to search the pool area for a waiter. “—and I think Tomlinson would have said something if the girl was giving him a hard time. But he didn’t. He described you, Doc. Told me to keep an eye out for you and to tell you he’d be in touch. ‘A day or two,’ he said. Not more than a couple of days.”

  “That’s all?”

  Geis was looking at Dewey, shaking his head slowly and starting to smile. “Well… there was something else. But I don’t think he knew that you were bringing her along.” Meaning Dewey.

  “He wanted you to fix Doc up with a woman?” I couldn’t tell if Dewey disapproved of the idea or just had a hard time believing it.

  “No, what he said was, ‘Tell Doc not to worry because—’ “Geis stopped. “It’s going to sound pretty weird.”

  “He’s an old friend. I’m used to it.”

  “Okay—” He’d warned me. “—what he said was, ‘Tell Doc not to worry because I’ve assigned an angel to protect him.’ Something like that. ‘He’ll be traveling with an angel?’ “Geis was trying to remember, amused by it. “It’s hard to tell when he’s joking, but he had this way of speaking like he was some kind of holy man. Or even God.”

  With that cross around his neck, Geis might be offended. So I didn’t tell him that, lately, Tomlinson had been talking more and more like both.

  10

  Geis came by our room at seven to take us to dinner. To join us, really, since I’d insisted on paying Tomlinson’s loan and using the interest to pay the tab. I decided a night on the town wouldn’t hurt. As Dewey had said, “Why sit around on our butts waiting?” Besides, I had the names that Armando Azcona and Juan Rivera had provided—Juan’s secretary had offered a couple of other bits of information—and I wanted to look around Havana, see if I could decipher where and how to get in touch with the anti-Castro underground. Something to do, like an old hobby.

  I opened the door to find Geis dressed in white dinner jacket and tropic worsted slacks, red hair brushed, mustache trimmed, shoes with a plastic shine. Smoking a cigar, too. One of the big ones wrapped hard with black leaves.

  “Cohiba,” he told me, moving it back and forth under his nose. “Couple of weeks ago, Fidel gave me one of his Trinidads to try. Next to that, this’s the best cigar in the world.”

  Jesu
s, put a dinner jacket on the guy and he became a name-dropper. Having meetings with Fidel?

  An hour earlier, I’d made it a point to strike up conversations with some of the hotel staff and managed to slip in questions about Lenny Geis. Yes, they said, he was a businessman from Canada. Yes, he’d spent every other month at Havana Libre for more than a year. Certainly—he was a nice man! And very important, judging from the government officials who sometimes came to dine with him.

  Now, from across the room, Dewey took one look at Geis, hooted, and said, “Shit, Lenny, you didn’t tell me we were going formal!” and hurried back to the bedroom to change. She came out a few minutes later wearing a gauzy, form-fitting black dress with silver buttons down the front that I’d not only never seen before but couldn’t imagine her wearing. She saw the question forming in my eyes and answered in advance. Leaned to my ear to whisper: “Madrid, you big dufuss. Think I order all my clothes from Cabela’s, like you? And I’ve got on those little jade underwear I told you about.”

  Finding Bets in bed with the French tennis star had been good for the Spanish fashion industry.

  We walked seaward, then east along the Malecón. The evening had weight to it, warm and saturated with Gulf Stream air. A tropic night with stars above the silhouettes of stone garrisons and palms, while salsa music—it always sounded like an accordion player on a galloping horse—drifted through the streets.

  Havana seemed healthier, more alive after dark… probably because decay is best revealed by sunlight.

  The promenade was busy: bicycles, strollers, black-market hucksters, a few cars. Mostly Detroit’s big-finned classics coming out of the shadows and showing themselves in the streetlights. Fifty-seven Chevys and Studebakers, a ‘49 Ford cruising beetle-like with its lavender taillights. They were something for Geis to talk about. Issue one of his nonstop monologues that seemed designed to purge loneliness rather than demonstrate what an expert he was on Cuba. At least the cars got him off the subject of prostitutes, who were hounding him, he said, making his life more difficult than it needed to be—he was so committed to the fiancée waiting for him in Montreal that he resented the temptation. “A lot of them, you can’t help but notice are just plain gorgeous,” he had said, “particularly some of the young mulattos. But I’ve got a good solid routine; I’m working. You won’t catch me paying ten bucks to bring one up to my room!”