“Okay,” the president said, lifting his hands and showing the palms. “Okay! What’s the date on that letter?”
“Today.”
“Make it a week from today. We’ll do this your way, and a week from today you’re permanently off to the golf course with your mouth welded shut.”
Totten got out his pen, changed the date on both the letters, and passed them across the table to the president, who didn’t even glance at them.
“Better get cracking, General,” the president snarled.
“Yes, sir,” said Tater Totten. He rose from his chair and walked out of the room.
At the same time the president and National Security Council were meeting in Washington, the Council of State of the communist government of Cuba was meeting in Havana.
“Where is Fidel?” someone roared at Alejo Vargas as he walked into the room, flanked by Colonel Santana on one side and a plainclothes secret policeman on the other. Santana limped as he walked. He was heavily bandaged about the head and left arm, and moved like a man who was very sore.
Vice President Raúl Castro watched Alejo Vargas take his seat at the table beside the other ministers. His face was mottled, his anger palpable. He motioned for silence, smacked a wooden gavel against the table until he got it, then looked Vargas straight in the face.
“Where is my brother?”
“Dead.”
“And you have hidden the body.”
“The body is being prepared for a state funeral. I didn’t think anyone would object.”
“Liar!” Raúl Castro spit out the word. He stood, leaned on the table, and shouted at Vargas. “Liar! I think you murdered Fidel. I think you murdered him so that you could take over the country.” He waved at the window. “The people out there think so too. You have murdered my brother and arrested the man that he hoped would eventually succeed him, Hector Sedano. Jesus, man, the whole country is coming apart at the seams; they are rioting in the streets!”
Alejo Vargas examined the faces around the table while Raúl shouted. Maximo Sedano was there, his face impassive. Many of the faces could not be read. Most of them merely wanted food to eat and a place to live, something better than the people in the cane fields had. They went to their offices every day, obeyed Fidel’s orders, took the blame when things went wrong — as they usually did — watched Fidel take the credit if things went right, and soldiered on. That had been a way of life for these people for two generations — forty years — and now it was over.
“ … the people loved Fidel,” Raúl was saying, “honored and respected him as the greatest patriot in the history of Cuba, and I think you, Alejo Vargas, had a hand in his death. I accuse you of his murder.”
“Watch your mouth,” Santana told him, but Raúl turned on him like an enraged bear.
“I am vice president of the republic, first in line of succession upon the death of the president,” Raúl thundered at the colonel. “Maintain your silence or be evicted.”
Alejo Vargas had already removed his pistol from his pocket while he sat at the table listening to Raúl. Now he raised it, extended it to arm’s length, and squeezed the trigger. Before anyone could move he pumped three bullets into Raúl Castro, who fell sideways, knocking over his chair. The reports were like thunderclaps in the room, leaving the audience stunned and slightly deafened.
Alejo Vargas got to his feet, holding the pistol casually in front of him in his right hand.
“Does anyone else wish to accuse me of murder?”
Total, complete silence. Vargas looked from face to face, trying to make eye contact with everyone willing. Most averted their eyes when he looked into their face.
“Colonel Santana, please remove Señor Castro from the room. He is ill.”
As a bandaged Santana and the plainclothesman were carrying out the body, Alejo Vargas again seated himself. He placed the pistol on the table in front of him.
“I will chair this meeting,” he said. “We are here today to decide what must be done in light of the recent death of our beloved president, Fidel Castro. He fought a long, valiant fight against the disease of cancer, which claimed him four days ago. Of course the news could not be publicly announced until the Council of State had been informed and decisions reached on the question of succession.
“I do hereby officially inform you of the tragedy of Fidel Castro’s passing, and declare this meeting open to discuss the question of naming a successor to the office of president.”
With that Vargas reached across the table and seized the gavel that Raúl Castro had used. He tapped it several times on the table, sharp little raps that made several people flinch.
“This meeting is officially open,” he declared. “Who would like to speak first?”
No one said a word.
“The news of our beloved president’s death has hit everyone hard,” Vargas said. “I understand. Yet the business of our nation cannot wait. I hereby nominate myself for the office of president. Do I hear a second?”
“I second the nomination,” said General Alba, his voice carrying in the silence.
“Let the record show that I move to make the nomination unanimous,” Admiral Delgado said, his voice quavering a little.
“I second that motion,” General Alba replied, “and move that the nominations be closed.”
One would almost think they rehearsed that, Alejo Vargas thought, and gave the two general officers a nod of gratitude.
Sharks!
The silent predators came gliding in even as Ocho Sedano watched with his face in the water, gray, streamlined torpedoes swimming effortlessly through the half-light under the surface. They seemed to be swimming toward the place where the Angel del Mar had just gone under. No doubt the turbulence and noise from the sinking boat attracted them.
The people thrashing about on the surface were also making noise. Nature had equipped the sharks to sense the death struggles of other creatures, and to come to feed.
He raised his head from the water, shouted, “Sharks. Sharks.” His voice was very hoarse, his throat terribly dry. He sucked up a mouthful of salty seawater, then spit it out.
“Sharks! Do not struggle. Swim away from the wreck, from each other.”
He didn’t know if anyone heard him or not.
A scream split the air, then was cut off abruptly, probably as the person screaming was pulled under.
Another scream. Shouts of “Sharks!” and calls to God.
He felt something rub against his leg, and kicked back viciously. With his face in the water he could see the shark, a big one, maybe eight feet; swimming toward the concentration of people in the water.
He turned the other way, began swimming slowly away.
The old fisherman was nearby, doing the same.
“Do not panic,” the old man said. “Swim slowly, steadily.”
“The others …”
“There is nothing we can do. God is with them.”
He heard several more screams, a curse or two, then nothing. He didn’t want to hear. And he was swimming into the wind, so the sound would not carry so well.
Dora was back there. If she got off the boat. He couldn’t remember if she leaped from the boat before it sank. Perhaps she drowned when the boat went down. If so, that was God’s mercy. Better that than being eaten by a shark, having a leg ripped half off, or an arm, then bleeding in agony until the sharks tore you to pieces or pulled you under to drown.
That there were still things on this earth that ate people was an evil more foul than anything he had ever imagined.