“Maybe. But she murdered a Cuban policeman. Very nearly murdered one of mine.”
“Perhaps. But did you see me shoot anyone? I didn’t even raise my voice. In my business, girls—girls like Melba—they’re one of the fringe benefits. What they get up to in their spare time is—” I paused for a moment, searching for the best phrase in English. “Hardly my affair.”
“It is when she shoots an American on your boat.”
“I didn’t even know she had a gun. If I’d known that, I would have thrown it over the side. And maybe her, too. And if I had any idea that she was suspected of murdering a policeman, I would never have invited Senõrita Marrero to come away with me.”
“Let me tell you something about your girlfriend, Mr. Hausner.” Mackay stifled a belch, but not nearly enough for my comfort. He took off his glasses and breathed on them, and somehow they didn’t crack. “Her real name is María Antonia Tapanes, and she was a prostitute at a casa in Caimanera, which is how she came to steal a sidearm belonging Petty Officer Marcus. That’s why he recognized her when he saw her on your boat. We strongly suspect she was put up to the assassination of Captain Balart by the rebels. In fact, we’re more or less sure of it.”
“I find that very hard to believe. She never once mentioned politics to me. She seemed more interested in having a good time than in having a revolution.”
The captain opened one of the files in front of him and pushed it toward me.
“It’s more or less certain your little lady friend has been a communist and a rebel for quite a while now. You see, María Antonia Tapanes spent three months in the National Women’s Prison at Guanajay for her part in the Easter Sunday conspiracy of April 1953. Then, in July of last year, her brother Juan Tapanes was killed in the assault on Moncada Barracks led by Fidel Castro. Killed or executed, it’s not clear which. When María got out of prison and found her brother dead, she went to Caimanera and worked as a chica to get herself a weapon. That happens a lot. To be honest, quite a few of our men use their weapons as currency for buying sex. Then they just report the weapon stolen. Anyway, the next time the weapon turns up it’s been used to kill Captain Balart. There were witnesses, too. A woman answering María Tapanes’s description shot him in the face. And then in the back of the head as he lay on the ground. Maybe he had it coming. Who knows? Who cares? What I do know is that P.O. Marcus is lucky to be alive. If she’d used the Colt instead of that little Beretta, he’d be as dead as Captain Balart.”
“Is he going to be all right?”
“He’ll live.”
“What will happen to her?”
“We’ll have to hand her over to the police in Havana.”
“I imagine that’s what she was worried about in the first place. Why she shot the petty officer. She must have panicked. You know what they’ll do to her, don’t you?”
“That’s not my concern.”
“Maybe it should be. Maybe that’s the problem you’ve got in Cuba. Maybe if you Americans paid a little more attention to the kind of people who are running this country—”
“Maybe you ought to be a little more concerned about what happens to you.”
This was the other officer who spoke now. I hadn’t been told his name. All I knew about him was that dandruff fell off the back of his head whenever he scratched it. All in all, he had rather a lot of dandruff. Even his eyelashes had tiny flakes of skin in them.
“Just suppose I’m not,” I said. “Not anymore.”
“Come again?” The man with the dandruff stopped scratching his head and inspected his fingernails before beaming a frown in my direction.
“We’ve been over this all night,” I said. “You keep asking me the same questions and I keep giving you the same answers. I’ve told you my story. But you say you don’t believe it. And that’s fair enough. I can see the holes in it. You’re bored with it. I’m bored with it. We’re all bored with it, only I’m not about to cash my story in for another. What would be the point? If it sounded any better than the original, I’d have used it in the first place. So the fact now remains that I can’t see any point in telling you another. And since I don’t care to do that, then you’d be forgiven for thinking that I don’t really care whether or not you believe me, because it seems to me there’s nothing I can do that’ll convince you. One way or another, you’ve already made up your minds. That’s the way it is with cops. Believe me, I know, I used to be a cop myself. And since I no longer care whether or not you believe me, then it would be entirely fair for you to conclude that I don’t seem to give a damn what happens to me. Well, maybe I do and maybe I don’t, but that’s for me to know and you to decide for yourselves, gentlemen.”
The cop with the dandruff scratched some more, which made the room look like a snow scene in a little glass ball. He said, “You talk a lot, mister, for someone who doesn’t say very much.”
“True, but it helps to keep the brass knuckles off my face.”
“I doubt that,” said Captain Mackay. “I doubt that very much.”
“I know. I’m not so pretty anymore. Only, that ought to make it easier for you to believe me. You’ve seen that girl. She was every sailor’s hard-on. I was grateful. What’s the expression you have in English? ‘You don’t look a gift horse in the mouth’? And if it comes to that, then neither should you, Captain. You’ve got nothing on me and plenty on her. You know she shot the petty officer. It’s obvious. And it only starts to get complicated when you try to tie me in to some kind of rebel conspiracy. Me? I was looking forward to a nice vacation with lots of sex. I had plenty of money with me, because I was planning to buy myself a bigger boat, and there’s no law against that. Like I already told you, I have a good job. At the National Hotel. I have a nice apartment on the Malecón, in Havana. I drive a newish Chevy. Now, why would I give all that up for Karl Marx and Fidel Castro? You tell me that Melba, or María, or whatever her name is, that she’s a communist. I didn’t know that. Maybe I should have asked her, only I prefer talking dirty when I’m in bed, not politics. She wants to go around shooting cops and American sailors, then I say she should go to jail.”
“Not very gallant of you,” said Captain Mackay.
“Gallant? What does it mean—‘gallant’?”
“Chivalrous.” The captain shrugged. “Gentlemanly.”
“Ah, cortés. Caballeroso. Yes, I see.” I shrugged back at him. “And how would that sound, I wonder. She was only trying to protect me? Give her a break, Captain, she’s just a kid? The girl had a tough childhood? All right. If it makes any difference, you know, I really think the girl was scared. Like I already said, you know what will happen when you hand her over to the local law. If she’s lucky, they’ll let her keep her clothes on when they parade her around the police cells. And maybe they’ll beat her with an ox-dick whip only every other day. But I doubt it.”
“You don’t sound too upset about it,” said the cop with dandruff.
“I’ll certainly pray for her. Maybe I’ll even pay for a lawyer. Experience informs me that paying is more useful than praying. The Lord and I don’t get on the way we used to.”
The captain sneered.
“I don’t like you, Hausner. The next time I speak to the Lord, I’m just liable to congratulate him on his good taste. You’ve got a job at the National Hotel? Fuck you. I never liked that damned hotel either. You’ve got a nice apartment on Malecón? I hope a hurricane comes and wipes it out, you Argentine cocksucker. You don’t care what happens to you? Neither do I, pal. To me you’re just another South American greaseball with a smart mouth. You can’t think of a better story? Then you’re dumber than you look. You used to be a cop yourself? I don’t want to know, you piece of shit. All I want to hear from you is an explanation for how it is that you were helping a murderer escape from this miserable fucking island you call home. Did someone ask you a favor? If they did, I want a name. Someone introduced you? I want a fucking name. You picked her off the sidewalk? Give me the name of the damned street, you asshole. It’s talk or lock, pal. Talk or lock. We went fishing tonight and we caught you, Hausner. And I get to toss you in my ice locker unless you tell me everything I want to know. Talk or lock and I throw away the fucking key until I’m satisfied there’s no information left in your lying body that you haven’t puked onto the goddamn floor. The truth? I don’t give a shit. You want to walk out of here? Give me some plain, straightforward facts.”