"I know he's a fascist pig. Why?"
"Why? For the love of God, Jaime, if you can give me the proof, we
can ..." He told Lobo about the plans of Lavandero and the anti-fascists
in San Hermano.
"I understand," Lobo said. "I've already sent for the dossier on
Ansaldo. It should be here in a few minutes. But while we're waiting,
there are a few things I'd like to show you." He opened the drawer in
his desk and took out an automatic wrapped in a brown-silk handkerchief.
"Take a look at this gun," he said, "but don't touch. I want to save the
fingerprints."
"What about it?" Hall asked.
"Oh, nothing. I thought you might know something about it. The hell with
it. But tell me, Mateo, when did you get to town?"
"This evening."
"Panair?"
"Sure, why?"
"Then you're staying at the Jefferson, registered as Victor Ortiz
Tinoco, eh?"
"My God," Hall laughed. "That's my gun!"
"That was your gun, _chico_. It is now Cuban Government Exhibit A in the
case against your brains. So you had it all figured out, my boy. You'd
come to Havana with fake papers, put up at an out-of-the-way hotel,
check your gun with the hotel management, shoot the Spanish Ambassador,
and then plant the gun in my back pocket and blow town on your
diplomatic Mexican passport. But you reckoned without two suspicious and
smart young second lieutenants from Oriente Province."
"What was my fatal mistake, chief?"
"Your accent and the cardinal stupidity of giving your attache case to
the desk clerk. He's a communist from Oriente. The weight made him
suspicious, and he called his friends in my office. Only he guessed from
your accent that you were a Spaniard, and that the gun was for the
purpose of shooting up the Mexican Embassy."
"You know what Jefferson said about eternal vigilance being the price of
liberty, Jaime."
"Sure. Jefferson and the natural shrewdness of a peasant from Oriente
Province. Of course the minute I saw the report describing Ortiz Tinoco
as a Spaniard with scars on the face, a broken nose, and big feet which
took him directly to the Casa de la Cultura, I knew it was Matthew Hall
in a beard."
"Yeah. Of course my phone calls every fifteen minutes didn't give you
any idea."
"They helped, my boy. I'll admit that." He took the envelope bearing
Androtten's pictures and fingerprints from his desk. "Who is this
individual? He looks as if he is very seriously dead."
"I brought that envelope here for you, Jaime. He was shot three days ago
in San Hermano, but I'm afraid I broke his nose before he died. That
other picture of him with his family and the letter from the Dutch
Government-in-Exile might be more interesting."
"Wilhelm Androtten? Sounds like a brand of gin. Why did you kill him?"
"He's a Nazi, Jaime. He was trying to kill me."
General Lobo took some notes as he listened to Hall's account of
Androtten's role in the Ansaldo mission. "I guess the first thing to do
is to find out if the letter from Queen Wilhelmina is genuine. But it
still wouldn't prove anything. The Nazi, if he was an agent, could have
picked the name Androtten from a casualty list and then written to the
Dutch Government in the name of the soldier's father. I'll check the
photos and the fingerprints here, and also with American F.B.I. and the
British. The F.B.I. has been very good lately. They've helped out
terrifically here with technical things."
A green light on Lobo's desk began to flicker. "It's the file room," he
said. "I guess they have the Ansaldo dossier." He called the lieutenant
on the inter-phone, told him to bring in the Ansaldo dossier.
The dossier was not very long. It told the story how, in the winter of
1938, a prominent Cuban Falangist in the best of health had suddenly
taken to bed with a "serious complaint." His family announced to friends
that they had sent to Spain for a great doctor, one Varela Ansaldo. They
said Ansaldo cured the Cuban, to be sure, but he also had long private
sessions with the leaders of the Falange at the Spanish Embassy and,
before he returned to Franco Spain, the Falange in Cuba had undergone a
complete shake-up of its leadership. There were pictures of Ansaldo, but
alone and in plain clothes.
"Are these the only pictures?" Hall asked.
"Perhaps not. We took about three thousand feet of movie film from the
Inspector General of the Falange for Latin America when he tried to
escape to Spain on a C.T.E. ship two years ago. Let's look at them, old
man." He pressed a key in his inter-phone box. "Pablo," he barked, "set
up those Villanueva films in the machine. I'm coming in in ten minutes."
"I didn't think of that film," Hall confessed. "Every time you were
supposed to show it to me, something came up, remember?"
Lobo was barking into the inter-phone again. "Teniente, scare up two
cold bottles of champagne for the theater, will you? We have a thirst
that is killing us."
"Are you screening the film in a theater?"
"No. It's a crime laboratory the F.B.I. installed for us. The whole
works. Wait till you see it, Matt. It's just like Hollywood. Colossal!"
"And the champagne?"
"That's my own contribution. I'll be damned if I can stop drinking
champagne in the middle of a party just because Johnny Green Moon drags
me out. Come on, let me show you the joint." He led Hall on a ten-minute
Cook's tour of the crime laboratory, his patter a slightly off-color
imitation of an American tourist guide's spiel. A small beaded screen
had been pulled down from the ceiling, facing two chromium-and-leather
lounge chairs. When the lieutenant brought in the champagne in two ice
buckets, General Lobo signaled the soldier in the tiny projection booth
to start the film.
There was everything but a shot of Ansaldo.
"He was too smart, the _cabron_," Lobo said. "Let's go back to my office
and think it over." He poured what remained of the champagne into Hall's
glass.
On the way back to his office, he asked the lieutenant to join Hall and
himself. "Lieutenant," he said, "here are some pictures and data on a
man named Wilhelm Androtten, and some notes I made. Put them all through
the mill--our own files, F.B.I., the British. Check the papers and
letters of Villanueva and Alvarez Garcia for any reference to Varela
Ansaldo. And give me a report by noon tomorrow. Anything else you can
think of for the moment, Mateo?"
"One thing. Those pictures of Gamburdo at the secret Falange dinner in
San Hermano. Remember it? I want about six microfilm negatives of each
shot."
"Give them to me with your report, Lieutenant."
The young officer accepted the papers, saluted smartly, and left.
"There's one place in Havana where I can get that picture, Jaime," Hall
said. "The Spanish Embassy has a complete file of the Spanish _Arriba_,
and I'll stake my life on that picture of Ansaldo's being in that file."
"So?"
"Listen, Jaime, I don't know if I'll have to examine that file. I won't
know until some time tomorrow morning. There's an outside chance that
old man Nazario has the _Arriba_ we need in his collection at the
University. But please, Jaime, if I do have to go through the files on
Oficios Street, I don't want any of your excellent boys from Oriente
Province giving me a nice case of Cuban lead poisoning."
Lobo, who had opened his collar and draped his long feet over his desk,
stopped smiling. He put his feet on the floor, buttoned the tunic
collar. "You don't understand," he said, speaking to Hall in Spanish for
the first time that evening. "In there, with the foolish movies, I make
foolish sayings. At the circus Lobo becomes the clown. But please
remember, Mateo, that I am a Latin American. My own people were driven
out of Spain by the spiritual forefathers of the Falange. I know what
will happen to Latin America if the Falange crowd wins out anywhere."
"I know you do, Jaime."
"I'm not always the playboy, Mateo. I know what my chief means to the
little nations of the Caribbean. I know what Don Anibal means to every
country south of Miami. I love Don Anibal. I love you because you love
my chief and my people and Don Anibal. _Claro?_"
"Thanks, Jaime. Then you'll tell your men I'm O.K.?"
"On the contrary, my friend. I must tell them much more than that."
"Thanks. I'll try not to make any trouble. No international incidents."
"If you don't have to shoot." Lobo became gay again. "Ay, Senor Ortiz
Tinoco," he sighed, "you might want to shoot, but you are without a
shooter to shoot with. My men are too good for you. They stole your
gun."
"They are very good men, my general."
"They have a good chief. But look, friend, in this drawer. I have a
treasure for you." He emptied the contents of a canvas bag on the desk.
"Ay, Senor Ortiz Tinoco, when I relieved Jefe Villanueva of his
super-production, I also took his gun. Such a wonderful little Swiss
automatic, built to be carried in a lady's purse or a horse's--ear. And
such a dainty Spanish leather shoulder holster. You would be a fool not
to accept this outfit in return for your gigantic cannon."
Hall took off his jacket. "It's a deal," he said. "Help me get the
holster on."
"Where are you going when you get the picture--if you get it, Mateo?"
"Caracas. Someone is meeting me there."
The General laughed. "Caracas? Ay, we'll get you back to Caracas in
style, _chico_." He opened his cigar box, held it out in front of Hall.
"By the way, Mateo," he said, "I never asked you before. Are you a Red?"
"No. I'm a Red, White and Blue Kid. Why?"
"Your government. Your embassy in San Hermano was sure that Pepe Stalin
was paying for your rice and beans. They asked your Embassy here to
check on you with me."
"What did you tell them?"
"Naturally, I told them that you were an agent. _Si_, senor! I told them
that you were a triple agent: mornings for the Kuomintang, afternoons
for the Grand Llama of Tibet, and evenings for the Protocols of Zion.
You'd better be careful when you get back to New York."
"You bastard!"
"Where are you going now? Me, I'm going right back to that party. I
promised a certain Vassar female, in my halting English, that I would be
back. Can I drop you anywhere?"
"I'm going to the Casa de la Cultura."
"Good. But listen, Mateo, give me at least five hours' notice if you
decide to do any scholarly research on Oficios Street, eh? _Vamonos._"
_Chapter sixteen_
Don Anibal Tabio died at ten o'clock the next morning. He died on the
operating table, under Ansaldo's knife.
Hall was in Santiago's office when Eduardo Sanchez called at eleven to
say that an AP flash had just come through in the newspaper's wire room.
"Call me when the next bulletin comes through," he said, slowly. "We
have to know what Gamburdo and Lavandero are planning." Somehow,
although he had known for days that Tabio's hours were numbered, it was
hard to swallow his friend's dying on Ansaldo's terms. He was too
stunned to wonder how Gamburdo had finally won out. For a moment, there
was a sensation of sudden emptiness; this gave way to a sense of horror
and rage.
"Poor Anibal," he said. "Charging the arrows of the Falange with only
the white plume of Truth in his thin hands."
"He was your friend, wasn't he?" Santiago said. "He was a very great
man."
"Yes."
"Would you like a drink, Mateo?"
"No, later. Call de Sola again. Tell him to hurry up. I'm going to the
Mexican Embassy. I have to leave an envelope with the secretary. I'll be
back in less than an hour."
"_Bueno._" The Spaniard walked to the door with Hall. "There has been a
good change in you, Mateo," he said. "I remember the day when such a
blow would have sent you off like a wild bull. It is better to fight
them back the new way, no?"
"You should know, Colonel Iglesias. You should know." Hall stopped off
at a bar on the way to his hotel for a quick double brandy to steady his
nerves.
The manager of the Jefferson avoided Hall's eyes when he handed the
attache case back to him. "The senor will notice that the seal is
unbroken?" he asked.
"It is a new seal," Hall said. "But be tranquil. I was present at Secret
Police Headquarters when the seal was broken. And please tell your clerk
that I am not angry with him." He put the case under his arm and took a
cab to the Mexican Embassy.
There was more bad news when Hall returned to the Casa. The files of
Franco publications kept by Doctor Nazario at the University had also
failed to produce the needed picture of Ansaldo. And a messenger from
Eduardo Sanchez had brought for Hall a copy of the first AP bulletin
from San Hermano.
Hall read the bulletin aloud for Santiago and Rafael. "The wily
bastard!" he said, reading how Gamburdo had decreed six days of official
mourning and a national election on the seventh day following Tabio's
death. "'As our beloved Educator's chosen deputy and successor, I can
promise the people of the Republic a continuation of the peace which was
ours under Don Anibal's wise leadership. I can promise that any
warmongers who would destroy this great blessing left to the nation by
Don Anibal will immediately feel the wrath of the government. It was
Anibal Tabio's last wish that our Republic be spared from suffering the
ravages of a war that is neither of our making nor of our choosing.'"
"I hate politicos," Rafael said. "They are a stench in the nostrils of
decent people."
"Tabio was a politico, too," Santiago said, sharply. "What else does it
say, Mateo?"
"It says that the Radicals and the Nationals have already nominated
Gamburdo. The Progressives and the Communists are meeting this afternoon
to select Lavandero as their candidate, and the Socialists are asking
both candidates for guarantees against Bolshevism before making up their
minds. The Traditional Nationalist Action Party--that's the Cross and
the Sword--are out a hundred per cent for Gamburdo."
"What the hell are the Socialists stalling for?" Rafael shouted. "Where
are their brains?"
"You mean," Santiago answered, gently, "where is their socialism?"
"Listen to this," Hall said. "'The body of the President will lie in
state for six days in the Great Hall of Congress. Acting President
Gamburdo has ordered a hand-picked elite corps of army and navy officers
to maintain a twenty-four-hour watch over the bier.' An elite corps for
Don Anibal!
"And listen to this: 'In the name of the Republic, Acting President
Gamburdo thanked the noted surgeon, Varela Ansaldo, for his last-hour
effort to save the life of the late President, and announced that he
would recommend to the Congress that Dr. Ansaldo and his assistant, Dr.
Marina, be given formal decorations. Gamburdo revealed that Ansaldo, who
came to San Hermano at his urgent pleas, left the mourning capital at
noon on the first leg of a flying voyage to Lisbon where he is to
perform a delicate operation on a prominent jurist.'"
"They got away!" Rafael said.
"It's not so bad," Hall said. "That is, it won't be if ..."
"Of course, Mateo. If we can pin the arrows on Ansaldo after this
statement," Santiago said, "it will be very hard for Gamburdo to explain
to anyone. Especially since you have that picture of Gamburdo at the
secret Falange dinner."
"I have more than that. I have a copy of the report the Inspector
General of the Falange made about Gamburdo at that dinner, and it's
written on official stationery. We've just got to get more on Ansaldo!"
"Are you still against raiding the Embassy, Rafael?"
"I changed my mind. When do we do it? Tonight?"
"I hope so, Rafael, you'll have to find Dr. More. I think you'll catch
him in at the clinic now. Tell him to get Rivas and bring him to his own
house in Vedado."