Cuba (14 page)

forward through the wheelhouse windshield.

“Look, you bastardea”…Ocho ordered through clenched

teeth, and grabbed the smaller man by the

neck. He rammed his head forward against the glass.

“See what your greed and stupidity have cost.”

Then he threw Diego Coca to the floor.

The impact of the disaster bowed Ocho’s head, bent his

back, emptied his heart. Diego’s guilt did

not lessen his, and oh, he knew that well. He,

Ocho Sedano, was

guilty.

His lust had set this chain of events in motion. He

felt as if he were trying to support the weight of the

earth.

Maximo Sedano’s office in the finance ministry

reflected his personal taste. The furniture was

simple, deceptively so. The woods were

hardwoods from the Amazon rain forest, crafted in

Brazil by masters. Little souvenirs from his travels

across Europe and Latin America sat on the

desk and credenza and hung on the walls, small

things of little value because expensive trinkets would be

impolitic.

He turned on the light, then walked to the huge

floor safe, which he unlocked attd opened. He

found the drawer he wanted, removed a stiff

document envelope, took it to his desk and

adjusted the light.

With the contents of the envelope spread out on the highly

polished mahogany, Maximo Sedano paused and

looked around the room with unseeing eyes. He

blinked several times, then leaned back in his chair and

stretched.

There were four bank accounts in Switzerland, all

controlled by Fidel Castro. The last time

Maximo computed the interest, the amount in the accounts

totaled $53 million. Castro had been very

specific when the accounts were opened years ago; the

accounts were to be denominated in United States

dollars. This choice had worked out extraordinarily

well through the years as the currencies of every other

major trading nation underwent major inflation or

devaluation. The United States dollar was the

modern-day equivalent of gold, although it would

certainly be poor pol-

COONTS

itics for any member of the Castro regime to say

so publicly.

Fifty-three million dollars.

Quite a sum.

Enough to live extraordinarily well for a millennium

or two.

Fidel kept that little nest egg in

Switzerland just in case things went wrong here in this

communist paradise and he had to skedaddle. No

sense living on government charity in some other

squalid communist paradise, like Poland or

Russia or the Ukraine, when a little prior

planning could solve the whole problem. So Fidel

rat-holed a fortune where only he could get at it

and slept soundly at night.

Now he wanted the money back in Cuba.

Not that the money ever really belonged to the Cuban

government. The money came from drug dealers, fees

for using Cuban harbors for sanctuary, fees for

being able to send shipments directly to Cuba,

stockpile the drugs, then ship them on when the time was

right.

The money was really just Castro’s personal share of the

drug fees. An even larger chunk of the profits

had gone to army, navy and law enforcement personnel,

all of them, every man in the country who wore a

uniform had been paid; another chunk went

to Castro’s lieutenants and political allies.

Maximo had received almost a half million

dollars himself. All in all, the deals with the drug

syndicates had been good public policythe drug

business was highly profitable, giving

Castro money to buy loyalty and so remain in

power, and the business corrupted America, which he

hated. Ah, yes, the money came from the United

States despite the best efforts of the American

government to prevent it. Fidel had savored that

irony too.

Fifty-three million.

Maximo pursed his. lips as he thought about the

life of luxury and privilege that a fortune that

size would buy. The money could be invested, some

hotels, bank stock, invested to earn a nice

income without touching the principal.

He could stay in the George V in Paris, ski

in St. Moritz, shop in London and Rome and

yacht all over the Mediterranean.

God, it was tempting!

Fifty-three million.

All he had to do was get Castro’s thumbprint on

the transfer order. Without that thumbprint, the banks

would not move a solitary dollar.

Really, those Swiss banks … Maximo had

urged Castro to transfer the money to Spanish and

Cuban banks for months, ever since the dictator

was diagnosed with cancer. If he died with the

money still in Switzerland, prying money out of those

banks was going to be like peeling fresh paint from a

wall with fingernails. And the drug dealers thought their

racket was profitable!

But why be a piker? Why settle for $53

million when there was a lot more, somewhere?

From his pocket he removed a coin, a gold

five-peso coin dated 1915. There was a

portrait of Josd Marti on one side and the

crest of Cuba on the other.

Gold circulated in Cuba until the

revolution, until Fidel and the communists declared it

was no longer legal tender and called it in, allowing

the peso to float on the world market.

Maximo rubbed the gold coin with his fingers. By his

calculations, based upon Ministry of Finance

records, almost 1.2 million ounces of gold were

surrendered to the government in return for paper

money.

One million, two hundred thousand ounces …

about thirty-seven

tons

of gold. On the world market, that thirtyseven tons

of gold should be worth about $360 million.

A man who could get his hands on that hoard

would be on easy street for the rest of his life.

Yes, indeed.

The only problem was finding it. It wasn’t in the

Finance Ministry vaults, it wasn’t in the

vaults of the Bank of Cuba, on account at

banks in Switzerland or London or New

York or Mexico City … it was gone!

Thirty-seven tons of gold, vanished into thin

air.

If a man could lay hands on that gold… well,

Alejo Vargas and Hector Sedano could fight

over the presidency of Cuba, and may the better

man win. Maximo would take the gold. If he

could find it.

He had a few ideas about where it might be. In

fact, he had been quietly researching the problem

since he took over the Finance Ministry. Eight

years of ransacking files, talking to old

employees, looking at clues, thinking about the

problemthe gold had to be in Cuba, in Havana.

Thirtyseven tons of gold.

A-life of ease and luxury in the spas of

Europe, mingling with the rich and famous, surrounded

by beautiful women and the best of everything …

But first the $53 million.

He would type the account numbers on the transfer

orders and the accounts the money was to be transferred

to. He would use the secretary’s typewriter.

He had the account numbers written in the notebook

he removed from the safe. He flipped through the

notebook now, found the page, stared at the

numbers.

How closely would Fidel check the order?

The man is sick, drugged, dying. He is barely

conscious. Unless he has the numbers of the accounts in

the Bank of Cuba by his bedside, he ‘II be

none the wiser.

But what if he does? What if he has the

numbers written down in a book or diary and hands

the transfer order to Mercedes to check? What then?

Fifty-three million. More money than God

has.

He remembered the old days when he was young, when

Castro walked the earth like Jesus Christ with a

Cuban accent. Ah, the fire of the revolution, how

the true believers were going to change the world!

Instead, time changed them, America bled them, and

life defeated them.

Maximo had been loyal to Fidel and the

revolution. No one could ever say he was

not. He had been with Fidel

since he was twenty-four years old, just back from the

university in Spain. He had endured the good times

and the bad, never uttered a single word of criticism.

He had faith in Fidel, proclaimed it

publicly and demanded it of others.

Now Castro was dying. In just a few days he would be

beyond regrets.

Fifty-three million.

The pounding the overloaded boat had taken buckjng

the heavy Gulf Stream swells opened the seams

somewhat, and now the fisherman was pumping out the water

with the bilge pump, which received its power from the

enginedriven generator.

“As long as we can keep the engine running, as long

as the seams don’t open any more than they are,

we’ll be all right.”

“How much fuel do we have on board?”

The fisherman went to check.

Ocho was at the helm, steering almost due east. With the

wind and sea behind her, the

Angel del Mar

rode better. Now the motion was a rocking as the

swells swept under the stern. Very little roll from”

side to side.

Of the eighty-four people who had been aboard when the

boat left the harbor in Cuba, twenty-six

remained alive. The captain’s body lay against the

wheelhouse wall.

Ocho found Diego’s pistol and put it in his

belt. He physically carried Diego from the

wheelhouse and tossed him on the deck.

Fifty-seven living human beings, men, women, and

babies, had gone into the sea. There was no way in the

world to go back to try to rescue them. Even if he

and the fisherman could find those people in the water, in the

darkness, in this sea, the pounding of heading back into the

swells would probably cause the boat to take on

more water, endangering the lives of those who remained

aboard.

No, the people swept overboard were lost to their fate,

whatever that might be.

The living twenty-six would soon join them, Ocho

told himself. The boat was heading east, away from

Florida.

Perhaps if the sea calmed somewhat, they should bring the

boat to a more southerly heading and return to Cuba.

That, he decided, was their only chance.

Cuba. They would have to return.

Why wait? Every sea mile increased the

likelihood of the engine quitting or the boat

sinking.

He turned the helm a bit, worked the boat’s bow

to a more southerly heading. The roll became, more

pronounced. The wind came more over the right stern

quarter.

How long until dawn? An hour or two?

The door to the wheelhouse opened. Diego was standing

there, the whites of his eyes glistening in the dim

light. “Turn back toward Florida! No one

wants to go back to Cuba.”

“It’s the only way. We’ll all die trying

to make it to Florida in this sea.”

“I was dead in Cuba all those yearsea”…Diego

Coca shouted. “I refuse to go go back! I

refuse.”

Ocho hit him in the mouth. One mighty jab with his

left hand as he twisted his body, so all his weight

was behind the punch. Diego went down backward, hit

his head on the deck coaming, and lay still.

Dora wailed, crawled toward her unconscious

father.

Ocho closed the door to the wheelhouse, brought the

boat back to its southeast heading.

Soon the door opened again and the fisherman

stepped inside. “We have fuel for another ten or

twelve hours. No more than that.”

“We’ll be back hi Cuba then.”

caret That’s our only chance.”

The stars in the east were fading when the engine quit.

After trying for a minute to start the engine, the fisherman

dashed below.

Ocho abandoned the helm. The boat rolled

sickeningly in the swells.

At least the swells were smaller than they were earlier

in the night, m the middle of the Gulf Stream.

The fisherman came up on deck after fifteen

minutes, his clothes soaked in diesel fuel.

“It’s no useea”…he said. “The engine has had it.”

“What about the water in the bilges? Is it still coming

in?”

“We’ll “have to take turns on the hand pump.”

“What are we going to do about the engine”…”…Ocho asked.

The fisherman didn’t reply, merely stood

looking at the swells as the sky grew light in the

east.

The van drove up to the massive,

250-feet-tall extra-highvoltage tower beside the

drainage canal on the southern outskirts

of Havana and backed up toward it. The base of the

tower was surrounded by a ten-foot-high-chain link fence

with barbed wire on top. The access door in the

fence was, of course, padlocked.

The driver of the van and his passenger were both wearing

one-piece overalls. They stretched, looked at the

wires far above, and scratched their heads while they

surveyed the ramshackle four-story apartment

buildings that backed up to the canal. One of the men

extracted a pack of cigarettes from his overalls