Suspicion of Rage (11 page)

"Un tipo va al infierno—"

Anthony translated: "A guy goes to hell, and he sees that every country has its own door. There is a hell for the Russians, a hell for the Chinese, a hell for the English, and so on. You have to pick a door. So first the guy goes to the American hell and asks what happens inside. The demon at the door says, 'Well, first they put you in an electric chair, then they put you on a bed of nails, and then they whip you with chains.' And the guy says, 'Oh, that's no good,' so he goes to the Japanese hell. He asks, 'What do they do to you in here?' "

Marta dumped the bread crumbs onto an empty plate. "My husband has the most stupid jokes."

Ramiro told her to be quiet. He resumed where he had left off Anthony said, "The Japanese demon says,'In here, they put you in an electric chair, then they put you on a bed of nails, and then they whip you with chains.' The guy thinks, 'That's exactly like the American hell.' So he goes to the other doors, and they're all the same. Then he sees a long line of people waiting to get into the Cuban hell, and he says to himself,
'Cono,
that's the place to be,' so he asks somebody in line, 'What do they do to you in here?' The man says, "They put you in an electric chair, then they put you on a bed of nails, and then they whip you with chains.' 'But that's the same as every other hell. Why is everybody trying to get in?' 'Well, my friend, in the Cuban hell, the electricity is off, the nails have been stolen, and the guy with the whip comes to work, punches in, and then leaves.' "

"Haaaaahhhh!" Ramiro Vega slapped his hand on the table so hard the silverware bounced on the plates. He leaned back in his chair with his hand on his chest. "Oh, my God. I love it!"

Laughter echoed off the terrazzo floor of the dining room, and the boy in the high chair shrieked and pounded on the tray.

Gail had already heard the joke—it was a favorite among the exiles—but she laughed anyway, more from incredulity that a Cuban army general would tell it, much less tell it to Americans.

Her mother fanned her face. "That is hysterical!"

"Oh, sure," Marta said. "They're going to put him on a comedy show in Miami."

He wiped his eyes and let out a chuckle, then a sigh. "What's the matter, mamita?" As Marta walked by, Ramiro grabbed her around the waist and said something in Spanish.

Anthony translated. "He says Marta laughs at his jokes but not if there are guests in the house."

Marta told her husband to let her go, she wanted to clear the dishes. Ramiro gave her a one-armed hug and a slap on her backside. Gail started to get up with her own plate and Anthony's, but Marta told her to sit down.

At the other end of the table, Luis Quintana felt his way across the lace tablecloth until his fingers found the bottle of rum. He connected his glass with the mouth of the bottle and poured. He had barely spoken during dinner. Irene had tried with her phrase book to talk to him, but his Spanish was idiomatic beyond comprehension. Now and then he had asked Anthony to help him with his food, but otherwise he seemed content to lean on the stump of his left arm and become quietly drunk.

Gail noticed her mother hiding a yawn behind her napkin, the result of the wine or the hour. It was past ten o'clock.

Ramiro Vega leaned across the table. "Irene! What are the three most big success of the Revolution?"

Irene blinked and focused on Ramiro. "Me? I don't know."

He counted them off. "Education. Medical. And sports. What are the three ... how you say, Tony?"

"Failures." Anthony had heard this one.

"Yes, yes, what are the three biggest failures?" Ramiro looked around at everyone. "Breakfast, lunch, and dinner!" He bellowed a laugh and clapped his hands together.

Marta stacked more plates. She said to Gail, "You see how we Cubans are. We laugh at our troubles. It's our national character. We're under siege, and we make jokes."

"Under siege?" Gail repeated.

"From the Americans," Marta said, as though three of them, including her brother, weren't sitting at her table. "Not you. I mean your government."

Gail was considering whether it would be rude to give her opinion, when Anthony said, "Marta, how about some coffee? And leave the politics in the kitchen, will you?"

Laughing at that, Ramiro went down the table to where his grandson sat in the high chair. He lifted the boy and tossed him in the air, babbling in nonsense verse and lifting his shirt to blow rude noises on his stomach.

Gail saw Anthony watching them. She could read his thoughts. How could Ramiro Vega possibly want to defect? To leave this house, this family? It was impossible. Anthony would return to Miami with bad news for Congressman Navarro and his mysterious friend from Washington.

A staccato click of heels came down the stairs in the living room. Janelle Vega swung around the railing at the bottom. She ran into the dining room wearing her new dress from the boutique in Coconut Grove. The dress was sleeveless, with a flounce at the bottom and a narrow waist. Too narrow. Gail saw with dismay that the buttons gaped, and the fabric rode up on her hips. The girl told everyone to look; wasn't it pretty? Her sister laughed, and Janelle told her to shut up.

Just then Marta came back with the tray of coffee. She set it on the table so she could look at the dress. She felt the fabric and tugged at the front. Gail guessed she was telling Janelle they could move the buttons over and let out the seams, and that Paula was saying no,
she
would take the dress because Janelle was too fat. Janelle's mouth turned down, wobbled, and opened in a cry of angry self-pity. The girls' father yelled at Paula, and their mother shouted at him to stop.

Gail murmured, "Oh, no. Anthony, I thought you told me the right size."

"I screwed up. How much did you pay for that?"

"Don't ask." Gail went to put an arm around Janelle, who was crying into a napkin. "Oh, Janelle, I'm so sorry. We'll buy you something else. Well go shopping right here in Havana. Anthony, please tell her."

He did, and Marta said, "No, no, don't worry about it. You give this to Karen. She's small. Janelle has enough clothes."

Ramiro said, "Marta, it's her birthday. If Gail wants to buy a dress, okay."

The girl raised her reddened eyes to her mother.
"Si, mami, por favor—"

Another argument broke out. Marta not wanting Janelle to be spoiled; Janelle pointing to Paula's good clothes; Paula saying what the hell was wrong with looking nice? Ramiro stalking off to the kitchen for another beer, coming back with two, tossing one to Paula's boyfriend. Luis saying a woman had a right to wear a pretty dress.

Gail and her mother exchanged a look. Irene mouthed the words,
What is going on?

Anthony motioned for Gail to lean closer. He said, "Tell her you'll take her to La Maison."

"What's that?"

"It's a store. Tell her."

Gail did, and Marta said no, they could go to the Carlos the Third shopping mall. That brought another sob from Janelle. Such terrible clothes there, everything so cheap and ugly. She wanted to go to La Maison.

Ramiro started yelling. Anthony said, "He's telling Marta to butt out, let Janelle go where she wants. You see, Gail, my sister doesn't think rich Americans should come in here and drop money on her kids. No, don't worry about it. She'll give in."

Gail slid back into her chair and whispered, "In about ten seconds I'm going to scream."

He shrugged and drank his wine.

It was decided: Gail could take Janelle to La Maison. Janelle threw her arms around Gail's neck and kissed her before running back across the living room, the sound of her pumps pounding, then diminishing, up the stone steps.

Ramiro said to Gail, "Thank you. You're very nice. My wife don't want to spend money for Janelle, but she's making a big party. The biggest. I have to sell my teeth for this party."
 

Marta snatched empty serving bowls off the table. "He hired someone to do the party for us, and now he doesn't like it."

"No, no, it's a good party. My wife don't like who does it."

"Ramiro forgot this is a
quinceañera.
That woman will make it look like a show from the Tropicana if I let her.
Qué desgracia"

They switched to Spanish, talking about each other to their guests, throwing accusations like spit wads. Gail glanced at Anthony for some explanation. He made a slight smile and said, "You'll get used to it."

"Oh, really?"

Ramiro told his wife to go get the coffee. He stood up with the wine bottle and reached over to top off Gail's glass yet again, then her mother's and Anthony's. He began to relate an off-color story about someone in the army who had served in Angola and came back with an African wife and found her sacrificing chickens in the bedroom.

Irene wasn't following the translation. Gail saw her eyes drift along the narrow, horizontal pieces of stone on the opposite wall, an architectural touch from the 1950s. Hanging on this wall was a beveled mirror in a gold metal frame. Under the mirror was a chrome beverage cart, and in a German beer stein on the cart someone had planted a lace umbrella with blue roses. From Paula's baby shower?

Such utter bewilderment settled on Irene's face that Gail had to look away. She felt a bubble of laughter rising in her chest and bit her lips to hold it in. Her mother kicked her under the table.
"Shhh."

Gail cleared her throat and sipped some wine.

It wasn't the decor that threatened to knock her off balance; it was just being here. This wasn't her family, not her culture, not her city. It was Anthony's, not hers. And maybe not even Anthony's. She wasn't sure if he really
liked
staying in this house or could tolerate it because he wasn't stuck here. They would be back in Miami soon, living in their minimalist apartment with the leather sofas and blond wood floors.

She reached for his hand. He was still listening to Ramiro's joke, but his fingers automatically closed around hers, warm and strong. When she leaned against his shoulder, he disengaged his hand and put his arm around her. Before dinner he had taken her into their room and said he was sorry they had argued. He had kissed her and said he loved her. There had been no time to talk, but even if there had been, Gail wasn't sure she could have found the words for what she really wanted to ask: Why do you come here? Is it because you can be yourself in Havana? Who is that? Do you think of me the same way here as in Miami?

He would say:
Gail, what are you talking about?

She wondered: Could love be true in one place and not another?

Marta came back with a battered
cafetera.
Holding a dish towel to catch the drips, she poured an ounce or two of coffee into each tiny, rose-decorated porcelain cup on the tray. She had put a plate of almond candy on the tray as well.

Gail wished she could apologize, but she wasn't sure for what.
Maria, I'm sorry for laughing at the umbrella. And for the missing toilet seat. You're a wonderful hostess.
Blinking to focus her vision, she put down her wineglass. She'd had too much of it already. Her head was starting to float.

A glow lit the windows across the front of the house. The glow became brighter, moved across the glass, then went out. A car, Gail thought. Someone had arrived. At the same moment she heard the front door open. Ramiro's driver appeared at the opening to the living room.

Interrupting himself in the middle of another story, Ramiro watched Cobo as he came around the table. Cobo leaned down and murmured in his ear. The family fell silent, and Marta turned her head toward the front of the house. She asked who was there.

"Es Garcia."
Ramiro took his paper towel out of his shirt collar and laid it on the table. His back had straightened; his movements were quick and precise. He told Cobo to get the door.

Gail leaned closer to Anthony. "Who's Garcia?"

Quietly he said, "General Abdel Garcia. Very close to Fidel. I've heard about him, never met him."

Ramiro's grin returned. "He's my boss."

Luis Quintana roused himself from his fog and lined
his head, asking if it was true that General Garcia was here. Here in this house? Marta told her father yes, yes, it was true, and be quiet. She brushed a hand across his shirtfront and straightened her hair.

Mumbling to himself, Luis found his glass and emptied it.

The door opened. Closed. The measured tap of General Garcia's heels preceded him. His shoes gleamed. The olive-green uniform had knife-edge creases in the trousers and a rectangle of ribbons on the long-sleeved shirt. The collar was open. There were two stars on each shoulder. He held a green cloth cap, which he beat slowly into the other palm, a cadence that matched his stride. He stopped a few paces away from the table.

Garcia was a man of medium height, mid-fifties, clean shaven, with clipped gray hair. His small black eyes glistened like onyx. He had an oddly shaped face, narrow at the brow, wide at the cheekbones, which were high and sharp. There was something wrong with his jaw. His square, jutting chin was off center. When he slowly turned his head to look from one end of the table to the other, Gail saw a scar. It went from the underside of his chin to his left earlobe, which seemed to have melted to his face.

Chairs scraped the floor as the family stood. Paula put the baby on her hip. Anthony stood as well, but put a hand on Gail's shoulder, a signal to remain seated. Irene got up halfway, then slowly sat again.

Gail shivered; the temperature had fallen, Logic told her it wasn't because of this visitor. The sliding door was open to the terrace; the night air had come in. Even so, she was chilled. She detected, or imagined, as his tilted eyes passed over her, a predator's quick dismissal, as if she were a small animal not worth swallowing.

Garcia spoke. An apology. He had just come from a meeting. It was so late. . .This was followed by a murmuring among the family. Marta said it was a pleasure
 
to see him again. Ramiro introduced everyone. Marta's
 
cheeks were pink with pleasure. She asked General
 
Garcia if he had eaten. Would he like coffee?