“We have been trying to be discreet in our movements, old grandfather.”
Federico nodded. They were being pursued by others like them. He would be a fool to put himself between such people, but the black man was very polite and it was obvious he was well educated. “Who looks for you?”
“Bad men, old grandfather,” said the black man.
And there was the age-old question of course, thought Federico. Bad men never thought they were bad, but everyone thought they were good. “And how am I to know that you are not the bad men and the people pursuing you the good?”
“You are a wise man, old grandfather, to ask such a question, but the answer is an easy one.”
“And what is the answer?”
“If we were the bad people, we would have blown you off your old burro by now and butchered his stringy old flesh for our dinner.”
The black man smiled.
Federico smiled. “That is a good answer,” he said. “Come with me to my home and we will talk and I will give you some food.” He put the willow switch lightly to Graciano’s neck and the burro moved slowly off again. Eddie and the others fell in behind him.
“That didn’t sound like any Spanish I ever heard,” whispered Carrie.
“That’s because it wasn’t Spanish—it was Cuban Creole,” said Black. “It’s the second language here and it goes back a long way.”
“Could you understand what Eddie was saying?”
“No, but it was obviously all the right things.”
28
Alfonsito’s finca, or farm, was located at the very end of the narrow little road in the mountains. There was a small cluster of plaster-covered single-story buildings that looked as though they had been a work in progress for a hundred years or so, a broken-backed small wooden barn and a pigpen with half-built walls of concrete blocks. The house was roofed with loose squares of rusted sheet metal, and the barn was thatched with woven banana leaves and cane.
Several small fields climbed up the slope behind the house and outbuildings. Holliday could see tobacco, tomatoes, potatoes, something green like spinach and even a spiky field of pineapples.
There were a pair of avocado trees ripe with fruit giving shade to the doorway of the farmhouse, and underneath one of the trees was a 1941 half-ton Dodge pickup that looked as though it might have been black at one point but which was now covered with a coat of uniform mud gray house paint.
The old Dodge was in excellent shape except for the frighteningly bald tires, and with a little work Alfonsito could probably get more money for the truck than for his entire farm. A dozen chickens poked about in the front yard, pecking at nothing. Off to the right was an adobe fire pit with a grease-encrusted grill. Heat was rising from it, which meant the coals had been lit some time ago.
Alfonsito slid off the burro, tying it to a low branch of one of the avocado trees. He led them into the main room of the house and threw open the shutters of the two windows to let in some light. There was a homemade table, four wooden chairs and a small bed in the corner.
Alfonsito spoke to Eddie. “Take the table and chairs outside. We will eat under the tree where it is cooler.”
“Certainly,” said Eddie. He explained what the old man had said and they began moving everything outside. Alfonsito stepped into a back room, disappearing from view.
“You think we can trust him?” Carrie asked.
“He’s offering his hospitality,” said Eddie. “That is trust enough for me.”
They took the table and chairs outside into the shade of the avocado and Alfonsito appeared a few moments later with a split and eviscerated suckling pig, which he laid on the grill.
Alfonsito disappeared again and came back in a few moments with a burlap sack and five tall plastic cups held in his spread fingers. The cups were old McDonald’s
He opened the burlap sack and ceremoniously removed five cool bottles of blue-labeled Mayabe beer. He set one bottle and one cup before each of his guests. He found an old wooden crate beside the door, upended it for a stool and then passed an old rusted bottle opener around the table. When all the beer had been passed around, he stood and lifted his bottle.
“It means ‘Drink, my friends,’” translated Eddie. The others all raised their bottles “
By early evening the team of scouts sent out by Turturro had returned with Veccione in tow, exhausted and suffering slightly from exposure but otherwise intact. Broadbent the Tucano pilot had searched until the light began to fail, but all he could find was an abandoned campsite and a clear trail heading northwest.
“They’re heading for the coast,” said Veccione. “I’d bet on it.” The “Therapist” gave a little wince of pain and his face darkened. “I’d like to get my hands on the savage son of a bitch who did that to Nick and the others.”
“Why didn’t he get you?”
“I was getting some kindling for a fire. I heard the commotion, so I bellied down and got as close as I could. It was too late. One against three and he took them all out. There was nothing I could do.”
“You had a sidearm.”
“It was holstered. He would have heard.”
“So you just watched him kill my men?”
“Fuck you, sir. They were already dead with their guts pouring out and their heads on poles. I didn’t think getting myself killed was going to be particularly useful.”
“So you bellied away?”
“I didn’t move a muscle until they were gone.”
“They?”
“The guy with the eye patch showed up about half an hour later. The black guy went off with him. I split.”
“Why do you think they’re headed for the coast?”
“Where else would they go? They know we’re after them. They flew in here with a crop duster, for Christ’s sake! They’re not equipped to get through army checkpoints on the highway, so they sure as hell aren’t going back to Havana.”
“The guy with the eye patch and the black came by boat up the Agabama River. What’s to stop them from doubling back?”
“They’d have to double back. They gotta know they’d run into us. Not to mention the fact that it’s almost a hundred miles downriver to the south coast. With this Viva Zapata shit we’ve stirred up, every Cuban patrol is going to be on edge.” Veccione winced again and moved on his cot to get more comfortable. He shook his head. “They have to be heading for the north coast. By now they’re not more than twenty-five or thirty miles from the Atlantic side.”
“Where?”
“Caibarien,” said Broadbent, the pilot, speaking for the first time. “I was studying the maps and charts when I got back. It’s the only place they could find a boat.”
Turturro looked at his watch. Forty-eight hours now before Point Zero, the code name for their operation, to begin in force. Holliday and the others had to be caught before then. “All right,” he said finally, “Caibarien it
