Assassin's Honor (9781561648207) (41 page)

I happened to be closest to the man and grabbed his right arm. Jerking it around and behind, I forced him to bend over, precluding any resistance. Rork brushed Cano out of the way and seized the left arm. Our efforts weren't needed, though, for the man didn't resist at all as we headed for the house. He only continued his mumbling, which I now could make out to be repeated apologies in Spanish for what he had done.

Cano's legal mindset came to the front and he took over, trying to interview the assassin for the details of his name and home, involvement in the crime, and location of his black partner. But the man continued blubbering, as if he was catatonically unaware of the tumult around him or questions posed to him.

The commotion had built considerably since the first shouts. Within seconds, there were twenty or thirty enraged men around us, trying to elbow their way to the assassin. Several had pistols, one had a rope. Their faces were inflamed by bloodlust, making them almost demented in appearance. There were no more frantic shouts. The crowd had become more sinister, snarling deep-pitched demands for instantaneous vengeance.

It was at this rather dicey juncture that our prisoner broke his monotone mantra and made a bizarre request—he wanted to
apologize to Martí personally.

Cano was the quickest to respond. He told Rork and me to walk the man to the front porch. He told the surrounding vigilantes none of them would touch the prisoner because he would inform Martí of the situation. Their leader would decide the issue. The invocation of that magic name was a smart move, for no Cuban dared to contradict or obstruct Martí, and the men parted to let us by.

Accordingly, Rork and I deposited our charge into a chair in the parlor and stood guard over him. Cano and Ruperto Pedroso had cleared most of the entourage out of the parlor, so we had some room to breathe and maneuver. Another trusted man was put at the front door to keep out the swelling mob.

Ruperto, still guarding entry to the stairwell, was the most crazed of them all. His pistol was held in the open as he glared at the prisoner and fidgeted to the point where I feared it would go off accidently. Quite reluctantly, I moved to stand in front of the prisoner, hoping my presence might calm Ruperto down a bit by removing his target from sight. It didn't work. Martí's surrogate father figure still kept the pistol aimed at a spot on the floor six feet in front of me, his maniacal gaze going right through me to the target behind.

Cano had left Rork and me alone to face this standoff, for he was upstairs explaining the matter to Martí—academic to academic, so to speak. After what seemed like a very long time, he returned and told me the doctor said Martí had a good chance to recover, if he rested. Then Cano calmly told Ruperto that Rork and I were bringing the man upstairs, and Ruperto was to remain at his guard post—all this being the wishes of Martí.

With Rork's help, I gingerly steered the prisoner around Ruperto and his revolver, and started up the stairs, Cano preceding us. At the entrance of the bedroom, Dr. Barbarossa shook his head in protest, but waved us through.

The scene had changed. Martí was still in bed, but now was clothed and had clean sheets. Flowers scented the air. Bottles of
water, wine, and gin were arranged on a nearby table, along with an assortment of medical vials, ampules, and powder boxes.

The great man himself still looked to be on death's doorstep. He raised a weak arm and beckoned me over. His voice was yet hoarse, but a bit stronger. And the dry wit was still strong. “My dear Neptune . . . I see . . . you have been . . . fishing on the street. What did you . . . catch?”

“This one jumped in my hands, José. He wants to apologize and appears sincere.”

He smiled. “You have always been a . . . good judge of . . . character, Peter. And now, I will ask . . . everyone to leave me . . . alone . . . with this man. He and I need to . . . talk, privately.”

“What if I am wrong, José? I was terribly wrong before. How about if I remain?”

Paulina arrived in the room with a damp towel for Martí's forehead. She refused to look anywhere near the assassin. Her patient said thank you and bade her return downstairs. Then he repeated his statement to me, this time making it an order, and saying he wanted the door closed too.

No one argued.

Ybor City, Florida
Saturday morning
17 December 1892

Outside the door, we strained to listen through the wood. I could hear the assassin's tearful apologies at first, then Martí asking his reasoning for doing the deed. Infuriatingly, after that the conversation became muted. We eavesdroppers were joined by Ruperto, who had fortunately jammed the revolver into his belt, his temper still barely held in check as he placed his ear to the door.

Below, the parlor filled again. Ominous grumbling emanated upward, making me even more nervous. Rork and I were in an impossible position, tactically, if things went the way I feared they might. The assassin's safety was expendable, as far as I was concerned. I was worried about
us
, since we were the only Anglos
in sight, and had been the killer's escorts. In my experience, crazed mobs seldom listen to logic.

An hour went by, with ever-heightening tension. The crowd below grew louder in their debate, which centered on not if, but when, the assassin was released to their clutches, and the best method of execution for the perpetrator. I heard no one counsel a legal remedy through the courts. No police had been called yet in this whole affair, and it appeared to me they never would be. I could tell Cano, himself a foreigner in a
yanqui
land, was worried as well.

By my pocket watch, the door opened one hour and twenty-two minutes after we'd let the assassin have a private interview with his victim. Martí himself stood there, holding up a hand to stop the rush into the room of men wanting to carry out the wish of every Cuban in the house.

“Do not harm this man,” Martí raspingly commanded us in Spanish, looking directly at Ruperto and Paulina. “He has made amends. He is now one of us, a brother Cuban, who has pledged to fight for our cause of liberty. This man will be there helping to lead the forces of freedom, when we rise up in the island for our independence. Let no one, Cuban or North American, doubt him or harass him in any way. The validity of our cause is at stake.”

Martí reached out for me and I took his hand. His sunken eyes were sad, pleading. With a frail voice, he spoke to me in English, “Peter, I must ask you a great favor. Please see this man is given safe passage away from Ybor City and Tampa. Get him to Key West. Once there, your responsibility will end. I have given him the name of a man there he can trust to get him to Cuba.”

He was running out of steam quickly, but he had more. “I have told him . . . to keep his . . . previous name unknown, for his life has . . . started anew. If somehow you do discover his . . . name, it is . . . crucial . . . you do not . . . reveal it to anyone. More . . . than most, Peter, you . . . understand the . . . necessity . . . 
for this. I trust you. Will . . . you . . . do this . . . for me?”

There was no time to discuss the finer points of his request, or the consequences of saying yes, or how the hell I would actually accomplish the job. When news of the door opening was learned down below, the stairwell promptly jammed with men, every one of them vocally demanding to lay a hand on the prisoner. None of them heard Martí's conciliatory words.

“Yes, José,” I answered. “I will take him with me.”

His shoulders slumped as if all the air left his body. “Ah . . . then I . . . can . . . rest easier . . . now. Thank you . . . my friend.”

“The worm deserves death,” someone said from below, an opinion endorsed by several others. The mob pushed higher on the stairs.

“No!” shouted Martí, starling me. Using his last degree of stamina to make his words heard, the great orator told the men in the stairwell, “For me, this man's honor is redeemed! He deserves the . . . opportunity to prove himself . . . worthy of our cause. Yes, he was weak . . . and made . . . a bad error. Who among you . . . have not made . . . an error, by omission . . . or by commission? Who among . . . you . . . is . . . perfect?”

Dr. Barbarossa, his face red with anger, ended the argument. “Just do what our country's leader says and stop aggravating his condition!”

The doctor took Martí by the arm back inside the room to his bed. The assassin stood in the middle of the room, his face a study in misery. I walked in and asked him if he spoke English, to which he replied yes.

To Cano and Rork, I murmured, “Mario, please clear the way out of the house for us. Rork and I will escort this man out. When we get on the street, get the first wagon you can and we'll use it to get out of Ybor City.”

Both nodded curtly and Cano started down the stairs, ordering the men to clear a way. I brought my Merwin-Hulbert “skull-crusher” revolver out into plain sight and Rork did the same with his 10-gauge pump shotgun, retrieved from the sea
bag still slung on his shoulder. With me ahead of the pardoned man and Rork astern, we pushed our way down to the parlor and out to the street.

The day was getting surprisingly warm. Dust from the dry sandy street floated in the air. Cano met us in the middle of the street, saying in exasperation there were no wagons or carriages in sight, and he couldn't get anyone to bring us one. The mob had spread out on our flanks by then, but stayed several paces away, discouraged by Rork's leveled shotgun and grimly set jaw. Cano admitted to being at a loss for an idea of how to escape with our charge. The man in question just stood there, saying and doing nothing, staring listlessly at the ground, waiting to be killed.

Not anticipating any of these developments, much less Martí's request, I didn't have a plan either. I went down the list. Señor Ybor himself was a moot point, for his secretary told us the day before that Don Vicente was leaving town after Martí's speech. The Masonic lodge had no telephone, so I couldn't call our friend there. The Pedrosos had no telephone either, so I couldn't call out for a carriage from Tampa.

Our continuing inaction was noticed by the vigilantes, who began sneering at us. Then came the jeering, with references to “
los gringos
.”

“An' what would be our orders, sir?” inquired Rork in a deliberately nonchalant way, not wanting to show indecision or concern in front of our adversaries.

Then it hit me. I
did
have an acquaintance in Ybor—just the kind of man who could get people out of town efficiently and quietly.

“Follow me, men,” I muttered and started walking east on Eighth Avenue.

They stayed close as we quick marched down the avenue a block to where Fourteenth crossed it. With crossed fingers, I entered the same saloon we'd chased Roldan's binocular man into.

And there he was, my new best friend in Ybor City.

“Ah, the navy man with the missing sailor! I have something
for you,
amigo
,” said Manuel Saurez, El Gallego, the king of
bolita
, with an evil sort of laugh. He was sitting at the same table with the same men, this time including the bartender. They chuckled too. Everyone stopped laughing, however, when they saw Rork walk through the door with a shotgun.

I held up a hand for patience from the
bolita
gangsters, then turned to Rork, pointed to the front doors, and made a twisting motion. He locked them. Afterward, he stood menacingly examining each man at the table of cutthroats.

All of them slowly moved their hands onto the table and kept them in plain sight. El Gallego's face went from sly mirth to concern. “I have your winning's,
amigo
. No need for guns.”

Ignoring him, I walked to the bar, put a glass under the tap, and pulled a beer, then drained it down in one long draught. I pulled another, then four more. Putting them on a tray, I took them to the table and put a ten-dollar gold piece with them.

El Gallego and his cohorts still weren't sure of what was going on. There was pounding outside on the front doors, but no one at the table moved.

With a smile, I said, “El Gallego, I apologize for my rude entry, but there are some men outside who are less than friendly. I am sure you have been in similar situations and can understand. Please, keep my winnings, and this ten-dollar coin, as a token of my appreciation for allowing us to rest for a minute. I also have a request, one I am sure you have the ability to make happen. But first, may I propose a toast?”

More pounding on the door, but El Gallego and his cutthroats never took their shrewd eyes off me, raising their glasses cautiously as I offered, “To free enterprise!”

After the toast was drunk, I made my request. “I want you, El Gallego, to arrange immediate passage for my three friends and I out of Ybor City to a place about ten miles from here. You will go with us. For this favor, I will pay you the rest of the money in my pocket, twenty-two dollars in gold pieces.”