Havana Red (27 page)

Two months later the Other Boy published an article on Cuban theatre which didn't mention my name or work, as if I'd never existed or it were impossible I might ever exist again . . . I then understood there was nothing doing, or that I could do nothing but retreat into my shell, like a persecuted snail. And I let the curtain fall. I gave in and took every punishment: first, factory work, then library work, forgot theatre and publishing, trips and interviews, was transformed into a nobody. And I assumed my role as a live ghost, performed with mask and all for so long, that what you see as a white mask is now my very own face.

 

“Really?” the Marquess said and added, “Come with me,” and the Count followed him through the livingroom, across the bedroom and down the passage to the room which reeked of damp, ancient dust and old papers. The dramatist switched on the light and the policeman found himself surrounded by books, from the floor to the highest point of the ceiling, books the number and quality of which was incalculable, in dissimilar bindings and volumes, in various sizes and colours: books.

“Take a good look, what can you see?”

“Well, books.”

“Yes, books, but as a writer you must know when you are seeing something more. Look, that one there is the edition of
Paradise Lost
which I stole with illustrations
by Gustave Doré. Now I'll ask you something: who would know the name of Milton's neighbour, a very wealthy man, much feared in his time, and one who perhaps one day accused him of some barbarity or other? You don't know? Of course: nobody knows or should know, but everyone remembers who the poet was. And was Dante a Guelph or a Ghibeline? You don't know that either, do you, but you do know he wrote
The Divine Comedy
and that his reputation is greater than that of any politician of his time. For that is what is invincible . . . And now I'll tell you why I brought you here!”

And he walked over to one of the shelves and took down a red folder tied with ribbons which one day had been white and now lay under several layers of dust.

“I'll tell you this, Friendly Policeman, because I think I owe it to you, as I owe you an apology for my excesses with you . . . Herein are eight plays written in my silent years, and the other folder you can see contains a 300-page essay on the re-creation of Greek myths in Western theatre in the twentieth century. What do you reckon?”

The Count gestured: shook his head.

“And why is all this hidden away? Why don't you try to publish it?”

“Because of what I said before: my character must endure silence till the end. But that's the character: the actor did what he had to do, and that's why I keep writing, because, one day, as with Milton, they'll remember the writer and nobody will even recall the sad functionary who repressed him. They wouldn't allow me to publish or direct, but no one could prevent me writing and thinking. These two folders are my best revenge, do you understand me now?”

“I think so,” replied the Count, and caressed the
typed pages of his story and realized right then that he didn't know where he should take it. Perhaps it was only a story for three readers: himself, Skinny Carlos and Alberto Marqués, and yet that was enough for him. No, he didn't feel a need to expose himself further, or have pretensions to literature: just do it, for the Marquess was right: those pages contained what was invincible.

“I also want to apologize, Alberto. At times I must have been too rough with you.”

“Oh, my honey chil'! You're an angel! You don't know what it is to be rough with me. Look, if I tell you . . . Better not, forget it.”

The Count smiled, remembering the stories he'd heard about the Marquess's erotic adventures, in that very house. Well, whatever they say, he is a pansy, that's no lie, but I like the man, he concluded.

“Come on, let's sit down,” the Marquess suggested and they went back to the sitting room, as the Count lit a cigarette.

“I must admit I'm the one who's now arse over tit,” the policeman said as he returned to his seat and position on that stage set. “But all these confessions have reinforced an idea I've been harbouring for two or three days: you know something you've not told me and which could help explain Alexis's death. Will you tell me now or must I interrogate you?”

“Ah, so you think there's more to it . . . I get the full bloodhound treatment now, do I? So you want to know more?” the Marquess persisted and, not waiting for a reply, he raised one of his arms so his dressing gown sleeve created a space where, like a spectacular magician, he could put in a hand and pluck something out to show the Count. “You want me to tell you what Alexis said to Faustino to cause him to react that way? But I
shouldn't tell you, because when Alexis told me, and he did tell me, he made me swear on the Bible that, whatever happened, I wouldn't tell anybody. And I never have . . . That's why I've gone silent, right?”

The Count smiled.

“So now you believe in sacred oaths? Even though the secrecy may save Alexis's murderer or attenuate his guilt?”

The Marquess wiped a hand over his sparsely populated head and smiled devilishly.

“True, if I don't believe in anything and that gentleman is . . . But I should tell you I also kept silent because I didn't think the man capable of doing what he did . . . For what Alexis said to him was that he'd found out about the fraud his father committed in 1959, when he falsified documents and got himself a couple of false witnesses to swear he'd fought clandestinely against Batista . . . That was how Faustino climbed on the chariot of the Revolution, with a past to guarantee he could be considered a trustworthy man who deserved his reward . . . Can you imagine what would happen if this got out? Well, you know: his feast would be at an end.”

The Count tried to smile but couldn't. Another of this bastard's tall stories, he thought.

“That's why he paid him with two coins . . . And how did Alexis find out about this business? Who could have told him?”

“María Antonia told him . . .”

“And why did she tell him?”

“I don't know, perhaps she thought Alexis should have that card in his hand, you know?”

The Count finally smiled.

“So it was María Antonia. The things María Antonia knew; and I thought . . .”

“Yes, you're naive, my policeman friend. But it's better that way: better naive than cynical. That's why I'll make one more confession to you: many of the accusations made against me are true: I am self-sufficient, proud, an experimentalist and ever since my twelfth birthday when I saw I was in love with my sister's boyfriend, I've known the only antidote was to frolic wherever with men, which I've been doing ever since. Because I'm that way, yesterday, today and tomorrow as the saying goes . . .”

The Count never thought he'd listen to something like that and find it appealing and wouldn't want to get up and kick such an exultant little poof. But anyway he did decide it was time to beat a timely retreat and try to tie up the last loose ends to his case.

“Did Arayán write that report?”

“Who did, if he didn't? He was always a sly, insidious cunt on the make.”

“And what's the latest on Muscles?”

“This is all awful, isn't it? I discovered he's very ill, really ill. They say he's got a few months . . . My poor friend. He suffered a lot from what they did to me. Perhaps even more than I did.”

“Right,” the Count responded, standing up. “I've got to go. But I must ask you two last questions . . .”

“It never changes: always two last questions.”

“Who is the Other Boy?”

“Haven't you guessed? Ah, you're not such a good policeman after all. I gave you all the clues. So find out for yourself and don't get into deep water. And what's the other one?”

“The day I went for a pee in your bathroom, did you take a peek?”

The Marquess rehearsed that gesture of amazement the Count was already familiar with: his mouth formed
a huge silent O and he put his right hand on his chest, as if about to swear an oath.

“Me? Do you think I'd do that kind of thing, Mr Friendly Policeman?”

“Yes.”

Then he laughed, but tittered not.

“Well, your mind has an evil bent . . .”

“If you say so.”

“Of course I do . . . Hey, I'd like to ask you a little favour: keep my secret. I've become fond of you and when I get fond of someone, I love to go confessional. But only three people know what's in those folders and you're one of them.”

“Don't worry. I won't even ask who the other one is, apart from Muscles . . . OK, I'm off. Thanks for everything.”

“When will you be back?”

“When I write another story or they kill another transvestite. Here's the book by Muscles you lent me, so I don't owe you anything, do I? Well, next to nothing . . .” he said, and stretched his hand out to the Marquess, who placed his squalid bony structure on the Count's palm. If Fatman Contreras grabs you . . . the lieutenant thought, and lightly pressed the dramatist's hand, but dropped it immediately, for he thought he glimpsed a dangerous advance light up on the Marquess's face. Does he want to kiss me? No, that's not on, he thought, and went into the street, where a magenta sun was putting its final delicate purple touches to the languid, velvety death agony of a Sunday afternoon more pansied than Alberto Marqués himself.

 

As he dived into the old part of the city, the Count's eyes interrogated every woman who crossed his path:
could she be a transvestite, he wondered, looking for a revealing detail in her make-up, hands, the shape of her breasts and curve of her buttocks. Two young women who were walking along, swinging their hips, arm-in-arm, struck him as slightly suspect of transformism, but the half-dark in the street didn't allow him to reach a verdict. He then understood that he wanted to meet a transvestite. Why? he wondered, unable to find an answer, and, as he walked up to Polly's flat, he thought how he should rid his head of all that ballast if he wanted to lift himself up and enjoy the spectacle of seeing a female, especially a Cuban female on a street in Havana, and think those dancing breasts, unattainable buttocks and juicy lips might be just for him.

Polly welcomed him in her doorway, barely covered by a white dressing gown which revealed the reddish dark of her nipples and the black of her nether hair. She didn't given him a chance to speak but leapt on him and shot her tongue between his lips, like an anxious snake.

“Oh God, how wonderful, my heterosexual policeman,” she cried when she'd finished her frisking by mouth, and her hand pressed the perky tumescence of a Count who asked her, bursting with pride: “Were you expecting me?”

“What do you think, you macho Stalinist? And what have you got in that bag?” was what she then asked as she turned to look inside his pack, but the Count stopped her.

“Wait, first I've got to ask you something . . . Can I stay here for three days, without going out or seeing the sun?”

She smiled and showed a row of sharp little sparrow teeth.

“Doing what?”

“Something you never tire of . . .”

“I think so.”

“Well, take my bag and put it in the sideboard. I've brought ten eggs, a can of sardines, two bottles of rum, five boxes of cigars, a chunk of bread and a packet of macaroni. That will make us strong enough to resist the siege . . . You got any coffee? Good, then we're invincible, like Milton.”

“Which Milton?”

“The Brazilian musician . . . Now I need to make a telephone call,” he said finally, as he stripped his shirt off.

“Boss, listen to me and prepare to fall off your chair,” he said as he smiled and told him the last possible revelation on the masquerade of Faustino Arayán. “Well, what do you reckon?”

“What I said before: this country has gone mad.” And his voice sounded neutral, neither astonished nor exhausted: it was simply an empty voice, and the Count thought what he'd thought on other occasions: his voice was the mirror of his soul.

“OK, I've earned my week off, haven't I?”

“Yes, you certainly have. I hope one day you'll decide to be a good policeman . . . Talking of which, will you tell me some time why you ever joined the police, eh, Conde?”

“Well, I'll try to find out and then I'll tell you . . . Oh, I can tell you one thing I do know: you're the best police chief in the world, whatever they say or do.”

“Thanks, Mario, it's always good to know such things, though they sometimes don't help one little bit.”

“Yes, they do help, Boss, and you know it. Look after yourself and I'll see you Monday,” he said as he hung up to ring Skinny's number. It only needed three rings.

“Skinny, it's me.”

“Go on, wild man. You going to drop by?”

“No, I can't tomorrow or the day after . . . I'm with little sparrow butt. I asked her for asylum for three days.”

“Hey, have you fallen for that little madcap?”

“I don't know, Skinny. I think my thinking head isn't thinking so much, and it's just as well.”

“Sure . . . But watch the other head, for when it fancies an idea . . .”

“Note down my number. Six, one, three, four, five, six. That's for you and old Josefina, but don't give it out even to death if she makes a call. Or the Guggenheim Foundation, or Salinger if he comes to Havana to see me, right? Oh, give it to Red Candito if he needs me for something . . .”

“And what if those investigators want to see you?”

“Let them go to hell. Skinny, to hell, or they can set their sniffer dogs after me. We're going to mount the Cuban version of
The Fugitive
. . . Oh, and I was forgetting the most important thing with all this shit I'm pouring out: buy two bottles of rum for Wednesday, and I'll give you the money. It's my birthday present. I'll call Andrés and the Rabbit to see what we can think up for the day, all right?”