In Flames (18 page)

From the club card room, music floated across the Saint Ignatius bar terrace, Frank Sinatra's
Duets
, an album I heard there dozens of times.

Before walking in, I paused for a moment and worked at turning on my best, most gentle Reg Townsley–type smile, attempting a prideless and unthreatening air. At first no one noticed me. If this was the extent of my recognition value, Reg and the ambassador were seriously mistaken about my career prospects.

Jimmy Padgett the golf pro was sitting in on a game with the poker regulars. They were off in a far corner, leaning together almost conspiratorially. No one was on the bar terrace outside. Klauer the poker champ looked up and spotted me. “Young dude! Our returning hero, victorious, just look at him.”

I sensed the envy, resented it, and brushed it off. Bigger work lay ahead. “Hey, everybody, how's it going?”

And they turned around and looked at me, a response not overly eager, even palpably resentful. It was clear I was far from the most welcome sight at the Club Saint Ignatius. Reg should have seen their cold reaction, it would have iced all his crazy ideas of me running for political office, even on Staten Island. The poker players exchanged glances, and Jimmy Padgett stood up from the card table. “Hiya, pal, what a terrific surprise, welcome back.” He crossed the room, his face a mask of faked enthusiasm. My return may have been exactly what they were dreading. “So you slipped their grasp, flew the coop right out of the mountains—”

“I walked out.”

He released a brief whistle of admiration. “You're famous.”

I wanted to ignore him but couldn't, and reluctantly shook his outstretched hand. Klauer, happy croupier, scooped up his winnings for the evening. “This calls for champagne. Go for some, Dan?”

“No—yes, I'm thirsty.”

“Bet you haven't had a drink in days. Look at your eyes.” Klauer's tone was amiable, if oblique. A couple of card players regarded me grimly and left, muttering good night as they appeared to be escaping, fearing a scene they'd rather not witness. Perhaps for the first time at the Saint Ig, I sensed I really was the center of attention, and the situation struck me as weirdly theatrical, as if I were a failed actor in a terrible play and the audience was set to throw rotten eggs at me. I almost wished I were armed again.

Jimmy Padgett grasped my shoulder. “C'mon, pal, let's get that champagne. Ain't every day our card sharp treats.”

“We were writing a letter to the
New York Times
,” said Klauer,” protesting your kidnapping, but you escaped before we could finish it.”

“Actually, pal, I wrote it, then Jerry our English major here started rewriting it.”

“It was full of clichés, no sense of urgency. I wanted it to be effective, Dan, not something that read like a stock analyst's report. You have to find the right voice, hit the right rhythm, or no will read it. We had to make you come alive.”

“And then you escaped, pal, and here you are now, a live hero. So who needs a letter. We always had your best interests at heart, Dan.”

We left for the bar, where young Jorge opened a bottle of champagne and filled our glasses. I flopped down at a table and drained my drink, staring blankly at the palm grove where Delgado Vinny had disappeared, and Elaine had reappeared, rushing past me.
Get out of the way
…Elaine in her clingy dress and swaying breasts was nowhere in sight now.

“Have another?” Klauer's generosity was turning positively extravagant. He waved to Jorge for a second bottle. What were they working up to? A champagne cork popped, and I posed the unavoidable question. “Where's Elaine?”

Klauer and Padgett waited until Jorge finished refilling all the glasses, and it was obvious they were stalling, playacting to gain time.

“Hooked on her still?” Klauer grinned. “Didn't the rebels knock that crazy shit out of you?”

Padgett shook his head. “Forget her, pal. Leave her in peace.”

What the hell did they know
…what exactly?

“Where is she?”

“Where? You're asking us?”

“She's not here?”

“Drink up, Dan. To your health. You're alive, pal, be thankful.”

“You mean she hasn't come back to the club—”

“No one said that. She's just not here right now.”

The music changed, Tony Bennett's
Duets
, another club favorite. I began feeling nearly as embattled and determined as I was back in the forest up in the tree. No, I wasn't going to let them bullshit me to death here. In these familiar surroundings, I felt capable of nearly anything, pulling it off with a near-serenity.

“C'mon, pal, take it easy. Have another. Don't do anything dumb.”

How patronizing, so totally condescending, who the hell did these bastards think they were
…but their tone stayed friendly. They weren't holding me for ransom. They were the same old club crowd. Nothing had really changed here, except that Elaine, clipboard in hand, Elaine bent over the bar, ass in the air, breasts seizing my attention, holding me hostage—Elaine was no longer around. My sexual obsession may have disappeared, but a singular duty remained for me to perform.

“There's a hearing in court tomorrow, Dan.” Klauer's face was next to mine, an odd face seen up close, almost friendly, disarming in its attempt at sincerity. “A hearing about Vinny. You understand what I'm saying?”

I said nothing.

“This took a lot of doing, Dan, I assure you, but it's done now. It's all set, and Elaine doesn't have to worry.”

“Where is she—”

“We told you, we don't know. Just stay the hell out of it, okay. Let justice take its course around here, God knows you've been through enough already. Elaine is no monster, she doesn't deserve twenty years in prison. Just go for plain vanilla, Dan, okay—do nothing, let it rest.”

Let it rest
…This was real hallucination. I heard their words, could see their faces, the nodding heads. But it was as if—how does the expression go?—I saw it all through a glass darkly, through a purposely distorting lens, and an ingenious filter warped the sound of their words. The sons of bitches were in on a secret deal.
Let it rest
…some advice. They'd all slept with her, every one of them, that was it, they were all in the same boat together, and they didn't want me rocking it.

Still, like an angry kid I persisted, I kept banging away.

“Where is she…”

Klauer emptied his glass. He appeared about ready to give up on me.

“Lookit, Dan, we stick together here. Shit happens and that's simply the way it is in this place. What had to be done is done and now it's almost over—only the court hearing is left, the inquest report. Yes, some terrible mistakes got made. Elaine couldn't have been in the greatest shape that night up in the hills. But nothing was planned. And you, now you're a hero. Relish this. It doesn't do anyone any good to start going after her. It's set and there's nothing you can do to change things. Stick with the big picture, Dan, forget any shitty details—details around here always suck, they're weird. Just take some downtime, you've earned it. All of us hope it works out fine and dandy for her tomorrow, and you should too. You'll be rolling in clover, if you don't crap on it first.”

“When you slept with her, did you—”

“Whoa, hang on there, Dan, okay, don't push. Get it?”

“But she—”

“Shit.” Jimmy Padgett released an exasperated blast of air. “You got to understand, pal, this is serious. So other people besides you slept with her, big fucking deal. That's got shit to do with what'll happen now. The day people stop sleeping around with each other is the day monkeys fly out your ass.”

I had to laugh.
Shit to do
…I suspected it had almost everything to do with the next day's proceedings, and with whatever deal had been reached.

Klauer was insistent. “No, Dan, it's no joke. And that's why we're all—hey, listen up, let's get this straight here, sometimes things have to get done, no matter what. She always had Ferg's full support. The proof is he never got pissed off at her. He understood, he accepted things.”

I felt utterly humiliated. I was clenching my fists, fighting to restrain myself.

Klauer remained calm. “It's why we're all here, Dan…the companies, the embassy…and exactly like everywhere else, business has overheads. You accept certain costs. And you insulate yourself against them. You don't go around looking for more costs.”

Padgett reached for a reasonable tone. “It was only coincidence Ferg died that night, but maybe it was just as well. Because if he hadn't, he might have tried something and only made things even worse. See what I mean? Trust me, Dan, Elaine came a cunt's hair away from the deepest pile of shit and by this point it's pretty amazing she's nearly out of it. Vinny had a big mouth, he blabbed too much. He pissed off too many people. Vinny's gone, he's over now. Forget him and leave it at that, don't push. Tomorrow everything gets settled. For good, we hope. She'll be out of the woods, just like you. And so I'm telling you straight off here, Dan, we're not tolerating any holier-than-thou crap, not from you or anyone else…” Padgett let his voice trail off and he fell silent.

Klauer reached over to still my quivering hands. His voice strained for understanding. “It doesn't do anyone any good to trash someone else's reputation. Elaine knows what she's doing.”

“Where is she—”

“No one knows. And no one here has the right to ask her what she's doing. Not even you. Yes, she could be in someone's bed right now trying to save her life.”

Padgett slammed his hand on the table. “Jorge! Close this place. It's late. Let's go home.”

I was furious, my brain racing madly, this was all a vast practical joke, and every bit of it could be at someone else's expense, mine especially. If I'd had a gun, I'd have used it.

Jimmy placed a brotherly hand on my shoulder, restraining me. “Listen, pal, Elaine does whatever she has to, anything to stay alive and out of prison. And you stay the hell out of her way. Hey, lookit, after all you've been through, nobody is out to bust your balls. This time tomorrow night, it's over and done. And you and Elaine can pick up wherever you left off, if that's what the two of you want. No one will stand in your way. Only go to sleep now and get your rest, Dan. You've earned it, pal, you're alive. Let her live too.”

I couldn't recall who put the key to my room in my hand, or how I made it to the door. I had no anger left with which to defend myself. I fell fully clothed on top of my bed, without checking in the sheets for spiders or scorpions. All I knew was misery and confusion as I clutched the pillow, almost imagining it was Elaine next to me in bed. And I stayed in that position, sleeping fitfully, until morning sunshine splashed across my face, and it was the start of the day of the court hearing.

The two-hundred-year-old Spanish law courts building in Ciudad San Iñigo—
el palacio de justicia
—with its long running balconies reminded me more of a hospital than a center for justice.

Over the decades since oil and gas were discovered offshore, a procession of stateside lawyers arrived there like Doctors Without Borders to treat the ailing patients of San Iñigo. Government ministers and landowners and even priests were all admitted for the cure, pocketing American prescriptions for new laws and treaties, revised contracts and mineral leases, and at the end of a year, two years, the local patients went back to their homes and offices and churches, drained, jaundiced, trembling, as others stepped up and took their place. The patients' conditions declined, their fevers rising with the first outbreaks of affront and distemper, a rum drink too many, the abrupt stand for self-respect and equity after years of acquiescence, and the surrendering slide into shame and despair, a humiliating dependence upon the visiting physicians and their handouts.

Inside, the court building was stripped of solemnity, the dark hardwood paneling auctioned off years before, proceeds applied to a quarterly interest payment on the San Iñigo national debt. The bare walls and ceiling of the central chamber were moldy and peeling from humidity and heat; the crumbling scene of Delgado Vinny's homicide hearing might have housed a sweatshop assembly line, so little did the room resemble a court. Five French doors, uncurtained, led out to a long broad veranda, and these high windows remained open during the proceedings—no air-conditioning here—so the crowd gathered on the balcony was able to follow the hearing. Delgado Vinny was a “very popular man”—I'd been told this repeatedly by way of explanation or excuse—and judging by the numbers who showed up to learn the results of the inquest into his killing, he appeared no less popular in death. Except for a single authorized reporter from the government news service, the media weren't allowed in to observe.

The local spectators were herded—no other word for it—outside the open windows, packed in along the open-air gallery and prevented by guards and ropes from entering the judicial chamber. The relatives and the fans of the deceased stood crammed together, dark bodies shuffling and stretching for a peek into the courtroom—some even sat on the balcony floor, unmoving. Silhouetted against the sun-filled sea sky, the dark bodies remained featureless figures.

Inside, little remained of what makes a court a court. A few benches held the concerned parties and their lawyers and some select spectators. There was a desk for the presiding magistrate, a smaller table for the clerk, a long empty stone floor behind the benches where no one stood, aside from a few armed guards. A green baize cloth covered the judge's desk like a billiard table. In the front of the benches, the prosecutor and the police major sat in sagging leather-upholstered armchairs, their legs crossed, hands folded, waiting their turns at speaking. A lone news reporter sat behind the prosecutor. No recording equipment or cameras or laptops were permitted in the courtroom. Cell phones had to be turned off.

Some members of the Club Saint Ignatius sat on a couple of rear benches. I sat by myself on the last bench, catching only occasional glimpses of Elaine up front next to her lawyer. Earlier that morning no one had bothered to wake me at the club—intentionally, no doubt—and I'd driven into town unshaven and unshowered, still wearing the clothes I'd slept in, my stomach grumbling for breakfast. I stayed awake on meds from the Xy Corp. clinic.

Standing by the judge's desk, a dark young man from the prosecutor's office began reading aloud from the official record of the inquest. His voice droned on and on, echoing off the bare walls, page after page, and if anyone inside the chamber was listening to him, including the judge, their attention wasn't obvious. The club members muttered among themselves. And the judge occasionally glanced over at the balcony windows and waved at spectators to move back. They obeyed, and a few moments later they moved forward again, pressing against the ropes. At least they were listening, they were certainly trying to hear the prosecutor's report.

I understood little of what was being read out in Spanish legalese. My gaze kept drifting back to Elaine, to the glimpse of yellow dress that caught my eye, only her right shoulder visible from my seat in the last row. She was often leaning over, whispering to her lawyer, a San Iñigo mulatto in a gray silk suit. Reg Townsley wasn't in attendance. If anyone from the embassy was there, I couldn't spot him; no one looked like an American official.

A teenage boy carried in a tray with glasses of fruit juice for the judge, the prosecutor, and the police major, but nothing for the reader, whose voice sounded like that of a chanter in the cathedral, bored with the day's text, passionless in delivery, performing a duty that had to be done, and little more than that.

I was starting to feel dizzy, the lack of breakfast catching up with me. Heavy odors wafted in from the crowd on the balcony, the smells of sweating bodies, chile peppers, garlic, and cooking oil, the heady scents of beer and rum flitted around freed from their origins, overwhelming the fresh outdoor fragrances of nearby sea.

The judge turned to the reader. “Very good, enough.”

And the reader stopped in midsentence.

“Let him finish!” A voice from the crowd called out, a deep explosive voice like the sound of rolling thunder.

“Señora Ferguson,” the judge said in reply, and the court clerk interpreted in English for us select spectators on the rear benches in the chamber, “has sworn under oath at the inquest…that she had no reason to dislike the deceased, that on the contrary, she and her late husband had several times employed Delgado Vinny as entertainment at their club, and often invited him there as their personal guest. She certainly had no motive to want him dead, quite the contrary, she mourns him deeply—”

“Louder!” the deep voice in the crowd said. The court officials ignored the voice. I found all this astounding, what tenuous links the inquest report bore to reality defied my memory. I looked ahead at the shoulder of Elaine's yellow dress, her body now unmoving, and I couldn't help wondering about whom she'd slept with the night before. Who'd been paid, and who'd been pressured during the inquest…I had no firm idea of anything. Was she naked under her yellow dress there in the palace of justice? Had the judge too enjoyed seeing her lift a dress up over her bare buttocks and watched her breasts bobbing like melons? Was all this farce why I had to go through shit up in the mountains, and what I returned to live for? If I jumped to my feet now and spoke out—told the court exactly what I saw and heard the night Delgado Vinny was killed—would anyone doubt me, a hero returned from an ordeal of captivity?

The crowd was muttering, their discontent audible and growing louder, words leaping out like imprisoned animals through wire mesh, words clattering their cages, words stopping to bare their teeth—the crowd didn't buy the judge's version of the inquest's findings any more than I could accept the legitimacy of the entire proceeding. The scene lost any semblance of reality for me; my jungle hallucinations were more real than this bizarre parody of justice.

The club members near me appeared relieved at the judge's summary, leaning back on the benches and smiling to each other. For them, justice was being done. They looked as if they were about to burst into applause.

“La hermana
,
la hermana
…”
the crowd said.

And the judge tinkled a small bell that looked more like a child's toy than any sign of judicial authority.
“Silencio!”
he said.

Hands pushed an elderly woman through the crowd, she was dressed in black, her head covered in a veil like a nun's habit, her skin as wrinkled as elephant hide. The fortune-teller priestess Sister Emma shuffled under a rope and no policeman dared impede her progress. She stood at the end of the first bench, Elaine's bench, and she said nothing at first, staring at the judge, who paid her no attention. At the same moment, Klauer turned his head and gave me a meaningful look, motioning with his hand over his mouth, his message unmistakable.
Stay cool, Dan, don't say a fucking word
…They still didn't trust me not to turn, not to betray our kind.

Sister Emma began speaking, her voice a steady monotone, as if her every word was of equal significance. She trained her eyes directly on the judge, assiduously ignoring the prosecutor and the police major in their leather armchairs, their legs now uncrossed, the major drumming his fingers on the armrests, a portrait of impatience. The court clerk made no attempt to translate the old woman's words. Sister Emma spoke in dialect, slowly, but without pause. Perhaps out of fear—of the crowd, or of what she was saying, or of both—no one tried to stop her. The judge's small bell remained unshaken on his desk. The old woman appeared fiercely determined to make herself heard and heeded. She didn't try to engage the court's sympathy. She never raised her voice or altered her tone. And in spite of her advanced age, or maybe because of this, she made it a point to stand stiff as stone, as erect as the great statue of El Cristo Redentor, whose outstretched arms were visible in the distance above the heads of the crowd on the veranda, the statue's white concrete skin glaring in unforgiving sunlight. The old woman's teeth flashed as she spoke, exactly as they had on the night of the Santería ritual, when she bit off the sacrificial rooster's head and spat it into the brazier fire. Was she relaying a message now from
El
Conde Moro…from
el comandante
…or were her words a communication from a dead man, perhaps soon a resurrected saint, the holy and blessed Delgado Vinny. Or perhaps she was only conveying her own warnings. I had no idea what she was saying, but I was as electrified by her performance as I was stunned by the court's demeanor. The judge, prosecutor, police major, clerk, all seemed to pretend she didn't even exist, as if they weren't registering a word she was saying, her voice growing as indistinct to them as the sound of gentle rain on a windowpane. But I heard her. I didn't understand her words, and yet her voice hurt me, her voice was touched with the dignity of a long-ago unrecallable past, and I squeezed my fists, gripped my chest as stabbing pain spasmed right to left, and my side and leg itched under bandages, and I was certain she was delivering truth, explaining the entire story of Delgado Vinny's killing, maybe even my betrayal in the mountains, and for these crimes she was condemning Elaine to eternal punishment in a Santería hell beyond imagining. There was something terrible and memorable about the old woman's performance, not a muscle in her face moved, and the sound of her voice alone was spellbinding. Although I didn't understand her words, her courage no less shamed me. And as if she could read our minds, she kept right on talking, by this point almost as in prayer, and a small hope entered my mind, a wish heavy with self-distrust, that if the chance came, I prayed I'd have the same nerve and determination to act as boldly as the old woman. Other images crowded into my thoughts, pictures from captivity and the nightmare of escape, sensations so sharp it was as if within the space of a few seconds I relived every moment of ordeal all over again. My hands and legs shook—from memories? or from no breakfast, from hunger and thirst. And at once a wild idea struck me, pushing me to my feet.

“Translate! Tell us what she's saying!”

The judge rang his absurd little bell angrily, and Sister Emma raised her voice over its ridiculous sound. She showed no sign of stopping, her voice rang out more clearly, and she was talking faster, as if she wanted everything told, everything known and understood now and forever.

The judge grew adamant. “Take her out!”

The police major was on his feet, shouting at the guards. Other dark men in police uniform moved quickly from the balcony windows and led Sister Emma from the front of the courtroom, and all the way down to the door at the back of the hall she went right on muttering to herself.

Elaine turned around to watch and I caught her eye. No question, she was starting to panic. And for a moment I saw an appalling demonic whiteness in her face—she was terrified, not only of what the old woman had said, but because for the first time she saw me in the courtroom. Sunlight from open balcony windows illuminated both her and me. She stared in my direction with the intense preoccupation of that night bird of prey in the jungle, accustomed to watching from far off for signs of carrion, and now surprised to find the carrion so close to her and still stirring with life, the living carcass too repulsive to touch. My appearance in the courtroom, and my audacious demand for truth, shocked her, my ordeal and escape and the heat and jungle, all of this must have been clear in my drawn ravaged face and fevered eyes, eyes that darted from her to the judge to the courtroom door closing behind Sister Emma…and to Klauer the poker player looking daggers at me. I was covered in cold sweat. My breath came in shudders, and I couldn't focus my thoughts any better than I could my eyes. But I had to think straight, this was urgent, clarity was essential.

“What did she say?” My own voice startled me. The echo of my distress shot back at me. “Tell us!”

The judge looked my way and spoke, the court clerk translating slowly, the functionary full of his own importance. “The old woman denies the inquest findings.”

Mutterings erupted outside on the balcony. The crowd began emitting its own kind of heat. Someone shouted,
La bruja americana!
American witch. And the crowd took up the chant,
La bruja americana, La bruja americana, La bruja americana
…

The judge shook his little bell.
“Silencio!”
And he went on speaking, the court clerk interpreting. “The inquest report is correct. The good sister is mistaken. Her evidence is inadmissible, she is not an authorized witness. The experts are certain Delgado Vinny, for whatever reason, was extremely distraught…and took his own life with the gun he had stolen from Señor Ferguson's yacht club. He had placed the mouth of the shotgun in his own mouth…and only his DNA was found on the weapon. No one else could have touched it. No further evidence exists.”