Murder in Havana (5 page)

She felt her anger rising. She knew that the older physicians in the room were thinking that aside from her impressive medical training and knowledge, she was young and wide-eyed and naïve and liberal, all the things most of them were not.

She continued.

“Before Cuba lost Soviet financial backing, UNICEF ranked the country just a few notches behind us in health care despite a Gross National Product representing one-twentieth of our own. A Cuban’s average life expectancy is almost seventy-four years, the highest in Latin America. A child born today in Cuba is twice as likely to survive as a baby born in Washington, D.C.”

Another physician in the audience asked, “Aren’t we doing research into the use of vanadium here in the States?”

“Yes,” Mancuso answered. “In Minnesota, at Parker Hughes Institute. I’m visiting there next month.”

The final question from the audience was “Did you have a pleasurable four days in San Francisco?”

Goldstein answered: “If seeing it from your hotel window at night equals pleasure, we certainly did.”

Mancuso’s boss stood and said, “I apologize for running late, and I know you all have places to be at this hour. Let me conclude by saying to those of you who dismiss what Cuba might be doing in cancer research, there are Canadian venture capitalists pouring money into Cuban medical research, and investors tossing millions at Canadian mutual funds with interests in Canadian companies backing the Cubans.” He turned to Mancuso and Goldstein and said, “Nice job.”

The doctor in the front row who’d laughed off what Mancuso had said stopped her on the way out. “These Canadian mutual funds that Gil mentioned. Which are they?”

Mancuso smiled pleasantly at him. “I wouldn’t know,” she said. “I follow medicine, not the market.”

As Mancuso left the room, she looked for the little man in the green suit. He was gone. She asked her boss who he was.

“One of our intelligence services,” he said. “Whenever we have anything to report on Cuba, they send someone over to take notes.” He laughed. “Even now, your words are being immortalized in a computer at Langley.”

The man in the green suit had a name, Raymond Cisneros. He sat in a windowless room at CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, entering into a computer his notes from the briefing. He printed a hard copy and delivered it to his superior in the Cuba section of the agency. The ranking officer read it, scowled, looked up, and asked, “Who’s this Dr. Mancuso?”

“An NIH physician.”

“Flag her. Another apologist for Fidel. Sounds like she’d like to marry him, for Christ sake.”

Pauling, Doris, their older son, Robert, and Doris’s new husband, Daniel Schumer, had dinner at a local restaurant the night of Max’s arrival. The younger son, Richard, opted not to join them. Max knew that the fourteen-year-old was uncomfortable being at the same table with his biological father and stepfather, and didn’t blame him. Max himself wasn’t crazy about breaking bread with the new man in Richard’s mother’s life, and bed.

It turned out to be a surprisingly pleasant evening. Schumer, “the accountant,” was a good-looking, slightly overweight man with a full head of hair—mildly annoying to the thinning-haired Pauling—and an amiable table companion. He told a good story and got everyone laughing with a few tales of former clients who’d decided they could beat the tax system and ended up as guests of the federal penal system. Schumer picked up the tab, which Pauling considered appropriate.

He’d taken a taxi from the private airport to the house, and they drove to the restaurant in Schumer’s white Lexus. As they stood in the parking lot waiting for an attendant to fetch the car, Schumer said, “You’re leaving in the morning?”

“Yes,” said Max. “An early start.”

“It must be satisfying flying your own plane, avoiding those commercial flights—with commercial waiting.”

“It does have advantages,” Pauling said.

“I’ll pick you up at your motel and drive you to the airport,” Schumer offered.

“I don’t want to put you out.”

“I’d do it but I’m tied up with an early meeting,” Doris said.

“No problem for me,” Schumer said. “I have a racquetball date first thing. What time do you want to go, Max?”

“Seven too early?”

“Perfect.”

They dropped Pauling at his motel, said good-bye, and left him pondering the evening over a drink at the bar. He was glad he’d made the stop. Seeing that his family was healthy and secure was important. But ambivalence reigned.

On the one hand, he was pleased that the new man in his sons’ lives seemed to be okay. No, that’s not fair, he told himself as the bartender indicated last call. Schumer was more than that, a decent enough fellow, kind and caring, and who seemed to have forged a good relationship with Robert and Richard. And he was obviously successful; they wouldn’t be missing any meals. There were moments during the evening when he toyed with the idea of calling Gosling, bowing out of the assignment, and hanging around Pittsburgh for some extra days with the boys. But as gracious as Schumer and Doris had been, he felt very much the outsider, an intruder into a family that once had been his. Better to get on with his new life and let them get on with theirs.

He carried a drink to his room where thoughts of his family were replaced by the reason he was passing through Pittsburgh, namely, to meet Gosling in Miami and then proceed to Cuba. So far so good. Jessica hadn’t
been angry at his decision to take the assignment and be away for a month—at least she’d been savvy enough to not display any anger that might have existed. And he didn’t have to worry about his ex-wife and sons. No wonder the CIA and other intelligence agencies preferred that their undercover operatives be unmarried, preferably without children, parents, grandparents, significant others, or friends. Having to worry about anyone other than yourself could get you killed.

Daniel Schumer was in front of the hotel precisely at seven. Pauling threw his small bag into the back and got in the front passenger seat.

“Sleep good?” Schumer asked as he pulled away.

“I always do,” Pauling replied. He almost asked whether Schumer had slept peacefully next to Doris but didn’t especially want to know.

Pauling gave Schumer directions, and they drove in silence until Schumer spoke. “You’re flying to Miami, you said?”

“Right.”

“Vacation? Business?”

“Strictly vacation,” Pauling said.

“I enjoy Miami but not in the summer. Hot as hell this time of year.”

“I enjoy the heat.”

“Doris told me you used to be with the CIA. Hope that’s okay.”

“Of course it is. That was before. I’m not involved with the government anymore.”

“Must have been exciting, being with the CIA, and all.”

“It had its moments.”

Pauling tired of the conversation and would have preferred to talk about something accounting related—double-entry
bookkeeping or even tax shelters. “I enjoyed your stories last night about clients who’ve ended up in jail,” he said, hoping it would prompt another tale.

Schumer laughed. “People do really dumb things out of greed,” he said. “My job is to keep them out of trouble but sometimes they won’t listen.
They
know better. I’m also a lawyer.”

“Really?”

“Tax attorney. I don’t practice law but it comes in handy.”

“I imagine it does.”

They entered a small parking lot next to the side of a shack featuring peeling yellow paint that served as the airport’s operations center. Schumer turned off the engine and turned to face Pauling. “I really enjoyed meeting you, Max,” he said. “Frankly, I was a little nervous.”

“No need to be,” Pauling said, smiling to reassure. “You’ve married a hell of a good woman and inherited two fine boys.”

“I know, I know. I wish my daughters could have been with us last night. They’re with their mother.” He pulled a wallet from his hip pocket, extracted a small color photo, and handed it to Pauling. Two teenage girls, one with braces, smiled up at him.

“They’re beautiful,” he said.

“I know. I’m really proud of them. They get along great with Robbie and Rich.”

The use of his sons’ familiar names stung Max for a second.

“I just want you to know, Max,” Schumer said, returning the photograph to his wallet, “that I love Doris and the boys very much and will do everything I can to be a positive force in their lives.”

It was time to leave.

“I’m sure you will, Daniel. It was great meeting you. Have a good racquetball game. And thanks for the lift.”

“It was my pleasure, Max.”

They shook hands. Pauling got out of the car and walked to the ops center without looking back. It took him fifteen minutes to file an IFR flight plan to Miami. When he exited the building, Schumer was still parked in the lot. Schumer waved. Pauling returned it, went to where his plane was tied down, and did his walk-around inspection of the exterior. Satisfied, he said to the line attendant, “Thanks for topping her off.”

“Yes, sir. She’s a nice plane.”

“My baby,” Pauling said, climbing up into the left seat. When he’d completed his preflight checklist, started the engine, and begun to taxi to the end of the only runway, he noticed that Schumer was still there.

What the hell is he waiting for, to see me crash?
he wondered.

He didn’t know that Daniel Schumer was watching him with interest and envy. Doris’s new husband had been more nervous meeting Max than he’d admitted. He’d felt inferior to this steely-eyed pilot and former undercover agent for the CIA. Doris had described Max as obsessive about staying in shape, one with little patience for those who didn’t.

He watched the Cessna roll down the runway and lift off. A minute later, the plane disappeared into low clouds. He touched his belly that pressed against the seat belt and grimaced. He’d better do more than play an occasional game of racquetball with other overweight professionals before Max Pauling visited again.

And as Pauling flew toward Miami with a clear mind about those in his personal life, Daniel Schumer, CPA and
licensed attorney who played sports poorly, worried whether he paled in Doris’s eyes in comparison to her macho ex-husband.

That afternoon he signed up with a gym just a block away from his office.

James L. Walden was known as a man
and
a politician who held his cards close to the vest, literally and figuratively. On this night, the final evening at the presidential retreat after a much-needed weekend away from Washington and the White House, he sat at the table with fellow poker players and peered down through half-glasses at the five cards in his hand. He’d drawn only two. Others looked to him for a clue as to what he held. President Walden was not known as a risk taker, although he’d bluffed skillfully enough in a previous hand to force a couple of players out of the game even though they had held stronger hands than he.

To his left sat Mackensie Smith, a law professor at George Washington University. Smith and Walden had been friends since Walden ran for governor of California as a liberal Democrat—and won. He next won the White House. Smith, who had served on a number of panels and committees at the president’s behest, had become one of his closet “advisors”; read, poker buddies. Like every powerful leader, Walden needed to be surrounded with men and women who did his bidding for the most part without mounting undue challenges. Smith, along with a handful of others, fulfilled a second need. They were good company and they also spoke their minds to the president, always respectfully, of course. But their careers
were not dependent upon his reactions. Their advice meant something.

“Well, Mr. President, are you seeing me or raising me?” Price McCullough asked from across the table. He’d been a five-term senator from Texas until retiring, citing the appalling lack of civility in that hallowed chamber. McCullough had gone on to pursue business interests, the largest of which was BTK Industries, a biotech company with significant investment in the development of new monoclonal antibody anticancer drugs. A few eyebrows had been raised—but only a few—when he left government to become chairman and CEO of the company that had benefited for years from his votes in Congress. BTK Industries had also realized gains from McCullough’s chairmanship of the powerful Senate Appropriations Committee, plus the Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, and the Subcommittee on Education, both of which wielded considerable oversight of the pharmaceutical industry. That he went from being financially comfortable to multimillionaire status virtually overnight prompted the predictable resident cynics to cry foul, but their voices proved weak and momentary. Price McCullough’s congressional colleagues congratulated him and wished him well, and some were not above hoping that such criticisms and good fortune loomed in their futures.