Saffire (26 page)

January 13, 1909

Col. Geo. W Goethals,

Chairman, I.C.C.

Culebra, Canal Zone

Memorandum to Col. Goethals:

Referring to the attached:

Early yesterday morning I caught Marian Octega at his room at #206 Central Avenue Panama, this building being a Spanish boarding house.

Representing myself to be a saloon keeper from the Zone, I told him I was in the market for Golofina and Panatella cigars at the reduced price he was offering them to his Spanish friends, closing stating I had been referred to him by some of these people. He had one box partly full of “Golfina” (not “Golofina”) and six other full and sealed boxes of the same brand. The Panatella's, he claimed, to be out of at present.

The cigar manufactured in Jamaica and called “Golofina” is the one sold in the commissaries, not “Golfina” as stated by Major Wilson, on information given him by a representative of the accounting department.

This “Golfina” cigar is undoubtedly made to fool some of the buyers of the “Golofina” brand: the box, printing, lettering, etc. is identically the same with the exception that the letter “O” is omitted from the name in the fake brand. Up to this time, I had not noticed anything wrong in the spelling of the word, as I was depending on the way it was spelt in the attached complaint. However, I bargained with him for the six boxes at $2.20 a box, to be delivered. Then I noticed the difference in the spelling of the name of the brand. Owing to the fact of the name being spelled differently it made two separate and distinct brands and I doubted if we could do anything in the matter, especially when the price was much lower. Still owing to the fact that one could scarcely notice the difference in the pronunciation of the two words, and possibly be fooled, I thought he should be punished if possible and warned to stop selling that brand in the Zone. Accordingly, discovering through the wholesale dealers that the cigar he gave me was neither “Golofina” or “Golfina” and knowing this was the same as was in the partly filled box, I went to the Alcalde and asked to have him arrested for misrepresenting the brand of cigars or “fraud”. He sent one of his men with me and in the presence of this representative, I purchased this party filled box as “Golfina” cigars (it was a Panamanian brand). We arrested him and took him before the Alcalde who fined him for the mires presentation and warned him to be more careful in the selling of same under penalty of imprisonment.

The Pantella brand, he claims, is also spelled differently but I was unable to find out anything along that line as he was out of the same, however, I expect is as he states.

Respectfully,

Inspector

I
n the Dakotas, I'd become attuned to the positions of the sun as the seasons went through cycles, marking the gradual movement by where it seemed to leave different ridges of the Badlands at each new sunrise and touch down again on the opposite ridges at sunset. Summer solstice gave sixteen hours of daylight, and the winter solstice half of that.

Here, at the equator, there was no progression. As I woke in my spartan room with the sun at 6 a.m., I left my head on the pillow for a few moments, wondering about the monotony of an equatorial sun that gave twelve hours of sunlight every day of the year, dry season and wet.

Not that it mattered to me.

All I needed to do was dress, pack my valise, and give a final report to Goethals.

Before pushing off the thin mattress, I speculated briefly about Raoul Amador. The blow to the head might have caused him serious injury, and that would undoubtedly raise an outcry. I expected to be on a ship, however, and wasn't going to let the prospect of an inquiry give me much worry.

More than likely, however, he'd woken with a throbbing head and his fine clothing caked with horse manure, a prospect that childishly pleased me. I doubt he would seek vengeance, given that he'd have to cross an ocean and then a continent to find me.

More to the point, he'd have to deal with whatever investigation Goethals decided to apply once I delivered my report and his name.

I rolled my feet onto the floor. I'd draped the tuxedo jacket and trousers across the back of a chair and left my laundry package on the seat, with my boots below the chair and my hat atop the laundry.

I would take the tuxedo jacket and suit trousers back to my ranch with me. The clothing would roll up easily enough, and there would be at least one or two occasions in my life where I might have need of it.

I stretched, tossed my shirt and hat on the bed, and pulled on my denims and socks. I shook out my boots, a wise habit from living in places where any kind of critter might crawl inside during the night.

A folded piece of paper fluttered to the floor from the left boot.

Had someone been in my room while I slept?

No. I'd left my boots and hat unattended in the bathroom at the villa the night before. Easy enough to slip the paper into my boot there.

I sighed. I was tired of intrigue. But not so tired of it that I could ignore my curiosity. I opened it to see feminine handwriting:
Please join me at the bullring in Panama City this afternoon for the beginning of the fight. The time and location will be easy enough for you to find. I will be across from the Chinese restaurant.

It was signed by Odelia Cordet.

Well, enough was enough. I had no intention of meeting her. I'd pass along regrets to Miskimon and ask him to inform her that I had departed the isthmus.

Sitting on the edge of my chair, I slipped on my boots. Boots go on as soon as possible—this was another habit from endless mornings waking out of doors, where it made no sense to give buttoning a shirt priority while I hopped around barefoot in mud or thistles or ice or snow. I had a great amount of affection for my boots. The leather was supple and the fit perfect.

It wasn't until the final stages of dressing, then, that I found what had been tucked into my folded shirt—a small stack of photographs in a large envelope, each about the size of a sheet of letter paper, wrapped in wax paper to protect them from the humidity.

The stack was upside down, and I looked at the backing of the top photograph. Had these, too, been placed there by Odelia Cordet? While it was possible, given that the laundry had been taken away from the bathroom, it wasn't a foregone conclusion.

My first impulse was renewed irritation. I was leaving. I didn't want any more bother. Curiosity, again, triumphed.

I flipped over the photographs.

It was the same letdown as when I unfurled the flag. The first was a photograph of a typewritten sheet of paper, as was the second, third, fourth, and fifth, with each photograph plainly showing a seal and sets of signatures.

I set the photographs in order and examined the first one more closely. While not quite as clear as reading the original, everything was legible.

Preamble

With the ultimate purpose to strengthen the Nation; to guarantee the freedom, ensure democracy and institutional stability, exalt human dignity, promote social justice, general welfare, regional integration and invoking the protection of God, we, the undersigned, decree the Political Constitution of the new Republic of Panama.

I set the photographs down, giving them as much room as I would an angry rattlesnake. What I was holding…

…was treason.

Punishable by execution.

“Can you tell me what you know about the events of November 1903?” I studied Earl Harding.

I'd found him again at the same sidewalk café, shortly after the first train from Culebra to Ancón had delivered me once again to Panama City.

“That would be the revolution of Panama against Colombia.” He pursed his lips. “But you could just as easily go the
Star & Herald
and get the information yourself. Haven't I already done enough for you?”

I'd woken him at his hotel by telephone and asked for copies of some newspaper clippings and a chance to buy him another breakfast at his earliest convenience.

“Even if the
Star & Herald
presented those events in an unbiased manner,” I said, “I've learned that rumors travel fast. I'm not sure I'd like anyone in this city to know what I'm looking for. I have an aversion to electricity applied to tender parts of my body.”

Harding gave me a wolf smile. “I like the implications here. If you know something that is dangerous, it must be of value.”

“I'm just looking for general information.” And hoping that the National Police didn't learn what I was doing.

Harding tapped a manila envelope on the table. “General information. Along with newspaper clippings with photos of Cromwell, Sandoval, and Amador?”

“Still general information.”

“That you did not want to retrieve yourself.”

I held the lives of fifteen or so people in my hands. These weren't the types of conversations I was accustomed to navigating. I didn't want him to know how jumpy I was. I sighed. “You're enjoying this, aren't you?”

“It's how I make my living.” He leaned forward. “And it's a living based on the fact that I've never betrayed a confidence. Because if I did, no one would ever trust me with a new confidence again. Why are you asking me these things? Does it have anything to do with the little uproar you caused at the Sandoval ranch last night? I've already heard that you and Miskimon were about as popular as men handing out lumps of horse manure.”

“Will you tell me about 1903, or do I need to look for another way to learn what I need to learn?”

“Cowboy, your original promise still good?”

“If I ever speak to a reporter, you'll be the one and only.”

“Fair enough. I get the sense that you're too stubborn to let me push you much more than that.”

Harding needed to talk faster. The National Police might even now be looking for me— Ah. Of course. That's what was bothering me.

Across the street, at a similar sidewalk café…hadn't I seen that man before? I leaned back, hands locked behind my neck, as if surveying the neighborhood in the manner of a tourist.

Yes. Alone at a table was the Spaniard I'd seen in the administration office on my first morning in Panama. Then, he'd had slicked-back hair and a pencil-thin mustache. And last night…
he
was the waiter giving me the hostile glances. For all I knew, he was the man at the end of the tracks yesterday, monitoring my movements, or the man outside the alley on the night I'd walked the beach with Raquel.

“All right,” Harding said, unaware, of course, of the surge of adrenalin I felt in noticing that I'd been followed. “Here's the short of it. In 1903, Manuel Amador Guerrero, who became Panama's first president, was chosen by a small separatist network to travel to the United States to garner support for a revolution against Colombia. It was a very small group. They wrote their own constitution and designed their own flag because they wanted everything to be ready once the Americans showed up with a warship to block the harbor. They—”

I stood. “Thanks.”

“What?”

Cromwell had suckered me and Miskimon into unfurling that flag at his party. It wouldn't take long for Harding to figure out the significance of it, given my questions. “I'm aware that I should let you ramble a little while longer so it wouldn't be quite so clear what information I need. But sooner or later, you'd figure it out anyway. And I'm pressed for time.”

I'd landed in the middle of a second revolution. This was a deadly type of politics. I was not safe in this country. I needed to reach the American Zone—Ancón—but that meant somehow making it through Panama City untouched. With a spy right across the street.

I said, “Do me a favor, would you—”

Harding arched a brow. “Nothing I do is a favor. It's all about payback.”

“Then take a chance that I'll owe you for a long time. Find Waldschmidt and ask him to take a train to Culebra. I'll be waiting for him at the administration office at noon.”

He gave me a cynical smile. “Sure. We'll see where it leads.”

I grabbed my hat, threw down payment for breakfast, and started to stroll down the street—then spun and sprinted to the café on the other side of the street.

It didn't fool the Spaniard with the thin mustache. He pushed away from his table and toppled over some chairs to block my pursuit, then dashed into the café. By the time I made it inside, he'd disappeared. Probably through the kitchen, because a tall cook stood at the door, arms crossed and his face set in an imposing glare.