Tourist Season (19 page)

Over the protests of almost all the First Weekend in July’s hardcore soldiers, the
comandante
had promoted Jesus Bernal to defense minister and bought him an IBM Selectric. From then on, the First Weekend was known for having the most impeccable press releases in the hemisphere. In his new role Jesus Bernal was an innovator: he even sent communiques on embossed letterheads—italic for bombings, boldface for political assassinations. Even the most skeptical commandos had to admit that the kid from Dartmouth had style. Soon the First Weekend in July became the preeminent anti-Castro group in the United States.

In the summer of 1981, under Bernal’s inspired guidance, the terrorists launched an ambitious PR campaign to discredit Fidel Castro. Although this effort again won national publicity, it also led to Jesus Bernal’s second and final banishment from the First Weekend in July.

The linchpin of the campaign had been a “letter” from a renowned Swiss doctor reporting that President Castro was dying of a rare venereal disease transmitted by poultry. The malady supposedly was manifested by a number of grotesque symptoms, the mildest of which was drooling insanity. Of course the Swiss letter had been invented by none other than Jesus Bernal, but the document was accepted in Miami so unquestionably, and with such patriotic fervor, that Bernal decided to unleash it in Cuba as well. He hatched a daring scheme and persuaded the
comandante
to donate $19,022—a sum which, sadly, represented the entire treasury of the First Weekend in July Movement.

Not surprisingly, Jesus Bernal picked the first weekend of July in 1981 as the time of attack: the weekend Fidel would finally fall. In Little Havana, the air filled with intrigue and jubilation.

But not for long. On July 4, 1981, a low-flying DC-3 cargo plane dumped six metric tons of anti-Castro leaflets on the resort city of Kingston, Jamaica. The townspeople were baffled because the literature was printed in Spanish; only the words
Castro
and
syphilis
seemed to ring a bell among some Jamaicans. One of the leaflets was shown to the island’s prime minister, who immediately cabled Fidel Castro to express sorrow over the president’s unfortunate illness.

Later, under scornful grilling by the
comandante,
Jesus Bernal admitted that no, he’d never studied aerial navigation at Dartmouth. Bernal argued that it had been an honest mistake—from thirteen thousand feet, Kingston didn’t look
that
different from Havana. Then Jesus had flashed his trump card: a copy of the New York
Times.
Three paragraphs, page 15a, in the International News roundup:
Tourist Bus Damaged by Falling Air Cargo.

But the
comandante
and his men were not mollified: Jesus Bernal was purged forever from the First Weekend in July Movement.

“I know all about the bombs,” Viceroy Wilson said as they drove to Miami, several years later. “You’re just doing this to redeem yourself.”

“Ha! I am a hero to all freedom fighters.”

“You’re a pitiful fuck-up,” Wilson said.

“Look who’s talking, goddamn junkie spook.”

“What you say?”

Thank God the music was up so loud.

“Nothing,” Jesus Bernal said. “You missed the damn exit.” He was getting mad at Viceroy Wilson. “You never even said thanks.”

“Thanks for what?” Wilson asked from behind his sunglasses.

“For slicing that guy back in the swamp when he tried to strangle you.”

Wilson laughed. “A mosquito, man, that’s all he was.”

“You looked pretty uptight when that mosquito grabbed your neck. Your eyeballs almost popped out of your chocolate face, that little mosquito was squeezing so hard.”

“Sheee-iiit.”

“Yeah, you owe me one,
compadre.”

“You’re the one should be thanking
me.
You been waitin’ your whole Cuban life to stab somebody in the back and now you did it. Guess that makes you a man, don’t it? Say, why don’t you call up your old dudes and see if they’ll take you back.” Viceroy Wilson grinned nastily. “Maybe they’ll make you minister of switchblades.”

Jesus Bernal scowled and mumbled something crude in Spanish. “I spit on their mothers,” he declared. “If they got on their knees I wouldn’t go back. Never!”

This was a total lie: Jesus Bernal yearned to abandon Skip Wiley’s circus and rejoin his old gang of dedicated extortionists, bombers, and firebugs. In his heart Jesus Bernal believed his special talents were being wasted. Whenever he thought about Wiley’s crazy plan he got a sour stomach that wouldn’t go away. Somehow he couldn’t visualize the masses ever mobilizing behind
El Fuego;
besides, if Wiley had his way, there’d be no masses left to mobilize—they’d all be heading North. These doubts had begun the day Ernesto Cabal hanged himself; guilt was a deadly emotion for a stouthearted terrorist, but guilt is what Jesus Bernal felt. He didn’t feel particularly good about feeding strangers to crocodiles, either. It wasn’t that the Cuban sympathized with
gringo
tourists, but Wiley’s peculiar method of murder did not seem like the kind of political statement
Las Noches de Diciembre
ought to be making. And if nothing else, Jesus Bernal considered himself an expert on political statements.

“This is the place,” Viceroy Wilson announced.

Great, thought Jesus Bernal. He wished Wiley would just let him alone with the typewriter and plastique.

Wilson parked the car in front of a two-story office building on Biscayne Boulevard at Seventy-ninth. A sign out front said: “Greater Miami Orange Bowl Committee.”

“Comb your hair,” Wilson grumbled.

“Shut up.”

“You look like a damn
Marielito.”

“And you look like my father’s yard man.”

The lady at the reception desk didn’t like the looks of either of them. “Yes?” she said with a polite Southern lilt unmistakable in its derision.

“We’re here about the advertisement,” Viceroy Wilson explained, shedding his Carreras.

“Yes?”

“The ad for security guards,” Jesus Bernal said.

“Security guards,” Wilson said, “for the Orange Bowl Parade.”

“I see,” said the Southern lady, warily handing each of them a job application. “And you both have some experience?”

“Do we ever,” said Viceroy Wilson, smiling his touchdown smile.

When Brian Keyes awoke, the first thing he noticed was a woman on top of him in the hospital bed. Her blond head lay on his shoulder, and she seemed to be sleeping. Keyes strained to get a glimpse of her face, but every little movement brought a fresh jolt of pain.

The woman weighed heavily on his chest; his ribs still ached from the surgery. Keyes stared down at the soft hair and sniffed for fragrant clues; it wasn’t easy, especially with the tube up his nose.

“Jenna?” he rasped.

The woman on his chest stirred and gave a little hum of a reply.

“Jenna, that you?”

She looked up with a sleepy-eyed hello.

“You sound just like George Burns. Want some water?”

Keyes nodded. He let out a sigh when Jenna climbed out of bed.

“Where’d you get the nurse’s uniform?”

“You like it?” She hitched up the hem. “Check out the white stockings.”

Keyes sipped at the cold water; his throat was a furnace.

“What time is it? What day?”

“December 10, my love. Ten-thirty P.M. Way past visiting hours. That’s why I had to wear this silly outfit.”

“You’d make a spectacular nurse. I’m getting better by the second.”

Jenna blushed. She sat at the foot of the bed. “You looked so precious when you were asleep.”

Keyes shut his eyes and faked a snore.

“Now stop!” Jenna laughed. “You look precious anyway. Aw, Brian, I’m so sorry. What happened out there?”

“Skip didn’t tell you?”

She looked away. “I haven’t talked to him.”

Keyes thought: She must think I’ve had brain surgery.

“What happened out there?” she asked again.

“I got knifed by one of Skip’s
caballeros “

“I don’t believe it,” Jenna said.

Pausing only for gulps of water, Keyes related the sad tale of Mrs. Kimmelman. For once Jenna seemed to focus on every word. She was curious, but unalarmed.

“That poor woman. Do you think she died?”

Keyes nodded patiently. “I’m pretty sure.”

Jenna stood up and walked to the window. “The weather got muggy again,” she remarked. “Three gorgeous days with a little winter, and then poof, Sauna City. My folks already had three feet of snow.”

“Jenna?”

When she turned to face him, her eyes were moist. She was trying to keep it inside, trying to recoup like the magnificent actress she was.

“I’m s-s-so sorry,” she cried. “I didn’t know you’d get hurt.”

Keyes held out his hand. “I’m all right. C’mere.”

She climbed back into bed, sobbing on his shoulder. At first the pain was murderous, but Jenna’s perfume was better than morphine. Keyes wondered what he’d say if a real nurse walked in.

Jenna sniffed, “How’s Skip?”

“Skip’s a little crazy, Jenna.”

“Of course he is.”

“Slightly crazier than usual,” Keyes said. “He’s killing off tourists.”

“I figured it’d be something like that. But it’s not really murder, is it? I mean
murder
in the criminal way.”

“Jenna, he fed an old lady to a crocodile!”

“He sent me a Mailgram,” she said.

“A Mailgram?”

“It said: ‘Dear Jenna, burn all my Rolodex cards at once. Love, Skip.’ “

Keyes asked, “Did you do it? Did you burn the Rolodex?”

“Of course not,” Jenna said, as if the suggestion were preposterous. “The message obviously is in code, which I haven’t yet figured out. Besides, he keeps the Rolodex inside that darned coffin, which gives me the creeps.”

Keyes grimaced, not from pain.

“Look at all these tubes,” Jenna said. “There’s one in your chest and one up your nose and another stuck in your arm. What’s in that bottle?”

“Glucose. Tomorrow I’m back on solids and in three days I’ll be out of here. Jenna, where’s Skip now?”

“I’ve no idea.”

“You’ve got to find him. He’s killed four people.”

“Not personally he hasn’t.” Jenna pulled back the sheet. “Let me see your stitches.”

Keyes turned to one side and lifted his right arm.

“Oh, boy,” said Jenna, whistling.

“Nasty, huh?”

“Looks like a railroad track.” She traced the wound with a finger, light as a feather. Keyes shivered pleasurably.

“Did the knife hit your lung? Or was it a knife?” Jenna asked.

“Nicked it,” Keyes said.

“Ouch,” Jenna whispered. She stroked his forehead and smiled. “How do you feel? I mean
really”

Keyes flushed. He knew what she meant. Really.

“Woozy,” he said, thinking: Something extraordinary is happening here; maybe Wiley’s under the bed.

“Too woozy? What if I took this one away … would you be all right? Could you breathe?”

“Well, let’s find out,” Keyes said. Of course she couldn’t be serious. Not
here.
He removed the oxygen tube and took three breaths.

“Okay?” Jenna asked.

Keyes nodded; it was pain he could live with.

Jenna slid out of bed and unbuttoned her starched nurse’s uniform. Suddenly she was standing there in bra and panties and white hospital hose. She had a deliciously naughty look on her face. Keyes didn’t think he’d seen that particular look before.

“I think we should make love,” Jenna announced.

Keyes was stupefied. Considering what had happened the last few days, maybe he was due for a miracle. Maybe this was God’s way of balancing fate. Or maybe it was something else altogether. Keyes didn’t care; it was bound to be his last spell of infinite pleasure until Skip Wiley was caught or killed.

“It’s possible I still love you, Brian,” said Jenna, slipping out of her bra. “Mind if I lock the door?”

“What about the nurses?”

“We’ll be oh-so-quiet.” Jenna stepped out of her panties. She looked radiant, her new tan lines providing a phenomenal lesson in contrasts. Keyes had never seen her velvet tummy so brown, or her breasts so white.

He said: “I’m a wreck. I need to shave.”

Then he said: “I don’t know if I can do this.”

And then he decided to just shut up and let things happen, because he really couldn’t be sure that this wasn’t some splendid Dilaudid dream, and that Jenna wasn’t just your usual breathtaking nude mirage in white hospital stockings.

She studied him from an artist’s pose, arms folded, a finger on her lips. “This is going to be tricky. I guess I’d better get on top.” And she did.

Smothered in delight, Keyes kissed Jenna’s neck and throat and collarbone and whatever else he could get his mouth on. He half-hugged her, using the arm that wasn’t attached to the intravenous tube, and played his fingers down her spine. Jenna seemed to enjoy it. She arched, then pressed down hard with her hips. Her aim was perfect.