Tourist Season (27 page)

“Skip can’t stand Liza Minnelli,” Keyes noted.

“There you go!”

“The most sacred virgin in all Miami—Liza Minnelli?”

“Well, shit,” Mulcahy said. “You got a better idea?”

Brian Keyes did have an idea, but it wasn’t one that Mulcahy especially wanted to hear. Keyes hoped that Cab might think of it on his own.

“If you were Skip and you wanted to get the world’s attention,” Keyes said, “you’d try something drastic, something beyond the realm of merely heinous.”

“Don’t try to cheer me up.”

“And if you were Wiley,” Keyes went on, “you’d want—no, you’d
demand—
maximum exposure.”

Mulcahy’s chin came off his chest. “Maximum exposure?”

“We’re talking television,” Keyes said. “Network television.” That’s what Skip had promised at Cable Beach.

“Oh no.” Mulcahy sounded like a man whose worst nightmare was coming true.

“Cab, what’s the most fantastic spectacle in Miami, the event watched every year by the entire country?”

“The Orange Bowl Parade, of course.”

“And who’s the star of the parade?”

“Holy shit,” Mulcahy groaned. He thought: If Brian’s right, this is even worse than a nun.

“The Orange Bowl queen.”

“Right,” Keyes said, “and when is the Orange Bowl Parade?”

“The last night of December!” Mulcahy exclaimed.

“The very last night of December,” said Brian Keyes.
“La Ultima Noche de Diciembre.”

19

The conference table had been carved into the likeness of a Florida navel orange. A big one. The table filled the Chamber of Commerce with its roundness and orangeness. And at the crown of the orange, where the stem had been hewn, sat the chairman of the Orange Bowl Committee.

“Have a seat, Mr. Keyes,” he said.

Brian Keyes slipped into a leather chair. He couldn’t take his eyes off the damn table. Once upon a time it must have been a beautiful slab of white walnut, before they’d varnished it into such a florid atrocity.

“You know most everyone here,” the chairman said.

Keyes scanned familiar faces: the Miami chief of police, the Dade County chief of police, two vice-mayors, a few ruddy Chamber of Commerce types (including the late Sparky Harper’s successor), Cab Mulcahy, looking dyspeptic, and, of course, Al Garcia from the newly mobilized Fuego One Task Force. Garcia was sitting at the giant orange’s navel.

The air was blue with cigarette smoke and sharp with the aroma of fresh coffee. Everyone had their own ashtray, their own glass of ice water, and their own packet of press clippings about the tourist murders. The mood of the group was funereal.

“Let’s start with Sergeant Garcia,” the Orange Bowl chairman said, consulting a legal pad. “Did I pronounce that correctly?”

“Yes, sir.” The words hissed through clenched teeth. Garcia had promised the chief he’d be polite. The Orange Bowl chairman was a doughy white-haired Florida cracker who was still getting used to the whole idea of Cubans.

“The name of the gang is
Las Noches de Diciembre,
or the Nights of December,” Garcia began. “It’s an extremist organization but we’re not sure about its politics or its motives. We do know they use murder, kidnapping, torture, and bombing. So far they haven’t asked for ransom or anything else. All they seem to want is publicity. Their targets are mainly tourists, although we think they also whacked Mr. B D. Harper.”

“Whacked?” said the chairman.

“Murdered,” Keyes explained.

“Yes, murdered,” Al Garcia said, “with a capital M. These bozos mean business.”

“Bozos?” the chairman said tentatively, glancing around the table.

“The bad guys,” Keyes explained.

“Las Noches,”
Garcia said.

That was the extent of Garcia’s formal presentation. He hated meetings like this; they reminded him of
Sesame Street.
Garcia took off his tinted reading glasses and fished in his pockets for a cigarette.

The Orange Bowl man cleared his throat and said: “Sergeant, do we know exactly who these people are?”

“Some of them.”

Garcia took his time with the Bic lighter.

“The gang has at least four members. A white male, mid-thirties, identity unknown.” Garcia gave a sideways glance toward Keyes. “There’s a young Seminole Indian named Tigertail. The bomber, the one who did the Palmetto Country Club job—he’s an old acquaintance. A Cuban right-winger named Jesus Bernal.”

“How do you spell that?” the chairman asked, pen poised over the legal pad.

“J-e-s-u-s,” Garcia said impatiently.

“Oh. Just like
our
Jesus, only pronounced different.”

“Yeah,” Garcia said. “And the last name is B-e-r-n-a-l.”

“What does that mean?” the chairman asked. “In English.”

“It means ‘Jesus Bernal,’ “ Garcia grumbled. “It’s his fucking name, that’s all.”

The Dade County police chief looked sick to his stomach.

Garcia said, “The fourth suspect you all know. His name is Daniel Wilson, AKA Viceroy.”

“Oh no,” said the chairman. “One of the Dolphins.”

“Old number thirty-one,” one of the vice-mayors lamented.

Everyone at the orange table was a big football fan, and the mention of Viceroy Wilson’s name ignited a paroxysm of nostalgia.

“It’s hard to understand,” the chairman said sadly. “Our town was very good to that boy.”

Brian Keyes didn’t need the NAACP to tell him there were no black faces sitting at the orange table.

“Well,” Garcia said. “Mr. Wilson apparently has a beef against society. A serious beef. They all do.”

“Which one is
El Fuego?”
somebody asked.

“Don’t know,” Garcia replied.

“What does that mean,
El Fuego?”
the chairman asked.

“The Fire. The Flame. Take your pick.” Garcia was annoyed. He hadn’t come to teach Spanish 101.

“When can you arrest these men?” the chairman demanded.

“When I find ‘em.” Garcia motioned toward Cab Mulcahy. “There’ll be a story in tomorrow’s newspaper that ID’s the three known suspects and asks for the public’s help in locating them. We sent over some mug shots this morning with Mr. Bloodworth.”

“We’re running the pictures,” Mulcahy said, “on the front page.”

“That’ll help,” Garcia said. “But somehow I don’t think these guys are going to sit still and let us find them. I think we’re going to have to wait till they appear. And they
will
appear. Mr. Keyes here is a private investigator, a pretty good one. As you know, he was abducted by
Las Noches
a couple of weeks ago and roughed up pretty good. Brian, tell ‘em the good news.”

Keyes said, “We have reason to believe that they plan to kidnap the Orange Bowl queen.”

Everyone at the table sat back in their chairs like they’d been punched in the chest. There was plenty of nervous whispering.

“That’s the craziest stunt I ever heard,” said somebody in a bright blazer. Actually, several of the men wore identical bright blazers. The blazers were orange.

“We’re taking this threat very seriously,” interjected the Dade County police chief, always jittery among civic-leader types.

“We think it’s going to happen during the parade,” Brian Keyes said, touching off another round of white-establishment gasping.

“Good Lord!”

“They’re going to kidnap the Orange Bowl queen in the middle of the parade?”

“On national goddamn TV? In front of Jane fucking Pauley?”

“And Michael Landon?”

“ ‘Fraid so,” Al Garcia said.

Jane Pauley and Michael Landon were scheduled to host the King Orange Jamboree Parade from an elevated booth on Biscayne Boulevard. Jane Pauley and Michael Landon were big celebrities, but Garcia tapped his cigarette ashes all over the orange walnut to let everyone know he didn’t give a shit about that. Brian Keyes admired the way Garcia had taken over the meeting from the guys in the blazers.

One of the vice-mayors turned to Keyes and said: “You’ve met these people. What do you think—would they listen to reason?”

“Doubtful,” said Keyes. “Very doubtful.” If necessary, he was prepared to tell them wkat happened to Ida Kimmelman, just so they’d give up the idea of trying to bargain with
El Fuego.

“Mr. Keyes,” a vice-mayor said, “what is it they want?”

“They want us to leave,” Keyes said.

“All of us,” Garcia added, “from Palm Beach to Key West.”

“I don’t understand,” the vice-mayor said.

“They want Florida back,” Keyes said, “the way it was.”

“The way it was
when?”

“When it wasn’t fucked up with so many people,” Garcia said.

The table erupted in snorts and sniggering, and the men in the blazers seemed to shake their heads gravely in syncopation. “Why doesn’t this kind of shit ever happen to Disney World?” one of them said mournfully.

The Orange Bowl chairman decided he’d heard enough dire news from the private eye and the rude detective, so he turned to the police chiefs for encouragement.

“Gentlemen, surely you’re not just going to sit and wait for these outlaws to show up and disrupt the parade. They must be arrested as soon as possible, before New Year’s Eve. It’s bad enough that the press already knows about them.”

“It’s pretty tough to keep the lid on mass murder,” remarked the Miami police chief. “God knows we’ve tried.”

“We’re doing all we can to find these people,” added the Dade County police chief. “We’ve got every available detective working the case, but it’s tough. Especially around Christmas. Half the department’s on leave.”

The Orange Bowl chairman said grumpily, “I don’t want your excuses. I want to hear exactly what you’re doing to catch these killers!”

The police chiefs turned to Al Garcia, who’d been waiting patiently for the ball to bounce back his way.

“Right now we’ve got six undercover guys in Little Havana looking for Jesus Bernal,” Garcia said. “We’ve got eight more over in Liberty City searching for Viceroy Wilson. The Indian—well, he’s a problem. Looks like he just disappeared off the planet. Anyhow, we got plenty of reward money out on the street—just how much, I can’t say, but it’s more than my whole damn pension. We’ve doubled the patrols at every big South Florida tourist attraction—the Seaquarium, Ocean World, Six Flags, the racetracks, the beaches. There was a rumor that the Monkey Jungle might be next so we’ve got a sniper team waiting upwind. What’s more, we got choppers and air-boats searching the Glades for
El Fuego’s
camp. We even hired our own Indian guide.”

A nearsighted Miccosukee, Garcia noted silently, but he was better than nothing.

One of the vice-mayors suggested that warnings be posted in all the major tourist hotels.

“Are you out of your mind?” screeched Sparky Harper’s Chamber of Commerce successor. “Are you trying to cause panic?”

“No one would panic,” the vice-mayor said defensively, “if the warnings were worded properly.”

“Perhaps in small type,” the chairman suggested.

“And perhaps in Chinese,” said Al Garcia.

The chairman glowered. “Sergeant, you don’t seem to understand what’s at stake here.”

“Human lives,” the detective said, raising his hands. “That’s all, far as I’m concerned.”

“It’s much more than that,” the Orange Bowl chairman snapped. “NBC is here! Let’s not forget that. And let’s not forget the theme of this year’s parade: ‘Tropical Tranquillity.’ “

Brian Keyes desperately looked across the table at Cab Mulcahy. The managing editor’s eyelids closed slowly, like a dying iguana’s.

“Look,” Garcia said, “you guys have to put on a parade and I have to solve murders. Maybe even prevent ‘em, if possible. So listen real good ‘cause here’s the plan: we’re gonna have cops crawling all over Biscayne Boulevard on New Year’s Eve. We’re gonna have the Orange Bowl queen so completely surrounded by police that you might as well paint a badge on her goddamn float. I don’t care what it looks like on television. Fuck NBC. Fuck Jane Pauley. Fuck Alf Landon.”

“Michael
Landon,” Keyes whispered.

“Him, too.”

The Orange Bowl chairman looked like he’d have killed for a Maalox. He said, “Sergeant, that’s the worst plan I ever heard. It would be a catastrophe, image-wise.”

“I agree,” said Sparky Harper’s successor.

“This is not a military parade,” scoffed another Chamber of Commerce man.

“Now, wait a minute,” said one of the orange-blazer guys. “Maybe we can compromise. Suppose we have the police wave batons and march in lockstep behind the queen’s float! I’d say that would look mighty darn impressive. And no one would suspect a thing.”

“How about screw the batons,” said Al Garcia.

“Then plainclothes,” suggested the Dade County police chief.

“Maybe,” Garcia said.

“And have them hiding in the crowd,” the Orange Bowl chairman said. “Not in the blessed parade.”