Cuba (8 page)

Maria’s daughters, whispering with them, but inside the

clothes she was still one of them in a way that Maximo

would never be again. He had traveled too far, grown

too big….

Mercedes was thinking these thoughts when Hector arrived,

walking along the road. Even Maximo stopped

talking to one of his brothers, the doctor, when he

saw Hector coming up the path to the porch.

“Happy birthday,

Mima.”

Hector, Jesuit priest, politician,

revolutionary… he spoke softly to his mother,

kissed her cheek, shook Maximo’s hand, looked

him in the eye as he ate a chocolate,

kissed each of his sisters and touched the arms and hands of

their husbands and his brothers, the doctor and the

automobile mechanic.

Ocho was watching Hector, waiting for him to reach for

his hand, his lips quivering.

Mercedes couldn’t quite believe what she was seeing,

Hector hugging Ocho, holding him and

rocking back and forth, the young man near tears.v

Then the moment passed.

Hector refused to release his grip on his

brother, led him to Dona Maria, gently made him

sit at her feet and placed her hands in his.

Ah, yes. Hector Sedano. If anyone could,

it would be you.

“They do not appreciate youea”…Maximo’s wife

told him as they rode back to Havana in his car.

“They are so ignorantea”…she added, slightly

embarrassed that she and her husband should’have to spend

an evening with peasants in such squalid surroundings.

Of course, they were his family and one had duties,

but still… He had worked so hard to earn his standing and

position, it was appalling that he should have to make a

pilgrimage back to such squalor.

And his relatives! The old woman, the sisters

… crippled, ignorant, dirty, uncouth …

it was all a bit much.

And Hector, the priest who was a secret

politician! A man who used the Church for

counterrevolutionary treason.

“Surely he must know that you are aware of his

political activitiesea”…she remarked now to her

husband, who frowned at the shacks and

sugarcane fields they were driving past.

“He knowsea”…Maximo murmured.

“Europe was so niceea”…his wife said softly.

“I don’t mean to be uncharitable, but truly it is

a shame that we must return to

thisl”

Maximo wasn’t paying much attention.

“I keep hoping that someday we shall go to Europe and

never returnea”…she whispered. “I do love

Madrid so.”

Maximo didn’t hear that comment. He was wondering

about Hector and Alejo Vargas. He couldn’t

imagine the two of them talking, but what if they had

been? What if those two combined to plot against him?

What could he do to guard against that possibility,

to protect himself?

Later that evening Hector and his sister-in-law,

Mercedes, rode a bus into Havana. “It was good

of you to stay for

Mima’s

partyea”…Hector said.

“I wanted to see her. She makes me think of

Jorge.”

“Do you still miss him?”

“I will miss him every day of my life.”

“Me tooea”…Hector murmured.

“Vargas knows about youea”…she said, after glancing around

to make sure no one else could hear her words.

“What does he know?”

“That you organize and attend political meetings,

that you write to friends, that you speak to students, that most

of the priests in Cuba are loyal to you, that many people

all over this island look to you for leadership…. He

knows that much and probably more.”

“It would be a miracle if none of that had reached the

ears of the secret police.”

“He may arrest you.”

“He will do nothing without Fidel’s approval. He

is Fidel’s dog.”

“And you think Fidel approves of your

activities?”

“I think he tolerates them. The man isn’t

immortal. Even he must wonder what will come after

him.”

“You are playing with fire. Castro’s hold on

Vargas is weakening. Castro’s death will give him

a free hand. Do not underestimate him.”

“I do not. Believe me. But Cuba is more

important than me, than Vargas, than

Castro. If this country is ever going to be

anything other than the barnyard of a tyrant, someone

must plant seeds that have a chance of growing. Every per-

son I talk to is a seed, an investment in the

future.”

“”Barnyard of a tyrant.” What a pretty

phraseff”…Mercedes said acidly. The last few

years, living with Fidel, she had developed a

thick skin: people said the most vicious things about him and

she had learned to ignore most of it. Still, she

deeply admired Hector, so his words wounded her.

“I’m sorry if I”

She made sure her voice was under control, then

said, “Dear Hector, Cuba is also the

graveyard of a great many martyrs. There is room

here for Vargas to bury us both.”

He was remembering the good days, the days when he had

been young, under a bright sun, surrounded by happy,

laughing comrades.

All things had been possible back then. Bullets

couldn’t touch them, no one would betray them

to Batista’s men, they would save Cuba, save her

people, make them prosperous and healthy and strong and

happy. Oh, yes,

when we were young

…

As he tossed and turned, fighting the pain,

snatches of scenes ran through his mind; student

politics at the University of Havana, the

assault on the Moncada Barracks in

Santiago, guns banging and bullets spanging

off steel, off masonry, singing as they whirled

away…. He remembered the firelights on the

roads, riding the trucks through the countryside,

evenings making plans with Che and the others, how Jhey

would set things right, kick out the capitalists who had

enslaved Cuba for centuries.

Che, he had been a true believer.

And there were plenty more. True believers all.

Ignorant as virgins, penniless and hungry, they

thought they could fix the world.

In his semiconscious state he could hear his own

voice making speeches, explaining, promising

to fix things,” to heal the people, put them to work, give

them jobs and houses and medical care and a future for

their children.

Words. All words.

Wind.

He coughed, and the coughing brought him fully awake.

The nurse was there in the chair watching him.

“Leave me, woman.”

She left the room.

He pulled himself higher in the bed, used a corner

of the sheet to wipe the sweat from his face.

The sheets were thin, worn out. Even

el presidents”?,

sheets were worn out!

A sick joke, that.

Everything in the whole damned country was broken or

worn out, including Castro’s sheets. You didn’t

have to be a high government official to be aware of that

hard fact.

On the dresser just out of reach was a box of cigars.

He hitched himself around in bed, reached for one, then

leaned far over and got his hand on the lighter.

The pain made him gasp.

Madre mia!

When the pain subsided somewhat he lay back in the

bed, wiped his face again on the sheet.

He fumbled with the cigar, bit off the end and spat it

on the floor. Got the lighter going, sucked on the

cigar… the raw smoke was like a knife in his

throat. He hacked and hacked.

The doctors made him give up cigars ten years

ago. He demanded this box two days ago,

when they told him he was dying. “If I am dying,

I can smoke. The cancer will kill me before the

cigars, so why not?”

When the coughing subsided, he took a tiny puff

on the cigar, careful not to inhale.

God, the smoke was delicious.

Another puff.

He lay back on the pillow, sniffed the aroma of the

smoke wafting through the air, inhaled the tobacco

essence and let it out slowly as the cigar smoldered in

his hand.

The truth was that he had made a hash of it.

Cuba’s

problems had defeated him. Oh, he had done the

best he could, but by any measure, his best hadn’t

been good enough. The average Cuban was worse off

today than he had been those last few years under

Batista. Food was in short supply, the

economy was in tatters, the bureaucrats were openly

corrupt, the social welfare system was falling

apart, and the nation reeled under massive short-term

foreign debt, for it had defaulted on its

long-term international debt in the late 1980’s.

The short-term debt could not be repudiated, not if

the nation ever expecte’d to borrow another

peso abroad.

He puffed on the cigar, savoring the smoke. Then

he shifted, trying to make the ache in his bowels

ease up.

Of course he knew what had gone wrong. When he

took over the nation he had played the cards he had

… evicted the hated Yanqui

imperialistas

and seized their property, and accepted the cheers and

adulation of the people for delivering them from the oppressor.

Unfortunately Cuba was a tiny, poor country,

so he had had to replace the evicted

patrdn

with another, and the only one in sight had been the

Soviet Union. He embraced communism, got

down on his knees and swore fealty to the Soviet

state. With that act he earned the undying hatred of the

politicians who ruled the United Statesafter

several assassination attempts and the ill-fated

Bay of Pigs invasion debacle, they declared

economic warfare on Cuba. Then the cruelest

twist of the knifethe Soviet Union collapsed in

1990-91 and Cuba was cut adrift.

Ah, he should have been wiser, should have realized that the

United States would be the winning horse.

The Spanish grandees had bled Cuba for

centuries, worked the people as slaves, then as peons.

After the Americans ran the Spanish off,

American corporations put their men in the manor

houses and life continued as before. The people were still slaves

to the cane crop, living in abject poverty, unable

to escape the company towns and the company stores.

A few things did change under the Americans. The

is-

land became America’s red light district, the

home of the vice that was illegal on the American

mainland: gambling, prostitution, drugs, and, during

Prohibition, alcohol. Poor Catholic

families sent their daughters to the cities to whore

for the Yanquis.

The capitalists bled Cuba until there was no

blood left they would keep exploiting people the world

over until there were no more people. Or no more

capitalists. Until then, the capitalists would have

all the money. He should have realized that fundamental

truth.

He had grown up hating the United States,

hating Yanquis who drank and gambled and whored the

nights away in Havana. He hated their

diplomats, then- base at Guantanamo Bay,

their smugness, their money … he despised them and

all their works, which was unfortunate, because America was

a fact of life, like shit, A man could not escape

it because it smelled bad.

God had never given him the opportunity to destroy

the Yanquis, because if He had …

Fidel Castro was intensely, totally Cuban.

He personified the resentment the Cuban people felt

because they had spent their lives begging for the scraps that

fell from the rich men’s table. Resentment was a vile

emotion, like hatred and envy.

Wellea”he was dying. Weeks, they said. A few

weeks, more or less. The cancer was eating him

alive.

The painkillers were doing their jobat least he could

sit up, think rationally, smoke the forbidden cigars,

plan for Cuba’s future.

Cuba had a future, even if he didn’t.

Of course, the United States would play a

prominent role in that future. With the great devil

Fidel dead, all things were possible. The

economic embargo would probably perish with him, a

new

presidente

could bring … what?

He thought about that question as he puffed gingerly on the

cigar, letting the smoke trickle out between his lips.

For years Americans had paraded through the govern-

ment offices in Havana talking about what might be

after the economic embargo was lifted by their

government. Always they had an angle, wanted a

special dispensation from the Cuban government… and were

willing to pay for it, of course. Pay handsomely.

Now. Paper promises … He had enjoyed

taking their money.

He had made no plans for a successor, had

anointed no one. Some people thought his brother, Raul,

might take over after him, but Raul was

impotente,

a lightweight.

He would have to have his say now, while he was very much

alive.

But what should the future of Cuba be?

The pain in his bowels doubled him up. He curled

up in the bed, groaning, holding tightly to the cigar.