Contrary to the advice he gave the minister, he did not go back to sleep. Ramfis would not leave without wiping out his father’s assassins, a killing that could demolish his laborious efforts of the past few months to convince the world that with him as President the Republic was becoming a democracy without the civil war or chaos feared by the United States and the Dominican ruling classes. But what could he do? Any order of his regarding the prisoners that contradicted those issued by Ramfis would be disobeyed, testifying to his absolute lack of authority with the Armed Forces.
And yet, mysteriously, except for the proliferation of rumors regarding imminent armed uprisings and massacres of civilians, nothing happened on November 16 or 17. He continued to take care of ordinary matters, as if the country were enjoying complete tranquillity. At dusk on November 17 he was informed that Ramfis had abandoned his beach house. A short while later, he was seen getting out of a car, inebriated, and hurling curses and a grenade—which did not explode—at the facade of the Hotel El Embajador. After that, no one knew his whereabouts. The following morning, a delegation from the National Civic Union, led by Ángel Severo Cabral, asked to meet immediately with the President: it was a matter of life and death. He received them. Severo Cabral was beside himself. He brandished a sheet of paper scrawled by Huáscar Tejeda to his wife, Lindín, and smuggled out of La Victoria, which revealed that the six men accused of killing Trujillo (including Modesto Díaz and Tunti Cáceres) had been separated from the rest of the political prisoners and were to be transferred to another prison. “They’re going to kill us, my love,” the letter ended. The leader of the Civic Union demanded that the prisoners be placed in the hands of the Judicial Branch, or freed by presidential decree. The wives of the prisoners were demonstrating, with their lawyers, at the doors of the Palace. The international press had been alerted, as well as the State Department and the Western embassies.
An alarmed Dr. Balaguer assured them that he would intervene personally in the matter. He would not allow a crime to be committed. According to reports he had received, the transfer of the six conspirators had as its object an acceleration of the investigation. It was merely a step in the reconstruction of the crime, after which the trial would begin without delay. And, of course, with observers from the World Court at The Hague, whom he would personally invite to the country.
As soon as the leaders of the Civic Union had gone, he called the Solicitor General of the Republic, Dr. José Manuel Machado. Did he know why the head of the National Police, Marcos A. Jorge Moreno, had ordered the transfer of Salvador Estrella Sadhalá, Huáscar Tejeda, Fifí Pastoriza, Pedro Livio Cedeño, Tunti Cáceres, and Modesto Díaz to the cells of the Palace of Justice? The Solicitor General of the Republic knew nothing. He reacted with indignation: someone was misusing the name of the Judicial Branch, no judge had ordered a new reconstruction of the crime. Appearing to be very troubled, the President declared that it was intolerable. He would immediately order the Minister of Justice to carry out a thorough investigation, determine those responsible, and bring charges against them. In order to leave written proof that he had done so, he dictated a memorandum to his secretary and told him it was urgent that it be delivered right away to the Ministry of Justice. Then he called the minister on the phone. He found him in a state of agitation:
“I don’t know what to do, Mr. President. I have the prisoners’ wives at the door. I’m being pressured on all sides to make a statement, and I don’t know anything. Do you know why they’ve been transferred to the cells of the Judicial Branch? Nobody can explain it to me. They’re taking them to the highway for a new reconstruction of the crime, which no one has ordered. And no one can get near them because soldiers from the San Isidro Air Base have cordoned off the area. What should I do?”
“Go there personally and demand an explanation,” the President told him. “It is absolutely imperative that there be witnesses to the fact that the government has done all it can to stop the breaking of the law. Go there with the representatives of the United States and Great Britain.”
Dr. Balaguer personally called John Calvin Hill and begged him to support this step by the Minister of Justice. At the same time, he informed him that if, as it seemed, General Ramfis was preparing to leave the country, Trujillo’s brothers would move into action.
He continued attending to affairs, apparently absorbed by the critical financial situation. He did not move from his office at lunchtime, and, working with the Minister of Finance and the director of the Central Bank, refused to receive calls or visits. At dusk, his secretary handed him a note from the Minister of Justice, informing him that he and the American consul had been prevented from approaching the scene of the reconstruction of the crime by armed members of the Air Force. He confirmed that no one in the ministry, the prosecutor’s office, or the courts had requested or been informed of such an inquiry; it was an exclusively military decision. When he arrived home, at eight-thirty in the evening, he received a call from Colonel Marcos A. Jorge Moreno. The van with three armed guards that was to return the prisoners to La Victoria after completion of the judicial inquiry had disappeared.
“Spare no effort to find them, Colonel. Mobilize all the forces you need,” ordered the President. “Call me no matter the time.”
He told his sisters, disturbed by rumors that the Trujillos had killed the men who assassinated the Generalissimo, that he knew nothing. The stories were probably inventions of extremists intended to worsen the climate of agitation and uncertainty. As he reassured them with lies, he speculated: Ramfis would leave tonight, if he had not done so already. That meant the confrontation with the Trujillo brothers would take place at dawn. Would he order them arrested? Would he have them killed? Their minuscule brains were capable of believing that if they eliminated him, they could halt a historical process that would soon erase them from Dominican politics. He did not feel apprehensive, only curious.
As he was putting on his pajamas, Colonel Jorge Moreno called again. The van had been found: the six prisoners had fled after murdering the three guards.
“Move heaven and earth until you find the fugitives,” he intoned, with no change in his voice. “You will answer to me for the lives of those prisoners, Colonel. They must appear in court to be tried according to law for this new crime.”
Before he fell asleep, he felt a sudden surge of pity. Not for the prisoners, undoubtedly slaughtered this afternoon by Ramfis in person, but for the three young soldiers whom Trujillo’s son also had murdered in order to give an appearance of truth to the farce of the flight. Three poor guards killed in cold blood, to give the veneer of reality to a ridiculous sham no one would ever believe. What useless bloodshed!
The next day, on his way to the Palace, he read on the inside pages of
El Caribe
about the flight of “Trujillo’s assassins, after treacherously taking the lives of the three guards who were escorting them back to La Victoria.” Still, the scandal he feared did not occur; it was dimmed by other events. At ten in the morning, the door of his office was kicked open. Submachine gun in hand, and with clusters of grenades and revolvers at his waist, General Petán Trujillo burst into the room, followed by his brother Héctor, also dressed as a general, and twenty-seven armed men from his personal guard, whose faces looked not only thuggish but drunk. The revulsion this ill-mannered mob produced in him was stronger than his fear.
“I cannot offer you seats, I do not have that many chairs, forgive me,” the small President apologized, sitting very straight. He seemed composed, and there was an urbane smile on his round little face.
“The moment of truth has arrived, Balaguer,” roared the savage Petán, spraying saliva. He flourished his submachine gun in a menacing way, and waved it in the President’s face. He did not draw back. “Enough bullshit and hypocrisy. Just like Ramfis finished off those sons of bitches yesterday, we’re going to finish off the ones still walking around free. Beginning with the Judases, you treacherous dwarf!”
This vulgar imbecile was also drunk. Balaguer hid his indignation and apprehension with complete self-control. Calmly, he indicated the window:
“I ask you to accompany me, General Petán.” Then he spoke to Héctor. “You too, please.”
He walked to the window and pointed at the ocean. It was a brilliant morning. Facing the coastline one could see very clearly, gleaming in the sun, the silhouettes of three American warships. Their names were not visible, but one certainly could admire the long cannons on the
Little Rock
, a cruiser equipped with missiles, and on the aircraft carriers
Valley Forge
and
Franklin D. Roosevelt
, all aimed at the city.
“They are waiting for you to take power to begin firing,” said the President, very slowly. “They are waiting for you to give them an excuse to invade us again. Do you want to go down in history as the Dominicans who allowed a second Yankee occupation of the Republic? If that is what you want, shoot and make me a hero. My successor will not sit in this chair for even an hour.”
Since they had permitted him to say what he had said, he told himself, it was unlikely they would kill him. Petán and Blacky were whispering, talking at the same time and not understanding a word. The thugs and bodyguards looked at one another in confusion. Finally, Petán ordered his men to leave. When he found himself alone in the office with the two brothers, he concluded he had won the game. They sat down in front of him. Poor devils! How uncomfortable they looked! They did not know where to begin. He had to make the task easier for them.
“The country is waiting for a gesture from you,” he said amiably. “Hoping you will act with the generosity and patriotism of General Ramfis. Your nephew has left the country in the interest of peace.”
Petán, ill-humored and direct, interrupted him:
“It’s very easy to be a patriot when you have millions overseas and the properties Ramfis owns. But me and Blacky don’t have houses outside the country, or stocks, or bank accounts. All we own is here, in this country. We were the only assholes who obeyed the Chief when he prohibited taking money overseas. Is that fair? We’re not idiots, Mr. Balaguer. All the lands and goods we have here they’re going to confiscate.”
He felt relieved.
“That can be remedied, gentlemen,” he reassured them. “Of course it can. A magnanimous gesture such as the one the Nation asks of you must be compensated.”
From this moment on, it was nothing but a tedious financial negotiation, which confirmed for the President the contempt he felt toward those who were greedy for money. It was something he had never coveted. He finally settled on amounts he considered reasonable, given the peace and security the Republic would gain in return. He ordered the Central Bank to pay two million dollars to each of the brothers, and to convert into foreign currency the eleven million pesos they already had, some of it in shoeboxes and the rest on deposit in banks in the capital. To be certain the agreement would be respected, Petán and Héctor demanded that it be countersigned by the American consul. John Calvin Hill agreed immediately, delighted that matters would be settled with goodwill and no bloodshed. He congratulated the President and declared: “It is in a crisis that you know a true statesman.” Lowering his eyes modestly, Dr. Balaguer told himself that, with the departure of the Trujillos, there would be such an explosion of exultation and joy—and some chaos too—that few people would remember the murder of the six prisoners, whose bodies—how could there be any doubt?—would never be found. The episode would not do him too much damage.
In the Council of Ministers he asked for unanimous agreement from the cabinet for a general political amnesty, which would empty the prisons and nullify all judicial proceedings against subversion, and he ordered the Dominican Party dissolved. The ministers rose to their feet and applauded. Then, with somewhat flushed cheeks, his Minister of Health, Dr. Tabaré Álvarez Pereyra, informed him that for the past six months he had hidden in his house—most of the time confined in a narrow closet with robes and pajamas—the fugitive Luis Amiama Tió
Dr. Balaguer praised his humanitarian spirit and asked him to accompany Dr. Amiama to the National Palace, when both he and Don Antonio Imbert, who would undoubtedly reappear at any moment, would be received in person by the President of the Republic with the respect and gratitude they deserved for the great services they had rendered the Nation.
After Amadito left, Antonio Imbert remained a while longer in the house of his cousin, Dr. Manuel Durán Barreras. He had no hope that Juan Tomás Díaz and Antonio de la Maza would find General Román. Perhaps the political-military Plan had been discovered and Pupo was dead or in prison; perhaps he had lost his courage and stepped back. He had no alternative but to go into hiding. He and his cousin Manuel reviewed his options before deciding on a distant relative, Dr. Gladys de los Santos, Durán’s sister-in-law. She lived nearby.
In the small hours of the morning, when it was still dark, Manuel Durán and Imbert walked the six blocks at a rapid pace without seeing any vehicles or pedestrians. Dr. De los Santos took some time to open the door. She was in her bathrobe, and rubbed her eyes vigorously as they explained the situation. She was not particularly frightened. She reacted with a strange equanimity. A stout but agile woman in her forties, she displayed enormous self-assurance and regarded the world with dispassion.
“I’ll put you up the best I can,” she told Imbert. “But this isn’t a safe hiding place. I was arrested once, and the SIM has me in its files.”
To keep the maid from finding him, she put him in a windowless storeroom next to the garage, and placed a folding mattress on the floor. It was a tiny, unventilated space. Antonio could not close his eyes for the rest of the night. He kept the Colt .45 beside him, on a shelf filled with canned goods; he was tense, his ears alert to any suspicious sound. He thought about his brother Segundo, and his skin crawled: they must be torturing him in La Victoria, or had already killed him.
Dr. De los Santos, who had locked the storeroom with a key, came to let him out at nine in the morning.
“I gave the maid the day off so she could visit her family in Jarabacoa.” She tried to cheer him. “You can move anywhere you want in the house. But don’t let the neighbors see you. What a night you must have spent in that cave.”
While they ate breakfast in the kitchen—mangú, fried cheese, and coffee—they listened to the news. There was no mention of the assassination on the radio. Dr. De los Santos left for work a short while later. Imbert took a shower and went down to the living room, where, sprawled in an armchair, he fell asleep, the Colt .45 on his lap. He gave a great start and groaned when somebody shook him awake.
“The
caliés
took away Manuel this morning, not long after you left his house,” said an extremely agitated Gladys de los Santos. “Sooner or later they’ll get it out of him that you’re here. You have to go, right away.”
Yes, but where? Gladys had passed by the Imberts’ house, and the street was crawling with guards and
caliés
; no doubt about it, they had arrested his wife and daughter. It seemed as if invisible hands were beginning to tighten around his throat. He hid his anguish so as not to increase the terror of Dr. De los Santos, who was a changed woman, so perturbed she could not stop blinking her eyes.
“There are
caliés
in Beetles and trucks full of guards everywhere,” she said. “They’re searching cars, asking everybody for papers, going into houses.”
Nothing had been reported yet on television or radio, or in the papers, but rumors were flying. The human tom-tom was sending the news all over the city that Trujillo had been killed. People were frightened and confused about what might happen. For close to an hour he racked his brain: where could he go? He had to leave now. He thanked Dr. De los Santos for her help and went out, his hand on the pistol in his right trouser pocket. He walked for some time, in no particular direction, until he thought of his dentist, Dr. Camilo Suero, who lived near the Military Hospital. Camilo and his wife, Alfonsina, let him in. They could not hide him, but did help him go over other possibilities. And then the image came into his mind of Francisco Rainieri, an old friend, the son of an Italian, and an ambassador of the Order of Malta; Francisco’s wife, Venecia, and his wife, Guarina, had tea together and played canasta. Perhaps the diplomat could help him seek asylum in one of the legations. Taking every precaution, he called the Rainieris’ residence and passed the receiver to Alfonsina, who pretended to be Guarina Tessón, the maiden name of Imbert’s wife. She asked to speak to Queco. He came to the phone immediately, and she was startled by his extremely cordial greeting:
“How are you, my dear Guarina? I’m delighted to hear from you. You’re calling about tonight, aren’t you? Don’t worry. I’ll send the car for you. At seven sharp, if that’s all right. Just give me your address again, all right?”
“Either he’s a mind reader or he’s gone crazy or I don’t know what,” said Alfonsina when she hung up the receiver.
“And now, what do we do until seven o’clock, Alfonsina?”
“Pray to Our Lady of Altagracia,” she said, and crossed herself. “If the
caliés
come, just use your gun.”
At exactly seven a shiny blue Buick, with diplomatic plates, stopped at the door. Francisco Rainieri was at the wheel. He pulled away as soon as Antonio Imbert sat down beside him.
“I knew the message was from you because Guarina and your daughter are at my house,” said Rainieri by way of greeting. “There aren’t two women named Guarina Tessón in Ciudad Trujillo, it could only have been you.”
He was very calm, even cheerful, wearing a freshly ironed guayabera and smelling of lavender water. He drove Imbert to a distant house, along remote streets, taking a huge detour because there were roadblocks along the main streets where vehicles were stopped and searched. Less than an hour had passed since the official announcement of Trujillo’s death. The atmosphere was heavy with apprehension, as if everyone were expecting an explosion. Elegant as always, the ambassador did not ask a single question regarding Trujillo’s assassination or the other conspirators. Very casually, as if he were talking about the next tennis championship at the Country Club, he remarked:
“With things the way they are, it’s unthinkable that any embassy would give you asylum. And it wouldn’t do much good. The government, if there is still a government, wouldn’t respect it. They’d drag you out no matter where you were. The only thing you can do, for the moment, is hide. At the Italian consulate, where I have friends, there are too many employees and visitors going back and forth. But I found someone, and he’s totally reliable. He did this once before, when they were hunting down Yuyo d’Alessandro. He has only one condition. Nobody can know, not even Guarina. For her own safety, more than anything else.”
“Of course,” Tony Imbert murmured, astounded that on his own initiative this man who was no more than a casual friend would risk so much to save his life. He was so disconcerted by Queco’s daring generosity that he did not even manage to thank him.
At Rainieri’s house he embraced his wife and daughter. Considering the circumstances, they were remarkably calm. But when he held her in his arms, he could feel Leslie’s body trembling. He stayed with them and the Rainieris for approximately two hours. His wife had brought an overnight bag for him, with clean clothes and his shaving kit. They did not mention Trujillo. Guarina told him what she had learned from neighbors. Their house had been stormed at dawn by uniformed and plainclothes police; they had emptied it, breaking and smashing what they did not take away in two vans.
When it was time, the diplomat made a small gesture, pointing at his watch. Antonio Imbert embraced and kissed Guarina and Leslie, and followed Francisco Rainieri through the service entrance onto the street. Seconds later, a small vehicle with headlights dimmed pulled to a stop in front of them.
“Goodbye, and good luck,” said Rainieri, shaking his hand. “Don’t worry about your family. They won’t want for anything.”
Imbert got into the car and sat down next to the driver. He was a young man, wearing a shirt and tie, but no jacket. In impeccable Spanish, though with an Italian lilt, he introduced himself:
“My name is Cavaglieri and I’m an official at the Italian embassy. My wife and I will do everything possible to make your stay at our apartment pleasant. Don’t worry, in my house there are no prying eyes. We live alone. We don’t have a cook or servants. My wife loves keeping house. And we both like to cook.”
He laughed, and Antonio Imbert imagined that courtesy required him to attempt a laugh as well. The couple lived on the top floor of a new building, not far from Calle Mahatma Gandhi and Salvador Estrella Sadhalá’s house. Señora Cavaglieri was even younger than her husband—a slender girl with almond-shaped eyes and black hair—and she welcomed him with lively, smiling courtesy, as if he were an old family friend coming to spend the weekend. She did not display the slightest misgiving at having a stranger in her house, the assassin of the country’s supreme ruler, the man whom thousands of hate-filled guards and police were avidly hunting down. During the six months and three days he lived with them, never, not once, did either one make him feel—despite his extreme sensitivity and a situation that predisposed him to seeing phantoms—that his presence was in any way an inconvenience. Did they know they were risking their lives? Of course. They heard and saw detailed reports on television of the panic those nefarious assassins had provoked in Dominicans, many of whom, not satisfied with denying them refuge, rushed to inform on them. The first one they saw fall was the engineer Huáscar Tejeda, shamefully forced out of the church of Santo Cura de Ars by the terrified priest, and into the arms of the SIM. They followed every detail of the odyssey of General Juan Tomás Díaz and Antonio de la Maza as they drove through the streets of Ciudad Trujillo in a taxi and were denounced by the people they turned to for help. And they saw how the
caliés
killed Amadito García Guerrero and then dragged away the poor old woman who had given him shelter, and how the mob dismantled and destroyed her house. But these scenes and reports did not intimidate the Cavaglieris or lessen their cordial treatment of him.
After Ramfis’s return, Imbert and his hosts knew that his confinement would be a long one. The public embraces of Trujillo’s son and General José René Román were eloquent: Pupo had betrayed them, and there would be no military uprising. From his small universe in the Cavaglieris’ penthouse, he saw the crowds standing in line, hour after hour, to pay homage to Trujillo, and he saw himself on the television screen, pictured beside Luis Amiama (whom he did not know), under captions that offered first a hundred thousand, then two hundred thousand, and finally half a million pesos to anyone reporting his whereabouts.
“Hmm, with the devaluation of the Dominican peso, it’s not an interesting deal anymore,” Cavaglieri remarked.
His life quickly fell into a strict routine. He had a small room to himself, with a bed, a night table, and a lamp. He got up early and did push-ups and sit-ups, and ran in place, for about an hour. He had breakfast with the Cavaglieris. After long discussions, he convinced them to let him help with the cleaning. Sweeping, running the vacuum, passing the feather duster over objects and articles of furniture, became both a diversion and an obligation, something he did conscientiously, with total concentration and a certain joy. But Señora Cavaglieri never allowed him into the kitchen. She cooked very well, especially pasta, which she served twice a day. He had liked pasta since he was a boy. But after six months of confinement, he would never again eat tagliarini, tagliatelle, ravioli, or any other variant of that popular Italian specialty.
When his domestic chores were concluded, he read for many hours. He had never been a great reader, but in those six months he discovered the pleasure of books and magazines, which were his best defense against the periodic depression brought on by confinement, routine, and uncertainty.
When it was announced on television that a commission from the OAS had come to interview political prisoners, he learned that Guarina, along with the wives of all his friends in the conspiracy, had been in prison for several weeks. The Cavaglieris had kept Guarina’s arrest from him. But a few weeks later, they were overjoyed to give him the good news that she had been released.
Never, not even when he was mopping, sweeping, or running the vacuum, did he fail to keep the loaded Colt .45 with him. His decision was unshakable. He would do the same as Amadito, Juan Tomás Díaz, and Antonio de la Maza. He would not be taken alive, he would die shooting. It was more honorable to die that way than to be subjected to abuses and tortures devised by the twisted minds of Ramfis and his cronies.
In the afternoon and at night he read the papers his hosts brought him and watched television newscasts with them. Without believing much of what he saw and read, he followed the confused dualism of the path the regime had embarked upon: a civilian government led by Balaguer, who made reassuring gestures and statements asserting that the country was democratizing, and a military and police power, headed by Ramfis, that continued to kill, torture, and disappear people with the same impunity as when the Chief was alive. Yet he could not help feeling encouraged by the return of the exiles, the appearance of small opposition papers—published by the Civic Union and June 14—and student demonstrations against the government, which were sometimes reported in the official media, though only to accuse the protesters of being Communists.
Joaquín Balaguer’s speech at the United Nations, criticizing the Trujillo dictatorship and pledging to democratize the country, left him dumbfounded. Was this the same little man who for thirty-one years had been the most faithful and constant servant of the Father of the New Nation? In their long conversations at the table, when the Cavaglieris had supper at home—on many evenings they went out to eat, but then Señora Cavaglieri would prepare the inevitable pasta for him—they filled in the gaps in his information with the gossip that was churning through the city, soon rebaptized with its old name, Santo Domingo de Guzmán. Though everyone worried about a coup by the Trujillo brothers that would restore the cruel, harsh dictatorship, people clearly were losing their fear, or, rather, breaking the spell that had kept so many Dominicans devoted, body and soul, to Trujillo. A growing number of anti-Trujillista voices, declarations, and attitudes gradually appeared, as well as more support for the Civic Union, June 14, or the Dominican Revolutionary Party, whose leaders had just returned to the country and opened an office in the center of the city.