Chapter One

Elliot Steil sat on a backless bench in the shady public park, rested his left ankle over his right knee, slipped off a well-worn tasseled loafer, and began massaging his foot. A couple of minutes later, he gave the same treatment to his right foot, then finally placed both heels on the cement walkway and wiggled his toes as he held the marble slab on which he sat.

Trying day, Steil reflected. His coffee and sugar reserves had simul­taneously given out two days before, and breakfast had consisted of forty grams of stale white bread washed down with a glass of cold water. A few minutes later he found his bike's rear tire punctured. He spent seventy-five minutes waiting for a bus, and at 10:02 AM punched his card at the Polytechnic Institute where he taught English, two hours and two minutes late.

Lunch was a meager, poorly seasoned mixture of rice and insufficiently cooked red beans escorted by overripe tomatoes. The teacher had left the building at 5:00 PM pondering if he should walk home or waste some more of his free time on the almost nonexistent Havana public transportation system. The scheduled 8:00 to 11:00 PM blackout and pending household chores led him to cover the eight kilometers on foot.

When riding the bus or his bicycle, Steil frequently forgot about the problematic metatarsal bones he had inherited from some unknown ancestor. The orthopedic corrections made for the regular shoes he bought at stores became ineffectual after a forty- or fifty-minute walk.

Steil sighed and lifted his gaze from the walkway. Two approaching teenagers cut short their exchange of buzzwords to glance at him, then looked at each other, smiling broadly. The lanky, blond boy in dirty high-top sneakers and oversized shorts, carrying a basketball under his arm, suddenly raised his head and pressed his nostrils closed with his fingers.

"Whaddaya know? Shoulda brought my gas mask," quipped the taller, light-skinned black kid as they passed Steil.

 Both youngsters bent over in a series of hiccups and moans, meant to be laughter. Six or seven steps further on, their merriment subsided, and they slapped each other's palms—first at shoulder, then thigh level—before returning to their conversation.

Steil didn't resent the comment; in fact, he smiled in amusement, certain that his feet were odorless. After twenty years of high school teaching, he had grown used to teenagers' ways. What troubled him was the regressive Spanish that kids were speaking. How could they effectively learn a second language when they mispronounced and clipped their mother tongue? Every school year the number of stu­dents who spoke an appropriate Spanish dwindled; the ones who did were almost exclusively girls. Boys with above-average writing and communication skills swept everything under the mat to avoid being ridiculed unmercifully by their male peers.

The lanky, blond boy dribbled the ball proficiently with his left hand, talking to his companion as they sauntered away. Steil put his loafers back on and resumed his long walk.

One hour later, just after rounding the corner of his block, Steil was spotted and surrounded by kids excitedly babbling something about a gleaming new car and a tourist. Knowing that pain and exhaustion made him lose his temper, he patiently tried to extricate himself from the gang. But the children kept blocking his way, jumping and yelling that the americano had given them chewing gum. Steil stopped dead in his tracks and glared at them angrily, imposing silence.

"Okay, Lemar. What's the matter?"

"An americano is looking for you. He came in that car," the boy said, pointing straight ahead. "He gave us chewing gum."

For a moment Steil was too surprised to react and kept his gaze fixed on the nine-year-old undisputed group leader. "Fine, thanks a lot. Now get back to whatever you were doing."

Steil turned and peered at the pearl-gray Toyota Corolla parked at the curb, right in front his apartment building. It had tourist plates, and behind the steering wheel sat a dim figure. Moving tiredly, the teacher approached the driver's seat, placed his left hand on top of the car, and stooped over. A man in his late 60s looked up, his bushy eye­brows rising for an instant and his lips parting in surprise.

"Looking for someone?" Steil asked.

"Thank God," the driver said. "Nobody seems to understand English around here, except for 'gimme.' Yes, I'm looking for Elliot Steil."

"That's me."

Now the blue eyes glinted with excitement. The stranger tilted his

 head to the side and smiled fleetingly before getting out of the car and extending his hand. The door clicked shut on its own.

"Dan Gastler," he said. "Glad to make your acquaintance."

"Pleased to meet you. Er….is there anything I can do for you?"

"The other way around."

"Pardon?"

"I've been retained to do something for you. Can we talk in private?" His accent sounded familiar to Steil. Georgia maybe?

"Oh...sure, sure. This way, please. Just a minute. Roll up the win­dow and lock the car."

Steil's apartment building had been erected in 1924, and the old red bricks showed where plaster had fallen away. The small Otis elevator was out of order, so the two men took the neglected stairway to the third floor. Steil led the way through the right side of a U-shaped hall­way and past three front doors, before inserting a key into the cylinder lock of apartment 314.

The teacher hastily retrieved a soiled shirt draped over an old green armchair, picked up a kerosene lamp with a blackened glass-chimney that stood on a coffee table, and kicked a slipper under another, match­ing armchair. After switching on a sixty-watt bulb, he deposited the lantern on the kitchenette's drain board and threw the garment into a dark bedroom where disorder reigned. Steil closed the main door, opened a window overlooking the street, and motioned Gastler to a couch.

"Please, sit down, Mr. Gastler."

"Call me Dan."

"Okay, Dan. Would you...? Can I get you a glass of water?"

"Water will be fine," Gastler said before plopping down. He wore a tan sport shirt, which matched the color of his baggy khaki pants and deck shoes.

An embarrassed Steil opened his antediluvian Hotpoint refrigera­tor and poured water into two discarded Classic Coke cans. There were no glasses for sale in Havana stores, and the cans were a present from some bimbo who had accidentally broken his last water tumbler almost a year before.

Poorly hiding his amazement, Gastler accepted the container and sipped from it, while Steil stared at the visitor from his armchair: sandy-colored sparse hair, ruddy complexion, a heavy-set build, a cou­ple of inches under six feet. Their eyes met briefly, and the teacher shifted his gaze, then gurgled his water.

Gastler emptied his can and placed it on the coffee table. He pulled a wallet from his back pocket and produced a Florida driver's license, a credit card, and a business card. "Check my credentials," he said, smiling broadly and extending them to Steil.

For the first time in his life, the teacher held a credit card and a foreign driving permit in his hands. Both were issued to a Daniel E. Gastler. The business card said "Licensed Private Investigator" under the name. Steil nodded in confusion, handing back the IDs.

"I've been told Cubans have some sort of identity card," Gastler said.

"We do, yeah."

"Can I see yours?"

From the patch pocket of his light-green, short-sleeved shirt, Steil removed a slim blue notebook and handed it to Gastler. The visitor put on a pair of rimless bifocals, peered attentively at Steil's photograph, and flipped several pages before returning the document. Then he heaved a sigh of relief. Removing his glasses, he leaned back on the couch.

"Elliot, I've got some good news and some bad news."

"Bad first," Steil said expectantly.

"Your father died on May 14."

The teacher leaned back in his seat and stared at the visitor. But he was no longer seeing him. In his mind, a jovial face appeared, towering above him. His small hand was lost in the huge warm one that guided him along a forest trail. He always remembered his father either that day in the Everglades, or reading the Havana Post on a rocking chair in their Santa Cruz del Norte home, or teaching him how to throw a for­ward pass in Sebastian. There were many other memories, but one of those three usually popped up first on his mental screen. Steil felt nos­talgia, some self-pity, and a little sadness.

"Hadn't seen him for the last...thirty-four years," he said, shifting his gaze to the floor.

Gastler remained silent.

"How did he die?"

"Lung cancer."

Steil frowned. "Did he smoke?"

"Never lit one in his whole life."

The teacher forced a smile, shook his head, and looked sideways for an instant. Then he stood, entered the kitchenette, opened a cupboard, and returned to the living room brandishing a plain white bottle with no label.

"Would you like a shot of bootlegged rum, Dan? It's called Train Spark."

"Train Spark? Why?"

"Beats me."

 "Okay."

Steil poured a small amount in Gastler's can and a stiff one for himself.

Gastler downed his ration. "For Chrissake!" he gasped.

The teacher swallowed his own without batting an eye.

Gastler cleared his throat. "We were friends, Bob and I. Last March doctors told him his condition was terminal, and a couple of weeks later he came to my office and we had a pretty long conversation. Mostly about you."

Steil clicked his tongue and refreshed his drink. Gastler seemed to consider pressing on with his story, but decided against it. The teacher drank.

"What's the good news?" he asked.

Gastler parted his lips. He took a deep breath, thought over what he was about to say, then smiled disarmingly. "I'll tell you over supper at a restaurant of your choice."

Steil watched him fixedly and bit his lower lip, pondering the invi­tation. He hadn't dined out for the last four, perhaps five years. But he was exhausted. He recalled the scant and unappetizing menu he had planned for the evening, stealing a glance at his watch.

"All right. I'll take a shower and change. Meanwhile, Cuban air­wave piracy presents Crossfire, live from Washington."

The teacher turned on a black-and-white, twenty-four-inch Russian TV set and operated one of two dials protruding from a plastic box over the set. To Gastler's surprise, within a few seconds he was watching Pat Buchanan.

"I can't believe this," the American said.

Steil chuckled and went into the bedroom. Five minutes later, while the teacher showered and Kinsley prodded an arms expert on the Korean nuclear crisis, the electric power was cut. Taken by surprise, Gastler was wondering what was wrong when he heard the Cuban holler from the shower.

"Sit tight, Dan. It's an emergency blackout. Should've started at eight."

"Okay. No problem."

The visitor heard angry shouts in Spanish coming from nearby apartments. Several pops followed, and Gastler correctly identified them as glass bottles smashing on the street. He shifted his gaze to a tall bookcase crammed with paperbacks written in English. A minute later Steil emerged from the bathroom, barefoot, a towel wrapped around his waist.

"Each city district has a blackout timetable," he explained as he moved into the kitchenette and fumbled for a matchbox. "Sometimes

 they are brought forward, or there are unannounced emergency black­outs. People get really angry."

Steil found the matchbox and struck a match. Its tip fell off. The same thing happened with the next two. In a spurt of anger, the teacher let out a cascade of Cuban profanities, and the fourth match burst into flame. He lifted the glass-chimney of the kerosene lamp, lit the wick, and reinserted the glass, then moved the contraption to the coffee table.

"Did you hear bottles crashing on the street?"

"Yeah."

"That's the newest form of protest."

"Seems kind of foolish to me," Gastler scoffed. "They'll never hit those really to blame for the power cuts."

"Guess you're right," Steil admitted. "I'll get dressed."

"Take the lamp with you. I don't need it to sit here."

Shortly after 8:00 PM, Steil emerged from the bedroom in his Sunday best: a tan linen guayabera, maroon slacks, and brown moc­casins. He placed the lamp on the coffee table and closed the window. Dressed up, freshly shaved, and with his hair properly combed, the teacher looked five or six years younger than his forty-four.

"I'm ready," Steil announced.

"Okay, let's go," Gastler declared, slapping the palms of his hands on his thighs and standing up. "Blow out the lamp."

At that moment, as if by enchantment, the wick sputtered and the flame died. The last drop of Steil's kerosene reserve was exhausted.