Topaz - Leon Uris [55]
Yes! See! They are squashed half flat under the agony of the load. The great tube lay on the trailer bed. It was two arcade lengths and covered with canvas, and as it inched along the street was indented by the tire marks.
The tail was uncovered. Arnaldo tried to draw a picture in his mind of its size and shape.
But he could no longer see. The caravan passed on, with a dozen armored cars and an open truck of Russian soldiers following the missile carrier.
He waited for total silence, but there would be none for his own breath and heartbeat were audible. At last the motors faded from earshot.
He was about to crawl from his cover but hedged. For certain, G-2 men would be sweeping the area. The thought of the Green House sickened him. That was where his brother had been beaten to death.
The lottery vendor’s stall seemed to be the safest place. Tuck in and stay till daylight. Anita would be frantic, but it was all for the best.
In the old days before the Revolution it was a common sight to find drunks asleep in the streets. But this morning Arnaldo Valdez was discovered by a pair of militiamen and dragged to his feet and shaken rudely.
He played the part of a sick man with a hangover and grinned at his captors sheepishly. “I am a medical student, comrades. Please let me clean up and get to the university.”
“Drunks are a disgrace to the Revolution. You are going to the police station. They’ll sober you up all right. Pancho, call for the wagon!”
“I beg you, señores. If you don’t give me a break, I’ll be thrown out of school.” Then Arnaldo wept, and not all his tears were phony.
“Who wants doctors like you in Cuba?” the militiaman scorned.
“Let the stupid bastard go,” the second said. “Who wants to fill out all those damned reports?”
“No! A medical student should not behave like a drunken pig.”
“Oh, very well. I’ll call for the wagon.”
Anita appeared on the scene. She walked to Arnaldo and slammed him over the head with her purse and kicked his shins.
“Dog!” Anita screamed.
A delighted crowd gathered.
“You leave me for that other woman and get drunk! Liar! Dog!”
She grabbed his ear, literally jerking him free of the militiamen’s grip.
“I worked to the bone to send you through medical school and this is the thanks I get! Bum!”
The crowd laughed and whistled as she banged him around the arcade. Arnaldo doubled up, shielding his face and stomach.
“I promise I’ll study. Day and night I’ll study!”
“He goes to the station.” One militiaman asserted his authority.
“No,” the crowd groaned. “No!”
“He’s getting a beating enough.”
“Dog! Bum!”
“Let him go,” they chanted.
Anita kicked him down the street and around the corner as the crowd gathered around the militiamen and argued heatedly. By now the police were dumbfounded. As they shrugged and continued their rounds, they were applauded for gallantry.
In her room, Anita wept and kissed him for every blow she had rendered. “I almost lost my mind,” she cried, “I almost lost my mind. Oh, my darling, darling, darling.”
They kissed and rolled in the bed and fell to the floor. He laughed convulsively. “I saw them! I saw them!”
And she sat beside him on the floor and laughed with him until their sides ached and tears drenched their cheeks.
27
THE APARTMENT OF TERESA Marín was but a block away from the French Chancellery. Teresa was one of Fidel Castro’s most trusted personal secretaries. In fact, he had her placed in the exclusive building in order that she might oversee an apartment on the floor below belonging to Fidel. It was a place where he entertained his mistress of the moment.
The first loyalty of Teresa Marín, however, was to the activities of Juanita de Córdoba.
Midway between the French Chancellery and Teresa’s apartment house stood the Chinese Embassy on an acre of land surrounded by a high pink wall. Its flat roof held a field of radio antennae, which delivered high-frequency transmissions around the clock to China.