“I suppose so.”

“Jesus Holy Mary. After that, he tells the prisoner—interreges is the right word—he says to them, ‘Listen to what your gut tells you. I’ll wait.’ Or your ‘inside voice’—something similar—is what I was told. Sounded like bullshit to me. Is it true?”

Rivera did everything with a flair, it was possible. Ford nodded.

“No shit? Why you think I came armed?”

Ford replied, “That’s fairly obvious.”

“No . . . not to kill the man, but as a precaution for my own personal defense. In the security business, that’s what we’re taught. Something else I was told”—Hector, becoming cautious, looked up—“well, that Rivera . . . General Rivera . . . was traveling with a . . . not a bodyguard, exactly, but some serious badass. You know, as in approach with extreme caution. Safety first, man. I’m not some crack addict. We have what’s called a procedural checklist. That don’t mean I came to kill anyone.”

No need for more wasp spray. Ford, placing it on the ground, added flattery. “From the way you came through the door, I knew you’d had some training. Keep talking, maybe we can work this out.”

“From how I handled myself, you mean? Same with you, when you grabbed my weapon—but I expected this psycho Cubano, not a gringo-looking dude. Not that I’m making excuses.”

“Oh?”

Hector, speaking as one pro to another, said, “Tell me something. If I’d pulled the trigger, would it have blown up? I’ve heard different things about freezing the slide. Not from anyone with the balls to actually, you know, experiment, so I’m interested.”

The temptation was to point the Beretta and demonstrate, but better to keep things moving. “Who told you I was Cuban?”

Hector, sitting on his butt in dirt, replied, “I’ll talk, but I want my weapons back. That one there”—a nod at the Beretta—“don’t belong to me. I’ll lose my job, man, if I can’t account for that suppressor. Don’t screw with the ATF, right? And you’ve got to promise not to tell the general until I’m gone. Hey—is he really a general?”

After a long, uneasy silence while Ford stared, the man added, “I ain’t saying you’re crazy. This Cuban dude, I mean. More of a murderer than a pro.”

Another chilly silence. “Man . . . by ‘gringo,’ I didn’t mean no racial slur. That’s what I was told: a Cubano who escaped and hooked up with Rivera. The big concrete jail in Havana—a prison asylum, I’m talking about, the one by the baseball field on your way to José MartÍ. You never been to Cuba?”

Ford thought, Uh-oh. “What’s the guy’s name?”

“The psycho Cuban?”

“Of course.”

Hector sensed an opening. “Do I get my guns back?”

Ford picked up the wasp spray.

As applause died down, Figueroa Casanova, enjoying his first ride on a sailboat, waved both hands at the crowd on Mallory Square and asked Tomlinson, “Brother, how’d you get so famous in Key West? Must be a hundred women, but the men, even that juggler, they’re clapping, too.”

Tomlinson, at the wheel, was kicked back, steering with his feet. “Naw, man, they do this every sunset. Hey . . . mind digging out another beer?” He pointed, wearing frayed shorts and a T-shirt that read BUM FARTO, CALL HOME.

Figgy had puzzled over the strange American words, but his interest had moved on. “They clapping just because the sun goes down?”

“Like a tradition, yeah.”

“Brother, you’re too modest. Every day since I was born, the sun comes up, it goes down, except in prison—no windows in my cell, you know?—but I’m pretty sure it happened anyway. Why they so happy about night coming?”

Tomlinson cocked his head. “You did time? Why’d the pigs lock you up?” Which, even to him, didn’t sound right in Spanish, so he translated, “Cops, I mean. Not ‘time’ as in clock time.”

Figgy replied, “I don’t need a clock to know night from day when I see it.” He couldn’t take his eyes off so much activity, flaming torches, cats jumping through hoops, and too many gringas with nice chichis to count. “No, this afternoon I’d of noticed any pretty fans from the dugout. Those women, they looking at you, brother.” He opened the Igloo, grabbed two beers fast so as not to miss anything.

Tomlinson considered what he’d just heard while his eyes lived in the moment: tourists and locals packed along the seawall, tangerine clouds over the Tortugas, the air sweet with coconut oil, Gulf Stream jasmine, and some professional-grade weed that only a true pirate town could handle with dignity. A slow turn of the head and there was Key West Bight, the Turtle Kraal docks busy where he often tied his dinghy, although the sandy spot at the end of Simonton was better for swimming naked.

Whoops . . . His head jolted and pivoted the other way. Christmas Island astern, a colony of sailboats floating where, three weeks ago, he’d moored No Más before taking a taxi boat, the Magic Penny, ashore. Then late this afternoon, after the ball game, the same in reverse but with a stop at Fausto’s Food Palace to buy provisions, then another stop at Marine Hardware on Caroline. No charts of Cuba available, but hemp for a boom vang and extra shackles might come in handy, as would oil for the dinghy’s little Yamaha outboard, boat and motor both secured forward atop No Más’s cabin.

The baseball team from Indiana had slipped a hundred bucks to Figgy, who’d picked the field clean and gone four for five with two RBIs. Only a Coors Light to the scraggly-haired pitcher who’d closed the game—no runs, but three duck-fart bloopers beyond the range of Indianola Cadillac’s limping, over-the-hill fielders. Tomlinson was still peeved about that. But he had gotten the save and paid for provisions anyway.

No problem. He’d inherited a family fortune, but that wasn’t the reason. The last thing he’d expected was the little shortstop to ask to accompany him to Cuba, and the chaos he’d recently escaped, all because of a promise he’d made to watch the briefcase.

The deal was done when Figgy finally perused the letters and saw what they contained.

Comrade, Tomlinson thought, I am proud to have you aboard.

Honor . . . conviction . . . loyalty—the little dude personified everything good about the Revolution, which, of late, had been made a mockery by snot-nosed dilettantes and political traitors. This sad truth had brought Tomlinson near tears more than once. He accepted the beer, sopping ice chips with his shirt, and toasted his new shipmate. “Solidarity, man.”

Figgy was wary of political slogans. He demurred by asking what BUM FARTO, CALL HOME meant.

“That’s what everyone called the guy. Bum. He was the fire chief in Key West years ago. One night, he got in his car and was never seen again. Farto, his real name. Seriously. Which reminds me . . .” Tomlinson checked his phone, seeing his last text to Ford, which read Sailing south on a righteous mission. Stop your damn worrying. He switched it off and added, “You can’t be too careful down here on the Keys.”

Figgy had refocused on a group of gringas, five or six with their chichis bouncing while they yelled something across the water. “Those women love you, brother. Modesty, yeah, that’s sometimes good, but it won’t get you no papaya. Maybe they’d enjoy a boat ride—make some hot oil with us. You think?”