ooOoo

7

ooOoo

It was late afternoon by the time we hit Avenida Quinta and were following the curving drive up to the Sandoval villa. Della had been quieter than usual but her face had lost that strained look it had had; her fingers had been beating time against the side of her seat the whole drive down. But there are only so many times you can ask a person how they are and have them tell you 'fine' before you finally take the hint and stop asking. Thing is, I had no idea what else to do.

The prowl cars outside the house had moved on and the place looked pretty deserted without them; the whole set-up was too landscaped and maintained to be neglected or anything anywhere close but it managed to have that air. It wasn't a happy place and somehow I wondered if it ever had been; I thought of the few things that Jack had told me about the family: Helen Sandoval had died some years before and Alejandro had never quite got over it; the two kids were close and Ignacio looked out for his little sister. We rolled to a stop, walked ourselves up the steps to the front door, pressed the bell and waited.

'Y'know, this joint reminds me of the first time I swung by that little shack I now call home.'

Della smiled. 'You're slipping there - you appear to have adopted the speech patterns of one Mike Garibaldi.'

'There's no need to get insulting, plaything.'

She laughed lightly.

'You think they've got their very own Drahl?'

'Drahl is a one-off,' she said. 'There'll never be another like him.'

'Amen to that, sister.'

'Drahl likes you. And don't call me sister.'

I grinned at her. 'Drahl only likes me because I let him beat me eight times in a row at pool.'

She arched her eyebrows at me. 'You let him?'

The door opened, its hinges nice and smooth, before I got the chance to answer that one. The person responsible for the opening was a tall character with less hair on his head than God had intended and possibly more nose. He had a fine pair of black eyebrows that were drawn together and he looked at us with a supercilious air.

'Yes?'

He was very definitely a specimen of the genus homo butlerus.

'Hello. Mr and Mrs Sheridan; we wanted to pay our respects.'

We got inspected again - I felt like I was back on the parade ground and about to have five kinds of hell handed to me for not having my kit in order. Della kept her chin up and her eyes on his face; maybe it was that dress of hers that swung it because after he was done examining her from the roots of her hair down to her toes had stood back and said, 'Of course. If you would care to wait, I will ascertain if the señor and señorita are ready to receive you.'

One thing I've learnt from Drahl - apart from the fact that he should probably be known as Geneva Fats - it's that there's nothing a butler likes better than ascertaining something. We followed him in, across a wide hallway and into a small room that could probably have held the lobby of the Nacional within it. He left us there and the door closed behind him; I put my eyes on Della and she was wearing a look that was far too innocent to be real.

'Our luck's holding,' I said. 'Funny how it's almost like he seemed to be expecting us.'

She looked at me vaguely. 'Hm? Oh, yes.'

I still looked at her.

'It's probably because of the note I sent.'

'What no- When did you have time to send them a note?'

'I sent it from the Country Club - I paid one of the porters twenty dollars to deliver it.'

'He probably would have done it for ten. And I thought we agreed not to contact them before we got here.'

'No, you agreed. I merely refrained from disagreeing - I knew there was no point. Besides, it seems to have worked, does it not?'

I grunted. 'Let's see.'

She smiled sweetly, clearly mightily amused at the whole thing. Women aren't like men; they're not civilised like we are. They'll go behind your back, pull a stunt, and then smile at you afterwards and expect you to like it.

The damn thing is that for the most part, you do. If you know what's good for you.

We weren't kept waiting long: the door swung open again and the Sandoval siblings tripped in. Ignacio was taller than I'd realised but still a slight figure and he looked worn; tension and exhaustion had drained his face until it had a strained, sallow look. Rosa was behind him, quiet and nervy, and beautiful, anxious eyes. She held herself very erect, her chin up high. Her brother directed his first words to her, not to us.

'You do not need to be here.'

'They are guests for both of us.' Her voice had a pleasant husky bite that was made more noticeable through the strain she was under. She was the kind of girl who arouses in most men the need to put their arms around her and tell her that everything in the world will be okay.

Personally, I prefer the kind of girl who'll deliberately put herself in a situation where everything is far from okay and then dare you to put you arms around her. So it's probably just as well that I married Della, because even though she looks like she'll break in half if you hold her too tight she can be downright petrifying when she puts her mind to it.

Ignacio put his sister in an armchair and then marched across to us, one hand sticking out stiffly. 'Mr Sheridan.' He bowed over Della's hand. 'Señora.'

'Señor Sandoval. We wanted to pay our condolences.'

He nodded, his face grave. 'This is most kind. Please, sit.'

We sat. The place had the air of a mausoleum - and given the day that might have been appropriate; but this was an old feeling, something ingrained in the walls. Rosa looked lost in the depths of her armchair; she was in the deepest black I'd ever seen on anyone and the handkerchief she was twisting between her fingers looked unnaturally white by contrast.

'We were so sorry to hear about your father,' Della said; she spoke more to Rosa than Ignacio and the girl turned to her a little.

'You knew him?'

'No.' The hollow at the base of Della's throat fluttered. 'No, we never met him.'

'But your father was his friend?' Rosa looked eager; her lips were tremulous and parted, just the way you would expect them to be. I wondered if she practised it much or if it really did just come naturally.

'My father did some business here in Cuba ... a long time ago.'

She was hating every second of it; I didn't blame her - I wasn't blown away by it myself and it had been my idea. But just because the idea is mine doesn't mean it's good.

'It is most kind,' Ignacio repeated. He flipped open a box of hammered-silver that was on the coffee table and extracted a cigarette; he rolled it between his long fingers. There was no tremor in them, his hands didn't shake; his eyes weren't as tired as his face. 'Please?'

We both passed; Rosa hadn't been included in the invitation at all. She just sat back in her chair and carried on twisting her handkerchief.

Ignacio blew out a stream of smoke. 'And please, señora, pass along our regards to your father.'

'Thank-you, but my father passed away some years ago.'

He tilted his head at her, a sharp movement like a bird. 'Oh?'

Della smiled stiffly; I blew out a breath.

'Mister Sandoval, I'm afraid that we haven't been entirely honest with you. We were asked to come here.'

His eyes were liquid and dark as black coffee; he turned them on me and blew out another stream of smoke. 'Who asked?'

'We - at any rate, I am a friend of Jack Maynard's.'

The only sound was a sharp intake of breath; Rosa leant forward. 'You have seen him?'

'Do not speak to them!'

'He's all right,' Della told Rosa, her words soft and fast. 'He wanted me to tell you-'

'We have no interest in what he has to say.' Ignacio still stood by the fireplace; he'd thrown down the cigarette and his hand was flexing, opening and closing, like the claws on an angry cat. 'This is the man who murdered my father.'

'Ignacio, no-' Rosa was half-out of her chair and stopped; there was a look in Ignacio's face as he turned to her that I couldn't quite catch and it was gone before I was sure.

'Do not defend him. He is a liar and murderer.' He turned back and his black eyes glittered. 'This is why you have come to my house? Because you have a killer for a friend.'

'Jack's been arrested, that isn't the same thing-'

He made a noise - a small volcanic sound forced between his lips; his words came out in a torrent. 'He has been arrested, yes. You think our police here in Havana are so ... so incompetent? I know about your fine American policemen, ours are not like that, they are no corrupt, they are no so easily bought. If Jack Maynard has been arrested he is guilty and he will pay.'

'We didn't come here to upset you.'

'I think you should leave. I want you out.' He glanced over his shoulder. 'Rosa, go to your room.'

She was very still, her hands gripping the arms of her chair; when she stood it was slow and she kept her eyes on Della's face.

'Rosa!'

The girl caught her breath, deep. There was the same look in her face again, the one she'd had that night at the hotel. Hard and wild and a little dangerous. She walked across the room, opened the door very quietly and left it open after she went through.

'And now you.'

And so that was it. The house seemed even quieter on the way out than it had on the way in. I handed Della into the car; she slid along the seat and I got in next to her.

'So much for luck.'

'Yes...' She shivered and rubbed her hands along her arms. 'That was far from pleasant. I feel so sorry for that poor child.'

Della is twenty-nine and Rosa not much younger, but I guess that Della has got into the habit of playing the big sister to people. She's had plenty of practice. 'She looked so ... lost.'

'Hm. Yeah, that too.'

'What do you mean?'

'Oh, nothing. Just that someone has to have killed Sandoval and Rosa has just as much motive as anyone. Her father ran her life for her; and she sounded pretty sick of it the other night. Could be that she'd had enough once and for all.'

She stared at me, her mouth a little open, and for a moment it was like she was looking at a stranger. 'You can't really be serious. John, that- that's a terrible thing to say.'

'It's a terrible thing to think, but it's a thought.'

Della pressed her lips together and shivered again. 'Sleuthing isn't much fun sometimes, is it?'

I threw the car into gear and let out the throttle. 'It's never fun.'

ooOoo

Back at the hotel we asked for any messages and there weren't any; if Ryland was actually getting anywhere with the mayor, the police chief, and maybe even the president for all I knew, he hadn't got there yet. We went back to our suite and thought about getting ourselves fixed up with some food. Della was brushing her hair when I went down to the kiosk in the lobby to buy cigarettes. The ceiling fans still rotated, languid, and the place had that still, quiet air that places have before the real onslaught of alcohol and forced good times begin. One character had started early: he wandered past, just about getting one foot in front of the other and his face was as sloppy as a bowl of Jell-O. When a bum is a drunk he's just a drunk, but when a guy with money is a drunk he's still somehow respectable. When he throws-up in the rose bushes it's okay because he's paying for someone to come along and clean it up after him. He lurched along, stumbling out to the gardens through the french doors that a bellhop held open for him. He fell through them and the kid closed the doors after him, his face remote and bored; he'd seen it all too many times before to have much feeling about it now.

I took the cigarettes and started back for the elevator; on my way across I saw another face: my chipmunk friend from that morning, peering at me from around a pillar. I grinned at him unpleasantly and he vanished again.

Back in our suite, Della was in the sitting-room with her hairbrush in one hand and the telephone receiver in the over.

'-it's bail money. No, it is not for John! ...Why would we be coming home earlier?' She sighed. 'Leonard, will you please just do as I ask? ...Thank-you ... Yes. Good-night, Leonard.' She replaced the receiver and her hand rested on top of it. 'He's been behaving very strangely lately,' she said, distracted. 'I don't know what's wrong with him.'

She meant it, too. I'd only known Leonard Chadwick all of five seconds before I knew how he felt about Della; pretty much everyone knew how he felt about Della; the only one who didn't know was Della herself. Whether she couldn't see it or just didn't want to, I don't know; but I'd made the mistake of trying to bring it up once before so I kept my opinions to myself.

Della went back into the bedroom, sat at the dressing table and started on her hair again. She wasn't quite looking in the mirror, just looking at some patch of air that didn't contain anything. Her shoulders were as close to sagging as I'd ever seen her. I sat next to her on the long low stool.

'You want to tell me what's up?'

A smile hardly worth the name chased across her face. 'It's nothing.'

'Is it what Mimi Rich-bitch said to you?'

'John...'

She held the brush in her lap between both hands, and she still didn't quite look at anything. 'I keep thinking I can get away from it... I've only seen my mother twice since I was ten years old. It wasn't the first time she'd walked out - she'd left before; but this time she didn't come back. It's like something out of a Mitford novel, it's a wonder they don't call her The Bolter-' There were scars, old, covered over and down so deep that you didn't even know they were there just to look at her. Della's breath was sharp; she pressed her lips together, hard; she released a breath slowly and the hairbrush was in a death grip. 'I know what people say; I know what they all think: that after all I'm just like her; that I ran off with the first man who came along and I'll leave you for the next one that asks me to.'

'Sweetheart... We both know that that isn't true.'

She turned to me, faced me, and those scars looked vivid and fresh. 'Do you? Don't you wonder: like mother, like daughter? that maybe you just married a little tramp?'

'No.'

Della bit the inside of her lip; I took the brush from her and held her hands between mine; her fingers were icy. I watched her helplessly, feeling pretty useless, and thinking that if I ever came across Vivian Ramir I'd probably wring her neck.

'It's always the same, no matter where I am. As soon as her name comes up... What's your mother like?'

I gave it a moment. 'She's a smart lady, keeps my dad on his toes... She spent most of her time bringing us kids up; she's a homemaker, mostly.'

'That must have been nice. God, what must she think of me.'

My fingers tightened around hers. 'Listen to me: she'll love you.'

'No, you love me; and you think that everyone else will just because you do.'

'What happened to that girl from last night who told me how well we know each other? Do you think that I don't know you? that I don't know what you're like? Or do you think I'm such a bad judge of character that I'd fall for just any girl? I love you because of all the things you are and anyone who knows you will see the same things I do.'

There was a smile but it was still wistful. 'Anyone who knows me... My own family- You should have seen the telegram Aunt Lucy sent around when we got married: it said "Della has gone wild".'

I couldn't help it, I laughed. Her grey eyes brightened.

'I can be wild!'

I put my arm around her. 'Of course you can, baby.' Her head rested on my shoulder and I felt a long breath against the side of my neck. 'I thought you didn't care what they think.'

'I don't. Most of the time. It just catches you off-guard sometimes.'

Her hair was soft against my cheek and I got her settled close against me. 'Well, if you do run off,' I told her, 'I won't get sore, I'll just come chasing after you.' I could just about see her smiling.

'It might be worth it for that alone. Anyway, I might not be the one who goes - you might be the one who abandons me.'

'There's always that possibility.'

'Well, when that happens I'm going to marry Jack.'

'Okay... But just so you know: he eats five times a day and whistles Deep in the Heart of Texas in his sleep.'

She laughed softly, more of a chuckle low in her throat. 'I'll keep the larder well stocked and buy some ear plugs.'

'That's my girl.'

'I am that.' She moved her head off my shoulder, put her arms around my neck and kissed me; her lips and teeth parted and I felt the tip of her tongue press against mine. I stroked her hair, curled it around my fingers.

'We should probably think about getting some dinner,' I said after a few minutes.

She tilted her head back; she was soft-focussed and starry-eyed. 'To hell with dinner.'

TBC