The Successor (3 page)

3

PADILLA WAS EXHAUSTED.
His day had started at six this morning with a difficult surgery. The removal of a stomach tumor from an elderly patient who had lapsed into cardiac arrest halfway through the touchy four-hour procedure. Fortunately, Padilla had been able to resuscitate the man despite the antiquated OR equipment and a sudden blackout the hospital had experienced a few moments after the man went flatline. It was a standard blackout, the kind that happened all the time. The kind Cubans simply dealt with as they dealt with any other daily nuisance because blackouts were as constant a part of life as night and day, as eating and breathing. Unfortunately, the blackout had occurred at a critical time during the procedure, and it had taken the hospital’s backup generator five minutes to kick in. As a result, Padilla had been unable to get all the cancer out. He’d have to go back in as soon as the man’s body could handle it. A couple of weeks probably.

After the surgery he’d grabbed a quick bite, then been off to his daily rounds and meetings with two other patients he’d operate on later in the week. At five o’clock he’d left the hospital, climbed into his 1956, pastel pink Chrysler Windsor Newport, and headed to José Martí Airport outside Havana to pick up his first fare of the evening. Which had turned out to be a young couple from London. They were honeymooners and they’d kissed and cooed in the backseat of the Chrysler during the entire forty-minute ride. He’d summoned every ounce of willpower he could find not to sneak a few glances in his rearview mirror—but the blonde was pretty and wearing a low-cut top—and he’d found himself stealing peeks several times. Found himself embarrassed at one point when he realized she was staring straight back at him while her new husband nuzzled her neck. Padilla loved Rose and their three children dearly, but he was forty-five, and more and more, he was suffering midlife yearnings he wished he wouldn’t.

The young husband had handed Padilla five euros after they’d pulled up in front of the Hotel Nacional. It was a fare any London cabbie would have spit on after such a long ride, but for Padilla—once he’d netted out fuel costs—it came to about 10 percent of his monthly state-issued surgeon’s salary. Such irony all around him, he’d thought, shaking his head ruefully as he’d waved good-bye to the couple after getting their luggage out of the trunk. The Nacional was one of the most ornate hotels in the world, yet all around it was awful poverty. The island had one of the highest literacy rates in all of Central or South America, yet there were few books to be had and there was only one daily newspaper. And doctors made more money to taxi people in Cuba than to heal them.

In all, Padilla had made the equivalent of twenty U.S. dollars today—a good day, made especially good because one of his fares had given him a $2 bill, which was highly prized by islanders—worth well more than two $1 bills. Now it was eleven o’clock and he was finally headed home, barely able to keep his eyes pried open as he sped along the narrow country lane. He had another operation scheduled for early tomorrow morning—a basic tonsillectomy and this time the patient was healthy—but he wanted to catch at least a few hours of sleep. He owed the young boy and his parents that because even a simple procedure could go terribly wrong if you weren’t careful.

He owed his own three children, too, but he was seeing less and less of them these days. He’d started out doing the cab thing one evening a week just to earn a little extra cash. Now it was up to four times a week, sometimes even five. Life was expensive with three kids, and the money was too good to pass up. It was like a drug, and he hated the intensifying addiction. But there was nothing he could do about it—at least, not in the short term. Fortunately, he had a long-term solution.
Unfortunately,
there were life-and-death risks involved with turning the goals of that long-term plan into a reality.

His last fare of the night had been a senior member of the Partido Comunisto Cubano—the Communist Party of Cuba. Or in Cuba, simply, the Party. The people who ruled this island. The man had claimed to be an executive of the national oil company on his way back from a business trip to Europe, but Padilla knew better. He recognized the man from a picture in a leaflet he’d seen a few weeks ago. A leaflet produced by the Party’s propaganda machine praising the great economic strides of the last six months—which was all crap. Things had gotten
worse
in the last six months. Much worse—and everyone knew it—thanks in no small part to Hurricane Rhonda, which had slammed into the island head-on from the south last fall and destroyed 30 percent of the sugarcane crop.

The man might actually have been a senior official of the national oil company, but he was definitely part of the Communist machine, too. A member of the Party. Only senior Party members had country villas like the one he’d just left. Only senior Party members had satellite phones—Cuba had cell phone service but generally it was available only in the larger cities. And only senior Party members would make sure to tell you what they did so you wouldn’t think they were deeply immersed in the Party. It was a classic disinformation technique. Padilla knew that because he’d surreptitiously been studying the Party diligently over the last few months. All pieces of that long-term plan aimed at getting him off the taxi habit. More important, making Cuba a better place for his children and making his father’s wish come true.

During the hour drive from the airport Padilla had acted as if he weren’t listening to the man’s phone conversation, as if he were just staring out at the dark countryside, but he’d overheard every word. The coded back-and-forth had been astonishing, seeming to indicate that someone important was either dead or at the doorstep. El Jefe? Padilla wondered. Rumors that the supreme leader was ailing had spread like wildfire through the tiny nation a month ago. Then, as if on cue, the old man had delivered one of his classic speeches, spewing fire and brimstone at the United States and its allies. Undoubtedly aware of the rumors thanks to the horde of DGSE officers—domestic spies—constantly mingling in the everyday lives of the 11 million residents.

Padilla had refused the healthy tip the executive offered as they pulled up in front of his beautifully maintained home. The tip could easily have been a Trojan horse. If Padilla had accepted it, he might have been hauled off to jail because it was illegal to accept anything over the fare, especially as an unlicensed gypsy. It was unlikely he’d get in real trouble because he was a doctor—and a good one—and the Party wanted Cuba to maintain its solid reputations for literacy and medical proficiency—despite that the reality was very different. However, confinement was still possible—perhaps just a week’s stay in a local lockup as a warning—but clearly not worth the risk of accepting a small tip. So he’d simply smiled, shook his head, and left, content with the fare and that he was finally headed home.

Padilla fought the urge to let his eyelids close as he raced home through the night. He rolled the window down and held his head outside as he drove, pinched his thigh, rubbed his gums—all in an effort to stay awake. Just as he was about to lose the battle, he sped through a tight S-turn and a hulking form appeared out of the gloom in front of the Chrysler’s high beams like a specter, directly in the middle of the road. For a moment he didn’t recognize the shape. Then he knew: a cow.

He shouted, hit the brakes, and wrenched the steering wheel hard left, but the right fender took out the cow’s two front legs. The animal’s head smashed against the hood with a sickening thud, spraying blood across the windshield, and then he was flying into a three-foot ditch carved out of the ground by the tropical squalls that soaked the island almost every afternoon in the summer. The left front fender hit the far side of the gully and ground into the soft soil with a terrible grinding noise. The crumpled car came to an abrupt halt on its side.

For a few moments Padilla lay against the door thanking God he’d buckled his seat belt—he rarely did—slowly coming back to full consciousness. Coming to his senses, to the smell of burning rubber and oil. To the sounds of the engine revving and the crippled cow bellowing pitifully as it thrashed about in the ditch on the other side of the road. Padilla’s left temple had struck the door window, and he was vaguely aware of a throbbing pain in his head and drops of blood trickling down his face.

The passenger door wrenched open.

“You all right?”
a stranger shouted, reaching across the seat and shaking him.
“Hey, you all right?”

Padilla grimaced and held up his hands. “Yes,” he groaned, signaling for the man to stop shaking him, “I’m all right.”

“The cow, she got out of the pasture. Must have found a hole in the fence somewhere.” The stranger was speaking fast. “I’m sorry about your car. It’s taken a bit of a hit, I’m afraid.”

As had his second career, Padilla thought to himself, turning off the engine and climbing across the seat, his head pounding.

“I’m Gustavo Cruz,” the stranger said, pulling Padilla out of the car and up to the side of the road. “The ranch I handle is just up the road. Who are you?”

“Nelson Padilla.” Padilla sank to one knee, overcome by dizziness.

“I’ve got to go to town and get the police.” Cruz winced, noticing the blood on Padilla’s face. “And you a doctor.”

“I
am
a doctor. I just need a few minutes.” Only one in twelve homes in Cuba had phone service, Padilla knew. Apparently Cruz’s wasn’t one of them. “Go ahead to town. I’ll be fine.”

“It’s about three miles from here. I shouldn’t be long.”

Padilla glanced over at the cow, still kicking around in the brush every few moments. “Do you have something that could pull my car out of the ditch?” He motioned back over his shoulder toward the Chrysler. Hopefully, it was drivable. At least the engine still worked. “A tractor maybe?” He dabbed at the cut on his head. It was small, a few centimeters long. It wouldn’t need stitches. He grabbed a couple of leaves off a bush and pressed them hard against the wound. “Something you can hook a chain to and drag me out.”

“The ranch has a tractor, but the transmission is shot. I’ve been waiting on parts for a few weeks.”

Padilla sighed. Typical. It seemed as if everything on the island were broken. Cruz would be lucky if he got the parts in a few
months,
let alone a few weeks.

“I’m going back to my place and get my car,” Cruz explained. “You stay here. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

“Yeah, okay.”

As Padilla watched Cruz hurry away, the sound of a loud motor reached his ears and then a truck slowly rumbled around the bend. “Hey!” he called after Cruz. “Wait!”

The truck skidded to a stop fifty feet past Padilla and the accident scene. He watched Cruz climb up on the running board and speak excitedly to the driver, then jump down as the driver slammed the truck into gear and roared off.

“It’s good,” said Cruz, making it back to where Padilla was kneeling as the truck’s lights disappeared around the next bend. “The driver says he knows a guy who has a tow truck and lives a few towns up. Says he’ll stop in and see the guy after he talks to the police. Says he’s pretty sure the guy will come and help, especially since you’re a doctor.”

Which meant the man who had the tow truck would want medical services in return for the tow out of the ditch, probably for a child in his family. But that was fine, barter was how it worked here. And Padilla always helped children in need, even if the parents had nothing to trade.

The noise of the truck had barely faded away when another vehicle’s headlights swung around the curve. Padilla squinted into the glare, realizing that there were actually two vehicles coming at him, a second directly behind the first. As the lead vehicle skidded to a stop, he saw it was a jeep. An army jeep of the Revolutionary Armed Forces—the FAR.

Two men in uniform hopped out and moved smartly toward Padilla.

“What’s going on here?” the driver demanded in a tough voice.

Padilla rose to his feet unsteadily, identifying the two men as
primer tenientes
—first lieutenants—by the shoulder bars with one red line in the middle of two blue ones sprinkled by three stars. Pretty senior to be out in the countryside at this time of night.

“The cow got out of the pasture,” Cruz explained nervously, gesturing from the animal to the car in the ditch to Padilla. “Unfortunately this gentleman hit it.”

“You all right?” the officer asked.

“Yes,” Padilla said, watching another man move toward the scene from the second jeep. The man had a vaguely familiar stride. Deliberate, one boot directly in front of the other, each step carefully placed. “I’m fine. I just need to get my car out of the ditch. Do you men have a chain or something in the jeep you could hook up to my back fender and give me a pull?”

“Maybe,” the man replied. “First tell me what you’re doing out here.”

The man who had walked up from the second jeep came into view over the lieutenant’s shoulder. Padilla glanced away quickly and subtly covered his face with his arm. Not because he was afraid of being recognized, but because he didn’t want Cruz or the two lieutenants to spot his expression of familiarity. The man who had walked up from the second jeep was General Jorge Delgado, commander of the FAR’s western and central armies—40,000 troops in all—and a man Padilla had gotten to know recently. They’d met secretly three times in the past two months. Padilla wondered what the hell he was doing out here.

“Lieutenant.”

The young officer who had been asking the questions turned toward General Delgado and saluted. “Yes, sir.”

“What’s going on?”

The lieutenant explained the situation.

Delgado pointed at the cow. “Shoot the animal, Lieutenant.”

“Yes, sir.”

The young officer strode to the side of the road, pulled an old Soviet-made pistol from his holster, and fired two bullets into the cow’s brain. It collapsed into the brush and lay still, barely visible.

As the sound of the shots echoed away, Padilla noticed another shadow hurrying down the lane toward the scene. This time from the direction of the ranch Cruz ran.