He sat holding his shoe, remembering the celebrated pair. A real institution in the colonial city. They lived under the laurels in Colón Park, between the arches of the cathedral, and when they were most affluent they would appear in the doorways of the elegant shoe shops and jewelry stores on El Conde, doing their crazy act so that people would toss them a coin or something to eat. He had often seen Valeriano and Barajita, in their rags and absurd adornments. When Valeriano thought he was Christ, he would drag a cross; when he was Napoleon, he would brandish his broomstick, bellow orders, and charge the enemy. One of Johnny Abbes’s caliés reported that Crazy Valeriano had started to make fun of the Chief, calling him the Cop. He was curious. He went to spy on them from a car with tinted windows. The old man, his chest covered with little mirrors and beer bottle caps, strutted around with the air of a clown, displaying his medals to a horrified crowd that did not know whether to laugh or run away. “Applaud the Cop, you assholes,” screamed Barajita, pointing to the gleaming chest of the madman. Then he felt the heat run through his body, blinding him, urging him to punish their audacity. He gave the order on the spot. But the next morning, thinking that crazy people don’t really know what they’re saying and that instead of punishing Valeriano he ought to catch the comedians who had told the couple what to say, on a dark dawn like this one he told Johnny Abbes: “Crazy people are just crazy. Let them go.” The head of the Military Intelligence Service, the SIM, grimaced: “Too late, Excellency. We threw them to the sharks yesterday. Alive, just as you ordered.”
He stood, his shoes on his feet. A statesman does not repent his decisions. He had never repented anything. He would throw those two bishops to the sharks, alive. He began the stage of his morning ritual that he performed with real delight, recalling a novel he read when he was young, the only one he ever thought about: Quo Vadis? A tale of Romans and Christians. He never forgot the image of the refined and wealthy Petronius, Arbiter of elegance, who revived each morning thanks to massages and ablutions, ointments, essences, perfumes, and his slave girls’ caresses. If he had the time, he would do what the Arbiter did: spend the entire morning in the hands of masseuses, pedicurists, manicurists, barbers, bathers, after the exercises for stimulating his muscles and activating his heart. He had a short massage at midday, after lunch, and a more leisurely one on Sundays, when he could spare two or three hours from his pressing obligations. But the times weren’t right for relaxing with the sensual delights of the great Petronius. He had to be content with the ten minutes he spent applying the perfumed Yardley deodorant that Manuel Alfonso sent to him from New York—poor Manuel, how could he go on, after his operation?—and the gentle French moisturizing cream Bienfait du Matin, and the cologne, also Yardley, with the light meadow scent, that he rubbed on his chest. When his hair was combed and he had touched up the ends of the thin brush mustache he had worn for twenty years, he powdered his face generously until he had hidden under a delicate whitish cloud the dark tinge of the Haitian blacks who were his maternal ancestors, something he had always despised on other people’s skin, and on his own.
He was dressed, with jacket and tie, at six minutes to five. He checked this with satisfaction: he never went past the hour. It was one of his superstitions; if he did not walk into his office at five sharp, something bad would happen that day.
He went over to the window. It was still dark, as if it were midnight. But he saw fewer stars than he had an hour earlier. They were shining less bravely. Day was about to break and soon they’d run away. He picked up a walking stick and went to the door. As soon as he opened it, he heard the heels of the two military adjutants.
“Good morning, Excellency.”
“Good morning, Excellency.”
He responded with a nod. At a glance he could tell that they were dressed correctly. He did not allow slovenliness or disorder in any officer or man in the Armed Forces, but among the adjutants, the unit responsible for guarding him, a missing button, a spot or wrinkle on trousers or tunic, a carelessly placed visored cap were grave faults punishable by several days of rigorous discipline and, at times, expulsion and a return to the regular battalions.
A light breeze stirred the trees of Radhamés Manor as he passed, and he heard the whisper of the leaves and, from the stable, another whinnying horse. Johnny Abbes, a report on the progress of the campaign, a visit to San Isidro Air Base, a report from Chirinos, lunch with the Marine, three or four audiences, a meeting with the Minister of the Interior and Religious Practice, a meeting with Balaguer, a meeting with Cucho Álvarez Pina, president of the Dominican Party, and a walk along the Malecón after he had visited Mama Julia. Would he sleep in San Cristóbal to take away the bad taste of the other night?
He walked into his office, in the National Palace, when his watch said five. Breakfast was on his desk—fruit juice, buttered toast, fresh-brewed coffee—with two cups. And, getting to his feet, the flabby silhouette of the director of the Intelligence Service, Colonel Johnny Abbes García:
“Good morning, Excellency.”
3
“He isn’t coming,” Salvador exclaimed suddenly. “Another night wasted, you’ll see.”
“He’ll come,” Amadito immediately replied, with some impatience. “He put on his olive-green uniform. The adjutants were ordered to have the blue Chevrolet ready for him. Why won’t you believe me? He’ll come.”
Salvador and Amadito were in the back of the car parked across from the Malecón, and they’d had the same exchange several times during the half hour they had spent there. Antonio Imbert, at the wheel, and Antonio de la Maza, who sat beside him with his elbow out the window, made no comment this time either. The four men were tense as they watched the handful of vehicles driving from Ciudad Trujillo, their yellow headlights piercing the darkness, on the way to San Cristóbal. None of the cars was the 1957 sky-blue Chevrolet with curtained windows that they were waiting for.
They were a few hundred meters from the Livestock Fairgrounds, where there were several restaurants—the Pony, the most popular, was probably full of people eating grilled meat—and some bars that had music, but the wind blew to the east and the sounds did not reach them, though they could see the distant lights through the palm trees. Yet the crash of waves breaking against the rocks and the clamor of the undertow were so loud, they had to raise their voices to be heard. The car, doors closed and lights off, was ready to pull away.
“Do you remember when we first started coming to the Malecón to enjoy the breeze and nobody worried about the caliés?” Antonio Imbert put his head out the window and filled his lungs with the night air. “Here’s where we began talking seriously about this.”
None of his friends answered right away, as if they were consulting their memories or had not paid attention to what he was saying.
“Yes, here on the Malecón, about six months ago,” Salvador Estrella Sadhalá replied after a while.
“Earlier than that,” Antonio de la Maza murmured without turning around. “In November, when they killed the Mirabal sisters, we talked about it here. I’m sure of that. And we’d already been coming to the Malecón at night for a while.”
“It seemed like a dream,” Imbert mused. “Difficult, and a long way off. Like when you’re a kid and imagine you’ll be a hero, an explorer, a movie star. Damn, I still can’t believe it’ll be tonight.”
“If he comes,” Salvador grumbled.
“I’ll bet anything you want, Turk,” Amadito repeated, full of conviction.
“The thing that makes me wonder is that today’s Tuesday,” Antonio de la Maza complained. “He always goes to San Cristóbal on Wednesday. You’re one of the adjutants, Amadito, and you know that better than anybody. Why did he change the day?”
“I don’t know why,” insisted the lieutenant. “But he’ll go. He put on his olive-green uniform. He ordered the blue Chevrolet. He’ll go.”
“He must have a nice piece of ass waiting for him at Mahogany House,” said Antonio Imbert. “A brand-new
one that’s never been opened.”
“If you don’t mind, let’s talk about something else.” Salvador cut him off.
“I always forget we can’t talk about asses in front of a saint like you,” the man at the wheel apologized. “Let’s just say he has something nice planned in San Cristóbal. Can I say it like that, Turk? Or does that offend your apostolic ears too?”
But nobody was in the mood for jokes. Not even Imbert; he talked only to fill the waiting time somehow.
“Heads up!” exclaimed De la Maza, craning his neck forward.
“It’s a truck,” replied Salvador, with a simple glance at the approaching yellow headlights. “I’m not a saint or a fanatic, Antonio. I practice my faith, that’s all. And ever since the bishops sent their Pastoral Letter on January 24 last year, I’m proud to be a Catholic.”
In fact, it was a truck that roared past, its swaying load of cartons tied down with ropes; its roar grew fainter and finally disappeared.
“And a Catholic can’t talk about cunts but he can kill, is that right, Turk?” Imbert tried to provoke him. He did it often: he and Salvador Estrella Sadhalá were the closest friends in the group; they were always trading jokes, at times so pointed that others thought they would come to blows. But they had never fought, their friendship was unbreakable. Tonight, however, Turk did not show a trace of humor:
“Killing just anybody, no. Doing away with a tyrant, yes. Have you ever heard the word ‘tyrannicide’? In extreme cases, the Church allows it. St. Thomas Aquinas wrote that. Do you want to know how I know? When I began to help the people in June 14 and realized I’d have to pull the trigger someday, I consulted with our spiritual adviser, Father Fortín. A Canadian priest, in Santiago. He arranged an audience for me with Monsignor Lino Zanini, the papal nuncio. ‘Would it be a sin for a believer to kill Trujillo, Monsignor?’ He closed his eyes and thought. I could repeat his exact words, with his Italian accent. He showed me the passage from St. Thomas, in the Summa Theologica. If I hadn’t read it, I wouldn’t be here tonight with all of you.”
Antonio de la Maza had turned around to look at him:
“You talked about this with your spiritual adviser?”
His voice was angry. Lieutenant Amado García Guerrero was afraid he would explode into one of those rages he had been prone to ever since Trujillo had his brother Octavio killed, years before. Outbursts like the one that was about to destroy the friendship that united De la Maza to Salvador Estrella Sadhalá. But Salvador calmed him down:
“It was a long time ago, Antonio. When I began to help June 14. You think I’m such an asshole that I’d confess something like this to a poor priest?”
“Turk, explain to me why you can say asshole and not ass, cunt, or fuck,” Imbert joked, trying once again to ease the tension. “Don’t all dirty words offend God?”
“Words don’t offend God, only obscene thoughts,” Turk replied in resignation. “Assholes who ask asshole questions may not offend Him. But they must bore Him to death.”
“Did you take communion this morning so you’d come to the great event with a pure soul?” Imbert continued the teasing.
“I’ve taken communion every day for the past ten years,” Salvador acknowledged. “I don’t know if my soul is the way a Christian’s soul should be. Only God knows that.”
“It is,” thought Amadito. Of all the people he had known in his thirty-one years, Turk was the one he admired most. Salvador was married to his aunt, Urania Mieses, whom Amadito loved dearly. From the time he had been a cadet at Batalla de Las Carreras Military Academy, whose director was Colonel José León (Pechito) Estévez, Angelita Trujillo’s husband, he had spent his days off at the house of the Estrella Sadhalás. Salvador had become extremely important in his life; he confided in him about his problems, troubles, dreams, and doubts, and asked his advice before making any decision. The Estrella Sadhalás gave the party to celebrate Amadito’s graduation, carrying the sword of honor—first in a class of thirty-five officers!—attended by his eleven maternal aunts, and, years later, for what the young lieutenant thought would be the best news he’d ever receive, his acceptance into the most prestigious unit in the Armed Forces: the military adjutants responsible for the personal safety of the Generalissimo.
Amadito closed his eyes and inhaled the salt-laden breeze blowing in the four open windows. Imbert, Turk, and Antonio de la Maza were quiet. He had met Imbert and De la Maza at the house on Mahatma Gandhi, and that meant he had witnessed the fight between Turk and Antonio, so violent he expected them to start shooting, and, months later, he also witnessed the reconciliation of Antonio and Salvador for the sake of a single goal: killing the Goat. No one could have told Amadito on that day in 1959, when Urania and Salvador gave him a party and countless bottles of rum were consumed, that in less than two years, on a mild, starry night, on this Tuesday, May 30, 1961, he would be waiting for Trujillo in order to kill him. So many things had happened since the day when, shortly after he arrived at 21 Mahatma Gandhi, Salvador took him by the arm and gravely led him to the most private corner of the garden.
“I must say something to you, Amadito. Because of the fondness I have for you. That all of us in this house have for you.”
He spoke so quietly that the young man leaned his head forward to hear him.
“What’s this about, Salvador?”
“It’s about my not wanting to do anything to hurt your career. You may have problems if you keep coming here.”
“What kind of problems?”
Turk’s expression, which was usually serene, contorted with emotion. Alarm flashed in his eyes.
“I’m collaborating with the people in June 14. If anyone finds out, it would be very dangerous for you. An officer in Trujillo’s corps of military adjutants. Just think about it!”
The lieutenant never could have imagined Salvador as a clandestine conspirator, helping the people who had organized to fight against Trujillo following Castro’s June 14 invasion at Constanza, Maimón, and Estero Hondo, which had cost so many lives. He knew that Turk despised the regime; Salvador and his wife were careful in front of him, but sometimes they let slip antigovernment remarks. Then they immediately fell silent, for they knew that Amadito, though he had no interest in politics, professed, like any other officer in the Army, a blind, visceral loyalty to the Maximum Leader, the Benefactor and Father of the New Nation, who for three decades had controlled the destiny of the Republic and the lives and deaths of all Dominicans.
“Not another word, Salvador. You’ve told me. I heard it. I’ve forgotten what I heard. I’m going to keep coming here, like always. This is my home.”
Salvador looked at him with the clear-eyed sincerity that communicated a joyful sensation of life to Amadito.
“Let’s go have a beer, then. Let’s not be sad.”
And, of course, when he fell in love and began to think about marriage, the first people he introduced to his girlfriend, after his Aunt Meca—his favorite among his mother’s eleven sisters—were Salvador and Urania. Luisita Gil! Whenever he thought of her, regret twisted his gut and anger boiled up inside him. He took out a cigarette and placed it in his mouth. Salvador lit it for him with his lighter. The good-looking brunette, the charming, flirtatious Luisita Gil. After some maneuvers, he had gone with two friends for a sail at La Romana. On the dock, two girls were buying fresh fish. They struck up a conversation and went with them to the municipal band concert. The girls invited them to a wedding. Only Amadito could go; he had a day off, but his two friends had to return to barracks. He fell madly in love with the slender, witty little brunette with flashing eyes, who danced the merengue like a star on the Dominican Voice. And she with him. The second time they went out, to a movie and a nightclub, he could kiss and hold her. She was the woman of his life, he could never be with anybody else. The handsome Amadito had said these things to many women since his days as a cadet, but this time he meant it. Luisa took him to meet her family in La Romana, and he invited her to lunch
at Aunt Meca’s house in Ciudad Trujillo, and then, one Sunday, at the Estrella Sadhalás’: they were delighted with Luisa. When he told them he was planning to ask her to marry him, they were enthusiastic: she was a lovely woman. Amadito formally asked her parents for her hand. In accordance with regulations, he requested authorization to marry from the commanding officers of the military adjutants.
It was his first clash with a reality that, despite his twenty-nine years, splendid grades, magnificent record as a cadet and an officer, he had known nothing about. (“Like most Dominicans,” he thought.) The reply to his request was delayed. He was told that the corps of adjutants had passed it along to the SIM, so that they could investigate the person in question. In a week or ten days he would have his approval. But the reply did not come in ten, or fifteen, or twenty days. On the twenty-first day the Chief summoned him to his office. It was the only time he had exchanged words with the Benefactor even though he had been close to him so often at public functions, the first time this man whom he saw every day at Radhamés Manor had directed his gaze at him.
From the time he was a child Lieutenant García Guerrero had heard, from his family—especially his grandfather, General Hermó-genes García—at school, and later as a cadet and an officer, about Trujillo’s gaze. A gaze that no one could endure without lowering his own eyes, intimidated and annihilated by the force radiating from those piercing eyes that seemed to read one’s most secret thoughts and most hidden desires and appetites, and made people feel naked. Amadito laughed at the stories. The Chief might be a great statesman whose vision, will, and capacity for work had made the Dominican Republic a great country. But he wasn’t God. His gaze could only be the gaze of a mortal man.