Ai! Pedrito!: When Intelligence Goes Wrong

  Working with brisk movements, all business, Yaquita set an enamel coffeepot on the small bedside table. Her own special brew, the coffee steamed a pungent aroma that should have been enough to wake a man from the deepest coma. She splashed a big white china cup halfway full of the inky black liquid and added hot foamy milk from another pitcher.

  Smith still sprawled on the floor, snoring. A swollen egg on his forehead marked where the brass pitcher had smashed him. Yaquita knelt beside him, adjusting her boots and tight black pants, then tilted the cup to dribble some of the potent coffee into his mouth. Groaning, Smith swallowed—but even the coffee didn't wake him up.

  Yaquita looked at the red-haired man intently and shook her head. All right, she would have to try more desperate measures. She stood, straightening her pants, then looked with narrowed eyes around her room. Luckily, she had many contingency plans.

  Reaching under her pillow behind the enamel coffeepot, Yaquita drew forth a fifth of black rum, glanced at the label and pulled the cork out of the bottle with her teeth. She poured half of the contents into the coffeepot and sloshed it around.

  "Try this, Pedrito. I guarantee it'll have some effect."

  Yaquita took Smith by a handful of his hair and tipped his head back. His mouth fell open in a faint moan, and she mercilessly dumped the hot, rum-drenched coffee down his throat.

  That worked.

  Smith surged forward, his eyes bugged wide open. He gasped, trying to get his breath, coughing coffee. He grabbed at his head with both hands, pressing against the big lump.

  "I'm glad you like it." With a satisfied smile, Yaquita poured the rest of the rum into the pot and stirred it with the bottle neck. She filled the cup again. "Have some more."

  Still trying to shake off the disorientation. Smith staggered around the room, holding his pounding head. "This is the second time in two days I've woken up on the floor of a hotel room. Who are you, anyway, and why did you attack me?"

  Forcing a smile, Yaquita gave him a push. He stumbled backward onto the bed and sat down heavily.

  Yaquita thrust the refilled coffee cup into his hands. He drank it down reflexively. Bleary-eyed, Smith lowered the cup and peered into it. "Hey, that's good coffee," he said. "Mellowed with chicory?"

  "It is a local blend grown in the Andes," Yaquita answered, taking the empty cup and handing him a new one. He drank it down.

  Now even more disoriented because of the effects of the rum. Smith reeled as he sat on the bed. "Funny, coffee usually wakes me up. But now I just feel... strange."

  Yaquita sniffed at the comment. "Pedrito, you act as if you've never been drunk before."

  He blinked at her innocently, working his lips until the slurred words finally came out. "Drunk? Drunk?" He closed his eyes, but the room still spun. "This is embarrassing. I don't drink."

  Yaquita leaned against the side of the wardrobe with her arms folded. She looked at him in a deadly way, then steeled herself and made up her mind. "For the revolution . . . and for old times' sake." She ran her fingers along the edges of the black bolero jacket that barely covered her breasts.

  "Pedrito, the only thing you were ever good for was bed," she said loud enough for him to hear. She slid off the skimpy jacket. In keeping with her habit of throwing things, Yaquita even hurled her clothes across the room, one item at a time. "So get in bed."

  Smith stared at her aghast as she pushed him backward onto the mattress. "But, miss, I'm not—" Then he forgot the rest of his sentence. He couldn't control his blinking eyes, nor could he focus on the multiple images of the devastatingly lovely naked woman who climbed onto the bedspread with him

  Yaquita's clothes and boots lay strewn across the floor. So did Smith's khaki safari clothes, shoes and skivvies. The headboard of the brass bed shook, then went still. It shook again. And went still again.

  Yaquita sat up, raising her head and bare breasts, glistening with perspiration. She gripped the brass headboard with a wide-eyed expression on her face. "Ai! This isn't the same Pedrito

  I remember!" Her long black hair was mussed and her lipstick was smeared.

  Beneath her. Smith still tried to say something, but Yaquita wouldn't let him get a word out. "Oh! Ai, Pedrito!"

  The headboard began to shake once more, briskly enough that another few knickknacks fell from shelves to floor. Neither Smith nor Yaquita paid any attention.

  Chapter 13

  MEANWHILE, BACK IN NEW YORK CITY, an endless string of yellow taxis honked at each other in a bizarre cab-driver's Morse code. Old Admiral Turner sat at his desk, writing out a check. He scratched his bristly gray hair as he tried to add numbers in his head.

  As a full admiral and director of the New York Office of Naval Intelligence, he could have commanded any underling do the work for him. In matters of his own heart, though, his brash daughter, Joan, outranked him, and the admiral had no choice but to follow her orders.

  Joan sat across from her father, wearing an unbuttoned street coat and a stylish hat into which she had neatly tucked her strawberry-blond hair. Her loveliness was like a statue's, serene and stony. She crossed her legs in her tight lavender wool skirt, showing off plenty of calf, knee and even a bit of thigh. She rested a sequin-studded purse in her lap.

  At times, the old admiral had trouble remembering that his little girl, Joan, was now in her mid-twenties and her own woman. Most definitely her own woman.

  "Five hundred bucks will be fine for this afternoon, Daddy," she said indifferently, gazing past his checkbook to the window behind him, where pigeons flew about. "Or more. Whatever you feel is best."

  An intent expression creased his weather-beaten face, and the admiral scribbled a larger number in the amount line.

  After a brisk knock, the office door swung all the way open. A redheaded lieutenant, junior grade, marched into the office, his white cap tucked under his left arm. The redhead caught himself beginning to swagger, then wiped a confident grin off his face in an attempt to look meek. He had to work hard not to ogle the strawberry blonde at the admiral's desk.

  "Lieutenant, uh. Smith reporting for duty, sir," he said, pronouncing his words carefully to squelch any lingering trace of a Spanish accent.

  Joan wrinkled her nose in distaste at the young lieutenant, giving him the brushoff with her blue eyes. She uncrossed her legs and straightened her lavender skirt to hide as much knee as she could.

  Pedrito Miraflores walked briskly up to the desk with military precision, stopped with a click of heels and gave a snappy salute. He stared straight ahead, awaiting Admiral Turner's pleasure. With a sinking feeling Pedrito realized he had already slipped up, since members of the U.S. Navy did not salute when not wearing a formal cap, and most especially did not salute under a roof.

  But the admiral didn't notice. He leaned back, giving Pedrito a friendly smile. "Oh, Tom, relax! I'm glad to see you back from your trip already, boy." He tore the check from his pad and tucked the checkbook into the pocket of his uniform. "Did you have a wild time on your vacation down in Colodor? How goes their mapmakers' strike?"

  Pedrito smiled his most charming smile. "It's been quiet down there lately. Santa Isabel is a fine city, though I'm sad to say that the mapmakers have still not been able to hurl off their foul oppressors' yoke." His eyes twinkled as he tried to work his charms on Joan. "The lovely lady might enjoy a vacation there sometime. I would be happy to show her around."

  Joan raised her eyes to the ceiling with a clearly exasperated sigh. She knew Lieutenant Tom Smith and didn't think much of him.

  Pedrito sensed her mystifying disdain—women weren't supposed to treat him like this—and shifted his attention back to the old man. "To answer your question. Admiral, I got plenty of rest and relaxation. I even finished reading my book of naval battles."

  "Sorry to hear it," the admiral said with a frown, "but still there's hope for you. Smith." He made a point of glancing at his watch and pretending to be surprised. "Well, well, look at the time. Eleven o'clock." He handed t
he seven-hundred-dollar check to Joan, and she tucked it into her sequined purse. "Tom, why don't you take my daughter, Joan, here out to lunch and recover from your trip?"

  Joan winced visibly at the suggestion. "Oh, Daddy!"

  Pedrito smiled like a wolf at the admiral's gorgeous daughter. "It would be my pleasure, sir!" he said, sensing the challenge. But she refused to look at him. She stalked toward the door, displeased, her high heels clicking on the floor. He promptly about-faced and followed Joan out, reaching for her arm to escort her. "How about it, Joan? Admiral's orders."

  Joan jerked her arm away and turned on him with scathing contempt. "Go piss up a tree. I wouldn't marry you if you were the last man on earth!"

  "I thought we were talking about lunch, not marriage—" "One thing leads to the other, you oaf. Now go away. I've got higher standards than a loser like you."

  Her vehemence surprised Pedrito, but he was used to dealing with opposition. "Why, what's the matter with me? I'm, uh, a clean-cut, nice young man."

  "What's the matter with you?" Joan repeated with a snort. "Does the word boring mean anything to you? How about dull? How about, I'd rather listen to radio coverage of an amateur golf tournament? I'll bet you've never told a lie in your life!"

  Pedrito stared, surprised, unable even to respond to such a preposterous accusation.

  "You don't even gamble at bridge!" Joan continued. "Some party animal—you wouldn't have the slightest idea how to show a girl a good time."

  Pedrito grew even more surprised, but he tried to remember to maintain his act. He didn't even know how to play bridge. "But I—"

  Joan flicked her hand at him as though to brush away a fly. "And to top it all off, you won't touch liquor either. What the hell do you think you are, you strait-laced jerk? A saint? I have no interest in marrying a saint."

  Pedrito flushed as he tried to contain his anger. This Tom Smith character sounded like a real prize. "But who said anything about marrying—"

  Joan gave a snort of contempt and stalked off. Pedrito thought better of following, so instead he stared after her tight lavender skirt as she strutted down the hall in high heels, showing off her lean and muscular legs.

  "A saint?" he muttered to himself, incredulous. "Nobody's ever called me that before." He scratched his head. "Caramba! The things they don't tell you in a pre-mission briefing!"

  Chapter 14

  THE STREET LIGHT in front of the cantina flickered, then burned out as night fell. Finally, customers began to arrive from the grocery markets, from the fields, from their fried banana kiosks and souvenir stands. Outside, an old woman had set up a roast pig over a barbecue drum. She used an acetylene blowtorch to scorch off the pig's bristles.

  Inside the cantina, rowdy patrons filled the tables, seemingly lost in the mirror maze of the walls. On stage, protected behind the chicken-wire barricade, the band played out of tune, to no one's surprise.

  The drunken knife-throwing man still sat at his small round table, somewhat conscious now. During the afternoon he had finished skewering all the black scorpions in the place and had eliminated most of the cockroaches as well. Now he held his knife in one hand, impatiently looking for a new target. He eyed the band members, considering.

  "Where's Yaquita?" the knife man demanded, then skewered an ant on the tabletop with the tip of his blade. The other customers glared at the stage and echoed the question. The band kept playing, somewhat skittish.

  The fat manager waddled out from behind the bar and climbed onto the stage, working his way through the protective fishnets and chicken wire. He mopped sweat off his brow and held out his hands, sputtering excuses and trying to quiet the audience.

  The crowd started throwing margarita glasses and brown cerveza bottles at the band. Patrons banged their glasses and rum bottles on the tables in rhythm to their chant. "We want Yaquita! We want Yaquita!" The angled mirrors on the walls multiplied their images infinitely.

  The manager gave up and raced away from the stage. Puffing for breath, he headed across the floor as bottles and glasses smashed against the mirrored walls, following him in his flight. A large knife thunked into the narrow gap between mirrors, quivering near the manager's ear. He gawked at the deadly blade, then scuttled along faster, rushing for the stairs.

  The music stopped as the band members surrendered. The chant continued.

  Red-faced from climbing up to the balcony room, the manager stopped outside Yaquita's door. He wrung his hands, glanced down at the crowd below, as if weighing the two types of danger. Someone hurled a beer bottle that arced up, then crashed down at his feet.

  The manager timidly opened the door, swallowing hard. "Yaquita? Please, senorita?" The room was dark inside. "Yaquita?"

  "Out! We're busy in here. Out!" The brass headboard rattled against the wall again.

  A huge white olla flew out of the dark, and sailed past the balcony rail to drop down into the crowded cantina. The wide pot bombed the knife thrower's table in an explosion of fragments and water. The knife thrower stood up, blinking and confused, then went to retrieve his knife from where it still quivered in the wall.

  "Si, Yaquita." Obsequiously, the manager shut her door, backing away before she could throw anything else at him. "Whenever you are ready, senorita."

  From the balcony rail he looked down at the crowd and spread his hands in resignation. "There is nothing I can do, my friends," he said. "She is ... Yaquita."

  The crowd, still seated, spread their hands just as expressively in resignation, all in unison. They were also familiar with Yaquita's unpredictable behavior.

  "Perhaps if you would just listen to the band?" the manager suggested.

  But when the musicians started playing again, striking up a disco tune this time, they were forced to flee the stage under a storm of smashed bottles.

  Chapter 15

  YAQUITA NEVER MANAGED to sing that evening for anyone but Smith.

  The next morning, sunlight streamed through the window Smith had smashed with his suitcase the day before. The gold-tasseled curtains hung open, ruffled by a breeze. The big brass bed had been knocked askew; the rumpled scarlet bedspread looked as if a herd of llamas had stampeded across it.

  Smith lay on the mattress, dead to the world, or at least wishing he was. One arm dangled off the bed to the pile of his discarded safari outfit. The buttons were loose, threads frayed from when Yaquita had torn off his clothes.

  The aftereffects of the rum made his head pound, and Yaquita had ridden him hard. Smith cradled his head in his hands; he had already learned not to sit up. "Oh, my skull!"

  Yaquita stood on the other side of the bed wearing only a thin cotton robe untied in front. She wrung her hands with worry. "I've never seen you like this, Pedrito! I'll get a doctor. Maybe you have the Black Death, or the Scarlet Fever, or the Green Gout!" She grabbed her trench coat and rushed from the room.

  To the barely conscious Smith, the door slam sounded like cannon fire on one of Admiral Nelson's ships during the Trafalgar battle.

  The wild chickens outside crowed every hour on the hour, like feathered alarm clocks.

  A Santa Isabel doctor with a gray suit and a white goatee examined Smith's head, measuring it, pressing against it. Throughout the examination, the doctor thrust out his lower lip and muttered incomprehensible sounds. Yaquita paced back and forth like a caged lioness, concerned for Smith's health.

  The young lieutenant's eyes were bleary. The doctor pried up the lids with his thumb and shone a light into the pupils. He picked up his bag and beckoned for Yaquita to follow him for a grim consultation. They went out onto the balcony, where they could talk in private above the empty cantina. Down below, the knife-throwing man snored across his usual table, his image reflected in the numerous mirrors.

  The doctor shook his head solemnly. "I examined him very thoroughly, senorita. There's not the slightest sign of concussion."

  Yaquita sagged with relief. "Good! I didn't hurt him by throwing all those things, or by ...
by working him too hard last night. Any signs of the plague?"

  . "No symptoms of fever or brain swelling. I performed a complete phrenology exam, and all the lumps on his head are completely normal," the doctor continued. "He does seem to have a hangover, however."

  "A hangover!" Yaquita said. "That's all?"

  "I'm amazed that the infamous Pedrito Miraflores is not familiar with the symptoms of too much drink—but he's perfectly all right. He could get up right now, if his head could take it."

  Yaquita smiled, exuberant with relief. Bag in hand, the doctor clomped down the curving staircase. Upon reaching the cantina floor, he wove his way around the toppled tables, kicking discarded beer and rum bottles. Out of professional courtesy, the doctor inspected the few unconscious patrons sprawled on chairs or on the floor, verified that they all still breathed, then departed through the front door.

  Yaquita returned to her room where Smith still lay groaning on the bed. She touched his head tenderly, brushing his red hair aside. Something was very different about this man, but she couldn't quite figure it out. Then her face grew sad, much in contrast to the expression of relief she had shown the doctor. This was definitely not the Pedrito she knew—perhaps he had amnesia, or brain damage of some kind.

  If so, then she had plans of her own

  Blinking with the pain of his splitting headache, Smith looked up at Yaquita in alarm. He raised an arm to fend off any other objects she might throw at him. But she kissed his hand instead.

  "Oh, you poor boy," Yaquita said with sympathy. "The doctor says you are very, very ill. Shhh! You must not get up or go out, even for a minute. Just stay here with me, dear."

  With her back turned, Yaquita dribbled another fifth of dark rum into the enamel coffeepot. "He did say, however, that you ought to drink more of my special coffee. Plenty more."

  Yaquita sat on the side of the bed with the steaming cup. She lifted his head gently and put the cup to his lips. "There you go, take a big sip." He gulped trustingly. She took the cup away, setting it on the bedside table, then bent over him. A breast escaped from her flimsy robe. She leaned closer to kiss him.