The Poisoned Pawn (31 page)

“So you contacted the Canadian authorities to warn them there was a pedophile with a stopover in Ottawa and that they should check his laptop. Normally, they don’t look all that closely; trust me, I was there. But that created a new problem: if the RCMP examined the computer too carefully, they might find the distribution list for all the recipients of those pictures. You realized you needed to get it back. Which meant creating another diversion.”

Ramirez exhaled. The smoke corkscrewed overhead.

“This, I think, is where it gets interesting. Once Callendes was arrested, you realized it would create an international scandal. This was something you could use for other purposes. You created a set of false Vatican documents and had our embassy leak them to the RCMP, with the help of Cuban Intelligence.”

An oxymoron, Ramirez thought. But he might as well blame Cuban Intelligence, even though the minister’s own clerk had been seconded to the task. She wrote English fluently, but seemed unable to spell some words correctly. The faked memorandum stated that Rey Callendes would “lick” to inform his superiors of events at the school in Viñales. Well, perhaps he had.

But the minister knew what happened to Sanchez at that school: all of the facts were in Ramirez’s draft report to the Attorney General. The fake memorandum was easy to manufacture once the minister had that information. And the other documents? For all Ramirez knew, they were genuine. Maybe true.

“It was a good ploy,” said Ramirez. “The Canadians were after the Catholic Church in a civil action for a lot of money. There’s a multi-billion-dollar settlement that the Catholic Church has refused to contribute to so far. They were almost too happy to give us Rey Callendes back if I would only confirm the authenticity of the Cuban documents they’d received. That was easy enough for me to do, once I realized you were the one who gave them the documents in the first place.”

Ramirez could tell from the minister’s face that he had scored.

“Rey Callendes shared a lot of information with you over the years, despite his oath of silence. He knew a lot about the cover-up of claims of child abuse, didn’t he? He held a position of considerable power. My fault, I didn’t realize he was a bishop; I thought he was a pawn. Once you had Callendes back in Cuba, it gave you something to trade with the Vatican, because they want him back too.”

“Complete nonsense. You accuse me of forging documents? I’ll have your head for this,” the minister sputtered.

“The RCMP officer working on this matter is the one who told me the documents were leaked. He mentioned a Cuban connection. When I realized he meant you, I wondered why you’d done it. It made sense when I learned the Catholic Church is facing an enormous wave of lawsuits. Twelve thousand claims in Canada alone. More legal actions forthcoming, I imagine, once the Dublin inquiry releases its report. The world is like a giant chessboard when it comes to protecting Church assets. But you already knew that. You knew that if the Canadians relied on those documents in their court action, it would frighten the Vatican into moving quickly. I seriously underestimated you. My apologies, Minister. You’re not stupid at all.”

“Your logic escapes me,” said the minister, ignoring the insult. He pulled a cigar from the humidor on his desk and rolled it back and forth in his fingers.

“Ah, that’s what Apiro says sometimes, too. That I use faulty logic. But it allows me to be creative. Here’s my thinking. Cuba needs money. The Catholic Church has money. Cuba wants the Catholic Church’s money. Is that logical enough for you?”

“You think I would blackmail the Catholic Church?”

“Not blackmail it. But certainly make it think it was about to be torn apart. After all, if the CIA could create an exploding
cigar, Cuban Intelligence could create an exploding file. The prospect of the Church being sued for billions of dollars around the world would send it into a panic. All that money at risk. But Cuba would be a safe place for the Vatican to hide its assets. Too harsh? Alright, let’s say
protect
them. Not only do we have no extradition treaties, but there is no reciprocal enforcement of civil judgments with other countries. Once the money is invested here, it’s safe from foreign judgments.”

The minister forced his face into a tight smile. “Certainly imaginative. And insubordinate as well, Ramirez. I should have you arrested.” He reached for the phone on his desk.

“Yes,” Ramirez nodded. “You probably should. But I think you should hear everything I have to say first. I’m sure the distribution list encrypted on that computer is a long one. In fact, I’m quite interested to see just how far it reaches. The internet is a wonderful thing. One of its many uses, I learned in Canada, is for the dissemination of child pornography.”

The minister collapsed in his chair. “What do you think you know, Ramirez?”

Ramirez thought back to the old cigar lady, the photograph she had stopped to examine in the hallway. She had given him another clue, he realized. Another one he had misunderstood.

“Rey Callendes was the priest who administered last rites to the counter-revolutionaries after the revolution, wasn’t he. He’s seventy-six, the same age as Raúl Castro. I should have recognized him in that photograph hanging in the hallway, but forty years does a lot to a man.

“Che Guevara was responsible for deciding who were war criminals and who would be executed. He was Argentinean, not Cuban, and therefore extremely efficient. But he was raised a Catholic and probably had a guilty conscience, something I have recently experienced firsthand. The least he could do was let a
priest meet with the prisoners to give them the sacraments. Rey Callendes knew just how summarily some of those prisoners were killed, and who fired the bullets. Bullets kill, you know. Another logic tree. People fire the guns. But guns make bullets go very, very fast.

“I’m guessing some of our leaders were a little overly enthusiastic when it came to sending Batista supporters over to the other side. Rey Callendes kept that information to himself. Which allowed him, once he was assigned to the boarding school at Viñales, to rape little boys with complete impunity. He knew he would never be prosecuted, that the presidential palace would protect him at all costs because of what he witnessed in the mountains.

“His work allowed him to identify men of like mind. He even brought in his friends, like Father Felipe Rubido, to work with him. When complaints began to circulate about abuse in the Catholic schools, Fidel Castro closed them, but he didn’t close the orphanages. I never thought to ask why Sanchez had maintained such a close connection to Viñales even after he had been sent for re-education to another school.

“At first, I couldn’t understand why you insisted on making Sanchez a hero when we both knew what he was. I wrongly assumed that Sanchez no longer had any contact with the priest who had molested him. But he didn’t hate Rey Callendes; he loved him. He supplied Callendes with photographs of little boys.”

“So Father Callendes has certain tendencies,” said the minister. “So what? You already knew that. It was in your report. And so what if Callendes had photographs on his laptop? There’s nothing revolutionary about that.”

“Good pun,” Ramirez smiled. “I have a friend who would appreciate your sense of humour. But as Orwell said, in a time of universal deceit, even telling the truth is revolutionary. If I had
been thinking clearly, I would have realized that a child pornography ring, by definition, involves more than two people. Which brings me back to the information on that computer. With the greatest of respect, Minister, and I mean this sincerely, you’ve been juggling a lot of balls.”

Apiro would have laughed. The minister stiffened with rage.

“You fool,” spat the minister, banging his hand on the desk. “You have no idea what you’re involved in. Why do you think we sent
you
to Canada instead of Luis Perez? Because you’re not yet corrupted.” Despite the minister’s intent, Ramirez didn’t feel insulted for not having achieved the prosecutor’s high level of corruption.

“Yes, we leaked documents to Canada,” the minister continued, “but you’re the one who swore under oath that they were true. The Canadians have already threatened to issue search warrants based on the reliability of those documents. When the story of the Vatican’s cover-up hits the wire services, lawyers across North America and overseas will be signing plaintiffs up by the thousands. The damages will be huge. Our consulate is talking to Vatican authorities about the considerable investments they might make to help our economy.”

Religion and money, thought Ramirez. There would never be charges against Rey Callendes. The whole thing had been a sham. A passive sacrifice, Apiro would say. The minister had moved Ramirez to avoid giving up his own man.

“You were afraid that if Rey Callendes was charged in Canada, he might tell the RCMP about the prominent men here who engage regularly in the sexual abuse of children and photograph themselves while they’re at it. And that would shut off the economic tap. The Vatican wouldn’t dare send money to a country run by men linked to a child-sex scandal; that’s what they’re trying to escape.”

Ramirez leaned back, enjoying the cigar enormously. Despite its small size, it was one of the best he’d ever had.

Money laundering. Bank accounts in Geneva. Political intrigue. Yes, Havana was returning to the good old days of Batista. And the embargo hadn’t even been lifted. But Catholic money could flow more quickly than American investments. And, even better for the Communist Party, it lacked the taint of capitalism. It didn’t require democratic change.

“Billions of dollars are involved, Ramirez,” said the minister. “That’s money we need for reconstruction, food, fuel. With that kind of money at stake, you should understand that any one man is dispensable. And
we
have the laptop now.”

“Before you get too far with that line of thinking, you should know I figured most of this out before I left Canada. I understood the importance of that laptop. That’s why I asked the Canadians to turn it over.”

“Its contents have already been destroyed by our intelligence section.”

Ramirez shook his head. “You really place much more faith in the Cuban Intelligence Service than I do.” Duplicates, triplicates, those files were probably all over Havana if Cuban Intelligence had taken control of them. “But you forget, there were
two
laptops. The one Callendes had and the one I assigned to Sanchez. My fault, really. I gave Sanchez a secure laptop to monitor the internet.

“The encryption on it wasn’t difficult to decipher. A silly password, really. But it produced a very interesting list of names. I have someone in my office working through them now. I’m quite sure we’ve found the location of some of those pictures as well. My new detective, Espinoza, made a trip to the Viñales orphanage this week.”

The politician turned pale. He slumped lower in his chair. He
was looking older with every passing moment. Ramirez almost felt sorry for him. But all he had to do was think of the abuse in those photographs to overcome any sympathy he might have.

“What is it you want, Ramirez? Money?”

Ramirez had thought about asking for the minister’s resignation. But Apiro agreed it was better for them to have him exactly where he was.

“Actually, I do have a list of demands. I plan to charge Father Felipe Rubido with the sexual assault of minors. I want those charges to proceed without political interference. If that’s not done, trust me, the names on that list will be posted on every lamppost in Old Havana. I’m sure that many citizens will be interested in them. The tourists certainly will be. Quite a few of our visitors come from Ireland.”

Banishment, thought Ramirez. That’s what I should do to these monsters. That’s what Charlie Pike and his people would do to protect their community.

But Ramirez had nowhere on the island he could send them without the consent of the monster on the other side of the desk.

The minister nodded, almost too enthusiastically. He’s back in his element, Ramirez thought. Wheeling and dealing. Any minute now and he’ll light up his cigar and break out a bottle of old rum.

“Someone in Security Services was responsible for the death of an old woman on International Human Rights Day. Her name was Angela Aranas. That section reports directly to you. I want the names of the man or men responsible so I can lay charges, just as I would in any other case. Things, again, are to take their usual course. No interference. And I want a meeting with the acting president. Call it insurance. I learned a lot about insurance in Canada. I won’t mention our discussion to him, I give you my
word. I have my own reasons for wishing to speak to him that are unrelated to this. Do we understand each other?”

The minister sighed. “And that’s it? That’s the price of your silence? Nothing for you, Inspector?”

Ramirez smiled. “I want only what I’m entitled to. I want my wife to be happy. I want a raise.”

FIFTY - NINE

Inspector Ramirez sat in the reception area, nervously awaiting the arrival of the acting president. He tried to keep his fingers still.
Win the king and you win the game
.

“Comrade Ramirez,” Raúl Castro said. He was smaller than Ramirez remembered, as if shrinking beneath the burden of power. He bore no resemblance to his famous brother. He had a slightly Asian look, which Ramirez thought more likely accounted for his nickname. But then, Raúl and Fidel Castro had different mothers. And possibly different fathers, if the rumours that Raúl’s biological father was one of Batista’s staunchest loyalists were true.

“It is good to see you again,” said Castro. “This meeting— I was told you want to keep it confidential? Between the two of us?”

“Yes, thank you.”

The acting president nodded to his bodyguard, who left the room.

“Please, come in.” He led Ramirez into another office. It was modest compared to that of the Minister of the Interior. “Have a seat. Shall I send out for some coffee?”

Ramirez shook his head. “I know you are busy. I wanted only a few minutes of your time.”

“I assume you are here about Rey Callendes. This business with the Catholic Church,” Castro sighed. “Can you understand why there can be no charges against him? Twenty years ago, ninety percent of our foreign exchange came from sugar sold to the Soviet Union. Now it comes from tourism. To develop that industry, we need money. Long-term loans. The Church plans to invest here.”