Tyler waited.

"Is to say, Who knows?"

NINE

Virgilheard the new one put in here during the night, heard him bumping into hammocks and heard words in Spanish among the chorus of snores-louder snores than you heard in the crew's quarters aboard the Maine, these men here being much older than fleet marines-but Virgil made no effort to have a look at the new one. What for? Virgil was new himself, put in here the night before and spent the next day discussing the possibility of America declaring war on Spain with his sixteen cellmates; most of them skinny old guys losing their teeth who'd been locked up here the past two years, some of them locked up other places before coming here, stuck in cells the whole time, not let outside even once. They were excited to have Virgil, a United States marine; he was like a messenger from heaven, as good as the Angel Gabriel come to tell them Uncle Sam was on their side now, so there was nothing to worry about. They made coffee for Virgil and served him some pretty tasty black beans and rice; and they let him hang his hammock down by the outside grating that looked out on the prison yard. The cell, with its oval ceiling, was about fifteen feet wide by forty feet deep, the grating at one end being the door to the corridor, the grating at the other end serving as a barred window. Hammocks hung from hooks in the wall and extended to posts that ran down the center of the room. The floor was flagstone and a few of the geezers preferred it to trying to climb into a goddamn hammock every night. They'd bed down on the floor with straw mats and blankets.

It was Lieutenant Molina who saw to Virgil's need for something to wear, having arrived drugged from the hospital in his drawers. Molina gave him one of his own cotton shirts and blue uniform trousers with yellow stripes down the sides. They fit snug-dons as a rule being smaller than Americans-and were shiny in the seat, but fine with Virgil. This was after the lieutenant told Virgil about his Washington duty and that he'd visited various points of interest along the Eastern seaboard. It turned out both Virgil and Lieutenant Molina had attended the dedication of Grant's Tomb. Imagine that. Virgil didn't mind not having shoes, the flagstone in here cool on his feet. He asked the lieutenant just what he was in jail for. Molina said he didn't know but would try to find out.

As soor as Virgil woke up he saw the new man by the grating that looked out at the yard. Virgil thought at first glance he was U.S. Army, the dark coat and tan-colored pants, except there was no insignia on the coat. Right then the new man turned around and walked away and Virgil noticed the light blue neckerchief and heard that ching… ching and looked down to see the man was wearing high-heeled boots and spurs with big wheels that made that chinging sound. It looked like the new man was pacing. When he came back this way Virgil said from the hammock:

"Mister, are you a cowpuncher by any chance?"

"Yes, I am," Tyler said, locating Virgil in the hammock. "Ben Tyler, from around Sweetmary, Arizona."

Now Virgil rolled out of the hammock and hit the floor in a pair of drawers, to Tyler a young guy with a full head of hair on top but none around the ears, a haircut that would last him a good while.

"I could tell," Virgil said. "You have that look of a cowpuncher."

"I had a panama hat might've thrown you off," Tyler said, "but a guard swiped it right off my head, grabbed it as he shoved me in here."

"Well, least you have your own clothes."

"I just bought 'em yesterday; they're brand-new." "What'd you do to be in here?"

"I thought it was for shooting a don, but now I don't think so. And you're " Tyler said. "I'm gonna say you're in the military from your haircut, but I can't tell which one from your drawers."

Virgil stuck out his hand. "Virgil Webster, one time from Okmulgee, Indian Territory. Most recently Private Webster, a seagoing marine off what used to be the USS Maine. God help the boys still aboard her."

"Jesus," Tyler said, shaking Virgil's hand, "you survived that terrible explosion."

"Barely," Virgil said.

Tyler squinted, studying him. "Well, what's a hero of the Maine doing in this flophouse?"

"I find out I'll let you know," Virgil said. "How about yourself? An honest-to-God cowpuncher, what I always thought I'd grow u. p to be when I was little."

"I know what you mean," Tyler said.

This was how they began talking that first day.

On the fifth day, February twenty-third, two guards brought Tyler along the corridor to the lieutenant's office, a large room with bare walls, a swept stone floor and a feeling of having been left abandoned until a desk and file cabinets were moved in. Molina looked up. He said in Spanish to the man sitting across the desk from him, "I'll leave you. Take as much time as you like."

The lieutenant got up and came this way, giving Tyler's shoulder a pat as he walked past him. He paused in the doorway and said something to the two guards. They turned and followed him out.

The man at the desk, one of those little Cuban guys with a big mustache, gestured for Tyler to come over, saying in English with the usual accent, "I like to ask you some questions."

There was something familiar about him. Tyler approached the desk and stood there, a few feet from it. "Please, sit down."

The only chair was the one Molina had left, behind the desk, a wooden swivel chair with a leather pad on the seat. "Here?"

"Yes, why not. It's all right." The man, in a rigid-looking straight chair, waited until Tyler was seated. "My name is Rudi Calvo. I'm an investigator with the municipal police for the city of Havana." Tyler remembered him now.

"You were at the Inglaterra the other night."

"Yes, I was present." He smiled then. "You notice me, uh?"

"I did, and you saw why I shot him. You were a witness, you and a barful of correspondents. It must've been in their newspapers."

"The ones I saw," Rudi said, "they say it was self-defense. So they want to know why you're here if it's not for the shooting. Also why do they arrest your partner. The Guardia Civil say you're held on suspicion of being spies while they look for the boat, the Vdmanos, you came here with the horses." "What do they want with the boat?"

"It's Lionel Tavalera. He believe you brought guns for the insurrectos. They waited at Matanzas, but the boat never came there."

"What if they don't find it?"

Rudi shrugged. "Yes? What if they don't?"

"I could be here the rest of my life?"

"Well, it isn't something new, is it? You were in prison one time before."

"How do you know that, from the newspapers?" "Someone told me."

"You talk to Charlie Burke?"

"Not yet."

Tyler stared at Rudi Calvo. When the police investigator looked away, Tyler said, "You know they're holding a U.S. marine here?" He watched Rudi Calvo's gaze return, eyes full of interest. "Private Virgil Webster, off the Maine. You don't know about him?"

Rudi shook his head.

"Blown into the water. Picked up and taken to a hospital. The night before last the Guards dragged him out of bed and brought him here. They think he saw something the night the ship blew up."

"Did he?"

"Not that he knows of."

Tyler watched the municipal police investigator taking time to think about this, staring at one of the bare stone walls.

"You're police, the Guardia are policewthey don't tell you what they're doing?"

Rudi took his time. "They have their own way of doing things."

"You knew I was in prison. Did you know I was here before, in Cuba? That my father ran a mill?"

"I heard that, yes."

"Do the Guardia know I was in prison back home?"

Rudi again took his time. "I don't think so."