Tomlinson slipped a baggy from his pocket. “Be judicious when you roll the next one,” he said. “We’re low on papers—and that’s the good news.”

They were on a winding road not much wider than the station wagon, the Rosario Mountains not yet cascading into the sea. Dark out here in the countryside: sugarcane and stars, tiny houses with goats, an occasional ox grazing in the yard. “Do you mind driving for a while?” Tomlinson asked.

For the next half hour, using a flashlight, he skimmed through more love letters, all to the same address in Plobacho, Pinar del Río, although the pet endearments varied: My Adored Gaitica, Beloved Angelica, Dear Little Ducky, My Sweet Galleguita. More often, My Beautiful Elma. Elma seemed a shorter form of Imelda, but was it? Were the letters all to the same woman?

“Did your grandmother have a sister?” Tomlinson asked. “Or a cousin—a niece, maybe—who lived in the same house?”

“She had maids and a housekeeper. Just a housekeeper the year I was sent away.” Figgy looked over from the steering wheel. “I was told never to open those. She didn’t mention you, but I . . . well, as long as I’m here to watch, I guess it’s okay.” A passing cottage caught his eye. “Have you ever owned a goat? They have eyes like snakes, but they’re very good in stew.”

“Your grandmother told you not to read these, huh? Then how did General Rivera get his greedy paws on the briefcase?”

“It was a deal we made before he bribed the warden and got me out of crazy prison. Now I’m worried she might be mad. But I told you the truth. They were never hidden in the Colon Cemetery no matter what I said to others.”

“That’s what you meant back there? Oh yeah, I asked about the letters.”

“You don’t remember that either? All the marble statues and tombs, the most beautiful cemetery in the world. After a doctor checks your brain, maybe we’ll go.”

“Geezus, please, no more with the cemetery. What about your grandmother?”

“That’s what I’m telling you. She never cared about baseball, so I doubt if she’ll understand.” The little man fretted for a moment. “I haven’t seen her in more than three years. She can’t cook either.”

Tomlinson returned to the letters, his eye sharpening as he skimmed through several. Fidel’s penmanship had more flourish than his brother’s, but his notes were shorter, seldom more than a few lines, and often cryptic. A couple of times Tomlinson asked Figgy for help with translation but soon realized that the multiplication table was not the shortstop’s only academic failing.

“I understand most words written in ink,” he explained, “as long as I know the person and can guess what they want to say. And certain books because they’re typed out. You know the thin ones with nice pictures?” He couldn’t talk without taking his hands off the wheel to gesture or indicate size and this time they almost went over a cliff into a river.

After that, Tomlinson stopped asking for help.

The letters were arranged haphazardly, no regard for dates or whether they were from Fidel or Raúl. Envelopes from 1953 to ’55 were all from federal prison on the Isle of Pines. Each first page contained illegible initials in red and sometimes a circular stamp CENSURADO. Aside from Fidel’s fantasy about his Galleguita bathing naked at a washbasin, Tomlinson was struck by the consistent formality. Each missive was respectful, mindful of decorum, but with love hidden between the lines. The same was true of letters posted after the Castros were free men.

He was impressed by the eloquence of the writing, especially Raúl, who wrote of his “embryonic love” and of his “auto-analysis” regarding Fidel’s behavior when, in 1957, they both went into hiding. These letters were not authored by ignorant thugs. They were written by articulate, well-educated men who were mindful of the social niceties due a woman, mistress or not. Two distinctive voices: Raúl rambled and strained for lyricism; Fidel snapped orders or lectured, often as a martyr or victim, and always in a superior tone.

But so far, not one single damning or controversial line, save for the one from Raúl, written from prison, that hinted at Fidel’s inept baseball skills—no, it had been softball. Certainly nothing worth killing for.

Tomlinson skipped ahead, seeking anything written during the political turmoil of the early 1960s, but correspondence had dwindled. He found several from Raúl, but only two from Fidel, who by then was revered, or feared, as the Máximo Gran, the leader of all Cuba.

An envelope leaped out. Tomlinson held his breath while he opened it to find a telegram:

MY FRIEND. DESTROY WHAT YOU HAVE SAVED AND FIND A SAFE PLACE. SAY NOTHING. THE SWAN LIES. MONTHS MUST PASS. F

It was dated 9:18 p.m. 22 November 1963. A Friday, Tomlinson remembered. The day John F. Kennedy was killed in Dallas.

The Buick’s roaring muffler vanished as he reread the lines several times. Fidel was ordering his mistress to destroy all letters. Or destroy all of something. That seemed evident. A respectful period of time had to elapse before they could resume their relationship. Made sense, as did instructing her to find a safe place, which anticipated a nuclear attack by the U.S. But what the hell did THE SWAN LIES mean?

“Brother, why are you so quiet?” Twice, Figueroa had to ask.

SWAN . . . ? The chances of Figgy knowing a Cuban acronym from 1963 were slim. Tomlinson switched off the flashlight. “These were written to your grandmother, weren’t they?”

It had been obvious for a while and it was time to put it out there.

“Maybe.” Figueroa shrugged. “Others are to women named Little Ducky and My Sweet Gingersnap and strange names like that.”

“But it was your grandmother who told you to guard the letters, wasn’t it? That’s cool, man. I’m just trying to understand. Did the general read these? He knew what was in the briefcase, that’s obvious, but did he actually read them?”

Figgy, concentrating on the road, said, “If he had, I would have had to kill him.”

Tomlinson sat back. “Say what?”

“That worries me, brother, now that we’re shipmates. My mu-maw doesn’t understand baseball and cares less about ships than she does cooking.” He glanced over. “But a promise is a promise. You know?”

•   •   •

IMELDA CASANOVA inhabited an upstairs room in a house that smelled of cobwebs and lavender, a wooden time capsule where the table was set with silver and china for two, napkins folded, as if awaiting a guest from 1959 who might yet appear.

That’s where Tomlinson waited, in the formal dining room, while Figgy stood at the stairs and called, “Guess who’s home, mi abuela? I brought a friend, but don’t worry, he’s not really a Rastafarian and doesn’t eat much.”

No answer. Figgy started up the stairs but lost his courage. “Maybe yayah is asleep,” he whispered.

“Your grandmother?”

“Yayah or mu-maw. It’s the same, but she doesn’t like those names—even from me.”

“It’s almost eleven,” Tomlinson reassured him, but was thinking, The poor guy’s scared shitless of the old woman.

Only now did he understand why.

The housekeeper, if there was one, hadn’t come to the door, so they’d entered through the root cellar into the basement. Oddly, Figgy’s room was down there, next to an old washing machine, the kind with a crank and wringers. He had lived in a cubicle with a steel door and only one window that looked out onto weeds at ground level. Except for some shelves and a homemade bong, it resembled a prison cell.

“How did you and your grandmother get along personally?” Tomlinson had inquired. The room reminded him of a Colorado drunk tank where he’d once spent a night.

“She treated me pretty good as long as I worked and brought home money” was the reply. “And, of course, did what I was told to do. But don’t make that woman mad.” The man’s expression read Wow. “Many times she locked me in here for all day. Once, almost a week.”