"A whole country," Carmine said.

"It was fucking paradise, Havana, then. The casino was gold-leaf walls. I mean beautiful. We had beautiful chandeliers, women in diamonds and mink stoles. The dealers wore tuxedos. We had greeters at the door in tuxedos. Twenty-five thousand for a casino license, which is the steal of all time, plus twenty percent of the profits. Batista gets his envelope, everybody's happy. We let the Cubans turn the wheel. We did the blackjack and craps. What's it called, brocade, the fucking drapes. I like to see a room where the dealers wear a tux. Plus there's action all over town. Your cockfights, your jai alai. At the track you play roulette between races. I mean tell me where it went."

"Kennedy should have blown it up when he had the chance," Ferrie said.

"You blow up Cuba, you get the Russians."

"I've got my rubber bedsheets all ready. An eternity of canned food. I like the idea of living in shelters. You go in the woods and dig your personal latrine. The sewer system is a form of welfare state. It's a government funnel to the sea. I like to think of people being independent, digging latrines in the woods, in a million backyards. Each person is responsible for his own shit."

Carmine rocked on the sofa. The ice cubes rattled. Ferrie knew he could make Carmine laugh just about any time he wanted. He always knew the moment, always sensed the approach to take. This was because he shared the man's perceptions.

"One thing, I have to say it," Tony said. "I don't bear no feeling against the President one way or the other. It's this rat fink Bobby that's pushing too hard. I say all right. They have their job, we have ours. But he's making it like some personal program. He crosses the line."

"They both cross the line," Carmine said. "The President crossed the line when he put out the word he wanted Castro dead. Let me tell you something."

"What?"

"I want to tell you a little thing you should always remember. If somebody's giving you trouble, again, again, again, again, somebody with ambitions, somebody with a greed for territory, the first thing you consider is go right to the top."

"In other words you take action at the highest level."

"That's where they're letting it get out of hand."

"In other words you bypass."

"You clean out the number one position."

"In other words you arrange it so there's a new man at the top who gets the message and makes a change in the policy."

"You cut off the head, the tail doesn't wag."

David Ferrie loved a proverb. He loved the feeling of being swept into another man's aura. A power aura like Carmine's was a special state of awakening. The man was like a fairy-tale pope, able to look at you and change your life, say a word and change your life. Ferrie had devised a theology based on militant anticommu-nism. He was a sometime master of hypnotism. He studied languages, studied political theory, knew diseases intimately, had official records of his skill as a pilot. All this paled in the presence of a man like Carmine Latta.

Carmine had a battle column of lawyers with millions ready to spend against repeated government attacks. He had men working on conspiracy to defraud, obstruction of justice, perjury, a thousand pain-in-the-ass details. Carmine had Ferrie doing research on tax liens. He had state officials and bank presidents making personal pleas on his behalf. Carmine and the boys were the state's biggest industry. Carmine had finance companies, gas stations, truck dealerships, taxi fleets, bars, restaurants, housing subdivisions. Carmine had a man who washed his pocket money in Ivory liquid to keep it germ-free.

Now Ferrie followed Tony Astorina down a hall flanked by simple bedrooms. On the floor of the last room stood a tall canvas bag laced at the top. Ferrie could see the square bulges the stacks of money made. A gift from Carmine to the cause. Guy Banister saw to it that exile leaders knew who was providing cash for arms and ammunition. It was Latta's bid for gambling concessions after Castro fell.

Back in the living room Ferrie said, "I'll take it straight to Camp Street, Carmine. They'll be very happy, very grateful. All through the movement."

"We all look forward to the day," Carmine said softly. "We only want what's ours."

Ferrie believed there was a genius in the man. Carmine was born in the mid 1880s to an Italian father and Persian mother, at sea, under the sign of Taurus. This was a powerful blend of elements. Ferrie admired Taureans. They were generous people, steadfast and tolerant, with a gift for empire.

He carried the duffel bag to the car. He waved to the boys and drove out to the main road. Astrology is the language of the night sky, of starry aspect and position, the truth at the edge of human affairs.

Raymo furled the blue bandanna and tied it around the neck of his German shepherd. Stinking hot today. He had a room in a little stucco house bristling with TV antennas. It was not far from the stone house on Northwest Seventh Street where Castro had lived when he was in Miami, raising money, finding men for the revolution. Raymo stroked the animal's head, muttered into the silky ear. Then he put on the leash and followed the dog down the stairs.

He went south toward Calle Ocho, the main drag of Little Havana. Dogs ran up to fences to yap at Capitan. A lot of killer dogs, a lot of cars with hood ornaments that were the only things worth saving. Old cars sinking into the tar. Dogs skidding sideways along the fences barking in the brilliant heat. Capitan plodded on, old and remote.

Raymo turned left on Calle Ocho. He walked past the jewelry shops, every bakery window with a pink-and-white wedding cake. A hundred men were crowded into a little corner park, playing dominoes and cards. Still plenty of time. He bought some fruit, stopped to talk to someone every half-block. It was busy on the street. Men stood in clusters, women moved from shop to shop. How the hell could you know, in an all-Cuban place, who were the spies for Fidel?

Up on Flagler Street, Wayne Elko slouched past the stumpy palms. He wore jump boots stained white by salt water and thought about stopping for a cerveza Schlitz. Not smart, Wayne. He'd been wandering Florida for nearly two weeks trying to find T-Jay. Spent three days as roustabout and barker with the Jerry Lepke Ten-in-One Carnival. They had a sword box, a ladder of swords, a fire-eater, a two-headed baby show and a snake girl with braces on her teeth. Called a dozen people he knew from the movement. Finally in Miami he received a message at Elliot Bernstein Chevrolet, where the assistant sales manager was an anti-Castro guerrilla who let him sleep in a used Impala.

Be on time, Wayne. He walked down to Calle Ocho and saw the man he was looking for, Ramon Benftez, standing at the designated corner with a doddering beast. He knew Raymo slightly from the days long gone when exiles used to practice close-order drill on front lawns, watched by sleepy children.

They shook hands, etc.

Wayne said to himself, Some tough hombre. Raymo led him a block and a half south. The Cuban facade faded into a version of suburban America. Sunny little stucco homes with postcard lawns. They went into a one-story house. The radio played in a back room. They came out a side entrance and sat at a wooden table in a small concrete enclosure with a statue of St. Barbara standing in the middle.

"This is Frank's house," Raymo said.

Hairy arms. One of those thick-bodied types you can't reach with the usual persuasion. There are only two or three things in the world he ever thinks about and he's made up his mind about each one. Wayne didn't know who Frank was.

"So there's still activity," he said. "There's this friend of mine who works in a Chevy dealership. He makes napalm in his basement with gasoline and baby soap. I sleep in a car in the lot. I'm the unofficial watchman."