Dimka sat beside her and kissed her hesitantly.
She kissed him back with reassuring enthusiasm. He realized with mounting excitement that she did not care if he was inexpert. Soon he was eagerly fumbling with the buttons of her shirtwaist. She had wonderfully large breasts. They were encased in a formidable utilitarian brassiere, but she took that off, then offered them to be kissed.
Things moved quickly after that.
When the big moment arrived, she lay on the couch with her head on the armrest and one foot on the floor, a position she assumed so readily that Dimka thought she must have done it before.
He hastily took out his condom and fumbled it out of the packet, but she said: ‘No need for that.’
He was startled. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I can’t bear children. I’ve been told by doctors. It’s why my husband divorced me.’
He dropped the condom on the floor and lay on top of her.
‘Easy does it,’ she said, guiding him inside.
I’ve done it, Dimka thought; I’ve lost my virginity at last.
*
The speedboat was the kind once known as a rum-runner: long and narrow, extremely fast, and painfully uncomfortable to ride in. It crossed the Straits of Florida at eighty knots, hitting every wave with the impact of a car knocking down a wooden fence. The six men aboard were strapped in, the only way to be halfway safe in an open boat at such a speed. In the small cargo hold they had M3 sub-machine guns, pistols, and incendiary bombs. They were going to Cuba.
George Jakes really should not have been with them.
He stared across the moonlit water, feeling seasick. Four of the men were Cubans living in exile in Miami: George knew only their first names. They hated Communism, hated Castro, and hated everyone who did not agree with them. The sixth man was Tim Tedder.
It had started when Tedder walked into the office at the Justice Department. He was vaguely familiar, and George had placed him as a CIA man, although he was officially ‘retired’ and working as a freelance security consultant.
George had been on his own in the room. ‘Help you?’ he had said politely.
‘I’m here for the Mongoose meeting.’
George had heard of Operation Mongoose, a project that the untrustworthy Dennis Wilson was involved in, but he did not know the full details. ‘Come in,’ he had said, waving at a chair. Tedder had walked in with a cardboard folder under his arm. He was about ten years older than George, but looked as if he had got dressed in the 1940s: he wore a double-breasted suit and his wavy hair was brilliantined with a high side parting. George said: ‘Dennis will be back any second.’
‘Thanks.’
‘How’s it going? Mongoose, I mean.’
Tedder looked guarded and said: ‘I’ll report at the meeting.’
‘I won’t be there.’ George looked at his wristwatch. He was deceitfully implying that he had been invited, which he had not; but he was curious. ‘I have a meeting at the White House.’
‘Too bad.’
George recalled a fragment of information. ‘According to the original plan, you should now be in phase two, the build-up.’
Tedder’s face cleared as he inferred that George was in the loop. ‘Here’s the report,’ he said, opening the cardboard folder.
George was pretending to know more than he did. Mongoose was a project to help anti-Communist Cubans foment a counter-revolution. The plan had a timetable whose climax was the overthrow of Castro in October this year, just before the midterm Congressional elections. CIA-trained infiltration teams were supposed to undertake political organization and anti-Castro propaganda.
Tedder handed George two sheets of paper. Pretending to be less interested than he was, George said: ‘Are we keeping to our timetable?’
Tedder avoided the question. ‘It’s time to pile on the pressure,’ he said. ‘Furtively circulating leaflets that poke fun at Castro is not achieving what we want.’
‘How can we increase the pressure?’
‘It’s all in there,’ Tedder said, pointing at the paper.
George looked down. What he read was worse than he expected. The CIA was proposing to sabotage bridges, oil refineries, power plants, sugar mills and shipping.
At that moment, Dennis Wilson walked in. He had his shirt collar undone, his tie loose, and his sleeves rolled, just like Bobby, George noticed; although his receding hairline would never rival Bobby’s vigorous thatch. When Wilson saw Tedder talking to George he looked surprised, then anxious.
George said to Tedder: ‘If you blow up an oil refinery, and people are killed, then anyone here in Washington who approved the project is guilty of murder.’
Dennis Wilson spoke angrily to Tedder. ‘What have you told him?’
‘I thought he was cleared!’ said Tedder.
‘I am cleared,’ said George. ‘My security clearance is the same as Dennis’s.’ He turned to Wilson. ‘So why have you been so careful to keep this from me?’
‘Because I knew you’d make a fuss.’
‘And you were right. We’re not at war with Cuba. Killing Cubans is murder.’
‘We are at war,’ said Tedder.
‘Oh?’ said George. ‘So, if Castro sent agents here to Washington, and they bombed a factory and killed your wife, that wouldn’t be a crime?’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’
‘Apart from the fact that it’s murder, can’t you imagine the stink if this gets out? There would be an international scandal! Picture Khrushchev at the United Nations, calling on our President to stop financing international terrorism. Think of the articles in the New York Times. Bobby might have to resign. And what about the President’s re-election campaign? Has no one even thought about the politics of all this?’
‘Of course we have. That’s why it’s top secret.’
‘And how’s that working out?’ George turned a page. ‘Am I really reading this?’ he said. ‘We’re trying to assassinate Fidel Castro with poisoned cigars?’
‘You’re not on the team for this project,’ said Wilson. ‘So just forget about it, okay?’
‘Hell, no. I’m going straight to Bobby with this.’
Wilson laughed. ‘You asshole. Don’t you realize? Bobby’s in charge of it!’
George was flattened.
All the same, he had gone to Bobby, who had said calmly: ‘Go down to Miami and take a look at the operation, George. Have Tedder show you around. Come back and tell me what you think.’
So George had visited the large new CIA camp in Florida where Cuban exiles were trained for their infiltration missions. Then Tedder had said: ‘Maybe you should come on a mission. See for yourself.’
It was a dare, and Tedder had not expected George to accept it. But George felt that if he refused he would be putting himself in a weak position. Right now he had the high ground: he was against Mongoose on moral and political grounds. If he refused to go on a raid, he would be seen as timid. And perhaps there was a part of him that could not resist the challenge of proving his courage. So, foolishly, he had said: ‘Yes. Will you be coming along?’
That had surprised Tedder, and George had seen clearly that Tedder wished he could withdraw the offer. But now he, too, had been challenged. It was what Greg Peshkov would call a pissing contest. And Tedder, too, had felt unable to back down; although he had said, as an afterthought: ‘Of course, we can’t tell Bobby you came.’
So here they were. It was a pity, George reflected, that President Kennedy was so fond of the spy novels of the British writer Ian Fleming. The President seemed to think the world could be saved by James Bond in reality as well as in thrillers. Bond was ‘licensed to kill’. That was crap. No one was licensed to kill.
Their target was a small town called La Isabela. It lay along a narrow peninsula that stuck like a finger out of Cuba’s north coast. It was a port, and had no business other than trade. Their aim was to damage the harbour facilities.