Rescue

is funny. If we stayed in the Army, we would be retired by now, half-salary pension, something like that.“
    “PX privileges.“
    “Even go to army doctors, we get sick. But I am glad we did not.“
    “You ever consider it?“
    “No, not even close. Those days, it would have meant another tour in-country, minimum. But I must tell you, before I met Alicia, it was something I thought about. You see, I already had this house, ‘the life,’ you know it?“
    “That’s what prostitutes call their trade, ‘the life.’“
    “Yes, well, it is not so different for the lawyers, either. Legal whores, kind of. We charge for doing things others would find unpleasant, and we do not always enjoy our work. In fact, before I met Alicia, I was not living life so much as life was living me. And wearing me out, bad.“
    “But now?“
    “The wife, and the children. John, you look into their eyes, and you see the face of God, and that is a very good thing.“
    I had a flash of Eddie Straw, saying good-bye to me at the edge of Route 93, and I wondered what face of God he was seeing.
    “John, you okay?“
    “Yeah, just drifting a little. Sorry.“
    “Hey, it has been a long day for you, we are going to grill something special. What do you want for dinner? Steak, poultry, fish, we got it all fresh.“
    “Your choice. Whatever the house does best.“
    He picked up his phone, pushed a button, and after a buzzing noise said something into it, rapid-fire Spanish. He pushed the button again. “Kind of an intercom. Not cheap, but so convenient. She is going to bring out another round, too.“
    I hadn’t noticed, but I’d drawn my drink down to ice. “Thanks, Justo.“
    He nodded. “Ask you a question?“
    “I think you’re entitled.“
    “No. I mean, not about you going down to Mercy Key or any of that. I mean, about... the Wall.“
    “Sure.“
    “What…“ He cleared his throat. “What got to you the most?“
    “The most.“
    “Yeah.“
    I didn’t have to think about it. “The things people left there.“
    “Yeah,“ said Justo Vega, not bothering to clear his throat this time. “Yeah, me too.“

13

    So, you enjoy your breakfast with Mr. Vega?“
    “Yes. He said it was a traditional Cuban meal. Eggs, ham, some peppers and onions, friedplantains.“
    Pepe rolled his shoulders a little as he turned the car onto another residential street. “Traditional, like the way things use to be?“
    “I think so.“
    “Then that’s right.“
    Pepe’s tone made me look over at him. “How do you mean?“
    A shrug. “Mr. Vega, he come here before the Revolution, he was just a kid. He remember things the way he see them, growing up. Not like that no more.“
    “In what way?“
    “Aw, man, the government in the United States , it do no let the companies make the trade with Cuba . So, the government in Cuba , it make the trade with the Soviets, you know it? But the Soviets, they go down, Cuba go down with them.’
    “The economy, you mean?“
    “Everything, I mean.“ Pepe glanced at me and grew quieter. “The people, they do no got pork, then no chicken. People losing the weight—eight, ten kilos—that’s like twenty pounds, man. No gasoline, everybody riding bicycles down there now, no cars to worry about. They even got los bueyes — don’t know the English for it.“
    “Sorry, I don’t speak Spanish.“
    “Big cows, kind of, with horns but real heavy, pull things on the farms?“
    “Oxen, maybe?“
    “Yeah. Yeah, ‘oxen’. I hear Mr. Vega use that word, talking with somebody. No gasoline for the machines on the farm, the cities do no even got electricity half the time now. You got to wait on lines in the morning for bread, and rice, and sugar. They got great beaches, new hotels, and stores for the turistas, but everybody else, they got to—how you say it, ‘resolviendo’?“
    “Resolve things?“
    “When you like make the trade, stuff for stuff but no money.“
    Pepe got dark, even quieter. “When I am growing up in Habana, I hear the stories. How the Batistas, they make deals with the American gangsters, the Mafia, let the gangs come down, open the hotels, turn the Cuban men into slaves, the little girls into whores? Well, let me tell you, that happen again. The hotels and the stores, the diplo-tiendas, these are there for the rich turistas from Europe, but not the people. No, man, the people, they try to go in the stores, the policeman at the door say no. The little girls, they are on the