Right to Die

leaving a message for Nancy that I’d still see her that night, just after eight o’clock. I figured by that time, either I’d have persuaded Maisy Andrus not to go with Hebert to the Caribbean or they’d be on their way.
    I sat around the reception area, eavesdropping on Deb and the girl who came to relieve her at five. They gossiped about one of the vets, but I had the feeling that they were more interested in his “totally” blue eyes than in his “radical” rabies research. When Inés Roja came out, I insisted on driving her to the Andrus house with me. At first she declined, saying that the professor would realize that she had told me about the trip. I replied that I’d tell the boss I’d forced it out of her. That brought a feeble smile and a nod.
    Outside, the wind was shrieking. I opened the passenger door of the Prelude for Roja, and she scooted in, flipping her coat away from the door that closed a little too quickly from the gale.
    Once I got behind the wheel, Inés said, “This is a very nice car.”
    “It’s old, but well maintained.”
    “Like...”
    “Like what?”
    Roja shook her head as I started the car. “Nothing.” She gathered the coat around her neck.
    “We’ll have heat as soon as the engine warms up a bit.”
    “I am all right.”
    To make conversation, I said, “It ever get this cold in Cuba ?”
    She started to look at me, then turned away. “No. But there are worse things than cold, John.”
    We drove in silence for half a mile through Broadway traffic, crossing the overpass for the train yards that anticipate South Station.
    Roja finally said, “I am sorry.”
    “Nothing to be sorry about.”
    “In Cuba , my father did not support Castro. He was in prison. When your President Carter dared Castro to free those who would come to the United States , my father was one. He was too weak from the prison, but they said if we did not go then, perhaps there would be no time to go later, no boat to carry us. So we left Cuba , and my father got sick. He could not breathe.... It was only ninety miles to Florida , but the other men would not keep his body on the boat with us. They simply threw him off, like he was... not a human being. Into the sea. Then my mother could not... Many of the men on the boat were prisoners too, but not political. Criminals, degenerados, do you understand?”
    “I think so. You don’t have to—”
    “My mother tried. She screamed and she tried, but she could not... keep them from me.”
    More silence. No tears, just nothing.
    “In the United States everyone tried to help us. My mother had relatives in New York , so we went there. We were poor but we were free. And the professor, she has been everything to me since I began to work for her.”
    I’d been keeping my right hand on the stick shift in the stop-and-go traffic. Roja placed her left over mine. Cool and dry, a hand that was washed a lot but never grew warm.
    I looked at her.
    She said, “Please keep the professor safe.”
    Roja withdrew her hand and buried it in the side pocket of her coat.

    “If I didn’t like you so much, John, I’d swear you were suggesting I can’t protect my own wife.”
    Tucker Hebert was smiling at me, but just barely. He wore a long-sleeved Georgia Bulldog jersey and sweat pants, no socks, and had just turned away from the closet.
    Maisy Andrus pushed the open duffel bag toward the pillows and sat heavily on the bed. “John, let’s resolve this. First, just what is your objection to my accompanying Tuck on this trip?”
    I leaned back against a highboy and crossed my arms. “I don’t like the idea of you traveling outside the country, even with Tuck as protection.”
    “But why?”
    “Whoever our note writer is, he might know that things are a lot looser in other countries.”
    Hebert said, “Sint Maarten is a pretty damned sophisticated island, my friend.”
    “Where an accident happening to a tourist might not be the most desirable subject for publicity or embarrassing investigation.”
    Andrus said, “Do you really believe that whoever is sending these notes would follow me to a Caribbean island rather than wait for my return?”
    “It’s possible. If he knows much about police work outside the States, he might know his chances of getting away with it are a little better down there.”
    Hebert said, “What if he doesn’t care about getting away
    with it?”
    Andrus and I both looked at him.
    Hebert reddened a little under the perpetual tan.