Read Online Tropic of Darkness by Tony Richards - Free Book Online Page A

would not have bothered with a suicide. But his curiosity was engaged. He kept remembering his brother-in-law’s comments.
    One of his lieutenants was behind him in the corridor. Carlos told the man where he was going and put him in charge.
    Dry, fiery heat washed over Carlos as he strode out through the parking lot. A load of people moaned about this kind of weather; never him. Far better than huddling indoors from the cold the way the Yanquis in New York and Washington did. He would not have changed this weather for the world.
    He went across to his car, wound the windows down, and set off for the tunnel underneath the bay.
    *   *   *
    The old coastal fortifications seemed to waver as Carlos emerged near them on the eastern shore. The rocks that they were built upon glistened brilliantly in the sun. The sea beyond them threw up so much glare that it was difficult to look at for too long.
    Distant palm trees looked ephemeral in the heat. Snatch at them and they might swirl apart.
    Off beyond the ramparts was the old DeFlores residence. And Carlos—as was many people’s custom when they passed this way—crossed himself quickly at the sight of the place. He wasn’t much of a religious man, but his upbringing still guided him in certain matters. And he didn’t think it foolish, since he did it without thinking very much at all.
    He tried to avoid looking directly at the house. The legends said that it was haunted and he did, deep down, have some belief in ghosts.
    The road carried him away from it and into the eastern part of town. In a few more minutes, he was pulling up outside the block where Doctor Alfonsine had lived. He found the building superintendent and received the spare keys to the apartment.
    It was not the mess that Carlos remembered from his own bachelor days. According to his colleagues, Alfonsine had lived alone for decades and, as was often the case with such men, the apartment was rather too tidy if anything, the furniture neatly arranged, gleaming pots and pans hanging in order of size in the kitchen.
    An ornament on top of the TV captured his attention straight away. It was a plastic model of a leaping sailfish and the legend on the base, when he stepped closer, turned out to read SOUVENIR OF MIAMI .
    People like Doctor Alfonsine were hardly ever granted permits to leave Cuba, even for a short trip. So . . . a visiting relative, perhaps?
    Other things began to point to that, before much longer. In a nearby cabinet was a brand-new Sony Walkman. And in the apartment’s spare room he found two American coins in a drawer.
    In the bedroom, there was one touch of untidiness. The bed was unmade, and its sheets heavily stained with dried sweat.
    Carlos searched the nightstand, found a bulky manila envelope. And he tipped its contents out.
    Photographs, newly developed by their smell. They were of the doctor and another, quite similar-looking fellow. A brother, or a cousin? They’d been taken mostly at nightspots. Carlos recognized El Galeon.
    He again recalled what Manuel had told him last night. The two gringos who’d committed suicide had both been taken to such places. But so what? It was merely a coincidence, surely?
    As well as the photos, there were tickets, menus, even serviettes. Visiting these places was a luxury that, by his own devices, Doctor Alfonsine could never have afforded. Hence the keepsakes. The man’s relative must have paid for each of these excursions.
    Carlos flicked through the paper scraps. There were quite a few, he noted, from the Karibe club.
    And here was another photo, of the pair at that location. Carlos’s brow furrowed as he studied it.
    Alfonsine’s relative was posed naturally enough, smiling at the camera. But the doctor himself . . .
    He was looking at the chair to his left. The empty chair to his left. Like something had just caught his attention.
    His face was deathly pale in the glare of the