The Most Beautiful Girl in Cuba(30)

And still, even in this horrible place, there are those whom I love: Se?oras Agramonte and Sotolongo, Miss Aguilar, the wives of generals Recio and Rodriguez. They’re all fine women imprisoned alongside me because they’re related to revolutionaries.

One day I stand in the cage, surrounded by my fellow prisoners. There are about a hundred of us here, from different backgrounds, fate dealing us all the unforgiving hand that brought us to this miserable place. Our jailer is holding court, two well-dressed men beside him. They speak of us as though we cannot hear them, as though we’ve lost our humanity in this horrid prison. Maybe we have. The more time that passes, the more I feel as though someone else has taken control of my body. When you strip away the things you love, the things that make you whole, what is left?

Sometimes, I think there’s hardly enough to sustain me. Other times, I’m fueled solely by the desire to keep my captors from seeing me fall apart.

And then, I hear the men’s conversation shift from the women surrounding me, to me.

I steel myself, turning my attention their way, making sure they know I hear every word out of that odious jailer’s mouth, his filthy suggestions that I should ingratiate myself to the guards by handing my body over to them. If I can’t have respect in this place, then at least I will evoke their shame.

But the leer on the jailer’s face isn’t matched by his two companions.

No, on their faces I see a combination of horror and pity, which in its own way might just be worse.

I duck my head, hurrying back inside the enclosed portion of the common cell. The courtyard affords fresh air of sorts despite the horrendous stench, but the prying eyes make it nearly unbearable.

With each day that passes, I slowly go mad.



* * *



—

One afternoon, the warden sends for me again.

“You have visitors,” a guard announces. “Americans.”

I cannot think of any American friends who would come to see me. Still, better to have a visitor than to spend the day closed up in this cell. Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays from noon to four in the afternoon are visiting days at the jail. On those days, the waiting room is filled with people who have come to share in our sadness and to carry news of the outside world to us.

Each visiting day I dream that my father, my sisters, Emilio will come see me, but I’m always left with disappointment instead. Even though I am surrounded by people, privacy an impossibility in a place like this, I am lonelier than I have ever been in my entire life.

I follow the guard through the prison, ignoring the noises surrounding me, the ever-present taunts. I trip down the stairs, righting myself quickly, and walk across the end of the courtyard, and through the gate into the reception room, ironically named the “Salon of Justice,” as though such a virtue exists here.

The Salon of Justice is a small, unforgiving room with a stone floor, its name painted on one of the walls, the words mocking me.

Today the room is occupied by two men who at first glance look vaguely familiar, although I can’t imagine where I would have come across them before.

They both rise as I walk in, the gentlemanly gesture surprising me. It’s been so long since someone treated me like a lady. They wait until I am seated and then follow suit.

“My name is George Bryson,” the first man says. He lowers his voice slightly. “I am a reporter for one of the American newspapers. The New York Journal.” He says this proudly, as though I would somehow be familiar with his work and that of his paper. “This is George Musgrave,” he adds, gesturing to the man beside him.

And then, I recognize them. They were here a few days ago meeting with Don Jose, the warden who runs the prison. Embarrassment floods me as I remember the way he spoke about me in front of these men, the conditions in which they saw me: in a cage like an animal, sunk in mire and desperation.

I sit up straight, trying to make my ancestors proud and doing my family justice rather than letting these men see me brought low.

“You shouldn’t be here,” George Bryson says. “We were alerted to your plight by some of your fellow countrymen, and my employers and I would very much like to right the wrong that has been done to you. We spoke with the warden, and he told us you were imprisoned because you were involved in an insurrection plot against the colonel in charge of the Isle of Pines.”

Anger fills me at the warden’s characterization of that night, the way in which the Spanish have smeared my good reputation by erasing Berriz’s villainy and making me the guilty party in his attack on me. I long to speak, to clarify Don Jose’s twisted version of events, but if prison has taught me anything, it’s that silence can be an armor of sorts, the need to guard your innermost thoughts paramount.

“Seeing you in person, well, we could hardly reconcile the elegant lady before us with the role the warden described you playing in such an affair.”

Musgrave nods in agreement with his friend’s words.

“I doubt someone as angelic and young as you could be involved in such perfidy,” Bryson adds. “We would like to hear your story.”

Their manners are impeccable, the solicitous way in which they speak to me a welcome change from the guards here. But at the same time, I have quickly learned that drawing attention to myself only hurts my case. That Berriz is the nephew of the Spanish minister of war and a close personal friend of General Weyler has certainly brought a great deal of attention to my alleged crimes, and Weyler himself has taken a keen interest in my future. After all, it wouldn’t do for my story to inspire others to rise up against the Spanish and their cruelties.