Ernesto Read online

  Hemingway appeared to believe sincerely that the Cuban Revolution would represent positive changes for most Cuban citizens and for the nation’s future. Papa was invited several times to meet Batista, and he always turned him down. He seemed to take particular delight not only in the dictator’s passage, but also the irony of his casino customers running with fear from an island at last in revolt. As far as his interests were concerned, the author, trying not to worry, took consolation in a phone call from Jaime Bofill, a Loyalist friend from civil-war Spain, who had been appointed to the provisional government and who said he would ensure personally that the Finca was protected.20

  In January, 30,000 “jeering spectators” crowded into the Havana Sports Arena to see the first of the Cuban “purge trials.” Among 600 Batista henchmen accused of horrendous war crimes were Major Jesús Sosa Blanco, Major Pedro Morejón, and Lieutenant Colonel Ricardo Luis Grau. Thirty witnesses attested to the fact that former Holguín army detachment commander Major Jesús Sosa Blanco had murdered 108 people. Among his crimes were his execution of 11 nickel mine workers and the cremation of a man by leaving him tied up in a burning house.

  “I’m not here to justify myself or to ask for clemency,” said Sosa, who also stated he had no respect for anyone in the crowd. “I do not know whether I am on trial in the Roman Coliseum or whether I am standing before our Lord Jesus Christ. I have nothing to say except that I only carried out orders. I am a man of honor.” Hearing that remark, the crowd broke “into even wilder hoots” and the tribunal president Humberto Sorí Marín threatened to have everyone thrown out of “the Coliseum.” A bearded judge of the rebel court then informed Sosa and his attorney that he had every right to defend himself, but that describing the court as a Coliseum did seem to amount to an adequate defense. Unremorsefully, he responded, “I would do it again under the same circumstances.” Just then, a woman who said she had eleven children came forward and accused Sosa of killing her husband, saying, “What of my children?” When Sosa responded that the rebels would raise them, the woman went berserk, started attacking the accused, and had to be carried away. Sentencing the men to death, the rebel courts subsequently announced that the trials would continue behind closed doors.

  Though he once hated it, said Herrera Sotolongo, Ernest started watching television, listening to the radio, and reading the daily newspapers, particularly when Fidel was involved or speaking. At one of those rallies, Fidel addressed the controversial executions: “The hired killers must be shot, for even the Bible says, ‘he who lives by the sword shall die by the sword.’”21 If, said Fidel, Americans who felt more tolerance for the mass slaughter of innocents at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, felt discomfort when seeing Cuba’s executions, it was because they had never experienced Batista’s repression and torture firsthand. Was it any wonder that the “student of revolutions” Ernest Hemingway, who had supported extreme measures in Spain, was glued to the television during these events?

  The following day, Fidel flew to Venezuela where a coup d’état had just ousted General Marcos Pérez Jiménez to spread his revolution before a crowd of 300,000 fans and to ask for their “sister nation’s” support.22 The visit would inaugurate a lasting and obstinate connection between the two countries. Upon returning from Venezuela, Fidel would discover that President Urrutia had outlawed casinos and brothels. In an uproar, Fidel questioned the decision made in his absence, which drastically reduced revenues for a country sorely in need.

  On February 13, José Miró resigned from the post of prime minister “to avoid a duality of government” and suggested Fidel Castro was the most appropriate choice for the position. Embracing Miró, Castro accepted it, about the swellest valentine that any rebel could receive, and after advising President Urrutia, the deal was as good as a done.23 In March, Cuba nationalized the International Telephone and Telegraph, which had infamously given Batista a golden telephone, so that they could raise rates and continue to extract excessive profit from Cuban callers.24 In the Havana Hilton, when a BBC journalist asked Fidel how long it would be until Cuba held elections, he responded that his country would be ready in eighteen months to two years.

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  Still lying low in Idaho, Ernest had negotiated a contract with Life magazine to cover the bullfights that summer in Spain. Spending the summer in Málaga, perhaps he could get down to see Patrick too. By the end of February, he was on chapter 45 of The Garden of Eden, did not have an ending, and was nearly finished revising A Moveable Feast. According to Emmet Watson, a small-time reporter from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, he was on a pleasure trip with a friend to Sun Valley Lodge, in the right place at the right time, when he chanced upon white-bearded Hemingway sipping Haig & Haig with a twist of lime on a Saturday evening just before dinner and “exchanging banter” with locals and visiting skiers.

  Invited to Watson’s table, Ernest came over and entered amicably into a conversation, talking with him for a half hour or so. When Emmett offered to buy him another drink, the writer apologized for not being able to stay longer, “I’m supposed to be home soon or I’ll get in trouble,” but he stayed anyway, talking freely, regaling jokes and stories, and laughing often as they talked, and after a half hour of conversation about boxing and writing and so on, got up to leave, then said, “Oh well, just once more. I can loaf a while longer.” When they had lost track of time, a man came over and whispered in Ernest’s ear, and tossing back his drink, the author said, “Mary just called. Looks like I’m in trouble. After all, I’m supposed to be working up here. I just went out for a walk and now I’m in trouble.”25

  Two days later, the high sun of early afternoon was turning the snow into slush along the sidewalk of the ski village. Emmett Watson and company were leaving the Challenger Inn to give the slopes a go when they ran into a tall, white-bearded man with steel-rimmed spectacles, carrying a stack of papers wrapped in a brown sack, who invited them for another drink at a place called The Ram. There Hemingway spoke freely with Watson whom he knew to be a reporter, “Look I’m all through working. And I don’t mind talking. Anything you want to talk about is fine.” So, Watson asked him about Cuba, and the conversation took a more serious turn.

  He seemed, said Watson, to have some things that he wanted to get off his chest about Castro’s uprising against Batista:

  I believe in the cause of the Cuban people. They have had changes in government before in Cuba. But these were just changes of the guard. When the new ones got in, they went right on stealing from the people. Some of Batista’s officials and police were good honest men, but a lot of them were thieves, sadists and torturers. They tortured kids, sometimes so badly they would have to kill them.

  This, however, “is the first revolution in Cuba that really is a revolution,” he noted. Cataloguing the unprintable horrors of torture and mutilated bodies discovered, he described the graft and corruption, a high official who had stolen $6 million in the last six years, and how teachers could not find jobs unless they paid bribes to these officials. Said the Nobel Prize winner speaking intently about a country he loved, “Cuban kids have a right to an education,” He described the case of a father who sent his girls to a school to become teachers, but who could not get a job because they did not have $2,000 to pay the graft money to be given the position.

  The labor laws under Batista were good, Hemingway believed, “but the unions were closed to a lot of workers. Others couldn’t get in. They were closed and a lot of people couldn’t work. They were actually going hungry.” He described the plantations that denied its workers the right to plant gardens on the land they lived on during the off season, who were forced to buy food in company stores. “American companies have some 800 million dollars invested in Cuba. Some of them behaved well. United Fruit and the Hershey Sugar Co. were good. Others were not so good, and others were drawn into the pattern before they realized what was going on. They came to Cuba and thought this was the accepted way of doing things.”

  Cit
ing a story from the daily news about a man who had been executed a few days prior, Hemingway said, “I know him. If they shot him a hundred times it wouldn’t be enough punishment for the terrible things he has done.” Concerning the tribunals of secret police, he said,

  The government has to carry out its promises. There was a lot of criticism over the shooting of Batista officials. So the Castro government began conducting public trials and executions. People abroad began to yell, ‘Circus!’ But the government had to do this to show it was in control, to give people a respect for law and order. The Castro movement promised the Cuban people that Batista’s men would be punished. The new government has to carry out its promises. The trials are necessary.”

  Having finished his work for the day, Hemingway sipped his Scotch slowly. Across the table, his ruddy face conveyed warmth, and he seemed very happy. He spoke about returning soon to Cuba to live. “Cuba has been good to Americans. It’s a wonderful place to live. I lived there and worked there. The Old Man and the Sea was about a Cuban fisherman, and it was written in Cuba.” Then lowering his voice shyly, “It was kind of a good book.” He reiterated, “I have great hope for the Castro revolution, because it has the support of the Cuban people. I believe in their cause. I only wonder if Castro has the strength to carry it out.”

  Toward the end of their interview, Watson noticed that his writing hand was marked by several deep scratches, and Hemingway, chuckling, explained,

  My pet owl. I’ve been training him. He didn’t mean to scratch me. He was just trying to stay on my hand. I was going to train him as a decoy for crows…But I got too fond of him. I like the way he sits on my hand. [Then holding out his hand to show him…] He sits there and stares right back at you. I like owls. They look you right in the eye. They don’t take any guff from anybody. I guess I’ll turn him loose when the weather warms. [Then with his face brightening] He had a better winter than any owl around here.

  When Watson tried to show him the article the following day to ensure there were no errors in it, Papa joked that it “would probably get him killed,” but said he did not need to see it: “I think you probably got it right.”26

  Watson’s story was picked up by the major papers and rebranded as “Trials in Cuba Defended by Hemingway.” When the press asked Castro how long the trials would continue, he responded until all war criminals were brought to justice. In response to the journalists’ objections, Fidel said, “We are not executing innocent people or political opponents. We are executing murderers and they deserve it.”27 When Fidel appeared later on the popular American television show, This Is Your Life, he was again pressed about the tribunals that were executing his former enemies: “Let me tell you what Ernest Hemingway, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, defender of the rights of humanity, thinks about that: the executions in Cuba are a necessary phenomena. The military criminals executed by the revolutionary government received what they deserved.”28 How had the bearded Cuban rebel, formerly imprisoned, become a star of prime-time entertainment for American audiences?

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  In the middle of March with A. E. Hotchner joining them, Ernest and Mary left Ketchum for Havana. Stopping in a Phoenix hotel, they watched the second half of Hotch’s adaptation of For Whom the Bell Tolls air on CBS, and, passing through Tucson, they visited Ernest’s enchanting, childlike friend, the painter, Waldo Peirce at his home. They headed east and dropped Hotch in New Orleans, continued to Fort Myers, and on to Key West, where they flew the next afternoon to Havana and received a warm welcome from their Cuban family.

  Behind the immigration counter at Boyeros Airport on March 29, they first found Juan and Roberto Herrera’s welcoming faces waiting for them. Pausing at the Floridita, they were reunited with friends, and arriving home, they hugged René, Lola, and Ana on the front steps beneath the ceiba tree. “People were sweet and cheerful, the pool deliciously clean and cool, the house fresh and airy, beasts healthy, vines, shrubs, flowers, and trees flourishing,” wrote Mrs. Hemingway in a state of bliss.29 Pulling fish caught in the cayos out of the deep freeze, they lunched with Mayito Menocal, Elicio Arguelles, and other Cuban friends. Though most appeared hopeful about Castro’s revolution, said Mary, the economy showed signs of slumping. In the airport, Ernest clutched Dr. José Luis Herrera Sotolongo close to tell him he wanted to arrange a meeting as soon as possible with Fidel and help him in any way he could.30 At the end of March, after 483 executions, the trials were suspended for Easter.

  On March 26, the police arrested and charged five men for a conspiracy to kill President Fidel Castro: Roberto Corral Miramón, Roberto López Paz, Roberto Pérez Merens, José Sosa Mojena, and Andrés Arango Chacón.31 Lethal pro-Batista exiles, Rolando Masferrer and Ernesto de la Fe were implicated in the plot. The press and the pubic became increasingly apprehensive about the new government as it continued to purge henchmen from the previous regime.

  The radicalization of Castro’s regime was mirrored by radicalism of its northern neighbors whose interests allied themselves with those of Cuban refugees. Investigating the abuses of the CIA, NSA, FBI, and IRS a decade and a half later, the Church Committee excluded assassination as a tool for foreign policy—specifying that it was “incompatible with American principle, international order, and morality,” yet according to CIA Director Richard Helms, the executive branch had long pressed the CIA to “get rid of Castro.”32 “If surviving assassination attempts were an Olympic event,” said Fidel later, “I would win the gold medal.”33 Former head of Cuban intelligence and the Cuban Department of State, author Fábian Escalante counted 638 attempts on Castro’s life (from Kennedy’s to Clinton’s, when Escalante wrote his book in 1996): thirty-eight occurring during the Eisenhower administration and forty-two during the Kennedy years.34

  Seeking to improve his image, Fidel accepted an invitation in April to hand deliver the truth to the American people.35 Hearing this announcement, Hemingway asked Dr. José Luis Herrera Sotolongo to request a meeting with El Comandante in advance of his trip so that he could prepare him to deal with the American press. As the head of the Cuban delegation, Castro would be going to the United Nations in New York, and Hemingway wanted the new leader to be briefed on American politicians and the idiosyncrasies of his people, so Castro assigned Vázquez Candela, assistant editor of the newspaper Revolución, to go to Hemingway’s house. Late at night at Finca Vigía, Ernest opened the door with a pistol in his pocket.

  While Vazquez was sure the trip would be a waste of time, after two hours of drinking white wine and conversing with the American novelist while Bach and Ravel played softly on the record player, he changed his mind. The Cuban journalist was impressed that Hemingway was so concerned about Fidel’s well-being before the vultures of the Miami Herald and Time. He had to emphasize the current stability in Cuba, not respond to hecklers, not lose his temper, promise to oppose Communism, give clear answers, and keep his cool. When Vazquez left the Finca, Ernest told him to tell his comrades that he supported them and their cause.36 On April 14, Hemingway heard a few minutes too late that Fidel and Camilo were playing baseball for their “Barbudo” baseball team.37 To go down to the El Cerro Stadium, he ordered the car brought ‘round so that he could meet them personally and exchange ideas but he missed them, and Fidel began his American tour the next day.

  From April 15 to 26, Fidel Castro travelled as a guest of the American Society of Newspaper Editors and as a keen emissary of goodwill to the United States. Hiring a public relations firm, Fidel attempted to conquer public opinion in America during an eventful eleven-day tour. The Cuban rebel laid a wreath on George Washington’s grave, delivered a speech in Central Park to thirty-five thousand fans, stared starry-eyed at Yankee Stadium, spoke with students at Harvard, pet a Bengali tiger at the Bronx Zoo, as well as fed the elephants, and met the classmates of his eight-year-old son who had been quietly attending Public School no. 20 in Queens while his father was overthrowing the government back home.38 At his son’s
school, the children were given real rebel army caps and pretend beards, and while they touched Fidel’s real beard, a Spanish-speaking New York City cop named Seymour Schimler had stepped in to play the role of his interpreter.

  Young, tall, and intelligent, Castro made an impression that did not disappoint his American hosts. He still wore the combat boots and fatigues that would become his trademark. When he spoke in broken English with effusive emotion and astonishing eloquence, a smile often escaped from beneath his bushy beard. With a hopeful heart perhaps, he waved to crowds, and sat down for lengthy interviews in which he submitted himself to American scrutiny and answered rough questions. He carried babies and signed autographs for awestruck beauty queens, while the flashbulbs of photographers crackled around him like popcorn, or fire.

  Of course, not everybody was as charmed by Fidel. The painter who Hemingway had convinced to leave Cuba to advance his career in the States, Antonio Gattorno, had become an accomplished and influential Cuban-American émigré, so he maneuvered a meeting with the visiting Cuban leader. Thirty-three-year-old Castro offended fifty-five-year-old Gattorno when he arrived late and advised, “You should return home to Cuba where you belong. I can help you to become a famous painter there.” Gattorno responded that he was “already famous” and would return to his island “When you [Fidel] are no longer there.”

  On Face the Nation, Castro was asked if political parties would be allowed to run candidates in the elections, and he responded movingly in broken English, “Yes, of course! If we don’t give free[dom] to all parties to organize, then we are not a democratic country.”39 Why was it necessary to wait eighteen months before free elections could be held? Castro responded that what his people wanted now was peace rather than more conflict. Would the Communist Party be allowed to participate in these elections? Castro answered, “What I think about that…all the rights before tyranny will return, free speech…are you afraid of an idea? Do you believe that a democratic man ought to be afraid of any idea? I am a man of faith.”40