Free The Poisoned Pawn by Peggy Blair

his unfaithful wife’s death. Tax-free . It made Jones wonder just how charitable he really was.

FIFTEEN
    A stray dog lay curled on the sidewalk, panting in the heat. Inspector Ramirez and Juan Latapier stepped around it; so did the cigar lady.
    She accompanied the two detectives until they reached the piled stones and twisted metal that formed the pillars at the entrance to Blind Alley, then halted like a stubborn mule. It made Ramirez feel uneasy that even a ghost didn’t want to pass through Blind Alley’s gates.
    She waved goodbye as they stepped into another world.
    The buildings that ran the length of the alley were covered with African murals painted from leftover paint supplies. Frenzied designs, as if the hands of the artist were possessed. A full-size Chango doll balanced on a beam. At least, Ramirez hoped it was a doll.
    African death masks glared at them, trapped in the gaps left by missing bricks in crumbling walls. Huge coloured obelisks towered beside palm trees. Colourful shrines were littered with gifts to the different orishas : Obatala, the god of peace; Babalu Aye, the god of illnesses; Chango; Oya; Yemayá; Oggun.
    Chango was the god of machetes, hammers, and shovels.Oshun, the goddess of lust and love, was the promiscuous younger sister of Yemayá, mother of fishes. Oggun was responsible for swords, guns, and crucifixes.
    Blind Alley was once called Smuggler’s Alley in honour of its founder, a man who, like Oggun, had brought weapons into Cuba. But it had been transformed by the orishas and their human conduits into a centre for Afro-Cuban drumming and dancing, trances and possession.
    The alley held the sacred drums that summoned the gods. To the believers of Santería, it was a portal, a gateway to the other side.
    The babalaos claimed that the police were kept away by sacrifices they made to Oshosi, the god of traps and spell-casters. Oshosi was also known as Saint Norbert, a Catholic canonized for restoring sight to a blind woman; hence the name Blind Alley.
    But most police considered Oshosi their own orisha , since he was also the god of courts and prisons. It made for a certain ambiguity that left Ramirez wondering which side Oshosi would favour if he and Latapier ran into problems.
    “You say your police are afraid to come here?” asked Latapier, smiling. “That’s funny. I feel right at home.”
    “My men try to stay away from Blind Alley,” said Ramirez. “They say arresting people is one thing, engaging in the supernatural another. Personally, I worry more about the babalaos than I do about spirits. I’m never quite sure where they get their blood sacrifices. There may be a shortage of animals because of rationing. But there’s never a shortage of police.”
    Ramirez and Latapier joined a crowd of people gathered around a young black woman who danced frantically on the cobblestones as drummers pounded the sacred drums. Her feet looked swollen, but she seemed oblivious to the pain. Her bald head wascovered with paint splatters. Her sweat formed coloured trails as it ran down her cheeks.
    The sound of the conga drums built in volume and intensity even in the few minutes that Ramirez and Latapier were there. Women chanted in Yoruba; they swayed and clapped to the beat. The young woman began to scream, whirling and spinning in her white dress as a babalao watched. The hairs on Ramirez’s arms stood on end, despite the heat.
    “It seems unusual, to have an initiation during the week,” said Latapier quietly. “I thought the nangale , the purification ceremony, was conducted on Sundays.”
    “Maybe everything is skewed because of the holidays.”
    They skirted the crowd to get to an art gallery built so deep underground it was almost completely buried. The stone stairs curved as if bent by the hands of giants.
    Once inside, it was damp and cool. Ramirez took a deep breath, gratefully filling his lungs. The shrieking above them was muted by the thick walls. Even so the drums filled