Havana Storm (Dirk Pitt 23)

“I’ll see who it is,” Salvador Fariñas said to his wife, who was in the kitchen filleting a fish for dinner.

Fariñas opened the door and stepped outside to converse with the visitors. After several minutes, he poked his head back through the doorway and called to his wife. “Maria, you better come see.”

Maria wiped her hands on her apron and strode outside with an impatient gait. She found a delivery truck parked in their drive and two men unloading numerous thin crates.

Fariñas was opening one of the crates with a screwdriver when he noticed his wife. “Maria, they’ve come back! They’ve come back to you!”

She approached with a confused look as he pried off the crate facing. Inside was a painting of an old woman holding a bouquet of flowers. Maria instantly recognized the portrait of her mother, one she had painted forty years earlier. “My painting of Mama,” she murmured.

She looked to the truck and the other crates being offloaded. “These are all my paintings?”

“Yes!” Fariñas said. “They all have been returned.”

Her eyes glistened. “I don’t understand.”

A switch seemed to flick on inside the woman, banishing the tired and defeated heart she had carried for the past several decades. With her husband, she eagerly pried open the crates, looking upon her works as a mother to her children.

When the last crate was unloaded, one of the deliverymen approached. “This is for you, Señora Fariñas.” He handed her a thick envelope. “Have a nice day.”

“Thank you,” she replied, opening the envelope. Inside was a note and a thin object wrapped in brown paper. She pulled open the note.

Maria,

Always remember, the artist who lives within can never die.

Dirk Pitt

She unfurled the brown paper to find a fine Kolinsky sable-hair artist’s brush inside.

Tears began cascading down her cheeks. She dabbed them away with her apron until regaining her composure. Then she raised the brush in the air and in a powerful voice said, “Absolutamente!”