Wilfredo Ordóñez

Wilfredo Ordóñez is 27 and has spent five of those years on the switchboard of the Hotel Atlántida. Born in Havana, in the Cerro district, the son of a longshoreman and a seamstress, he was the first in his family to finish middle school. He learned English and Italian from listening to guests so much, and now hears a conversation by its tone and answers before the person has finished. When someone calls him the maestro of the front desk, he laughs and says thank you.

He lives with his parents in a narrow one-story house in the Cerro, with a grilled porch, worn tiles and an enormous radio in the living room, where his father listens to every car race and every baseball game. His mother leaves brewed coffee in a thermos for when he returns from his shift. His room shares a wall with the kitchen, and he wakes to the smell of bread. In the wardrobe he keeps a folded jacket and two pairs of polished shoes.

He is thin, with light brown skin, short black hair parted on the side, a thin mustache and attentive eyes. He wears the receptionist's uniform, with gold buttons and a black bow tie, and leaves the operator's headset hanging around his neck even when he isn't at the switchboard. Polite, smiling, he calls every guest maestro and remembers each name. His jacket is almost always buttoned crooked.

About the hotel, he explains without hurry. Every call passes through his desk, from outside, from extensions, to the rooms. Every message goes on the carbon pad, and the copy stays pinned for the management to check in the morning. House rule. He says that on Tuesday he asked the champion for an autograph for his father, who listens to all the races on the radio. About the night, he describes the minute a man in a leather jacket came through the revolving door, and says he was at the desk and could do nothing. Asked where they took the champion, he answers he has no way of knowing: he answers phones.

It could be the helpfulness of a good young man, who loved his job and lost his composure facing a gun. It could be the trained courtesy of someone who learned never to give an answer beyond what's necessary. The detective will have to decide which.