Starting back even before he was born, Dr. del Marmol and his family have had several strange experiences: ladies who are complete strangers but seem to know all about the del Marmol family that appear and disappear mysteriously, forces that seem to protect them, and as a child how Julio Antonio would hear voices that advised and warned him. Not only that, but young Julio Antonio also seems capable of doing things with his mind. Warned by his uncle, he never talks about it lest it frighten people, but in addition to being able to make things happen he discovers he gets auditory warnings, almost like alarm bells ringing in his ears, whenever danger is about to occur. Flashing forward to his life as the Commandantico, he discovers that his friend Yaneba has an uncle about to be executed, sees a test of a new prototype device designed to extract information from the brains of spies directly, and meets with a new contact: the supposedly-insane Jose Maria Lopez Lledin, better known in Havana as the Gentleman of Paris. He is taken by Che to meet the American writer, Ernest Hemingway, who has been taking the plunder of the wealthy of Cuba who left their belongings behind when they went into exile, transporting them around the Caribbean to various auctions in his yacht, the Pilar, and then bringing the money back to Cuba. As it turns out, Hemingway also is working with intelligence, but it is not clear to Julio Antonio which intelligence agency he is assisting. The young spy begins to develop a daring plan to rescue Yaneba’s uncle, discovering in the process the two of them have a telepathic connection.