She read an account sent from a Miami relative of one of the 600-plus attempts on Mr Castro's life by the CIA and Miami exiles. The assassin had the Cuban leader in his sight but couldn't pull the trigger. Something stopped him. While there's no official personality cult, everyone knows exactly who's boss. Cuban politics works almost like the court of a monarch.
Rival factions form around a host of issues.
Within the court, stars rise and stars fall. But the one pulling all the strings is Mr Castro. He has never allowed opposition. The state has a spectacular system of internal control. It's far more subtle than the brutal military regimes I saw in Latin America in the 1980s.