Cuban security officials are warning that the arrest of a suspected bomber may not mean an end to the explosions that have shaken the island's tourism industry. There was more than one bomber at work, they say.

``We can't stop and question every tourist,'' said a Havana counterintelligence official, who acknowledged that tough security measures might only scare off as many tourists as the 11 bombing attempts since mid-April.

While Cuban authorities have released relatively few details of their case against the jailed Salvadoran, Raul Ernesto Cruz Leon, 26, more information has been emerging from unofficial sources in Cuba.

Two employees of the Triton Hotel, hit by one of the four bombings on Sept. 4, said they had been told by security guards in the hotel that a vacationing Spanish boy 5 to 8 years old gave police key clues to the identity of the suspect.

The boy, on vacation with his parents and a baby sitter, ran after a man who had forgotten a small black notebook when he got up from a lobby table, unsuccessfully trying to return the item, the employees said.

``The child was shouting, `Señor, Señor, you left something.' The kid ran after him, but the man did not stop,'' said one Triton employee who, like the other, asked for anonymity in telephone conversations from Havana.

When police began asking questions about suspicious people after the blast, which caused slight damage to the hotel lobby, the boy and his baby sitter gave them descriptions of the man, the hotel workers said.

Cruz fit the description perfectly when he was arrested about five hours later in his hotel: in his mid-20s, wearing shorts, a polo shirt, baseball cap and sneakers and carrying a blue backpack.

It was not known whether the notebook left at the Triton contained incriminating names or addresses.

And four Havana journalists working for foreign media now say they believe they met Cruz walking out of the Copacabana Hotel 2 1/2 hours after another of the Sept. 4 bombs there had killed an Italian-Canadian businessman.

``We asked him what happened but he said he didn't speak Spanish. We tried in French and English, but he kept saying he didn't know,'' said one of the journalists. ``Now we've seen his photograph, and we agree it was him.'' Latin American diplomats in Havana, meanwhile, say that although Havana officials appear to have proof against Cruz, in private conversations they seem less confident of the charge that he worked for Miami-based Cuban exiles.

``Officials do not seem to have strong evidence against the anti-Castro people in Miami, but they insist that these people have indirectly and discreetly provided economic aid for the attempts on Cuba,'' one diplomat said.

Cuban authorities also have now quietly confirmed that Cruz was not the only bomber attacking tourist targets, warning of future blasts and adding new layers of mystery to the increasingly intriguing tale.

An Interior Ministry counterintelligence officer, Col. Adalberto Rabeiro, said his investigators have ``evidence that allow us to confirm the participation of other people'' in the Aug. 4 bombing of Havana's luxury Melia-Cohiba Hotel.

Cubans say suspect confessed

Initial Cuban communiques said Cruz had confessed to two bombings on July 12 and four more on Sept. 4, but said nothing about five other bombings and bombing attempts confirmed around Havana and the beach resort of Varadero since April.

Rabeiro gave many fresh details of the case during a prime-time television appearance with Cruz on Monday, although a rough transcript of their comments became available only Wednesday.

The government thanks the Cuban people for their cooperation in the investigation, Rabeiro said, ``but we must caution everyone to remain alert because the counterrevolution is still active.''

Havana residents who saw the one-hour program said they were surprised by Cruz's seeming calm in the face of charges that could get him executed by a firing squad, and Rabeiro said Cruz was a very ``cool'' suspect.

Rabeiro said that after he was detained and with security agents looking on, Cruz had made telephone calls abroad to the people who had offered to pay him $4,500 per bomb. ``Those conversations were taped,'' he said, offering no further details on the identity of the person who allegedly recruited Cruz.

Cruz stayed cool, calm

Cruz also showed extreme cool on the day he was arrested, sitting through his initial interrogations without revealing that he had just left a bomb ticking away at the famed Bodeguita del Medio Restaurant.

He detonated three bombs in three hotels in rapid succession around noon on Sept. 4, killing the Italian-Canadian businessman, and calmly lunched at the Bodeguita at a rooftop table shortly afterward, Rabeiro said.

Cruz armed the timer of a fourth bomb and placed it behind a restaurant freezer, then walked to his hotel, the Plaza in central Havana, where he was arrested at 5:30 p.m., Rabeiro added.

The bomb at the restaurant, a famed Ernest Hemingway haunt, went off around 11 p.m.

Employees at the Havana travel agency that handled some of Cruz's arrangements in Cuba meanwhile said he did not sign up for any tours while in Havana July 9-14 or between his return to Cuba on Aug. 31 and his arrest.

One San Cristobal Travel Agency worker confirmed Cuban police reports that he stayed at the Ambos Mundos Hotel in July and the Plaza Hotel in the second trip, but added Cruz may have also stayed at other hotels in July.

``I don't know exactly how many [hotels], but there were others. He never took any day tours, but this man was a repeat customer,'' said the employee, who asked for anonymity.

Agency guide Orlando Ramos confirmed that he shuttled Cruz between his hotels and the Havana airport but angrily refused to give The Herald any more information, complaining about the ``counterrevolutionary news media.''

``How dare you call me to extract information,'' a clearly nervous Ramos shouted in a telephone conversation.

Herald staff writers Alfonso Chardy and Gerardo Reyes contributed to this report.

Copyright © 1997 The Miami Herald