BELLA MAFIA

by Lynda La Plante

  When the trial closed for the day, Carolla had still not taken the stand, had never used the microphone that linked him with the court. He had sat impervious to the proceedings.

  Graziella returned to the villa, more determined than ever to uncover the truth. Mario Domino was waiting for her. Adina, as instructed, had shown him into the dining room. The study was always kept locked now; Adina was not even allowed to clean it. It was littered with documents and tapes, and notebooks were stacked on the desk, and Graziella was, in truth, afraid lest anyone find out how much she now knew about the Lucianos.

  The dining room was cold. She did not turn on the light, preferring to sit in the shadows. Domino opened his briefcase and took out some files.

  "Did you find Gennaro Baranza for me?"

  "Yes, he lives with his son in Mondello. They run a small hotel; I have the address and phone number. He is very frail. May I ask why you wish to see him?"

  Ignoring the question, she asked if he would like a sherry. Just as he accepted, they heard the buzz of the door intercom.

  Mario was slightly flustered. "That may be the doctor. . . . Now please, before you say anything, for me, see him—"

  "Please apologize for wasting his time, and, Mario, when I need to see a doctor, I am capable of calling one for myself."

  Mario returned to find her flicking through his papers. She looked up, her face paler than ever. "You know, every day at the trial I look at the men in the cages, and I know many of them must have worked for or been known to Don Roberto. I hear of prostitution, blackmail, kidnapping, extortion, murders, and I think of this place, I think of my life. I listen to his voice, and he is a stranger to me. ... I have lost three sons, but worse, I have lost all respect for him, Mario."

  "Then you do him a great injustice."

  "Do I? How much of his fortune was built on fear? How many died to make my family worth being murdered for? You want to hear what I have been listening to? Hear him laughing when he describes how he arranged his son's marriage as a cover for murder? Do you want to hear what he did, how he used me, how he used his sons?"

  "Throw the tapes away. Don't listen to them."

  "I will listen to every one of them. Because even at the end he lied to me. He said he could not rest, could not die in peace without giving Michael the justice he deserved. It was liesl He could not die in peace unless he destroyed Paul Carolla. He was not content to have him in prison; that was not enough. Carolla had to know that it was Don Roberto Luciano who put him there. Michael had nothing to do with his decision, Mario; it was for himself. He wanted to prove to Carolla that in the end he had beaten him."

  "That is not true, Graziella."

  "No? How much proof did he need for his courts, for his law? And if my husband had been alive to go to the witness stand, who do you think would have paid the penalty? Paul

  Carolla? No! My family, my sons . . . He would have destroyed them anyway. Well, he succeeded, and now I want nothing, nothing to be left. My granddaughter, my sons' wives, none of them must know the truth. I want them to live their lives without fear. I want them free, Mario."

  Mario picked up his papers and carefully rearranged them in order, stacking them in his briefcase. He snapped the locks, resting his hands on top.

  "As you wish. I will contact you as soon as the transactions have taken place. But understand, you will be giving the very people you despise access to your husband's legitimate companies, companies that were to have been your sons' inheritances."

  "Mario, I know about my sons. Please don't think me that naive. They were part of it, too. I have read enough of your files to understand that much. I also understand how you played Roberto's game. Well, no more lies. I want to go to my grave in peace. Now you must excuse me; it has been a very long day."

  Mario looked at her sadly. "I have always loved you. You must know that. I would protect you with my life, but I could not go against his wishes."

  "Because you were afraid? Tell me, Mario, were you afraid of him too?"

  "What do you mean by that? To whom have you been talking?"

  "Diego Caruso. He was afraid even to talk to me."

  "What did you ask him?"

  She gave a small shrug of her shoulders. His heartbeat quickened, and his indigestion grew ten times worse. He sucked constantly on strong antacids, but the pain would not abate.

  Graziella's remark unnerved him. His hands shook as he replied. "Graziella, never, understand me, never ask questions of anyone. If you need to know something, then ask me, ask me."

  "Who were they, those men? Why did you search this house?"

  "For your own protection. I had to make sure there was nothing here, nothing anyone else would need or want—nothing incriminating, do you understand? The men I introduced to you ran certain branches of the Luciano holdings in the States. . . ."

  "But you were afraid of them?"

  "No, no . . . If it appeared so, then perhaps I am overtired."

  "Mario, have there not been enough lies?"

  His heartburn was worse, and he was growing impatient with her. "I was not afraid for myself! On one hand, you tell me to cut all ties with the organization; then, when I do so, you accuse me."

  "I am not accusing you."

  "Graziella, we are not dealing in small amounts of dollars and lire but in billions! Don't you understand how difficult you have made things for me? I have negotiated with the main families to take over Don Roberto's territories in America—New York, Atlantic City, Chicago, and Los Angeles. But the Sicilian families also want to negotiate. Even though it is against your wishes, I am simply trying to do what I believe is in your best interest. Your demand that I sell everything, whether at a profit or not, has caused nothing but suspicion. I am also trying to transfer all money to a Swiss bank account so that you would not be taxed as you would be if it were paid here in Palermo. You would be losing billions of lire, millions of dollars, in death duties and taxes. . . . And then today one of my clerks—"

  Domino had to sit down; he could not get his breath. "I have sixteen men in my offices, all working toward finalizing all the contracts for your daughters and granddaughter. Today, however, we have come across certain discrepancies. . . . One of the buyers, I believe, though I cannot be sure, is acting under orders."

  Domino could hardly bring himself to say the name. "I think that Paul Carolla is using fictitious names to purchase the Palermo-based export company, which includes the warehouses, the dock—"

  Graziella banged on the table. "How in God's name can this happen? The man is in jail, how can he be negotiating?"

  "He is not!” He is employing men to buy for him, but until I can verify that, until I can trace every one of these buyers . . . Here, see for yourself, see how many contracts, how much work all this entails. Tomorrow I am going to check out as much as I can in Rome."

  Domino's harassed face went gray, and Graziella brought him a glass of water, which she held for him while he searched for his indigestion tablets. She watched as he gulped at the water, then slipped her arms around his shoulders.

  "Forgive me. I have misused you, tired you, and never said one word of thanks."

  He patted her hand. "You know I will do my best; that is all I have ever been able to do. But I am tired, and this—this last. . . ." In a gesture of despair he held up the bundle of notes from his clerks.

  Graziella put them back in his case. "If you discover that Paul Carolla is trying to buy so much as a single orange tree, then withhold the sale. There is no hurry; we can wait. . . . Let the ships rot; let the warehouses fall into the water. I would rather be a beggar on the street than sell to Carolla."

  Mario smiled at her. "You will never be on the streets. You and your daughters will, I assure you, be well taken care of."

  "What will you do, Mario, when it is all over?"

  He snapped his briefcase shut. "Retire, live out my old age in blissful ignorance of everything occurring in the world. I have always wanted a garden, did y
ou know that? And I have always lived in an apartment without even a window box."

  Arm in arm they walked to his car, surveying the once-beautiful gardens. He laughed. "Perhaps you could hire me; I could come here and take care of that lawn. It is so neglected."

  Graziella smiled. "You forget, the villa is to be sold."

  "Ah, yes ... I don't suppose you remember, oh, it was a long time ago. . . . You were standing over there, in front of the groves, and you were wearing a big picture hat and a pair of gardening gloves. 'This is my world,' you said to me. You were so happy, so beautiful, so very beautiful."

  She tightened her grip on his arm. "I was happy, Mario, ignorant but happy. My three sons, my husband, this wonderful villa—what more could a woman have wanted?"

  "Not me, that was sure." He gave a grunt of a laugh. She opened his car door and stood waiting while he put his briefcase inside, then sat, wanting to go, wanting to stay.

  "I made this my world, Mario. I thought it was secure."

  He nodded, still recalling that day. The day before Michael had been found murdered.

  As if reading his thoughts, she said softly, "I know about Michael, Mario. I know, and I should have been told." She bent and cupped his face in her hands. "I know now that the only innocent was Michael. Roberto used the others, didn't he? Constantino, Filippo?"

  Mario agreed sadly. "He was a hard man to refuse, Graziella, yet he was so easy to love. I loved him like a brother, but you were right: I was always afraid of him. No, not always ... Do you remember when he came back after the war? He was different then; he had changed, he was so vulnerable."

  He looked up at her, even now hesitating to tell her the truth. But what was there to fear now? "He wanted out, Graziella, and he tried, but they wouldn't free him. He knew too much, was too valuable."

  She stepped back from the car and shut the door. Mario continued. "I'll be in Rome for a few days. If you need me, the office will know where I am. Take care now, and rest."

  She waved as he drove away, but her mind was churning over what he had said. It was true, after the war Roberto had been changed. He was very quiet, subdued, with a terrible listlessness to him that she had put down to months spent in the prison camps. As the weeks passed into months and Roberto still made no effort to find work, she had become concerned. The boys had been toddlers then, and the extra rations from her husband's friends—the black-market eggs and chickens that had been delivered throughout the war—had stopped. Sometimes food had become so scarce in the village that she had felt guilty because she had never gone without; there had always been enough bread and sometimes even butter.

  Graziella stood in the imposing hall, now filled with antiques and paintings, statues and the finest carpets. How different it had been then. She sat on the stairs and closed her eyes, picturing her husband as a young man, working outside, mending fences, cutting wood for the kitchen fire. The winter had been freezing, but she watched his health return along with his appetite. But the packages had stopped coming.Graziella put her hands over her ears. She could hear herself, hear the words she had shouted and see the children clustered around her as her voice rose to a screech, demanding that Roberto find food, his children were hungry. It was the first time the Lucianos had been short of food. Where had their supplies come from? She had never asked because she had known it was the black market, just as she'd known when she pressed his white shirt and best suit that he was not going to try to find work in town because there was no work. Sicily was desperately impoverished after the war. . . .

  Graziella stood and whispered to the empty, marble hall, "I have always known. . . ."

  She paused for a moment by the open carved doors of the dining room. The only sound was the soft ticking of the marble clock. She walked the length of the room, skirting the polished table, the rows of baroque chairs with their plum satin upholstery, passed the priceless paintings, the solid Georgian silver candelabra. . . . She walked beneath the crystal and gold chandelier and continued slowly by the inlaid glass-fronted cabinets filled with ornaments and treasures. Everywhere was lavish opulence.

  She sat in her husband's carved chair, her hands clasping the arms, feeling the lions' open mouths with her fingers. "I have always known," she whispered again. There in front of her was the single sheet of notepaper with one line in Mario Domino's meticulous handwriting: "Gennaro Baranza. Hotel Majestic, Mondello."

  Adina could not believe it when Graziella burst into the kitchen.

  "We are going to Mondello. ... I need you."

  "Mondello?" Adina smiled. She had been born in Mondello but had not been there for many years. "But, signora, you have no driver."

  "I know. That is why I need you. You will have the map, and you will direct me. I am driving."

  "Oh, no, signora! Please, no, don't drive."

  Graziella's driving had been a family joke for years. When she had learned to drive, she had caused so much damage that everyone remembered it. Adina had been tending the vegetable garden when Graziella drove through the wicker fence, backward. Graziella had then given way to the pressure, quite content to be driven.

  The single guard on duty had just enough time to open the right-hand gate before the Mercedes screeched past, right over his foot. As he hopped up and down in agony, the car jolted to a halt. He watched fearfully; it seemed to be coming back toward him. . . . With another jolt it stopped, and Graziella leaned out the window.

  "No one is allowed into the villa until I return."

  "Si, Signora Luciano."

  He watched the car weave down the road in a haze of dust, the gears grinding horribly. Graziella, her face set with determination, was at the wheel. Adina sat beside her, clutching her rosary, her eyes tightly closed, but she opened them when she heard Graziella laughing. . . .

  "This feels so good, I feel good now, Adina. Now, the map is in the glove compartment."

  "Si, signora, but please, don't take your hands off the wheel. I'll find it."

  CHAPTER 7

  Sophia hated the smell of the cab. It made her sick to her stomach, and the lurching, erratic driving threw her from side to side.

  For the last part of the journey she had to direct the driver along narrow cobbled streets until they reached the open, tall gates to the warehouses, now converted into factories. She could see her garment cutters hanging out the windows, calling to the men at work on the heavy machines in the building opposite. The women would have recognized her yellow Maserati, but they ignored the taxi.

  Sophia paid the driver and walked a few steps, swaying slightly. Her head was spinning, and her mouth was dry. She slipped on a pair of dark glasses.

  As she left the shadow of the building and emerged into the bright sunlight, she heard a frantic whisper: "It's Signora Luciano!" The women ducked quickly back to their work.

  Sophia entered the building by a small side door marked "S&N Designs" and climbed the narrow staircase; she had to clutch the wooden rail to help her up the old, uneven steps.

  At the first landing Sophia flattened herself against the wall to allow two workmen to pass, carrying files and artwork. They thanked her politely. Before she could start up the next flight of stairs, two more men came down, carrying armfiils of dresses. She watched from the window as the men loaded everything into an S&N delivery van. Through the van's open doors she could see that there were already two filing cabinets inside.

  The last of the stairs up to the top floor were expensively carpeted in a pale peach. She pushed open the freshly painted door with the tasteful gold S&N logo and entered the showroom. The reception area was filled with fresh flowers.

  "Buon giorno, Signora Luciano."

  "Buon giorno, Celeste. Come sta?"

  The young woman appeared flustered. "Molto bene."

  "Is Nino here?" asked Sophia.

  "Si, signora, shall I call him for you?"

  "No, grazie."

  Sophia continued through reception and into the outer corridor. She passed her own offi
ce and approached her partner's. His door opened, and two more workers came out, carrying plants and file drawers. Nino Fabio flushed when he saw her looking at the men, then returned to his office.

  "What's happening?" Sophia wanted to know.

  "I've tried to contact you for weeks."

  Sophia stood by his empty desk, opened her handbag, and took out a cigarette.

  Nino closed the door behind her. "Are you all right?"

  Sophia nodded, tossing the match in the wastebasket, then looked around the room. "What's going on?"

  "Guess it must be pretty obvious. I'm moving out."

  She inhaled, letting the smoke drift from her nostrils. "I can see that. Where are you moving to?"

  "Do you want coffee?"

  "Yes."

  Nino opened the door and called for fresh coffee. He seemed very nervous. "I tried to reach you, to tell you personally. I've had a good offer. So, with this new collection for Milan, I accepted. I've wanted to go for some time now. . . . Well, now I am able to."

  "You never mentioned this to me before."

  "Things have changed now."

  "In what way?"

  Nino was fidgeting around the room. "Well, I,xlon't have to explain, do I?"

  "Yes, of course, you do. I find the office half stripped, and you tell me you're quitting, just like that. I thought we were partners?"

  "I tried to contact you."

  She sighed, growing angry. "Well, you must know why I haven't been available."

  "Well, of course, I do. I wrote to you. Did you receive my letter, the flowers?"

  "Yes."

  The receptionist brought two cups of coffee, put them on the desk, and left without a word. Sophia said, "I see everyone is aware of your sudden departure except your partner. You are quitting, just when I need you the most. . . . What were you going to do, clear everything out and then write to me?"

  "I told you I tried to reach you, Sophia."

  "I heard you the first time. How many people are you taking with you?"

  "The ones I brought with me."

  "I see. ..." She picked up her coffee, shaking so much that she had to hold it with both hands. "Pretty low, isn't it? Sneaking out the back door?"