Corsican Honor

by William Heffernan

  She offered a crooked smile, and reached out and stroked his hand. “But I have dignity now. I work hard, and my work is appreciated for what it is. And I care for two of the most powerful men in France.” She lowered her eyes. “One now,” she said. She drew a breath, gathering herself. “And they always listened to me,” she added. “I wish I had found this life earlier.” She reached up and brushed a hand against her ruined cheek. “Even if it still meant this. But I don’t regret the old days. I learned from them.” She touched her cheek again. “I only wish I could have learned another way.”

  “And my father?” Alex probed. His voice was gentle.

  She looked away toward some flowers, then back at him, her ruined face offering a jagged smile, her eyes soft. In remembrance, Alex thought.

  “He was very handsome, and very … personable then,” she said. “He was like no man I had ever met.” Her eyes became firm. “And he was good to me during those years. He wanted me to have my little dreams of being the petit bourgeoise. And I wanted to be with him.” She lowered her eyes. “No matter the circumstances.”

  “But then he abandoned you,” Alex said. He said it as gently as he could.

  Colette waved a hand. “It was his way,” she said. “I do not excuse him, but I understand. I do not think he had ever been loved passionately before,” she said. She looked at him, as if afraid he would misunderstand. “I do not say this as anything against your mama,” she added. “I do not think it was something he ever permitted, that he ever allowed to happen to him. Do you understand what I mean?”

  “Yes, I do,” Alex said.

  Colette reached out and placed a hand under his, then placed the other on top.

  “I fear for you, my little Alex,” she said. “Oh, I know what you are doing. I know more than anyone here thinks I do.” She hesitated, then went on. “Is your father involved in this thing you do?”

  “Yes, he is,” Alex said.

  Her eyes grew sad, and she looked away for a moment, then back at him, as if taking time to choose her words.

  “Do not trust him, Alex. I do not say this because he does not love you. I know that he does.” She pressed his hand between her own. “I say it because he only knows one way to live. And it is a way that excludes everyone. Even the people he loves.”

  Meme left for Marseilles that evening, off to do his personal bit of killing, Alex knew. He remained behind with Michelle, to give her time to visit with her family, with whom she would stay, then to go on to Marseilles the following evening. It was like a respite, he told himself. Before the serious killing would begin.

  The next morning, she took him down the steep path into the Valle di Compoloro, to the old Romanesque Chapel of St. Christine, where she had gone to pray as a young girl. He stood behind her, watching her pray, kneeling on the stone floor, her head bowed and covered with a scarf. And he understood that he loved her—not just as he had loved her as a young woman, enchanted by her innocence and beauty—but as an equal who had been hardened by life but who had not surrendered her loveliness.

  They left the chapel, hands joined, and walked into a field of flowers that rose almost to their waists. Michelle turned to him and slid the scarf from her head, allowing the sun to play against the dark, shining beauty of her hair.

  “Make love to me, Alex,” she said. “Here in this field. It is an important place for me, this valley, and I want to love you here.”

  She knelt, hidden from other eyes by the flowers, and began unbuttoning her blouse. Alex understood what she was saying: how she wanted this innocence to their love-making now, before they returned to Marseilles and began what they had chosen to do. It was as though she thought they would never have the opportunity again.

  He knelt beside her and began removing his own clothing, then leaned forward, and kissed her face and lips. She drew him down to her, pressing her cheek against his.

  “Make love to me as though I were the young girl you wanted years ago but could not have,” she whispered. “Make love to me gently, because I am innocent and unsure of what I must do,” she said. “And allow me to surprise you with how deeply I love you.”

  He lay beside her and brought her gently against him.

  “It is the way I shall always think of you,” he said. And he wondered if the days ahead would change that forever.

  Meme entered the basement room alone, leaving his men upstairs. He wanted the pleasure of killing the man by himself, with only his brother’s spirit with him. And, he believed, Antoine would be there, the old Corsican superstitions still holding sway for him. And he also believed Antoine would never rest, would never allow either of them a moment’s peace, until his murder was avenged. It was foolishness, and instinctively Meme understood that. But he believed it anyway.

  Valeria lay on a massive table, his arms and legs spread and tied. He was naked, and he was shivering in the damp basement, both with cold and with fear. He stared at Meme as he walked slowly toward him, his eyes wide, and suddenly he was sweating despite the cold.

  “Padrone, you must listen to me. I had nothing to do with your brother’s death. I swear to God, and on the heads of my family.”

  He tried to twist against the ropes to gain a better look at Meme’s eyes, hoping they would tell him he was believed. The pain in his shattered arm surged and forced him to fall back with a gasp.

  “You not only were part of it, you told them how to do it,” Meme said. His voice was a low hiss, and he stood above Valeria, staring into his face.

  “You think I forget how you work? How you favor using the fake flic, with the barricade and the workers digging in the road?” His lips broke into a horrific smile, and Valeria began to tremble again.

  “How many times did you do that for me over the years, Jo-Jo? How many times did we laugh at the fools who fell for it?” He leaned his face closer. “Did you use it this time out of contempt for me and my brother?” he asked. “Did you think we were too old and foolish to remember?”

  Valeria began to stutter, fighting for words of denial. The sharp click of Meme’s stiletto snapping open froze him, and he knew the words would be wasted.

  “Please, Padrone. Do not kill me this way. I will help you find them. I will do anything you ask of me.”

  “My brother asked for your loyalty, and he gave you his trust,” Meme said. “Was that not enough?”

  “Oh, please. Please. Not this way.”

  “Yes. This way. Only this way.”

  Meme reached down and grasped Valeria’s penis in his hand, pulling it roughly. Then he placed the blade of the stiletto against it as the man’s body bucked against him, oblivious now to the pain from his arm. The blade sliced quickly, severing the member, as blood spurted in a fountain, washing across his legs. He screamed, his eyes riveted on the now grotesque part of his body as Meme impaled it on the end of the blade.

  Meme’s hand shot out, pressing against his jaw, holding his mouth open, then forcing the severed penis into his mouth and down his throat.

  Valeria gagged, thrashing his head from side to side. Meme worked quickly, wanting him to feel all of it before he lost consciousness. He grasped his testicles and cut them free, then placed his thumb at the base of one eye socket and popped the orb free, leaving it dangling on Valeria’s cheek on thread-like tissues. Quickly he inserted one of the testicles, then paused to allow Valeria to see his face one last time.

  “Pig,” he hissed.

  Then he did the same to the second eye.

  He waited, watching Valeria die, listening to his muffled screams. Then he dropped the knife to the floor and slowly stripped off his clothing. They had the man’s blood on them. They were tainted and vile to his mind. And he never wanted to use them again.

  Then he turned and walked out of the basement, his body naked, looking strangely old and frail, the splashes of blood the only indication of what he had just done.

  CHAPTER

  42

  Washington, D.C.

  The larg
e suite in the Hay-Adams Hotel looked out across Lafayette Park at the impressive facade of the White House. That was the place where the American people—all the bumpkins—believed the major decisions of their government were made, Piers Moran thought as he stared out the tall window before which he stood. But they were not, of course. The decisions were made elsewhere, often in rooms like this, and then affirmed in the great white building, based on information provided by those who had already made them. Oh, there were times when a decision was rejected, but that happened rarely. And then it was merely a question of accomplishing the desired ends in a more covert way. It was the same in all governments, Piers knew. Decisions made by men whose names the masses never heard. It was a fact of life both for the men who made those decisions and the people whom these strangers ruled. Piers turned back to face the others in the room. The ad hoc committee on narcotics, as he liked to think of them, plus one other, with whom he now had to deal.

  He looked at Raphael Rivera, the CIA station chief for Bogotá, and offered the “swarthy little bastard”—as he thought of him—a cold smile that would not be missed by the others, the true committee members.

  They were scattered about the large room in chairs and sofas, waiting to see how much of their lives would be changed by what would now be decided.

  Walter Hennesey was there, chugging on his pipe. So was Christopher Baldwin, overweight and balding, and John Batchler, reedy thin and coarse as ever—the same group who had met only months before at The Breakers in Palm Beach, when all this madness had begun.

  “So it would seem your operation—your little grab for power—has run into difficulty,” Piers said, his cold smile still radiating at Rivera.

  “Not so much it can’t be corrected,” Rivera said. He had ignored the smile and the sarcasm, sitting pat with his hand—which was far from pat, Piers told himself.

  “If that were the case, you wouldn’t be here,” Piers said, softening his tone and his manner. “So let’s talk about the deal we have to strike to make everything work, and place all the bravado where it belongs.”

  Rivera offered a helpless gesture with his hands. “I’m not here to fight,” he said. “Only to be fair.” He smiled. It was an oily smile, Piers thought. Just like the man. “So long as that fairness extends to everyone.”

  “And just what is your idea of fairness?” Hennesey asked.

  Piers raised a hand. “Let’s recapitulate first,” he said. “Just to get everything clear, before we begin speaking about what’s fair.” He nodded to Rivera, then added: “For everyone.”

  Piers walked to a chair that made him the center of the discussion and sat.

  “It would seem your people—Montoya and Ludwig—aren’t following the game plan very well, and now find themselves facing a very determined faction of the milieu,” Piers said.

  “A mistake,” Rivera said. “They were told—or rather, Ludwig was told—to be sure to take out both the Pisani brothers at the same time,” he lied. “It seems Montoya, greedy little shit that he is, was hungry for action, and that pressured Ludwig to get what he could to keep Montoya off his back.” Rivera shrugged. “But the other brother is a doddering old fool, and I don’t expect Ludwig will have any trouble getting to him.”

  Piers leaned forward, angered by the terminology used for a member of his own generation but hiding it as best he could.

  “Meme Pisani is the most lethal ‘doddering old fool’ you will ever meet,” Piers snapped. “If the two of you were alone together in a room, there would be no question in my mind who would come out alive.”

  Rivera sneered at him.

  Piers smiled. “Because the fucking floor would fall out from under you, if that was what it took,” he snapped. “Don’t sell the man short, my bright young friend. You won’t survive if you do.”

  The others in the room smiled, unaccustomed to hearing Piers use profanity.

  “I thought Antoine was the tough old bird,” Rivera said, still sneering but changing his language to soothe the old man. “Ludwig didn’t seem to have much trouble with him.”

  “Antoine is tough—was tough in the same way an uncaged gorilla is,” Piers said, still finding it hard to think of his old friend dead. “And it still took a small army and a traitor from within his own faction to get to him.” He leaned forward in his chair, his eyes filled with malevolent pleasure. “And have you heard what happened to that traitor?” he asked.

  Rivera shook his head. “No, I haven’t.”

  “He was found last night. With his penis in his mouth, and his testicles where his eyes should have been. And he was found in Aix-en-Provence, Mr. Francisci’s home base, and the very place from which your man Ludwig is believed to be operating.” He sat back again, looking pleased. “That is the work of Meme Pisani. And I would be amazed if the doddering old fool hadn’t done the cutting himself.”

  “So, you see,” Hennesey interjected, “your people are about to be hit very hard. And there won’t be much left”—he waved his hand, indicating everyone in the room—“for any one of us when it’s all finished.”

  “The French won’t stand for this kind of bloodbath.” It was Baldwin this time. Head of the CIA French desk. “They’re used to their own killings. A half-dozen Corsicans knocking each other off now and then, as happened in the so-called ‘Lemonade War’ a while back. But when they see South Americans are involved, and that it’s all about who’s going to control narcotics in France, those large frog noses are going to be very much out of joint.”

  Rivera raised his hands. “I never said there weren’t problems.” His eyes became cunning, feral. “But I assume you can control your man, get him to back off.”

  Piers let out a long breath. “No, we cannot. It’s already been suggested, and now Meme won’t even accept contact from us.” He leveled his gaze at Rivera. “Would you expect him to? It would be suicide for him—not to avenge his own brother.”

  “But you can call your son off. Right?” Rivera was almost smiling now, cutting to the root of the opposition’s dilemma.

  “Pisani won’t let us reach him,” Piers said. It was a weak excuse and he knew it.

  “And he wouldn’t listen if you could,” Rivera said. “Let’s be honest about this, shall we?”

  “All right.” It was Batchler, Hennesey’s number two this time. “We’ve got a loose cannon on our hands and we know it. Some of us have suspected it from the start.” Piers began to object, but Batchler cut him off. “He’s severed all contact with Walter,” he said, staring Piers down. “Shit, he never made contact in the first place short of a quickie visit to the consulate.”

  “So that’s the problem,” Rivera said. “I believe I can get my people back under control. You know you can’t. At least not until we have a bloodbath that’s going to hurt all of us.” He smiled. “That is the bottom line, isn’t it?”

  “The bottom line,” Piers snapped, “is your incursion into Europe. And your decision to attack Company assets.”

  “I thought we were putting bravado aside,” Rivera shot back. “The bottom line is that my ‘incursion,’ as you put it, threatens the drug profits you gentlemen have been squirreling away for years now.”

  “That is a concern,” Hennesey conceded. “But we are not, repeat, not going to surrender Company assets to a cabal of agents stationed in South America who are supposed to be working for the Company first.”

  Rivera raised his hands in a gesture of surrender that was nothing of the sort, Piers decided.

  “I can concede that,” Rivera said. “As long as these new profits are shared.” He stared at Piers. “That’s what I mean by fairness to everyone.”

  Piers started to speak, but Rivera shook his head, stopping him. It seemed everyone was shutting him down, Piers thought.

  “The real question is who the assets in France should be,” he continued. “The way I see it, you can’t call off Pisani because he can hit back. He’s got enough information on all of you—and probably years of recor
ds to go along with it—to kick up a scandal that would bring everyone down. Probably the agency itself.”

  “And your people wouldn’t?” Piers demanded.

  “In time,” Rivera said. “But I don’t propose leaving them in place that long. I envision a regular process of attrition, with replacement drug lords that we”—he imitated Hennesey’s gesture, taking them all in with a sweep of his hand—“all of us, can control.” He offered an apologetic shrug. “Your mistake, as I see it, gentlemen, was leaving your asset in place too long.”

  “So what you’re proposing,” Hennesey said, “is cutting you in on the proceeds, while we take over control of Montoya and Ludwig?”

  “In Europe,” Rivera corrected. “We maintain control in South America. In other words, we control the product. And we cut you in on profits outside Europe.”

  The members of what Piers thought of as the ad hoc committee glanced at one another, none indicating any objection to the proposal. The swelling of their bank accounts seemed obvious under Rivera’s proposal.

  “And Pisani?” Piers asked, his tone friendlier now.

  “He’s got to go,” Rivera said. “I can’t replace Montoya and Ludwig that quickly. It could take years to set up this deal again.” He smiled. “Years of some very nice profits that don’t exist in Europe right now.”

  “And if we stand by Pisani, someone just might leak information about our long-term connection with his faction,” Hennesey said.

  Rivera raised his eyebrows. “Let’s not even discuss that kind of unpleasantness.” He rubbed his thumb and index finger together. “That’s in no one’s real interest.”

  “So, how do you see the current situation?” Hennesey asked.

  Rivera leaned forward, now taking center stage. “We let Pisani go ahead, but we pull Montoya and Ludwig and as many of their people out as we can. So the only target left for Pisani is Francisci, and whatever South Americans get stuck in the cross fire. Without an acknowledged drug boss in the body count, it will just look like Francisci was doing a deal with South Americans, and Pisani took offense.”