“Only God can know for certain, but maybe we can find proof.”
“Really?”
“Let me explain.”
PROOF
“Chillo.” Him. The one.
In the days that followed the assassination attempt, it seemed as though everyone had learned to pronounce just that one word: “Chillo.”
Briato’ drowned him in a hail of texts. He wrote, “Keep an eye out for him,” defining the whole matter in terms of the protection of the paranza.
“Maraja,” said Tucano, “this guy must exist because he has a surname.”
“Chillo,” Drone kept saying, and so did Lollipop, and even a few of the youngsters.
No one, except for L’Arcangelo, ever uttered first and last name, that would have been pointless, and after all, “Chillo” no longer deserved even the modicum of respect afforded by having been baptized.
Nicolas even reached the point of thinking that they were all in cahoots in shoving aside the most dangerous pretender to the throne, all of them rutting, competing, each availing himself of his own special skills. Hadn’t he himself, when all was said and done, proven exactly how feasible such a thing really was? Nothing is impossible and Just do it, the mottoes that he’d had tattooed on his forearms, in English.
For a few days Nicolas had lain low in Lollipop’s gym, after he’d persuaded his folks to keep it shut to the public by slamming a stack of bills on the table, twenty thousand euros: “Let’s put in a bigger sauna, it’ll take at least a week for the construction.” Then when he was sick of sleeping on aerobics mats and eating takeout pizza, he decided to take L’Arcangelo’s advice. He picked up his phone: fifty texts from his paranzini, but not a thing on the paranza’s chat. So then he wrote a message to everyone.
Maraja
Tomorrow. Warehouse.
They no longer felt the need to dress like their grandparents on a Sunday just to walk into a bank. Nicolas showed up in the sweatpants from his tracksuit and a sweatshirt with a hood, and the others also arrived dressed the way they usually did, or even more down-at-the-heels and ragtag. By now they were familiar with the procedure, just as the security guard by now knew them: they walked through the metal detector one by one, at their ease, firmly holding the garbage bags full of cash to be deposited. That was the main reason for this trip to the bank: they were all going to have to strip themselves of their weapons in order to get through the metal detector. Tucano carried a suitcase full of money. “Next time, a little less ostentatious might be preferable,” said the manager. “I’ve already had to tell everyone that you’re the soccer team my son plays on.” “Sure enough, boss, we’re your son’s soccer team, we brought you a bag that he left on the field after the game,” said Nicolas. He set the bag down on the manager’s desk and asked, according to the traditional method, for a new line of credit to furnish the apartment in Vomero. He wanted to make sure that Letizia and Cristiana wanted for nothing; he was eager to spoil them and provide for their future. He’d said it to Mena, too: “When I’m not around anymore, Mammà, I’ve left you the shop,” and tears had come to her eyes.
Everything went smoothly for the line of credit and the new deposits; the manager made a point of giving them special treatment. “Grazie, Diretto’,” Tucano had thanked him at the end. “Thanks to you, we can even skip the line in your bank,” and he’d indulged in a complicit laugh.
When they left, before returning to his cloister in the gym, Nicolas said that he wanted to swing by his house to change his clothes, and everyone offered to accompany him.
“I don’t need an escort, all I need is Drago’,” said Nicolas.
Briato’ took him aside: “That’s not safe, Maraja, just him alone isn’t enough.”
“We’ll be your bodyguards,” said Tucano.
“We’ve just left the bank, we don’t have our gats!” Nicolas retorted. “If those guys shoot, what are you going to do?” That was the end of the discussion.
They swarmed off, each taking a different direction. To Nicolas they looked like a school of minnows scattering at the approach of a predator.
“Let’s go, Lui’,” said Nicolas. “You and I haven’t had a chance to talk in far too long.
Drago’ nodded seriously. Nobody in the paranza had ever called him Luigi, and that name hit him now as if it had been uttered by Viola, drawing on a family connection that Nicolas had always scorned. It was true, they hadn’t talked in a long while, since he’d first told Nicolas about his meeting with Micione. Then everything had been swept away in the rush of events, money, deaths. The attempt. A year ago, they couldn’t wait to grow up, and now time wouldn’t stop to wait for them.
In the past few days, it had seemed to him that the others were making a point of establishing a distance from him; he could especially sense the mistrust of Briato’ and Tucano. The attempt had disturbed every equilibrium. Even Nicolas, who had never displayed any doubt toward him, was wavering. What was it? he wondered. Who could have pointed an accusing finger at him with such vehemence that it had made Maraja change his mind? Why had he asked him alone to go with him, and why was he letting him come upstairs and into his home?
* * *
Once at home, Nicolas quickly packed a bag with a few changes of clothes; Drago’ waited for him in the kitchen, sitting at the head of the table.
“I’m going to use the bathroom, then we can head back to the gym.” Nicolas set the bag down in the hallway and his jacket on the backrest of Drago’s chair, making sure the Desert Eagle knocked against the chair. The pistol stuck out of the pocket, clearly visible.
He washed up, carefully. He lathered his hands, intertwining his fingers repeatedly, and then ran them over his face, his ears, and his neck. He cupped his hands and splashed water on his face repeatedly. He pulled out a towel and wiped the drops of water off the mirror, one less task for his mother. Before heading back to the kitchen, he stepped into his bedroom to get a sheet of paper and a pen, then went back to join Drago’. He was standing, leaning against the stove. The pistol was still where he’d left it. He sat down, turning his back on Drago’. Just a few days ago, he’d been able to say, “When Drago’ is behind me, I never think of turning around,” and instead now he felt all the fear that L’Arcangelo had praised as necessary during their first meeting: “In order to command, to be a boss, you need to be afraid, every day of your life, at every moment. To conquer the fear, to figure out whether you’re still capable…” He’d be capable, that much he knew, but he had the same fear: he didn’t want to lose another brother.
“Let me write a note for my mother,” he said. He bent over, concentrating, and started to scrawl the text of the message. He heard Drago’ stepping away from the stove, heard him holding his breath, to make as little noise as possible. He moved quickly. He took the pistol out of the jacket pocket. Nicolas felt the barrel press against the nape of his neck as Drago’ pulled the trigger three times. Three pointless clicks, the Desert Eagle was unloaded, Nicolas had removed the bullets from the magazine before slipping the pistol into the jacket pocket: “If he doesn’t touch the pistol, he’s your brother; if he’s the one who already tried once to put you down, then he’ll try again,” L’Arcangelo had said. And here was the proof.
Nicolas shut his eyes and let Drago’ get away.
* * *
Drago’ sought safety toward the border of the neighborhood; he ran without ever turning around, out of fear he’d see Nicolas appear just yards behind him, with the pistol aimed at him, that pistol he’d just dry-fired three times, hearing three empty clicks. He ran until his legs felt hard as wood and there were flames blistering his lungs, but he found that that pain helped him to think more clearly because it seemed to sweep away all useless thought, and like a sieve left behind only the thoughts that could actually prove useful.
When Nicolas had taken him up to his apartment after the visit to the bank, just the two of them alone, Drago’ felt certain Nicolas wanted to kill him. But instead, he no
w understood, it had been a test. A test he’d failed. He felt like crying, but he couldn’t give in to that impulse, he had to run, run as hard as he could. In the meantime, he couldn’t stop thinking that now he had Nicolas and the rest of the paranza against him. My friends, my brothers are all against me now, Drago’ kept thinking. And what about me? What side am I on?
Outside Forcella, in the territories where he usually felt most exposed and vulnerable, he felt free for the first time.
And the thing is, I’ve always been faithful, always a loyal bro, even when Micione summoned me, Drago’ kept telling himself, repeating it obsessively. I pointed the gun at your head because I thought you were the one who wanted to kill me, that’s what he wanted to write to Nicolas. But what good would that do him? Now I’m just the umpteenth traitor the paranza is ready to rub out—with the image before his eyes of Biscottino dying.
The shocks that started from his calves rose to his thighs and then radiated out to his brain. Another burst of adrenaline, and, mile after mile, he wasn’t even surprised to have reached San Giovanni a Teduccio. He stopped to catch his breath and turned to look behind him. No one. Drago’ started to feel a wisp of hope. He’d crossed the boundary. He’d chosen what side he was on. The family had called him once, and he’d spat on his own flesh and blood, but now he understood that flesh and blood was the only thing left to him.
Below Micione’s building he started shouting: “Viola! Diego!” The confidence and familiarity that allowed him to summon the big bosses by their first names brought the guards down. “What?”
“I need to talk to Micione. I’m … I’m his fratocucino,” said Drago’, describing himself with that term for the first time.
“Flesh and blood is all I have left,” he told Micione. Diego Faella had put on the expression of a boss surprised at such brazen recklessness, but then he’d welcomed him in. Already on the freight elevator, Drago’ felt right at home, just like the first time he’d entered the lair on Via dei Carbonari.
“Is Genghis all right?” he asked Micione, to groom him a little and win him over.
Micione smoothed his goatee: “He lives like a king: he eats and drinks, he’s better off than the rest of us, trust me!” And he burst out laughing. He’d gone back to the cheery tone of their first meeting there. “Luigi’,” he said as he laid a hand on his shoulder, “I don’t want to know what happened to you. Maybe you had an illumination, I don’t care. You’re here, and that’s what matters. You’re family. And together, we’re going to get Maraja.”
Micione figured all he had to do was sit down by the riverbank and wait for his enemy’s corpse to come bobbing along: after that good-for-nothing fool had promised to bring him Maraja’s hide and then vanished after killing the wrong man, now here was Drago’, having come around spontaneously. The first one had gone wrong, but Drago’ had what it takes, as well as the right blood: he’d rub out all the other Bambini, the other members of the Piranhas, and he’d give him back the city’s historic center.
“Now we need to get Maraja and that’s all we need to do,” Micione went on, “you don’t need to think about anything else. Now get out of here.” And together they rode the freight elevator down to the ground floor, but instead of ushering him out the gate, he walked him down a long hallway and then through a door that gave onto the rear courtyard. “You’d better not let anyone see that you’ve been here. We need to come up with a strategy,” Micione explained to him with a wink.
From behind, emerging from the dark, Viola appeared, surprising them both.
“Ciao, Viola,” said Drago’.
“You see?” said Micione. “He’s come home. To his family.”
Viola kept her eyes on Drago’, studying him, scrutinizing him.
“Better late than never,” she said at last. Drago’ stepped close to give her a hug but she gestured for him to follow her, and walked over to a gate with a security camera. She typed a code into a luminous panel and the lock clicked open.
“I wonder how happy ’o Viceré is that you’ve finally found your way home. Have you already told him?”
“No,” he replied, and that was when Viola quickly drew a compact revolver from her handbag and pulled the trigger. She shot him right in the forehead, right at the hairline of that head of hair that had won him his nickname.
Micione jerked, startled, blurting out a “What the fuck!” and immediately bending over the corpse of the boy, as it collapsed lifeless to the floor. Viola, on the other hand, simply put the revolver away without a word and, just as she had come, turned on her heels and left.
“Viola, ua’,” Micione thundered, yelling after her, “what the fuck have you done? This guaglione could have come in handy…”
Viola turned partway around, as regal as a lioness: that’s why Micione had fallen in love with her immediately.
“We can’t do anything with someone who has nothing but lies in their eyes,” she said. “Have the guaglioni take his corpse out and leave it in the street. Let’s toss him to Forcella. If it hasn’t already emptied out.” She looked at the pool of blood spreading across the floor. “This has to be business.”
FORGIVENESS
He was two people at the same time. That was an idea that he’d had before, but one he’d have been unable to put into words, because he’d never known the right ones.
There was once the ’o Selvaggio who had run a piazza, attracting important customers, men from law enforcement, celebrities capable of paying with more valuable favors than mere cash. The ’o Selvaggio who, when ’o White died, had dreamed that the Longhairs could become his paranza; after all, he’d earned his valor on the field, and so he went to Micione directly and asked for the investiture. Micione had turned him down, but the reason he was called ’o Selvaggio in the first place is that he was a bit of a savage, capable of extreme acts. And so, in order to win an audience, he had presented himself at the boundary of San Giovanni a Teduccio with a sign and a bucket of paint. Then, indifferent to the chilly temperature, he’d stripped buck naked and painted himself blue. The sign read: “I want my piazza back.”
“He looks like the guy from Avatar,” passersby had commented. Micione’s guards had intercepted him immediately, and, frightened by what he might do if they rejected him another time, they’d taken him to Via Sorrento, and in the end, Micione had come downstairs to talk to him, because he was scaring everyone away. Once upon a time, there’d been the ’o Selvaggio who’d spilled everything to Micione. The paranzas uniting, the war against his empire, Nicolas’s upcoming moves. The ’o Selvaggio who’d been able to force Micione to make a deal. “You give me back my piazza and I’ll rub out Maraja.” Micione had accepted; after all, he had nothing to lose.
Then there was ’o Selvaggio who had failed, who hadn’t been able to kill Nicolas, and who’d taken off at top speed down Corso Umberto, slaloming between the cars stuck in the traffic jam, until he reached the statue of Victor Emmanuel II. He’d taken off the full-face helmet and made a decision that he never dreamed he would make. He’d called his mother, he’d interrupted the chatter she poured into the phone, she didn’t understand the reason for that unexpected phone call just as the whole neighborhood was seething with activity because there’d been a shoot-out, and in the end he’d told her that he was going to take a vacation. “You’re coming to see me, aren’t you?”
’O Selvaggio had left the scooter on the roundabout; after all, from there to police headquarters it was just five minutes on foot.
* * *
So it had been Drago’.
I always trusted him, always. To me, he was a friend, a brother, something closer than blood, Nicolas thought to himself as he rode around on his TMAX, indifferent to which street he turned down, which direction he took. He hadn’t told anyone yet that Drago’ had turned out to be a traitor, that the paranza had harbored another Higuain close to its breast. He thought back to when Drago’ had told him about the way things had gone with Micione: Fool that I was, I eve
n believed him! Who knows how long Drago’ had been scheming to kill him and take his place on the throne. Envy, the desire to shed honor on his name, the frenzy to become boss, must all have eaten at him for a long time. But Nicolas hadn’t suspected a thing, just went on trusting him, defending him against anyone around him who whispered suspicions about him. He searched his memory for the moment when something must have changed … that time that he’d taught him to drive, was he already hearing the clarion call of blood? And during their expedition in Rome, when he’d sulked the whole time, claiming it was about the car, but maybe it was really because he didn’t want to insult his cousin like that …
It’s pointless, brooding over it won’t do a bit of good, he thought, speeding up.
He’d always been good at looking ahead; turning around and looking back was just painful, because you can’t change the past, there’s no strategy, no action you can take, however ingenious, that can change even a jot of what’s gone before. The only thing I can do, he thought, is flush Drago’ out of hiding, the same way I took care of Dentino.
As he was formulating that thought, he found himself in front of Poggioreale Cemetery, where Christian now lay. Maybe it’s no accident that I wound up here, he thought. He left the scooter out front, bought a spray of five small white roses from a flower vendor, and went in.
He was walking past the vaults and he saw all those pictures of old people, the women with hair cut short and light blue in color, the men with watery eyes that reminded him of nothing so much as the eyes of elephants. And then, in among them, there were muccusielli, youngsters, and even the occasional nennillo, or little child, with an angel by their name. He thought about Cristiana, as yet unborn, and already his heart was aching at the idea of all the dangers that awaited her, out in the world and in that city. But he would protect Cristiana, he wouldn’t make any of the same mistakes he’d made with Dentino, and even with that traitor Drago’. He’d keep a thousand eyes glued to his surroundings, and he had plenty of money in the bank; even if he was gone, Letizia and Cristiana could live their lives without worries. He lengthened his stride; he’d almost arrived.
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