The Scarlet Thread (37 page)

Angela's color drained. “Steven, you can't! You can't go back. You'd be killed!”

“I swore an oath to my father; I swore it to my brother too. If there was trouble, I'd come back. Nothing can make me break that promise. Not even you, Angela.”

She said, “What about your son? What about Charlie? What do you think it'll mean to him if something happens to you? And it's not just Charlie, either, now.” She went back and sat on the bed.

He wasn't listening to her. He had become a stranger, a man caught up in a frightening, alien world.

“You go home to your father,” he said. “Get ready for Christmas. Maxton can close up here. I'll join you there as soon as I can.”

“No, Steven!”

He turned at the tone of her voice. “Angela, don't try to stop me. Please don't try to stop me. I have to do this.”

She said, “You can't go back and risk your life. You've got another family to think about. I'm having a baby. I was keeping it as a surprise for Christmas.”

She broke down and began to weep. He came and sat with her, taking her in his arms. She turned and clung to him.

“If you go you won't come back. You'll get drawn in. There'll be violence, killing—it'll be the end of everything for us.”

“You should have told me,” he said slowly. “You should have told me you were pregnant.”

“I had it all planned. My Christmas present to you, Steven. You've said you wanted another child, and I wanted one too, to make you happy. Try to make your father see sense. Try once more, before you do something that could destroy everything for us. You gave up the old life. You had no right to promise anything that meant getting involved in it again.”

He asked her, “What are you saying to me, Angela?”

She took a deep breath. “I'm saying this: I love you with all my heart, Steven. But you've got to find another way.”

Maxton went shopping for Christmas presents. A present for the old father; he found a nice antique backgammon set. He could teach the doctor to play. He'd cut his gambling teeth on that particular game when he was in his teens. A tennis racket for Charlie from a smart sports shop in Monte Carlo. He'd actually bought it for himself in the summer and never used it. For Angela, what? What could he give that was personal enough and yet not too personal? The bibelots from Hermès—scarves, expensive gold-plated key rings and costly knick knacks—were not Angela's style. In the end he chose silk-embroidered flowers in an oval frame. He wrapped it carefully. It was just possible that Steven might not be there when she opened it. His absence at Christmas had been hinted at, but not confirmed.

She had been crying on the morning they drove to the airport at Nice. She had a lot of luggage, he noticed. Steven drove them. He looked grim. In the departure lounge, Maxton pretended not to watch them say goodbye. His keen ears picked up their urgent whispers.

“Please, Steven, please change your mind! Don't go back!”

“I've got to go. We've been over and over it. It's the only way to make them listen. Oh, darling, I beg of you, try to understand.”

“I know what will happen. I know it'll be the end for us. You've broken your promise to me.… I've got to go now. They've called our flight.”

She literally pulled herself away from him and started off toward the gate. Falconi stood looking after his wife and then abruptly swung away and disappeared.

Maxton settled down in the seat beside her. He dug into his pocket. “From one coward to another,” he murmured. “Have a drop of this before we take off.” He held out a little silver flask of brandy. “It'll make you feel better.” He had unscrewed a tiny cup from the top.

Angela took it from him. “I don't think anything will do that,” she said, and drank it down.

The plane was taxiing onto the runway, the engines gathering power for the takeoff. She closed her eyes and then opened them, watching the ground speeding away from them outside the window.

“If you feel like clutching something …,” his voice said, and she gripped his hand as they lifted off with a thrust of the engines, the plane climbing steeply. “All over,” he said. “Hang on if you want to, in case we get a few bumps through the clouds.”

Angela said, “Thanks, Ralph. I'm all right now. It's just the takeoff I don't like.”

“I don't like the bumps,” he admitted.

“I think you're not frightened at all,” she said. “You're just saying it to make me feel better.”

They weren't holding hands anymore. The No Smoking and Fasten Seat Belts signs were switched off above their heads. People around them were relaxing, opening newspapers. There was a rattle as the drinks trolley started on its journey.

“You remember what you said when we took off?” Ralph Maxton reminded her. “If there's anything wrong and you think I could help, you will ask me, won't you, Angela?”

“Yes, Ralph, I will.”

He didn't press her further. He ordered a drink for them. There were English newspapers on board. She tried to read. She felt sick with the baby inside her and heartsick at what lay ahead. Her father and Charlie had to be protected up to the last moment, the facade that Steven was on business kept going till the holiday was over. He hadn't changed his mind. She wouldn't change hers. She was sure it would end in disaster.

SEVEN

They met in the back of a corner trattoria in the area where the first immigrants to New York had settled.

They'd come from Sicily, from Naples, from Calabria, from the bitterly poor industrial towns in the north, and made their home in the rat-ridden tenements and tumbledown shacks of a sprawling slum. It was known as Little Italy. The little food shops were still there, selling pasta and salami and wine from the old homeland; the cafés and restaurants, the tenement blocks, the Catholic-run schools and the big churches built with poor people's money; the funeral parlors and the flower shops, the markets where the old women liked to congregate and bargain, talking their native dialect. It was the heartland of the Mafia and its Neapolitan offspring, Cosa Nostra. The trattoria was owned by one of the New York families; they ran the gambling and the drug factories and the whorehouses in part of the neighborhood. They were affiliated with the Fabrizzis, who were much bigger and more powerful. It was just before Christmas and snowing, with savage temperatures. The men came in their cars, wrapped to the ears in coats and scarves, hats pulled low against the wind that blasted around the corner. They went in one by one and were shown to the room at the back. They took their places at the single large table. When the door opened and closed and the last man was in place, the meeting was called to order by Joe Nimmi, an old friend and business associate of Aldo Fabrizzi.

The brothers Roy and Victor Guglielmo were among the group. Joe Nimmi was a powerful man, a senior Mafia capo, respected for his loyalty and wisdom. He spoke with due solemnity. Everyone was quiet. “You all know why we've come together,” he said. “It's a sad day for me; maybe the saddest of my life. For forty years I've been a friend of Aldo Fabrizzi. We worked the streets together; we were like brothers. We fought side by side in those early days when the Irish tried taking over our territories. I've got the scars right here to prove it.” He laid a hand on his chest. “Aldo's become a big man. We respected him. We owed him loyalty. But I tell you, he's been cheating on us.” He looked around at them. “A few months ago he called us to a meeting. He says he wants to eliminate the Falconis to avenge his daughter's honor. But he lied. He had another reason. My niece Gina stayed in Aldo's house. I tell you the truth: I sent her there. I'd been hearing things I couldn't believe. Gina heard Aldo and his daughter talking business. Our business. She saw Clara reading the ledgers. Checking the figures. Aldo Fabrizzi wants the Falconis rubbed out. He wants the territories and their business to give to his daughter, Clara. He wants us working for her.” He paused, and there was an angry murmur. He said to Victor Guglielmo, “Isn't this true?”

“It's true,” Victor agreed. “They fixed the marriage so he could put the power in Clara's hands. Bruno's our boy. He admitted what was going on. We asked a few questions of our own. We found out she's running the protection for the garment business. There's a mouthpiece, but she's giving the orders.”

Joe Nimmi took it up. “Men have ruled our society as they rule their families at home. No woman has ever been admitted. We are the Men of Respect.” He gave the ancient Sicilian title in all its solemnity. “What he has done is a crime. A dishonor to us all. My friends, we swore an oath not long ago. It was a false oath. It doesn't bind me anymore. Are we to put a gun to Lucca Falconi's head, to kill so many of their family, so Clara can take us over?” There was a shout of “No” almost in one voice. He nodded. “What Aldo was planning would have meant war on the streets. We've had peace for many years. I say we keep that peace. We leave the Falconis alone. But I say Aldo Fabrizzi's life is forfeit. I call on you to vote.”

He sat down. One by one, hands were raised. There were no abstentions. It was a solemn moment. Victor Guglielmo asked the only question: “What about Bruno Salviatti?”

Joe Nimmi shrugged. “We'll think about Bruno,” he said. He cleared his throat. It had been a long, emotional speech. He asked for some water. Gradually the mood lightened. People started talking about family plans for Christmas. The meeting broke up, and they exchanged holiday greetings.

They left as they had come, one by one at intervals, speeding away in their cars, back to their homes or their offices. Joe Nimmi was the last to go. He stayed talking to the man and his wife who ran the trattoria; he shared a pot of coffee with them before going out into the cold. He gave them an envelope full of money and wished them a Merry Christmas. He pinched their plump little boy's cheek as he sat on his mother's knee.

“What a fine-looking boy,” he said. He slipped a ten-dollar bill into the mother's hand. “Buy him something from me.” He went outside into the street. It was nearly dark. A man in a Santa Claus costume was ringing a bell and collecting money for the poor.

“Mum, what's the matter?”

She was on her way out and Charlie was barring her way. “Nothing; nothing's the matter.”

“You've been crying,” he said, “I can tell. Why isn't Dad coming home? Come on, I'm not a baby. I want to know.”

“I told you, it's business,” Angela said. Charlie had grown amazingly since September. Grown and matured with the rapidity of his Sicilian blood. And he looked so like his father standing there. She had been a fool to think he wouldn't be aware.

“I don't believe it's business,” Charlie announced. “The casino's shut down for the winter, Ralph was telling me.… You've had a row, haven't you? He hasn't even phoned to speak to me.…”

“Yes,” she admitted. “We have had a row, Charlie. I didn't want him to miss Christmas. He may still change his mind. So don't worry about it, will you? Please?”

“Of course I'm worrying,” he said angrily. “It's just not like you two—you never row about anything. Mum …” He hesitated and turned red. “He hasn't met someone else, has he?”

“Oh, darling, no. It's nothing like that! I can't really talk about it. And I'm going to be late. Grandpa's waiting in the car. I must go.” She pushed past him.

If they went on discussing it, she might break down in tears. She had kept up a facade of cheerfulness, hoping to deceive her son. And hoping, in spite of everything, that Steven would call and say he'd changed his mind. She had noticed that Charlie was quite hostile to Ralph Maxton, and that disturbed her. Now she knew why. He resented any man but Steven near her.

“What kept you so long?” Hugh Drummond grumbled. “I won't have any time to get anything, at this rate.”

She had found him very frail and inclined to be querulous. He wanted to get an extra present for his grandson and something for Maxton. He was always saying how much he liked Maxton. Ralph was very good with the old man; he listened patiently to his rambling stories of his early days in medicine, never once showing that he was bored. And the preparations for Christmas went ahead, with the question hanging over her that was becoming less of a question with every day that passed. Steven wouldn't go back on his promise. His responsibility to his family came before his love for her, their son and the baby she was carrying. There would be a hideous bloodletting in America, and inevitably he would become part of it.

She said, “I'm sorry, Daddy. Don't worry, we've got plenty of time before the shops close.”

Charlie watched them drive away. He let the curtain fall back and stood staring down at the fire in the grate. He loved his stepfather. He wanted them all to be together, to celebrate this Christmas as they had the first one, just before his mother and Steven were married. He didn't want that beak-nosed bugger Maxton hanging around his mother either, making himself useful. The way he pandered to his grandpa turned Charlie's stomach. Charlie wasn't taken in. His grandfather's long stories about hospital life in the twenties couldn't possibly interest Maxton.

And now his stepfather was absent. A row about business, his mother had called it. A pretty serious row, to set them apart like this.

“Business my bloody foot,” Charlie announced out loud. His best friend, Jordan, the instigator of his trip to New York, had flunked out halfway through his end-of-term exams and been sent home. His parents were getting a divorce. The news had shattered him. Charlie was shattered too. If it could happen to Jordan, then it could happen to him too. Unless he did something about it. He had learned that from Steven. You didn't sit on your hands and wait for fate to slap you down. You got up and threw the first punch. Steven had told him this when Charlie was having trouble with one of the senior prefects.