Mario Puzo - The Last Don

Giorgio said, «You don't understand. Don't fuck around. You are already judged guilty. Where did you dump him?»

At the bar, Vincent turned away as though he could not look into his face. Behind him Cross could hear Petie coming closer to the sofa.

«Where's the proof?» Cross said. «Who says I killed Dante?»

«I do.» It was the Don who spoke. «Understand: I have pronounced you guilty. There is no appeal from that judgment. I brought you here to make your plea for mercy, but you must justify the killing of my grandson.»

Hearing that voice, the measured tone, Cross knew that everything was over. For him and Lia Vazzi. But Vazzi already knew. It had been in his eyes.

Vincent turned to Cross, his granite face softened. «Tell my father the truth, Cross, it's your only chance.»

The Don nodded. He said, «Croccifixio, your father was more than my nephew, of Clericuzio blood, as you are. Your father was my trusted friend. And so I will listen to your reasons.»

Cross prepared himself. «Dante killed my father. I judged him guilty as you judged me guilty. And he killed my father out of revenge and ambition. He was a Santadio in his heart.»

The Don did not respond. Cross went on. «How could I not avenge my father? How could I forget my father was responsible for my life? And I had too much respect for the Clericuzio, as my father had, to suspect your hand in the killing. Yet, I think you must have known Dante was guilty and did nothing. So how could I come to you to redress the wrong?»

«Your proof,» Giorgio said.

«A man like Pippi De Lena could never be surprised,» Cross said. «And Jim Losey at the other end is too much of a coincidence. There is not a man in this room who believes in coincidence. All of you know Dante was guilty. And Don, you yourself told me the story of the Santadio. Who knows what Dante planned after he killed me, as he surely knew he must. Next, his uncles.» Cross did not dare to mention the Don. «He counted on your affection,» he said to the Don.

The Don had laid his cigar aside. He face was inscrutable but held a touch of sadness.

It was Petie who spoke. Petie had been the closest to Dante. «Where did you dump the body?» Petie asked again. And Cross could not answer him, could not get the words out of his mouth.

There was a long silence and then finally the Don raised his head to all of them and spoke. «Funerals are wasted on the young,» he said. «What have they done to celebrate them? How have they inspired great respect? The young have no compassion, no gratitude. And my daughter is already crazy, why should we compound her grief and erase hopes for her recovery. She will be told her son has fled and it will take years for her to know the truth.»

And now it seemed that everyone in the room relaxed. Petie came forward and sat on the sofa beside Cross. Vincent, behind the bar, raised a glass of brandy to his lips in what could have been a salute.

«But justice or no, you have committed a crime against the Family,» the Don said. «There must be a punishment. For you, money, for Lia Vazzi, his life.»

Cross said, «Lia had nothing to do with Dante, for Losey, yes. Let me ransom him. I own half the Xanadu. I will transfer half that ownership to you as payment for me and Vazzi.»

Don Clericuzio seemed to ponder this. «You are loyal,» he said. He turned to Giorgio and then Vincent and Petie. «If you three agree, I will agree.» They did not answer.

The Don sighed as if in regret. «You will sign over half your interest but you must move out of our world. Vazzi must return to Sicily with his family, or not, as he pleases. That is as far as I can go. You and Vazzi must never speak together again. And I order my sons, in your presence, never to avenge their nephew's death. You will have a week to arrange your affairs, to sign the necessary papers for Giorgio.» Then the Don spoke in a less harsh voice. «Let me assure you that I had no knowledge of Dante's plans. Now, go in peace and remember I always loved your father like a son.»

When Cross left the house, Don Clericuzio got out of his chair and said to Vincent, «To bed.» Vincent helped him up the stairs, for the Don now had a certain weakness in his legs. His age was finally beginning to ravage his body.

ON HIS LAST day in Vegas, Cross De Lena sat on his penthouse balcony and looked down on the sun-drenched Strip. The great hotels — Caesars Palace, the Flamingo, the Desert Inn, the Mirage, and the Sands — blazed their neon marquees to challenge the sun.

Don Clericuzio had been specific in his banishment: Cross was never to return to Las Vegas. How happy his father, Pippi, had been here, and Gronevelt had built the city into his own Valhalla, but Cross had never really enjoyed their ease. True, he had enjoyed the pleasures of Vegas, but those pleasures always held the cold flavor of steel.

The green flags of the seven Villas dropped in the desert stillness, but one hung from the burned building, a black skeleton, the ghost of Dante. But he would never see all of this again.

He had loved the Xanadu, he had loved his father, Gronevelt, and Claudia. And yet he had in some sense betrayed them. Gronevelt, by failing to be faithful to the Xanadu; his father, by not being true to the Clericuzio; and Claudia, because she believed in his innocence. Now he was free of them. He would begin a new life.

What could he make of his love for Athena? He had been warned of the dangers of romantic love by Gronevelt, by his father, and even by the old Don. That was the fatal flaw of great men who would control their worlds. Then why was he now ignoring their advice? Why was he placing his fate at the mercy of a woman?

Quite simply, the sight of her, the sound of her voice, the way she moved, her happiness and her sorrow, all made him happy. The world became dazzlingly pleasurable when he was with her. Food became delicious, the sun's heat warmed his bones, and he felt that sweet hunger for her flesh that made life holy. And when he slept with her he never feared those nightmares that preceded the dawn.

It was now three weeks since he had last seen Athena, but he had heard her voice just this morning. He had called her in France to tell her he was coming, and he had caught the happiness in her voice because now she knew he was still alive. It was possible she loved him. And now, in less than twenty hours he would see her.

Cross had faith that someday she would truly love him, that she would reward him for his love, that she would never judge him, and that like some angel she would save him from Hell.

Athena Aquitane was perhaps the only woman in France who put on her makeup and clothes to try to destroy her beauty. Not that she tried to look ugly, she was not a masochist, but she had come to regard her physical beauty as too dangerous for her inner world. She hated the power it gave her over other people. She hated the vanity that still spoiled her spirit. It interfered with what she knew would be her life's work.

On the first day of work at the Institute for Autistic Children in Nice, she wanted to look like the children, to walk like them. She was overcome with the sense of identification. That day, she relaxed her facial muscles to their soulless serenity and limped in the weird, lopsided way of some of the children who had motor damage.

Dr. Gerard observed this and said sardonically, «Oh, very good but you're going in the wrong direction.» Then he took her hands in his and said gently, «You must not identify with their misfortune. You must fight against it.»

Athena felt rebuked and ashamed. Again her actress vanity had misled her. But she felt herself at peace caring for these children. It did not matter to them that her French was imperfect, they did not grasp the meaning of her words anyway.