Warren Murphy - Mob Psychology

"It's the truth, I swear!"

The nibbler jerked up. It moved right, like a mechanical claw in a grab-the-prize carnival concession.

"I'm from Brooklyn, right?" Don Carmine was screaming. "I don't know my fuggin' ass from yesterday's paper."

"You do! You do! I know you do!"

The nibbler slashed to the right.

Tony screamed and tried to avert his face.

The hard nibbler point only brushed the tip of his nose, but it felt like the cartilage had been yanked off.

The point dropped. It started hammering again, this time in Tony Tollini's right ear. He was crying now, loud and without shame. He was asking for his mother.

When the sound stopped and Tony could hear a resonant ringing in both eardrums Don Carmine was saying, "Tell me about the guy Remo. You hire him off the street too?"

"It's true!" Tony swore, blubbering. "On my mother. It's true."

"Then how come he breaks my computer and three of my best guys end up dead? That's a fuggin' coincidence, right?"

"I don't know."

"So how come the Jap is trying to con me into buyin' my own hard-on disk back?"

"I don't know what you're talking about!"

The nibbler jumped up. It moved leftward again. Tony tracked it with his eyes. The concrete on either side of his head was shattered. The only place left for it to go was his head, which suddenly felt as fragile as an eggshell.

When the point was poised over Tony's mouth, he shut it. The nibbler's engine started up. He could smell the diesel-exhaust stink.

The nibbler point retreated a few inches until it was over Tony's sternum.

Then it dropped.

The weight was like the Washington Monument on Tony Tollini's fragile chest. He couldn't breathe. But he could yell.

"I didn't do nothing! Ask Uncle Fiavorante. I didn't do nothing. On my mother, Don Carmine."

"You watch what you say about your mother, weasel," Don Carmine warned. "She is Don Fiavorante's sister. I won't have you defamin' the sister of Don Fiavorante with your fuggin cogsugger lies."

"Please. Don't kill me."

"Show him the ad, somebody," ordered Don Carmine.

A newpaper was thrust into Tony Tollini's field of vision. He blinked the blurry tears from his beady frightened eyes and scanned the crumpled page.

Smack in the middle of the racing results was a blackbordered notice. It read:

LANSCII DISK FOUND

WILL RETURN FOR PROPER REWARD CALL CHIUN 555-522-9452

"Chiun was the name the Jap gave," Don Carmine growled. He glared at Tony. "Your Jap."

"He's not my Jap," Tony moaned.

"You sent him."

"I hired him off the street, Don Carmine. Please don't nibble me to death like a baby duck."

"I own you, Tollini. If I wanna nibble you into the ground, I can. And you know why. Because I'm the fuggin' Kingpin of Boston, that's why. Now, tell me where the hard-on disk is."

" I don't know. I swear to God!"

"Okay, if that's the way you want it," said Don Carmine, jerking levers. The nibbler sank an eighth of an inch, but it made Tony Tollini's tortured sternum creak like a loose shutter in the wind.

"Had enough?"

"I swear," Tony sobbed.

The nibbler dropped again.

Now Tony could not breathe because his cracking ribs were compressing his lungs. His heart felt like it was about to burst.

He clicked his heels together and thought: There's no place like home. There's no place like home.

Abruptly the nibbler lifted. The pressure went away. When Tony opened his eyes, he could inhale again. He filled his lungs greedily.

A shadow crossed his face. He looked up. Don Carmine's brutish face was looking down at him. "Scared you, didn't I?" he said.

"Yes. Don't shoot me."

"I ain't gonna fuggin' shoot you." Don Carmine made motions with his paws. "Let him up, boys. Let him up."

Tony Tollini's head, wrists, and ankles were released, and he was hauled to his feet.

"What are you going to do to me?" he asked, his voice cracking.

"Nothin'. You're tellin' the truth. You gotta be. A weasel like you ain't man enough to be stand-up in the face of a nibbler." He swept his hands around to indicate the rusting

construction yard with its idle equipment and piles of metal. "How'd you like my latest acquisition?"

"You bought a construction company?" asked Tony, prying a rusty gear off' the back of his dirty Izod shirt.

"Naw. I just stuck a gun in the owner's face and he said it was mine. That's what I love about this state. Nothin's worth nothin' no more. So people don't put up a fuss when you take it away from them. I figure when things bounce back, I'll be in the driver's seat."

Tony found a hearty arm around his shoulders. He looked. It was Don Carmine's arm.

" I like you, Tony. Did I ever tell you I liked you?"

"No. "

"You're sharp. You got brains. You also got what we call intesticle fortitude." He shook a lecturing finger in Tony's miserable face. "This is a good thing to have."

They were walking toward the Cadillac now. Bruno the Chef opened the rear door. Carmine stepped in. Tony meekly walked around to the trunk and waited for the lid to be opened.

"G'wan," said Don Carmine. "Get in here. From now on, you ride up front with me."

Tony slid into the back seat. The others got in. The Cadillac pulled out of the construction yard.

"Something's up," said Don Carmine as they hummed south along Route One. Tony saw sights he had never seen before. A miniature golf course guarded by a twenty-foot-tall orange plastic dinosaur, strip joints with fruit names like the Golden Banana, the Green Apple, and the Pink Peach. Chinese restaurants sprouted along the roadside like deformed mock-bamboo mushrooms.

"What do you mean, boss?" asked the Chef.

"Something about this doesn't add up. Think about it."

Everyone thought. Even Tony Tollini, although thinking wasn't in his job description.

"Anything, any of yous?" asked Don Carmine.

"Nope."

"Naw. "

"I ain't got a thing," admitted the Maggot.

"Hah. That's why yous are all soldiers and I'm the kingpin. Listen up," said Don Carmine, ticking off points on his left hand with a stubby forefinger. "Tony hires this Remo character off the street. He breaks the box and whacks out Frank, Luigi, and Guido. Bing bang boom. Just like that. Dead. All three of 'em."

"Yeah?"

"What was the last thing I said before they dragged this Remo away?"

Everyone thought. The Maggot ventured an opinion.

"Scroom?"

"No, not scroom. I said, 'Get me a Jap.' Right?"

"Yeah. So?"

"You dummies. I say 'Get me a Jap' in front of this mook, Remo. He lams. I say 'Get me a Jap' to Tony here. And what happens?"

"He sends up a Jap."

"Right."

"So?" Pink Eye pointed out in a reasonable voice. "You're the Kingpin of Boston. Of course he sends up a Jap. Who wouldn't?"

"But follow my thinkin'. He wasn't any old Jap. He's a fuggin' thief. He robs me blind. Now he wants to sell me back my hard-on disk. What does that tell you?"

"Japs are crooks?"

"No. This is something new. There's someone on to us. You, Tony. This Remo. Why'd you send him?"

"I thought he would work out."

"You were wrong," Don Carmine snapped. "Why else?"

"Because he wrote that he would be the answer to my problems on his resume."

"Ba boom," crowed Don Carmine Imbruglia. "There it is. This guy's a plant. They were both plants. You were conned, Tony my friend."

"I didn't mean to be."

"It's okay. You're new at this. Someone's trying to muscle in on our operation. Okay, it happens. Now we know. They don't know that we know, but we know. That gives us the edge."

"So what are we gonna do, boss?"

"So far we're okay. They may be cops. We don't know. They may be feds. We don't know that. They may be the fuggin' KGB. We don't know that either. They don't know where we are on account of I shot that Fedex guy accidentally on purpose and we hadda relocate."