Mario Puzo - Fools die

Valerie was proud of her son’s graduating day. A few years ago we realized he really couldn’t read, yet was getting promoted each semester. Valerie was mad as hell and started teaching him to read, and she did a good job. Now he was getting top grades. Not that I wasn’t mad. It was another grudge I had against New York City. We lived in a low-income area, all working stiffs and blacks. The school system didn’t give a shit whether the kids learned anything or not. It just kept promoting them on to get rid of them, to get them out of the system without any trouble and with the least amount of effort.

Vallie was looking forward to moving into our new house. It was in a great school district, a Long Island community where the teachers made sure all their students qualified for college. And though she didn’t say it, there were hardly any blacks. Her kids would grow up in the same kind of, to her, stable environment she had had as a Catholic schoolchild. That was OK with me. I didn’t want to tell her that the problems she was trying to escape were rooted in the illnesses of our entire society and that we wouldn’t escape them in the trees and lawns of Long Island.

And besides, I had other worries. I might be going to jail instead. It depended on the grand jury I would appear before today. Everything depended on that. I felt lousy when I got out of bed that morning. Vallie was taking the kids to school herself and staying there for the graduation exercises. I told her that I was going into work late, so they left before me. I got my own coffee, and as I drank it, I figured out all the things I had to do before the grand jury.

I had to deny everything. There was no way they could trace the bribe money I’d taken, Cully had assured me of that. But the thing that worried me was that I had had to fill out a questionnaire as to my assets. One question was did I own a house. And I had walked a thin line on that. The truth was that I had put a down payment on a Long Island home, a deposit, but there had not yet been a “closing” on the house. So I just said no. I figured I didn’t own a house and there was nothing said about a deposit. But I wondered if the FBI had found out about that. It seemed it must have.

So one of the questions I could expect the grand jury to ask would be if I had made a deposit on a house. And then I would have to answer yes. Then they would ask me why I hadn’t put it down on the sheet and I would have to explain that. Then what if Frank Alcore cracked and pleaded guilty and told them about our dealings when we had been partners? I had already made up my mind to lie about that. It would be Frank’s word against mine. He had always handled the deals by himself, nobody could back him up. And now I remembered one day when one of his customers had tried to pay me off with an envelope to deliver to Frank because Frank was not in the office that day. I had refused. And that had been very lucky. Because that customer was one of the guys who had written the anonymous letter to the FBI that started the whole investigation. And that had been pure luck. I had refused simply because I didn’t like the guy personally. Well, he would have to testify that I wouldn’t take the money and that would be a point in my favor.

And would Frank crack and throw me to the grand jury? I didn’t think so. The only way he could save himself would be to give evidence against someone higher up in the chain of command. Like the major or the colonel. And the catch there was that they were not involved at all. And I felt Frank was too decent a guy to cause me grief just because he was caught. Besides, he had too much at stake. If he pleaded guilty, he would lose his government job and pension and his Reserve rank and pension. He had to brazen it out.

My only big worry was Paul Hemsi. The kid I had done the most for and whose father had promised to make me happy for the rest of my life. After I had taken care of Paul, I had never heard from Mr. Hemsi again. Not even a package of stockings. I had expected a big score from that one, at least a couple of grand, but those initial cartons of clothing had been it, the whole thing. And I hadn’t pushed it or asked for anything. After all, those cartons of clothes were worth thousands. They wouldn’t “make me happy for the rest of my life,” but what the hell, I didn’t mind being conned.

But when the FBI began its investigation, it got onto the gossip that Paul Hemsi had beaten the draft and been enlisted in the Reserves even after he got an induction notice. I knew that the letter from the draft board rescinding his induction notice had been pulled from our files and sent to higher headquarters. I had to assume that the FBI men had talked to the draft board clerk and that he had told them the story I had given him. Which would still have been OK. Nothing really illegal, a little administrative hocus-pocus that happened every day. But the word was out that Paul Hemsi had cracked under the FBI interrogation and had told them that I received a bribe from other friends of his.

I left the house and drove by my son’s school. It had a huge playground with a basketball court of cement, the whole area fenced by high wire-mesh fences. And as I drove by, I could see that the graduation exercises were being held outside in the courtyard. I parked my car and stood outside the fence, clinging to the wire.

Young boys and girls barely in their teens, they stood in orderly rows, all neatly dressed for the ceremony, their hair combed, their faces scrubbed clean, waiting with childish pride for their ceremonial passing into the next step toward adulthood.

Stands had been erected for the parents. And a huge wooden platform for the dignitaries, the principal of the school, a precinct politician, an old grizzled guy wearing the blue braided overseas cap and 1920’s-looking uniform of the American Legion. An American flag flew over the platform. I heard the principal saying something about not having enough time to give out the diplomas and honors individually, but that when he announced each class, the members of that class should turn and face the stands.

And so I watched them for a few minutes. After each announcement a row of the young boys and girls swung around to face the stand of mothers and fathers and other relatives to receive their applause. The faces were filled with pride and pleasure and anticipation. They were heroes this day. They had been praised by the dignitaries and applauded now by their elders. Some of the poor bastards still couldn’t read. None of them had been prepared for the world or the trouble they would see. I was glad I couldn’t see my son’s face. I went back to the car and drove to New York and my meeting with the grand jury.

Near the federal courthouse building I put my car in the parking lot and went into the huge marble-floored hallways. I took an elevator to the grand jury room and stepped out of the elevator. And I was shocked to see benches filled with the young men who had been enlisted in our Reserve units. There were at least a hundred of them. Some nodded to me and a few shook my hand and we made jokes about the whole business. I saw Frank Alcore standing by himself near one of the huge windows. I went over to him and shook his hand. He seemed calm. But his face was strained.

“Isn’t this a lot of shit?” he said as we shook hands.

“Yeah,” I said. Nobody was in uniform except Frank. He wore all his WW II campaign ribbons and his master sergeant stripes and longevity hash marks. He looked like a gung-ho career soldier. I knew he was gambling that a grand jury would refuse to indict a patriot called back to the defense of his country. I hoped it would work.

“Jesus,” Frank said. “They flew about two hundred of us up from Fort Lee. All over a bunch of crap. Just because some of these little pricks couldn’t take their medicine when they got recalled.”