Mark Winegardner - The Godfather returns

“So who feeds the meat eaters?” Geraci asked. The Corleone Family’s greatest asset was the network of people it kept on its payroll. “I know a lot of the cops and union people we have, some of the judges and the D.A.s, but I’m sure I don’t know the half of it. And the politicians, forget it. All I know is rumors.”

Geraci had been running most of the Family’s business in New York, but the connection guys were under Michael and Hagen.

“Tom will be in touch with you,” Michael said. “There will be a transition period. When I took over from my father, it took him and Tom six months to explain everything to me.”

“I guess if it’s possible to make the transition from one leader of the free world to another in two months, I can figure all this out in six.”

Michael chuckled.

“You’re really not going to use our judges and cops and so on?” Geraci asked. “You’re giving that up?”

“Did I say that? I said I have no more need for the income from the businesses you run.”

“Sure,” Geraci said. “I understand. You’re out.”

“Don’t be naive, Fausto. There are plenty of men on the president’s transition team who are feeding more meat eaters than we do.”

So there’s retired and then there’s whatever it is that you are, Geraci thought. Got it.

“And the seat on the Commission. Do I have one, or is that you?”

“That’s me for now. You’ll have one eventually. Get yourself organized, and after that the Commission will take care of it. I don’t think there’s going to be any problem with that.”

They discussed several other specific issues. The car crossed the park again and started back down Lexington Avenue-hardly a neighborhood for a murder. They really weren’t going to kill him. Michael still hadn’t learned who was really behind his brother’s betrayal. But Geraci wasn’t taking any chances.

“Speaking of excellent sources,” he said, “I want you to know something. They tried to kill your brother.”

“Who tried to kill my brother?”

“Louie Russo. Fuckface.”

“My brothers are dead.”

“A while ago. I just learned about it.”

“Which brother?”

It unnerved Geraci that Michael could call Hagen my brother one moment and say My brothers are dead the next. “Fredo. It was a botched hit, and Russo called it off. Remember Labor Day?”

Geraci didn’t need to say which Labor Day. Michael nodded.

“After Pete’s kid’s wedding, Fredo wound up in a motel in Canada. With-I don’t know how to say this-with another man. The button guys were supposed to make it look like Fredo killed himself out of shame or what-have-you. I’d tell you that it was a setup, a frame-up, except for a few things.”

The problem with Michael’s poker face was that when he put it on, you noticed it.

“First,” Geraci said, “when Russo’s men got to the motel, Fredo was gone but there was still someone there-a salesman; nice job, wife, kids-and he’s naked on the bed. Second, the button guys open the door, and the salesman pulls a gun and shoots them. The gun’s a Colt Peacemaker with the serial number filed off. It may have been Fredo’s gun, maybe not, but he definitely lost a gun on that trip-Figaro told me that-and Fredo loved those Colts. Anyway, the salesman kills one guy, wounds the other. Next day, someone chloroforms a nurse, slits the wounded guy’s throat, then buries the knife in his eye up to the hilt and leaves it there. The day after that, the salesman goes to meet with his lawyer, and that’s the last anybody ever sees him. Other than his hands, that is, which someone chopped off and mailed to his wife.”

“You’re saying Don Russo covered his tracks.”

“I’m saying that, yes.”

“Why didn’t they come after Fredo again?”

“The idea was to embarrass the Family. You named Fredo sotto capo, and right after that it turns out he’s queer. I’m not saying he was, all right? I’m just giving you information.”

Michael nodded.

“If they made it look like he offed himself,” Geraci said, “that would’ve been the end of it. No revenge, no nothing. Our organization is hurt, and they benefit. They were mad about Las Vegas. They thought of it as their turf. But then after… you know. The crash. My crash. It wasn’t necessary anymore, at least for a while. I can’t prove it, but it stands to reason that Russo was behind the tragedy with your brother. Fredo was out in L.A. half the time, and L.A. was where he betrayed us.” Geraci raised his eyebrows, shrugged. “L.A. equals Chicago, right?”

It was no secret among the made members of the Family that Michael had ordered his own brother killed.

“How do you know so much?” Michael said. “How did you learn these things?”

“I’ve got a guy,” Geraci said. “Somebody inside the FBI.”

“The FBI?” Michael said, clearly impressed. The FBI-the director’s peccadillos notwithstanding-was considered incorruptible.

“The gun Fredo was arrested with in L.A. when he killed that dog? Also a Colt with its serial number filed off. In the lab they were able to use acid and bring the number back up. Same with the gun from Windsor. They were both part of a shipment that our guy in Reno got and sold to nonexistent people. Thank God not to Gerald O’Malley. Oh, and one more thing.”

Geraci reached in his coat pocket for the closest thing he had to a concealed weapon-a cigarette lighter: jeweled, made in Milan, engraved CHRISTMAS 1954. He tossed it to Michael.

“Recognize this?”

Michael’s face reddened. He turned the lighter over in his small, perfectly manicured hand, then made a fist, covering it. Almost covering it.

“The salesman said it belonged to the other guy,” Geraci said. “Listen, Michael, I feel awful about this. If you want me to go after Russo, say the word and it’s done. I’ll come at him with everything we got.”

Michael turned to face the window. For several blocks he tapped the fist with the lighter in it against his chin.

Geraci was bluffing. He didn’t have anyone in the FBI. He’d heard those Colts all came from the same dealer and hoped that was right. He’d gotten the lighter from Russo, who’d gotten it from the salesman’s killer.

But Geraci was serious about going after Russo. He’d had peace in his regime for five years. He had a hell of a war chest. The last few years, Cesare Indelicato, the Sicilian capo di tutti capi, had been providing Geraci not only with heroin and other drugs but also personnel. Geraci had a whole crew of zips now, over in Bushwick, there on Knickerbocker Avenue, and he’d been setting up some of the legal immigrants with jobs in pizza parlors all over the Midwest, quietly tossing dough and making a little of it until the time may come for them to do Nick Geraci a favor. Men like that, living as law-abiding good neighbors for years in Kenosha, Cleveland Heights, or Youngstown, could go on “vacation,” do a job on somebody, come home, and nobody would ever in a million years connect them to some dead gangster eight hundred miles away. If Richie Two Guns was as good as he seemed, Geraci was confident the Corleones could cripple the Chicago outfit and make those animals answerable to the New York Families again. And, of course, Geraci could in the process cover his tracks for his role in manipulating Fredo to betray his brother. Better to do it on Michael’s say-so (with Michael having to answer to the Commission for it) than for Geraci to worry about whether to do it later.

“Thank you just the same,” Michael finally said. “But as I told you, I’m retired.”

The car stopped. They were back on First Avenue, in front of the Roach’s bar. Geraci wondered if Michael had really been thinking all that time or if he’d simply waited until the end of the drive to answer.