"What did you tell him?"
The clerk's eyes fell again to the twenty-dollar bill. He smiled and said, "Well, really . . . what is there to tell, Mr. Lambretta? You're registered here. You deal in cash, not credit cards. You're quiet, mind your own business, and . . ." He flashed Bolan a hopeless look.
"And I lay a hundred on the ponies every morning with my friendly local bookmaker," Bolan added.
The clerk's eyes darted to left and right but the smile did not leave his face. "Loose talk is not very sporting, Mr. Lambretta," he said nervously. "I'd appreciate it if you wouldn't speak so casually of such, uh, connections."
Bolan retrieved the twenty, leaned away from the desk and unbuttoned his coat, allowing it to stand open to reveal the snubbed .32 nestling there as he dug into his pocket and produced a money-clip. He returned the twenty to the clip, extracted a fifty, and dropped it in front of the clerk. The man's eyes shifted from the gun to the new bill lying on the counter. He nervously wet his lips and said, "I really don't see . . ."
"I don't want you to see anything," Bolan said pleasantly. "And I don't need to stand here playing games with my bankroll. I could just drag you across that desk and slap you silly. You think of that?"
Apparently the thought had crossed the clerk's mind. The words came then in a warmly conspiratorial stream. "The man just wanted to know who you were and what your connections are, Mr. Lambretta. I figured you had nothing to hide. I told him how long you'd been here and what a quiet, cultured man you seem to be. Oh, and I believe I told him that Mrs. D'Agosta had called for you here a time or two. Was I indiscreet? I hope not. Mrs. D'Agosta is such a fine young lady . . . certainly too young to be widowed. It's a shame, such a shame."
"And you told him about the ponies."
"Yes sir, I believe I did. Oh, but I'm sure it's quite all right. I have handled bets for this gentleman also."
"So who is he?"
The clerk's lower lip trembled. "A Mr. Marasco. I believe they call him Honey Marasco. Odd name for such a burly person, but that's . . ."
"And you told him about my mail?"
The clerk's face was becoming contorted with the evidence of an inner conflict becoming apparent. "I . . . uh . . . Marasco is connected with Julian DiGeorge, Mr. Lambretta. You're aware, certainly, that Mr. DiGeorge is Mrs. D'Agosta's father. So, all things considered, I saw no harm in . . . in . . ."
"You told him about my mail!"
"Yes sir. I told him that you had received letters from New Jersey and Florida. Was I violating a . . ."
Bolan said, "No, no, forget it," and pushed the fifty into the clerk's sweating palm. He was smiling as he crossed the lobby and went out the door. The cover was falling into place.
Chapter Twelve
Thin blood
"This guy is just a cheap hood, bambina," DiGeorge told his daughter. Though he despised the use of old-country phrases in general conversation, the bambina was an endearment he used whenever he wished to emphasize the intimate nature of a father-daughter relationship. Andrea understood this bit of family psychology and went along with it. The so-called generation gap was nowhere more evident than in the DiGeorge household. Mother and daughter had long ago lost all semblances of a common ground for unemotional conversation; indeed, Mama was rarely at home these days, preferring to spend most of her golden age on the Italian Riviera. Between father and daughter, bambina had become a sort of trace word, with a history reaching back to the aftermath of Andrea's first paddling at the age of three. So, bambina had become a place to bury the hatchet, or to gloss over ruffled sensitivities, or to smooth the way for an unpleasant bit of news, which DiGeorge obviously presumed that he was now delivering. "He don't even have any connections," the troubled father continued. "He's a free-lancer, a punk, a two-bit rodman and drifter who's for hire to the world at large. I hate to tell you this, but you got to be careful who you bring into the home, baby. A free-coaster like this could cause all sorts of trouble to your Poppa's business arrangements. Besides, a guy like this is just going to wind up with a bullet in the neck and a weeping widow, and he's liable to take someone with him. Now I'm not trying to say I should pick your friends, but . . . well . . . listen, bambina, you're in the know now, and you know how careful your Poppa has got to be."
"Where did you get all this information?" Andrea asked in a surprisingly casual tone.
"Hey, it's my business to know things."
"Yes, I realize that, Poppa," Andrea said patiently, "but your sources are off the track this time. Frank is a . . . a . . . well, I don't know how he makes his living and I don't even care. He's first class in my book and that's all I care to know." Her veils came down and she sank her hooks into the tenderest area of her father's psyche. "After all, where would I be now if Momma had asked you for a character reference 30 years ago?"
"Ah, ah, ah," DiGeorge groaned. He banged his elbow against the wall and worked his fingers into a series of fists. "You're not trying to be reasonable, bambina," he said. "You're just trying to make your Poppa feel like a heel. Okay, okay. I feel like one. But not because of anything I ever did to you or for you. So I've done some things I don't want to strut around and talk about — so any man can say the same. Times have changed now, the world has changed, and there ain't no room in it for two-bit rodmen anymore. Hey, you think your old man hasn't always had his wife and kid's best interests in mind? Huh? You think that?"
"You'd have cut Momma's throat and mine too at the first demand of your blood brothers, and you know that's true," Andrea replied dismally. "Even now you'd do it. 'Our thing' first, last, and always — isn't that the way it is, Poppa? Above family, above state, above God even, loyalty to 'this thing we have' — isn't that right, Poppa?"
Andrea had again struck a raw nerve. The color had drained from DiGeorge's face when his daughter spoke the phrase "our thing." He laughed nervously and said, "Hey, where are you getting this stuff? These fairy tales you been listening to, eh? Who's been telling my bambina these old-country fairy tales?"
"They're not fairy tales, and they're not old-country," Andrea stated flatly. "The vintage is the late twenties or early thirties, and the origin is strictly New York, a long ways from the old country. The whole thing is common knowledge now, Poppa. I wouldn't be surprised if it isn't being taught in American History classes. So who're you trying to kid? You'd better get modem and get with it. The Mafia and the Cosa Nostra are one and the same, the whole world knows it, and you're up to your eyes in it, and I know who you are and what you are. So don't come around here giving me the bambina routine and trying to tell me that the daughter of a common hood is too good to become the wife of one. Like mother like daughter, Poppa. You're stuck with us both, so you may as well decide to make the most of it."
Julian DiGeorge was not angry. Nor even hurt, now. He was frightened, and saddened. "Okay, so you wanted to hurt the old man and you've hurt him," he said quietly. "Okay, I guess I don't blame you. And I guess I'm glad it's out in the open now, so I can see the claws coming before they scratch. You're a hundred percent right, bambina. Deej was a nothing until the brotherhood came along and made him a somebody. You're right. I got no fancy schooling like you did, and I didn't grow up with roasted pheasants for breakfast neither."
He raised his arms to shoulder level and gazed around the luxurious surroundings as though perhaps seeing them for the first time ever. "As for a place like this — when Deej was a kid, a place like this was strictly from fairy tales. Everything you got, remember this, you owe to this thing of ours. The Cosa Nostra, yeah, it gave you the clothes on your back and the food in your belly and yeah, your old man is loyal to a thing like this and if you had any sense, you,d be too instead of smart-mouthing it. And you better remember this smart-mouth, you ain't so wrong as to just be digging your Poppa with emptiness. What you said was right, about throats getting cut and such. It could happen to anybody, even to a Capo's bambina. Eh? You thought I'd deny it? Well, Deej is not denying it. If I was a Miss Smart Mouth, I think I'd be damn careful where my words were going and what they was saying about my Poppa's friends. Huh? Deej is big, sure, the biggest thing west of Phoenix, but not as big as God, bambina. When an order comes down from the top, it comes down, and a hit is a hit, and it don't ask whose daughter is this or whose wife is this."