Viper - Michael Morley [54]
Franco Castellani searched deep inside himself. There was no trace of self-respect. Only a stinking sump-oil residue of painful memories. His jailbird father, his runaway mother and his current fleapit, hand-to-mouth existence. Finding respect was impossible.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said and kissed the top of his grandfather’s head. ‘I know I disappoint you. Mi dispiace.’
Before Antonio could reassure him, Franco had pulled away from his grandfather and was gone. Leaving the wind to slam shut the rusty old door of the van.
43
Napoli Capodichino
Salvatore Giacomo’s knees cracked as he bent to pick up the morning mail behind his apartment door.
It was his fiftieth birthday. Not many people knew that. Even fewer cared.
The mail included several free newspapers, an electricity bill, but no cards. He sat alone in the kitchen of his one-bedroomed rental. Although he was a couple of blocks back from the busy A56 he could still feel the steady rumble of traffic. He breakfasted on instant coffee and old cheese slices. As he ate, he thought about his half-century on earth. What did it amount to? A little cash in a number of false bank accounts. Run-for-the-hills money. Start-all-over-again dough. He’d never use it. Never spent much, anyway. He didn’t drink, didn’t smoke, didn’t have friends. He just worked and came home. What money the Don gave him went on rent, cheap food and the savings he’d never need. Don Fredo had said to put something away every month, so he’d done that. He’d always done whatever the Don had said.
Sal guessed he saw Fredo as a father figure. A replacement for his old man. He’d been nine years old when his parents had split up. He still remembered the fearful row; his father slapping his mother’s face and calling her a cheating slut, then storming off. A father one minute. A memory the next. Then strange men came to stay at the apartment, men who looked at him with spiteful eyes. He hated his mother for letting them in. Into the house. Into his father’s bed. It wasn’t long before he ran away. Stayed with friends on the other side of Herculaneum or, in summer, camped out in the parkland around Vesuvius, killing wood pigeons and foxes. Then in his teens his mother disappeared and he pretty much made his own way in life. His brains and his fists helped him survive and stay one step ahead of the law.
The distinctive horn of the Mercedes sounding in the street shook him from his thoughts. Valsi had arrived and was waiting.
Sal pulled on the jacket of a navy-blue suit, adjusted his tie in the old tarnished mirror by the front door and, before leaving, checked just one more thing. His weaponry. Sal never opened a door without being ready to deal with anything that was on the other side. It was that level of caution that had got him through the first fifty years of his life, and he hoped would get him through many more years. For that reason, Sal didn’t carry just one gun, he carried two. Matching Glock 19s, snugly concealed in a double shoulder holster. The pair gave him a minimum of thirty rounds of 9mm ammunition. What’s more, if one jammed or got dropped, then that was no shit, he just pulled the other one. If he was caught in a firefight, he could also throw the spare to whoever was with him. The horn sounded again. Capo or no Capo, the fucker could wait. He took a leak, locked up and left the building.
‘Sal, you’re slower than a snail,’ shouted Dino Pennestri from the driver’s seat as he approached the car. ‘We should call you Sal the Snail.’
Giacomo said nothing. He slipped in the back, alongside Bruno Valsi, who greeted him with a curt ‘Buon giorno.’
They drove in silence for about a minute. Valsi shifted in his seat so he was half facing Sal. He wore an open-necked black and blue striped shirt and had a cream suit jacket across his lap. ‘I’ve got a little surprise for you,’ he deadpanned.
Sal waited. Valsi tilted