The Fortunate Pilgrim - Mario Puzo [89]
One detective held the door open for Larry, and, as he walked out, he saw Mr. di Lucca standing at the bottom of the steps outside the precinct house.
Mr. di Lucca said, “Thanks, thanks,” and shook hands clumsily with the detective. Then he grabbed Larry by the arm and walked him down the street to a waiting car. The driver was a kid Larry had gone to school with and never seen since. He and Mr. di Lucca got into the back seat.
Then came the second surprise. Mr. di Lucca grabbed him by the arm and said in Italian, “Bravo, what a beautiful fellow you are. I saw his face, that animal, you did a lovely job. That bastard. Oh, you’re a beautiful fellow, Lorenzo. When they told me you hit him because he wouldn’t sell you bread, I was in heaven. Ah, if you were only my son.”
THEY WERE ON Tenth Avenue going downtown. Larry stared out the window at the railroad yard. It was almost as if he were changing second by second, each drop of blood, each bit of flesh, into someone else. He would never go back to work in the railroad yards, he would never be afraid as he had been in that station house. The whole majesty of law had crumbled before his eyes with that handshake between Mr. di Lucca and the detective; his swift rescue and the admiration that marked his freedom. He thought of the baker’s blood, of the baker’s arms outstretched to bar his escape, of the mad staring eyes above that smashed pulpy face, and he felt a little sick.
Larry had to speak the truth. He said, “Mr. di Lucca, I can’t go around beating guys up for the money. I don’t mind collecting, but I’m not a gangster.”
Mr. di Lucca patted him soothingly on the shoulder. “No, no; who does these things for pleasure? Am I a gangster? Don’t I have children and grandchildren? Am I not godfather to the children of my friends? But do you know what it is to be born in Italy? You are a dog and you scratch in the earth like a dog to find a dirty bone for supper. You give eggs to the priest to save your soul, you slip the town clerk a bottle of wine merely to bandy words. When the padrone, the landowner, comes to spend the summer at his estate, all the village girls go to clean his house and fill it with fresh flowers. He pays them with a smile, and ungloves his knuckles for a kiss. And then a miracle. America. It was enough to make one believe in Jesus Christ.
“In Italy they were stronger than me. If I took an olive from the padrone, a carrot, or, God forbid, a loaf of bread, I must flee, hide in Africa to escape his vengeance. But here, this is democracy and the padrone is not so strong. Here it is possible to escape your fate. But you must pay.
“Who is this German, this baker, that he can earn his living, bake his bread without paying? The world is a dangerous place. By what right does he bake bread on that corner, in that street? The law? Poor people cannot live by all the laws. There would not be one alive. Only the padroni would be left.
“Now this man, this German, you feel sorry for him. Don’t. You see how nice the police treat you? Sure, you’re my friend, but this baker, right around the corner from the police, he doesn’t even send coffee and buns over to make friends. How do you like that? The man on the beat, the baker makes him pay for his Coffee An. What kind of a person is this?”
Mr. di Lucca paused, and on his face came a look of almost unbelieving, finicky disgust.
“This is a man who thinks because he works hard, is honest, never breaks the law, nothing can happen to him. He is a fool. Now listen to me.”
Mr. di Lucca paused again. In a quiet, sympathetic voice, he went on, “Think of yourself. You worked hard, you were honest, you never broke the law. Worked hard? Look at your arms, like a gorilla from hard work.
“But there is no work. Nobody comes and gives you a pay envelope because you are honest. You don’t break no law and they don’t put you in jail. That’s something, but will it feed your wife and children? So what do people like ourselves do? We say, Good. There is no work. We have no pay. We cannot break the law, and we cannot