The Sicilian - Mario Puzo [153]
He turned over in the bed, and it seemed to him there was a lighter pool of blackness on the floor nearby. He reached over and turned on the bedside lamp. The pool became the severed head of the black Madonna. He thought it had fallen off the table and the sound had brought him awake. He relaxed and smiled with relief. At that moment he heard a small rustling sound at the door. He turned toward it, and in the shadows the dim orange light of the lamp did not quite reach, he could see the dark bony face of Aspanu Pisciotta.
He was sitting on the floor with his back against the door. The mustached mouth was spread in a triumphant grin, as if to say, so much for your guards, so much for the security of your sanctuary.
Michael looked at his wristwatch on the night table. It was three o’clock. “You keep strange hours—what were you waiting for?” he asked. He got out of bed and dressed quickly, then opened the shutters. The moonlight entered the room like a ghost, appearing and disappearing. “Why didn’t you wake me up?” Michael said.
Pisciotta rolled to his feet like a snake raising its head on its body to strike. “I like to watch people sleep. Sometimes in their dreams they shout out their secrets.”
“I never tell secrets,” Michael said. “Not even in my dreams.” He stepped out on the terrace and offered Pisciotta a cigarette. They smoked together. Michael could hear Pisciotta’s chest rattle with suppressed coughs and indeed his face looked ghastly in the moonlight, the bones skeletal.
They were silent. Then Pisciotta said, “Did you ever get the Testament?”
“Yes,” Michael said.
Pisciotta sighed. “Turi trusts me more than anyone on earth—he trusts me with his life. I am the only person who can find him now. But he did not trust me with the Testament. Do you have it?”
Michael hesitated for a moment. Pisciotta laughed. “You are like Turi,” he said.
“The Testament is in America,” Michael said. “It is safe with my father.” He did not want Pisciotta to know it was on its way to Tunis simply because he did not want anyone to know.
Michael almost dreaded to ask the next question. There could be only one reason for Pisciotta to be visiting him so secretly. Only one reason he had risked evading the guards surrounding the villa; or had he been passed through? It could only be that finally Guiliano was ready to appear. “When is Guiliano coming?” he said.
“Tomorrow night,” Pisciotta said. “But not here.”
“Why not?” Michael asked. “This is safe ground.”
Pisciotta laughed, “But I got in here, didn’t I?”
Michael was irritated by this truth. He wondered again if Pisciotta had been passed in by the guards under the order of Don Domenic, or even brought here by him. “It’s for Guiliano to decide,” he said.
“No,” Pisciotta said. “I must decide for him. You promised his family he will be safe. But Don Croce knows you are here, so does Inspector Velardi. Their spies are everywhere. What do you plan for Guiliano? A wedding, a birthday party? A funeral? What kind of foolishness do you tell us? Do you think we are all donkeys here in Sicily?” He said this in a dangerous tone.
“I’m not going to tell you my plan of escape,” Michael said. “You can trust me or not as you choose. Tell me where you will deliver Guiliano and I will be there. Don’t tell me and tomorrow night I will be safe in America, while you and Guiliano are still running for your lives.”
Pisciotta laughed and said, “Spoken like a true Sicilian—you haven’t wasted the years in this country.” He sighed. “I can’t believe it will finally be over,” he said. “Almost seven years of fighting and running, of betrayals and killing. But we were the Kings of Montelepre, Turi and myself—there was glory enough for both of us. He was for the poor and I was for myself. I never believed at first, but in our second year as outlaws, he proved it to me and all of our band. Remember I am his second in command, his cousin, the man he trusts most. I wear the belt