Английский язык с Крестным Отцом
Шрифт:
boy's godfather and had a duty to speak, came to Don Corleone one evening and
informed him that his son had taken part in an armed robbery, a stupid affair which
59
could have gone very badly. Sonny was obviously the ringleader, the two other boys in
the robbery his followers.
It was one of the very few times that Vito Corleone lost his temper. Tom Hagen had
been living in his home for three years and he asked Clemenza if the orphan boy had
been involved. Clemenza shook his head. Don Corleone had a car sent to bring Santino
to his offices in the Genco Pura Olive Oil Company.
For the first time, the Don met defeat. Alone with his son, he gave full vent to his rage,
cursing the hulking (громадный,
неповоротливое судно) Sonny in Sicilian dialect, a language so much more satisfying
than any other for expressing rage. He ended up with a question. "What gave you the
right to commit such an act? What made you wish to commit such an act?"
Sonny stood there, angry, refusing to answer. The Don said with contempt, "And so
stupid. What did you earn for that night's work? Fifty dollars each? Twenty dollars? You
risked your life for twenty dollars, eh?"
As if he had not heard these last words, Sonny said defiantly (с вызовом), "I saw you
kill Fanucci."
The Don said, "Ahhh" and sank back in his chair. He waited.
Sonny said, "When Fanucci left the building, Mama said I could go up the house. I
saw you go up the roof and I followed you. I saw everything you did. I stayed up there
and I saw you throw away the wallet and the gun."
The Don sighed. "Well, then I can't talk to you about how you should behave. Don't
you want to finish school, don't you want to be a lawyer? Lawyers can steal more
money with a briefcase than a thousand men with guns and masks."
Sonny grinned at him and said slyly, "I want to enter the family business." When he
saw that the Don's face remained impassive, that he did not laugh at the joke, he added
hastily, "I can learn how to sell olive oil."
Still the Don did not answer. Finally he shrugged. "Every man has one destiny," he
said. He did not add that the witnessing of Fanucci's murder had decided that of his son.
He merely turned away and added quietly, "Come in tomorrow morning at nine o'clock.
Genco will show you what to do."
But Genco Abbandando, with that shrewd insight that a Consigliori must have,
realized the true wish of the Don and used Sonny mostly as a bodyguard for his father,
a position in which he could also learn the subtleties (subtlety –
изощренность, хитрость; subtle – тонкий, нежный; утонченный) of being a Don. And
60
it brought out a professorial instinct in the Don himself, who often gave lectures on how
to succeed for the benefit of his eldest son.
Besides his oft-repeated theory that a man has but one destiny, the Don constantly
reproved Sonny for that young man's outbursts of temper. The Don considered a use of
threats the most foolish kind of exposure (выставление /на солнце, под дождь/;
подвергание /риску/; to expose – выставлять, подвергать действию /дождя, солнца/;
подвергать риску); the unleashing (to unleash – спускать с привязи) of anger without
forethought as the most dangerous indulgence (потворство своим слабостям
[in'dldGns]; to indulge – позволять себе удовольствие, давать себе волю). No one
had ever heard the Don utter a naked threat, no one had ever seen him in an
uncontrollable rage. It was unthinkable. And so he tried to teach Sonny his own
disciplines. He claimed that there was no greater natural advantage in life than having
an enemy overestimate your faults, unless it was to have a friend underestimate your
virtues.
The caporegime, Clemenza, took Sonny in hand and taught him how to shoot and to
wield a garrot (владеть гарротой /шнуром для удушения/). Sonny had no taste for the
Italian rope, he was too Americanized. He preferred the simple, direct, impersonal
Anglo-Saxon gun, which saddened Clemenza. But Sonny became a constant and
welcome companion to his father, driving his car, helping him in little details. For the
next two years he seemed like the usual son entering his father's business, not too
bright, not too eager, content to hold down (удержать, не потерять) a soft job.
Meanwhile his boyhood chum and semiadopted brother Tom Hagen was going to
college. Fredo was still in high school; Michael, the youngest brother, was in grammar
school, and baby sister Connie was a toddling girl of four. The family had long since
moved to an apartment house in the Bronx. Don Corleone was considering buying a
house in Long Island, but he wanted to fit this in with other plans he was formulating.
Vito Corleone was a man with vision. All the great cities of America were being torn by
underworld strife (борьба, раздор). Guerrilla wars by the dozen flared up, ambitious
hoodlums trying to carve themselves a bit of empire; men like Corleone himself were