Английский язык с Крестным Отцом
Шрифт:
surburban life where his reputation was not known. He bought the mall property in Long
Beach, which at that time had only four newly built houses but with plenty of room for
more. Sonny was formally engaged to Sandra and would soon marry, one of the houses
would be for him. One of the houses was for the Don. Another was for Genco
Abbandando and his family. The other was kept vacant at the time.
A week after the mall was occupied, a group of three workmen came in all innocence
with their truck. They claimed to be furnace (печь,
town of Long Beach. One of the Don's young bodyguards let the men in and led them to
the furnace in the basement. The Don, his wife and Sonny were in the garden taking
their ease and enjoying the salty sea air.
Much to the Don's annoyance he was summoned into the house by his bodyguard.
The three workmen, all big burly fellows, were grouped around the furnace. They had
taken it apart, it was strewn around the cement basement floor. Their leader, an
authoritative man, said to the Don in a gruff (грубый, сердитый) voice, "Your furnace is
in lousy shape. If you want us to fix it and put it together again, it'll cost you one hundred
fifty dollars for labor and parts and then we'll pass you for county inspection." He took
out a red paper label. "We stamp this seal on it, see, then nobody from the county
bothers you again."
The Don was amused. It had been a boring, quiet week in which he had had to
neglect his business to take care of such family details moving to a new house entailed
(to entail – влечь за собой). In more broken English than his usual slight accent he
asked, "If I don't pay you, what happens to my furnace?"
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The leader of the three men shrugged. "We just leave the furnace the way it is now."
He gestured at the metal parts strewn over the floor.
The Don said meekly, "Wait, I'll get you your money." Then he went out into the
garden and said to Sonny, "Listen, there's some men working on the furnace, I don't
understand what they want. Go in and take care of the matter." It was not simply a joke;
he was considering making his son his underboss. This was one of the tests a business
executive had to pass.
Sonny's solution did not altogether please his father. It was too direct, too lacking in
Sicilian subtleness. He was the Club (дубинка), not the Rapier. For as soon as Sonny
heard the leader's demand he held the three men at gunpoint and had them thoroughly
bastinadoed (приказал как следует отколотить; bastinado [bжsti’neidu]–
удары) by the bodyguards. Then he made them put the furnace together again and tidy
up the basement. He searched them and found that they actually were employed by a
house-improvement firm with headquarters in Suffolk County. He learned the name of
the man who owned the firm. Then he kicked the three men to their truck. "Don't let me
see you in Long Beach again," he told them. "I'll have your balls hanging from your
ears."
It was typical of the young Santino, before he became older and crueler, that he
extended his protection to the community he lived in. Sonny paid a personal call to the
home-improvement firm owner and told him not to send any of his men into the Long
Beach area ever again. As soon as the Corleone Family set up their usual business
liaison with the local police force they were informed of all such complaints and all
crimes by professional criminals. In less than a year Long Beach became the most
crime-free town of its size in the United States. Professional stickup artists and strong-
arms received one warning not to ply (усердно работать, заниматься чем-либо; ply –
сгиб, складка; уклон, склонность) their trade in the town. They were allowed one
offense (обида, оскорбление; проступок, нарушение; преступление). When they
committed a second they simply disappeared. The flimflam (трюк, мошенническая
проделка) home-improvement gyp (мошенничество; плут) artists, the door-to-door
con men (жулики /сленг/) were politely warned that they were not welcome in Long
Beach. Those confident con men who disregarded the warning were beaten within an
inch of their lives (чуть не до смерти; within an inch of = closely, near to). Resident
young punks who had no respect for law and proper authority were advised in the most
fatherly fashion to run away from home. Long Beach became a model city.
What impressed the Don was the legal validity (действительность, законность
[v'liditi]; valid [‘vжlid] – действительный, имеющий силу) of these sales swindles
(swindle – надувательство). Clearly there was a place for a man of his talents in that
other world which had been closed to him as an honest youth. He took appropriate
steps to enter that world.
And so he lived happily on the mall in Long Beach, consolidating and enlarging his