Крестный отец, часть 1. Английский язык с Марио Пьюзо.
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Luca sat at the bar and Bruno Tattaglia went behind it. Luca refused the drink offered to him and lit a cigarette. It was possible that this would turn out to be something else, not the Turk. But then he saw Sollozzo emerge out of the shadows at the far end of the room.
Sollozzo shook his hand and sat at the bar next to him. Tattaglia put a glass in front of the Turk, who nodded his thanks. "Do you know who I am?" asked Sollozzo.
Luca nodded. He smiled grimly. The rats were being flushed out of their holes. It would be his pleasure to take care of this renegade Sicilian.
"Do you know what I am going to ask of you?" Sollozzo asked.
Luca shook his head.
"There's big business to be made," Sollozzo said. "I mean millions for everybody at the top level. On the first shipment I can guarantee you fifty thousand dollars. I'm talking about drugs. It's the coming thing."
Luca said, "Why come to me? You want me to talk to my Don?"
Sollozzo grimaced. "I've already talked to the Don. He wants no part of it. All right, I can do without him. But I need somebody strong to protect the operation physically. I understand you're not happy with your Family, you might make a switch."
Luca shrugged. "If the offer is good enough."
Sollozzo had been watching him intently and seemed to have come to a decision. "Think about my offer for a few days and then we'll talk again," he said. He put out his hand but Luca pretended not to see it and busied himself putting a cigarette in his mouth. Behind the bar, Bruno Tattaglia made a lighter appear magically and held it to Luca's cigarette. And then he did a strange thing. He dropped the lighter on the bar and grabbed Luca's right hand, holding it tight.
Luca reacted instantly, his body slipping off the bar stool and trying to twist away. But Sollozzo had grabbed his other hand at the wrist. Still, Luca was too strong for both of them and would have broken free except that a man stepped out of the shadows behind him and threw a thin silken cord around his neck. The cord pulled tight, choking off Luca's breath. His face became purple, the strength in his arms drained away. Tattaglia and Sollozzo held his hands easily now, and they stood there curiously childlike as the man behind Luca pulled the cord around Luca's neck tighter and tighter. Suddenly the floor was wet and slippery. Luca's sphincter, no longer under control, opened, the waste of his body spilled out. There was no strength in him anymore and his legs folded, his body sagged. Sollozzo and Tattaglia let his hands go and only the strangler stayed with the victim, sinking to his knees to follow Luca's falling body, drawing the cord so tight that it cut into the flesh of the neck and disappeared. Luca's eyes were bulging out of his head as if in the utmost surprise and this surprise was the only humanity remaining to him. He was dead.
"I don't want him found," Sollozzo said. "It's important that he not be found right now" He turned on his heel and left, disappearing back into the shadows.
Chapter 8
The day after the shooting of Don Corleone was a busy time for the Family. Michael stayed by the phone relaying messages to Sonny. Tom Hagen was busy trying to find a mediator (посредника) satisfactory to both parties (удовлетворительного,
Clemenza was tied up with Paulie Gatto. Tessio had been given the assignment of trying to track down the whereabouts of Luca Brasi (местонахождение). Luca had not been home since the night before the shooting, a bad sign. But Sonny could not believe that Brasi had either turned traitor or had been taken by surprise (врасплох).
Mama Corleone was staying in the city with friends of the Family so that she could be near the hospital. Carlo Rizzi, the son-in-law (зять), had offered his services but had been told to take care of his own business that Don Corleone had set him up in, a lucrative bookmaking territory in the Italian section of Manhattan. Connie was staying with her mother in town so that she too could visit her father in the hospital.
Freddie was still under sedation (успокоительные) in his own room of his parents' house. Sonny and Michael had paid him a visit and had been astonished at his paleness (удивлен, поражен его бледностью; pale – бледный) , his obvious illness. "Christ," Sonny said to Michael when they left Freddie's room, "he looks like he got plugged worse than the old man (словно ему больше досталось, чем старику; plugg – пробка, затычка; to plugg – затыкать, закупоривать; нанести сильный удар кулаком /сленг/)."
Michael shrugged. He had seen soldiers in the same condition (в том же состоянии) on the battlefield. But he had never expected it to happen to Freddie. He remembered the middle brother as being physically the toughest one in the family when all of them were kids. But he had also been the most obedient son to his father (послушный [∂'bi:dj∂nt]). And yet everyone knew that the Don had given up on this middle son ever being important to the business (отказался от этой мысли, оставил эту идею). He wasn't quite smart enough, and failing that (кроме того: «за неимением этого»), not quite ruthless enough (ruthless ['ru:θlıs] – безжалостный, беспощадный). He was too retiring a person (застенчивый, скромный, здесь – робкий: «отступающий, уступающий»), did not have enough force.
Late in the afternoon, Michael got a call from Johnny Fontane in Hollywood. Sonny took the phone. "Nah, Johnny, no use coming back here to see the Old Man. He's too sick and it would give you a lot of bad publicity (гласность), and I know the old man wouldn't like that. Wait until he's better and we can move him home, then come see him. OK, I'll give him your regards (передам твое почтение)." Sonny hung up the phone. He turned to Michael and said. "That'll make Pop happy, that Johnny wanted to fly from California to see how he was."
Late that afternoon, Michael was called to the listed phone in the kitchen by one of Clemenza's men. It was Kay.
"Is your father all right?" she asked. Her voice was a little strained (напряжен; to strain – натягивать, напрягать), a little unnatural. Michael knew that she couldn't quite believe what had happened, that his father really was what the newspapers called a gangster.
"He'll be OK," Michael said.
"Can I come with you when you visit him in the hospital?" Kay asked.