The Scarlet Thread (13 page)

“Charlie darling,” Angela said, “would you really like to go there?”

“Oh, Mum, could we? You mean it? A week'd be fine, if we could manage it.”

“I think we could afford more than a week,” she told him. “On one condition.”

“Anything,” he promised. “Just name it!”

“You don't read upside down from now on. And when we get back, you work really hard at school.”

“Don't you worry. I'll get distinctions in every subject! New York. I can't believe it. Wait till I ring up Jordan and tell him!”

“Not on my phone you don't!” Hugh Drummond called after him as he rushed into the house. “They jabber on for hours, these young people. No idea of the cost.… Can you afford this, Angela? I can help out a bit if need be. Always thought America was damned expensive. He was jumping up and down, wasn't he? Very excited.”

“Yes, he was,” Angela agreed. “Don't worry, Dad. I've got some extra money. Mum's dividends have been very good lately. Charlie deserves a real treat. He's had such good reports every term. He'll love New York. We'll go.”

Thanks to David Wickham, they'd been lent a small apartment on East Seventieth Street. Two bedrooms, a living room and two bathrooms. And the luxury of television. Wickham had provided them with a list of restaurants that were good but not expensive and some suggestions for sightseeing. Her new employer had asked her to contact two clients, whose offices were on Park Avenue. She could call them after a few days.

Charlie loved everything. He loved American food, American soft drinks, hamburgers and ice cream. They went to the Frick Collection, which Charlie enthused about just to please Angela, and to the Statue of Liberty. They walked up into the dizzying height of the great head and looked out onto the panorama of the Hudson River. In Central Park, they joined the stream of foot traffic down myriad paths and took a ride in a horse-drawn carriage. They strolled down Broadway at night, marveling at the lights, and went to see the latest hit movie. The variety in restaurants was staggering. They ate German and Chinese, Indian and Japanese. And the days sped into each other until one morning Angela realized that it was time she paid David Wickham back for all his kindness.

The first client gave her an appointment in his office at eleven o'clock and then invited her out to dinner. He was a very important manufacturer of luxury leather goods, with stores in seven major cities. He was also friendly and, in true American style, eager to show her the best restaurant in the city. She accepted and left Charlie in the apartment for the evening, with a supply of Coke and hamburgers, in front of the television.

“I've got a headache,” Clara Falconi stated. “I've had a headache for three days. Not that you give a damn, of course.”

Steven didn't even turn around. He knew all about Clara's headaches. He'd said to her once, driven beyond patience by her complaints about her health, his family, and their life together, “You've got a headache, but I've got you. And Jesus, that's some headache, I can tell you!”

It had led to one of their worst rows. He stayed away for a week, while she calmed down and went to see yet another specialist. There were no children after nine years, and no explanation either. She didn't conceive, and Steven broke every male taboo by going for tests himself, although he knew they were a farce. He'd already got one woman pregnant. His tests showed a high fertility count. At least it gave him a respite from Clara, who was always accusing Angela of deceiving him. More than anything, he wanted to stop her taunting him with that.

She dismissed the idea of adoption with scorn. He didn't press it. He didn't want someone else's child.

“Ever since Sunday,” Clara said, “I've had this goddamned pain in my head. You know I hate those lunches with your father and mother and your brother and his bitch of a wife sneering at me. They push those children up my nose every chance they get! I won't go again. I've made up my mind.”

He turned and said, “My father likes to have the family for Sundays. And when he asks us, Clara, we go. Like we go to your family. I don't hear you griping about that.”

“They understand,” she retorted. “They're
my
family. Don't you think Papa's disappointed? Don't you think he'd like grandchildren?”

“After nine years, he's forgotten.” Steven was brutal. Aldo Fabrizzi was no friend to him. Clara had seen to that. But he went to the Fabrizzi house anyway for the family gatherings, and Clara was not going to disrespect his parents by refusing to accompany him.

“Well, I'm not coming tonight,” she countered. “My head's bursting. You can entertain your senator on your own.”

“Okay.” He didn't argue, though the senator would be bringing his wife. He was a valuable contact. There was talk of a federal investigation into gambling, an open hearing before a Senate committee. That had really alarmed Steven, and he needed the senator's news and views.

It had taken five years of pressure to divest the old warrior Musso of his monopoly. His son had died of a heroin overdose. Fabrizzi had arranged for someone to give him a lethal fix. But Musso gathered his men and held fast. He wanted no partners, and he loosed a little well-aimed violence at the Falconi and Fabrizzi families himself. Some minor characters had died.

The Falconis and Fabrizzis were so well guarded that it was impossible to target them. They bought up property as close to the Musso casinos as they could. He was constantly surveyed by enemies, and several times fires broke out in the gambling halls. People began to drift away. Musso's take was dropping. He was old, his son was dead. Not long afterward, he had a mild heart attack. Suddenly the fight was over. There was a meeting, at which Steven was present, and the truce was arranged. The deal cut Musso in for a good percentage of his own profits, and control passed directly to the Falconis, with the Fabrizzis as equal financial partners. Steven was given the management of that side of the business. And he had built it up steadily over the last four years into a huge investment, branching out into hotels and restaurants and resorts, with the gambling as a lure. It was Steven's idea, too, to entice Hollywood stars down to entertain the clients. A veil of respectability was drawn over the uglier side of the organization. It became a kind of show biz spectacle.

And he had remembered Monte Carlo. Class was all-important to attract the big-time spenders. The smoky rooms full of housewives risking their few dollars on a crooked wheel were offset by the plush salons and tuxedoed attendants paying court to the superrich.

Steven was a big shot now: respected, admired and feared. When he talked, even the older men listened. He had proved himself by using his brains. There were plenty of others to supply the brawn. Lucca Falconi was right to be proud of his eldest son. Of course he was proud of his younger boy, Piero, too, with his clutch of handsome children. But Piero wasn't clever like Steven; he was tough, and he made his father think of the old days, when a man had to think fast and act faster to stay alive. But the old days were gone. Now they were in a business just like any other.

Steven finished dressing. Clara watched him bitterly. She wondered whether he would call up some other woman and take her along. There were always other women. Like her empty womb, her jealousy obsessed her.

No, she decided. The senator took bribes from the families, but he was careful of his reputation. Steven wouldn't antagonize him by taking out one of his whores instead of his wife. She hoped her absence would embarrass him. She hoped one day she could hurt him as he had hurt her. He picked up his wallet, buttoned his jacket and went to the door.

“Steven”—her voice commanded his attention—“don't wake me when you come in.”

“Take a sleeping pill,” he said, and went out.

He had a driver and a man sitting in the front seat keeping watch. The car was plated and the windows were bulletproof glass.

“Les A,” he told them, as his bodyguard ushered him into the back seat. He leaned against the leather cushion, searching for a cigarette.

She wouldn't come with him. Okay, she wanted to be persuaded, cajoled. She wanted to do her duty as a wife and make out it was some kind of favor. To hell with her. He said it to himself, lighting the cigarette, seeing the traffic weaving in and out. There'd been a murder attempt on him eighteen months before, as he rode along like this, alone in the back seat. A car had pulled up alongside at an intersection, and suddenly the window was rolled down and a gun was pointing at him. The glass shattered but held. His driver didn't take a chance. He shot the lights and sped to safety. Nobody knew who was responsible. He and Clara had been going through a particularly bad time in their marriage when it happened. They lived a life of hell together, and there couldn't be a divorce. Not while Aldo Fabrizzi was alive. When he died, Steven would file against her outside New York City, and she could do her goddamnedest after that. His father hated her; all the Falconis hated her now. Not just because she was childless, but for the bile on her tongue and the arrogant way she behaved.

He dismissed her from his mind. He had business to attend to. Maybe it would be a pleasant evening. He liked the food at Les Ambassadeurs. His taste had changed over the years, and the mammoth Italian meals his relatives and compatriots enjoyed didn't appeal to him much. Clara wouldn't eat more than a mouthful of pasta. She said it ruined her figure. She was very conscious of her looks and spent lavishly on clothes and furs and treatments. She was beautiful as a mature woman, but he couldn't bear to sleep with her anymore.

The senator and his blond wife were waiting at the bar. Steven kissed the woman's hand gallantly; she thought he was very attractive. Dangerous too. She liked that. The men ordered Scotch on the rocks, she chose a brandy sour, and they moved to a cocktail table. Steven had been making small talk, apologizing for Clara's absence, when he happened to look straight at the door and saw Angela walk in ahead of an older man. The lights were flattering, not too bright, and the atmosphere a little hazy with tobacco. But he saw her. She even hesitated for a few seconds, so that he had time to stare at her and make sure he wasn't going crazy.

“Mr. Falconi?” the senator's wife inquired. He didn't answer. He didn't hear her speak. He sat and stared at a dead woman who had come to life and was smiling, walking toward a table not twenty yards away.

“Mr. Falconi, do you have a light? I've left my lighter at home.”

It was the second time she'd asked. He felt for the gold Dunhill and clicked it for her.

“I'm sorry,” he managed to say. “I've just seen an old friend. Excuse me.”

He didn't go up to her. He went to the barman. “There's a man and a woman over there. Do you know them?”

“I know him. Mr. Forrest. He comes here often. I don't know the lady.”

“Are they booked for dinner?”

“I guess so. He asked for the menu.”

“What the hell's he doing?” the senator murmured to his wife.

“I don't know. He's talking to the barman, not an old friend.”

“They're funny guys,” her husband said. “I'm sorry, honey; I'm going to have to talk a few things over with him. It won't take long. I thought his wife would've been here.”

“That's okay.” She smiled at him. “I don't mind. Just so long as you throw me a word now and then.”

Steven leaned closer to the barman. He had money in his hand. Quite a few folded bills were visible.

“Get Louis,” he said. “Tell him to call the lady to the phone when they're at dinner. And give me the nod before he does it. You got that clear?”

“No phone to the table?” the man inquired.

“No. Out in the booth.”

“You know her name? Who's calling her?”

“Try Drummond,” Steven said. “Don't say who's calling. There's fifty here. Twenty-five for you, the same for Louis. No mistakes.”

“No mistakes, Mr. Falconi.”

He went back to his guests and said, “Shall we go to our table? I've reserved in the back room.”

As they went out, he glanced behind him. She was sitting with her back to him. He could see the shining blond hair and the set of her neck on her shoulders. It wasn't an illusion. It couldn't be. He'd heard everyone has a double somewhere in the world, but he didn't believe it. Even with her back to him, he knew it was Angela. How could she have left him so heartlessly? His rage was growing. He went through the motions of ordering dinner and studying the wine list, while he watched and waited for her to come back into the restaurant. He had to see her once more in a clear light, making allowances for sixteen years.

She was different, of course. The girl of twenty was in her thirties now, older and sophisticated. She wore a black dress, very simple, and had the same sun-colored hair he used to thread through his fingers. She had the same kind look in her eyes. But it was the slight smile, the one he had imagined on her lips so often at the height of his frantic grieving, that engulfed him in anger. He had to keep his hands out of sight, because they shook with the force of it.
She wasn't dead
. She'd cheated him. She'd let him believe she and their unborn baby had been destroyed by a bomb.

The senator was talking about the federal investigation. “You know what it is when these sons of bitches get their teeth into a thing like this. However straight your operation is, they're going to start screaming corruption and racketeering.”

“I know,” Steven heard his own voice answering and was surprised at how normal it sounded. “That's why it's so important for us to know what line they're going to take, so we have a chance to put our case. We'll have the best legal advice, but we don't want to get caught up in an investigation, be subpoenaed. My father's not so young, and he's got a weak heart.” The lies tripped off his tongue, while anger twisted his insides into knots.