Nicolas was standing next to the DJ, in the cone of shadow cast by the floodlights. From there he could keep an eye on the club and see everyone all at once.
It was a new discotheque in Pozzuoli, just opened for business, and the paranza had been invited. Open bar, only for the paranza, the owners had guaranteed, and when they heard those two words, the paranza had been persuaded. Opening night was a success. The bodies weren’t dancing, there wasn’t enough physical space to sway and hip-swivel, so people just rubbed against one another, crammed together as if in an orgy that however still maintained the boundaries of common decency. In the churn of the crowd, the guys found themselves glued against girls who were perfect strangers; they held both arms high as if trying to grab the music as it sprayed out of the speakers, and they ventured to lower their arms only if they picked up on the slightest hint of an invitation, a warm gaze, a smile, and then down they went, both hands, into the sea of bodies, where everything was hidden and their hands were free to wander—and discover.
From his privileged vantage point, every so often Nicolas would identify one of his men, arms wrapped around his own girlfriend or else eagerly focused on cutting in on somebody else’s girlfriend. They were laughing, and they appeared to be utterly carefree. Nicolas, too, was laughing. But his laughter was edgy and bitter. Another brother had been killed. Pesce Moscio had fallen victim to his great undertaking. Nicolas had desired and planned out the death of Scignacane at Micione’s hands, and La Zarina had found out. These old people just wouldn’t stop rearing their heads; they couldn’t seem to get it through their skulls that he was the one riding the crest of the wave now. He knew that these were just the last lashes of the scorpion’s stinger, that sooner or later they’d be forced to knuckle under, just as you ultimately have to bow to God’s will. If God Almighty actually exists, thought Nicolas, who knows if He gets these stomach pains, who knows if He, too, lies awake at night mulling over strategy, money, and accounts.
He threw back a Moscow Mule in a single gulp, and he heard the roar of the crowd. At first he thought they were objecting to the DJ and his terrible music, but the minute he leaned out to look down he understood what was going on.
At the center of the club a small gap had opened in the crowd and all eyes were turned to Lollipop and a young man in torn jeans and a white skin-tight T-shirt. They were quarreling. Lollipop held both arms crossed behind his back, chest puffed out in a provocative stance. Behind him, handbag clutched to her oversized breasts and eyes downcast like a violated virgin martyr, stood Gloria, or whatever the hell her name was, Lollipop’s latest girlfriend.
“What do you think, that this good-looking guagliona is waiting for you?”
“Who the fuck do you think you are?” the other young man replied. “You’re too little for this guagliona.”
“Too little! Now I’ll take a shit right in your mouth.”
“Before I talk to you, you need to put your thoughts at rest, I’m not understanding a thing.”
Nicolas had seen it all, he’d heard it all. The guy had come on to Gloria. Gloria was Lollipop’s girlfriend. She was part of the paranza.
He rushed down to the center of the dance floor, where Lollipop greeted him by slapping a hand on his chest to make it clear to the other young man that things were about to turn very dark for him. The young man with the torn jeans recognized him and took a step back. The mass of spectators eager to relish the clash formed a sort of compact barrier, the perimeter of which the young man navigated while Nicolas stepped up to him, sniffing at him, first his head, then his neck and shoulders, and while the other young man did indeed start retreating, he never once took his eyes off Nicolas.
“So you get the point now?” asked Nicolas, and gave him a couple of slaps in the face.
The young man planted both feet wide, solid as a boulder. He’s not afraid of me, thought Nicolas, he’s not lowering his gaze, he wants to penetrate my eyes. He pulled out his pistol and killed him with a single shot to the forehead. Behind him, the smiling faces of the young crowd were splattered with blood.
A brief moment of silence, and then utter chaos. The security doors were taken by assault, but even then, they didn’t open instantly, creating swirling whirlpools of screaming bodies. Then, at last, they were flung open, and in the blink of an eye the club emptied out, even Nicolas’s paranza was outside now—perhaps swept away in the rush of the crowd, perhaps tugged away by their girlfriends. He left the corpse behind him on the floor, tucked the pistol into his pants pocket, and watched the discotheque empty.
The first to get back in was none other than Lollipop.
“Maraja,” he said, yanking on his arm, “what did you do that for?”
“He looked at me,” Nicolas retorted, and tried to shake loose from Lollipop’s grip, but now Lollipop grabbed his other arm as well.
“Hurry up! The sirens! Don’t you hear them?” And he dragged him toward the exit. “The cops are coming! Get moving!”
“What the fuck are you talking about!” But even as he was replying he recognized the shrill sound.
Yes, he could hear them now, and they sounded very close.
The paranza was waiting for him outside and they’d even already started his TMAX. They all took off, bent over the handlebars, heads lowered to cut through the air, like a flock of sparrowhawks. Behind them, the timid rays of the rising sun mixed with the flashing lights of the rushing squad cars. Then, nothing but the increasingly dense orange of broad sunlight as the new day got under way. The sirens were dying away now, the squad cars must have stopped at the new club. They slowed down a little. They’d made their escape.
They were heading away from home and toward the water, which was already blazing bright. Nothing could be more beautiful. They rode past Castel dell’Ovo, opening out in a fan shape like boats cutting across the water.
Briato’ slammed on the brakes, and Drone, riding right behind him, braked hard in his turn to keep from hitting him.
“What the fuck are you doing?” he said, but then he noticed the police car stopped at an intersection. Inside, two officers were staring out at them, but they showed no signs of being about to pursue them. Drone immediately veered away, and so did all the others: two other cars were now cordoning off the intersection they’d just passed through.
“Maraja…” yelled Tucano, but Nicolas didn’t let him continue, and instead pressed his thumb down on the TMAX’s horn. In the sleepy morning, that blaring sound was like a blasting cap. Out of the windows of the surrounding apartment buildings alarmed faces appeared here and there, and even the street began to fill with a few rubberneckers, who’d popped out of who knows where.
“Shoot,” Nicolas yelled, “put somebody down!”
Lollipop was the first to get his Beretta out and leveled, and he fired off a shot at an elderly man who hadn’t been quick enough to retreat behind the front door. He was still dressed in his boxer shorts, and a white sleeveless T-shirt covered with wrinkles clung to his skinny body. The bullet caught him in the belly and his creased old body, without resistance, folded up and dropped slowly to the sidewalk.
When Lollipop turned again to look for Nicolas, he’d already turned down a side alley. The cop cars took off, tires screeching, while people poured out of the buildings and into the streets, moving in the opposite direction from what instinct would have advised, as if salvation were out there, in the open. Tucano, Drone, and Briato’ revved wildly into the small knots of people forming on the sidewalks and found gaps that let them escape into the alleys.
Lollipop saw them vanish as he shoved the pistol down his pants and took off a few seconds later. But too late.
The cops were all over him.