There were thousands of arrests. Those people destroyed our world. It wasn’t the incarcerations; our lands could immediately replace fathers with their children, children with grandchildren. But the real blow to our culture was psychological. No one trusted anyone, nor would they ever again. The army of predators that had marched the streets of Western Europe was disintegrating.
People like us were replaced by new depraved souls: Slavs, Albanians, Arabs, South Americans, Africans. Milan would never benefit from the revolution that took us down; it simply exchanged one criminal system for another. We were no saints but, paradoxically, we had represented minor danger for ordinary people. In our own way, we knew the moral codes, and when we violated them we did so mindfully. The new arrivals brought violence, bitterness, and blind, indiscriminate destruction. We were no better than they were, but at least when we were around, people hadn’t been afraid to go out; later, they were. Cash disappeared from circulation.
The avengers of the new regime, some in good faith and others less so, were wiping us out as they cleaned house. They were reducing Milan to a shadow of itself, and the people applauded. On the streets, criminals began to rape, bag-snatch, rob, and kill over nothing. The people, locked in their homes, watched thousands of children of the forest being led away in handcuffs, powerful politicians sweating and mumbling before the new courts, and they enjoyed the show.
We had certainly been evil, and we deserved to be punished. But justice made nothing better; even without people like us on the streets, the world failed to improve.
Drug dealers were doing real jail time now, while on the outside people complained that the criminals got off too easily. Nonsense. Pedophiles, rapists, thieves, pick-pockets, assassins and contract killers who took out mafiosi, politicians and poor, hungry migrants, would be released after a few days on the inside to go back to their important responsibilities to the Milanese. However, if your crime was included among those under Article 4b, if you were associated with mafia organizations or drug traffickers, you did real prison time, and it was hard time. You could forget about a reduced sentence.
It was only fair that they made us pay, but in the end it was only people like us who did time.
Not us, personally. In the eye of the storm, our group was grinding coke and making billions, undaunted and unscathed. It seemed as though the cops and informants had forgotten our names.
But Natalia’s living room had grown deserted; there were only a few of us left. It was at one of these survivors’ meetings that Rino passed me a typescript. “My friends thank you,” he said, “but there won’t be a need for this, the storm will pass, everything will work itself out.” I read the document later; it was in Luciano’s style. Only he would have been able to produce such a thing. It was a dossier, the first part of which described the vices, virtues, addresses, friendships, and habits of very famous people, as well as those of others who were perfectly unknown to me. According to Luciano, these were the main culprits of the current judicial revolution. The second part laid out a plan for their physical elimination, which would take place through the creation of a fictional subversive group, which Luciano had named the LAL, the Liberation Army of Locri, whose declared purpose was the autonomy of our region of origin and the liberation of all the prisoners born there. The true purpose of the organization, through multi-pronged attacks, was to kill the enemy targets.
The plan might have seemed impossible, but at that time we were in a position to implement it, or at least try. We could get hundreds of guys involved; we had the money, the weapons, and the lack of conscience required to pull it off.
I passed along the news to Luciano that Rino and his friends had refused the offer and returned the dossier. “With everything they did for us, we owe it to them,” he told me. “Call the others, we have to talk,” he said as he left.
All of us attended Luciano’s meeting, including Natalia. He spoke at length: “The three of us started off as desperate goatherds and rose up to challenge the Blood Brothers and the cops. Then Sante joined us, opening our eyes to many things and defending us to the death. In Milan, we met Sasà, who helped us arrive at unimaginable riches. We reunited with Santoro, and it was as if Sante were with us again. Natalia rejoined us. And then there was Tonino, Alfio, and other friends. United, we’ve traveled dangerous roads together, and we’ve achieved everything we set out to do and more. Now, the sun is setting on this world we’ve created. We belong, perhaps without knowing it, to an age that has already passed. Milan gave us so much, and took something from us, from inside of us. We live lives that are not our own, with people we no longer like, we operate on autopilot, waiting to crash. We have become the extras, not the protagonists, of a play directed by others. We’ll end up in a ditch or rotting in jail, with Don Peppino Zacco laughing at us. We’ll meet some fucking Albanian who will put six inches of steel in our stomachs. It’s just a matter of time. Still, apart from the tragedy of what happened to Sante so long ago, everything has gone all too well. We are, as they say, young and rich. We can still go out on top.”
Luciano paused to let his speech seep into our consciences. Then, knowing that he had to give Luigi and Sasà an extra push to convince them, he made a proposal. We would organize one last run—a huge one. We would sell all our remaining merchandise exclusively to the four or five larger groups that used us. He and Natalia would monetize the company shares, houses, and all the assets we held. Then they would move all our liquid assets into foreign bank accounts. In the meantime, Tonino would transport about ten billion lire and a decent supply of weapons to the South, storing it in the remote mountains of our countryside, where Stefano Bennaco and the four or five other interrelated families were living.
Once we organized the money and coke, we would finally close accounts with Zacco. After that, those who wished could follow us into whatever our next endeavor would be, or they could take their share of the money and do whatever they pleased.
We all welcomed the plan; it was liberating, and we were tired. Having a concrete goal gave us the motivation we needed to go on. Implementation would be difficult but not impossible. It was the right dream for the moment, and we felt united again after so much time swallowing our feelings.
We threw ourselves headlong into the operation; Sasà and Luigi organized a five-ton shipment. We contacted the major downtown traffickers and got them involved, making them pay a share of the costs of the trip up front. As soon as it arrived, the coke was delivered in huge quantities to the new members, who quickly got themselves out of the red. Santoro and Alfio transported our constant cash flow to Lugano, Switzerland, where Natalia and Luciano distributed it among our accounts, which had been opened in Brazil. Tonino threw himself into his assignment, traveling up and down the country by car. My brother, Gino, and his friends, Giulio and Ciccio, lent a hand.
We worked without pause for a few months. When just a few coins remained to be collected, we relaxed. Of all the real estate we’d held, we’d only kept a two-room apartment in via Spartaco, just behind the courthouse, where we stayed in anticipation of our departure in the coming days. We abandoned our usual precautions—no more weapons or false documents. We bought a small car for our trip in my name, since traveling no longer posed a risk.
We were in the habit of getting up just before noon, having breakfast at the Tre Marie on via Bergamo, taking a spin to get our appetites up, then heading to a small tavern in the Barona area, frequented only by sales representatives. One Friday morning, we finally decided that we were done. After the meeting we had planned for that afternoon, we would shut ourselves in the apartment until our departure the next day, destination Calabria.
We were ready for the best part.
But the best part came for us first.
After our usual breakfast, we got in the car, which I was driving. I first noticed them a few cars behind ours when we were in the thick of traffic on viale Liguria. That malicious sm
ile was unmistakable. Years had passed, but the smirk was the same: it belonged to the cop who had thrown Tonino his party, which we had spoiled by replacing the evidence.
I relaxed. We had nothing to fear, we were clean, and maybe it was a coincidence. I pulled out of our lane as if to find a clearer route, and the cops turned with us. It wasn’t a coincidence. They seemed too pleased with themselves, and my temples began to buzz as I slipped down narrow streets in the direction of the tavern. I told the others to get out of the car one at a time when I braked, and not to ask any questions.
There was no room for Luciano to open his door, but Luigi jumped out fast and disappeared down an alley. Then it was Sasà’s turn. He was quick, too, but not like Luigi. We were at the end of via Binda when I tried again with Luciano. He just managed to crack open the door. When he did, he was met by the barrel of a Beretta 92SF 9x21 caliber against his forehead and froze. Two cars in front of us and two behind forced us to surrender. The peace was over.
They opened the trunk and pulled out a heavy black duffel bag. They probably had an orgasm when twenty packages spilled out. I’d never seen the bag before, but I didn’t need a clairvoyant to know what had been planted on us. I’d handled packages like those thousands of times.
They handcuffed us. A small crowd formed around us, applauded contentedly, hurled insults; someone called us peddlers of death. “Maybe you’ll all live better now,” I shouted back.
Sirens accompanied us all the way to the Fatebenefratelli. The cops had their fun making a mockery of us. We didn’t take it personally, we understood them, we knew what revenge was, and that the victors were entitled to savor it.
They thrust our ink-stained fingers onto cards printed with our faces and names, then unloaded us at a prison just outside Milan. They would go home to their small houses, their families, and in a few days we would be nothing more than a memory for them; we were work, not people. They were unaware, perhaps, of the drama their revenge would cause.
The correction officers stripped us, booked us, confiscated our belongings, and led us, trousers in hand, to the solitary confinement block, where they placed us in two separate cells, per the magistrate’s orders.
We signed our names in the register and designated our legal representation, a renowned lawyer who was a longtime friend of ours. After a few days, we were led by our leashes, steel chain sheathed in black plastic, to the preliminary investigations judge. In the place of the luminary we had chosen as our representative, we were met by one of his young partners, apologizing that his colleague was bedridden with the flu. That was when we understood how powerful our enemies were, and how serious our predicament.
We availed ourselves of the right to remain silent. The judge issued a precautionary detainment order against us. Our attorney appealed to the review court. We took another journey on our leashes. The hearing lasted a few minutes, enough time for us to declare our innocence and explain that we’d been framed. The presiding judge smiled good-naturedly and issued his ruling, which was communicated to us in short order: our petition was rejected and we were sentenced to pay all court fees, in the amount of one million lire.
After a week, we were formally removed from solitary confinement, but since the high-security block was overcrowded we were stuck there almost a month waiting for space.
Anguish consumed us. We leapt up from our cots at the slightest sound. The officer in charge of the mail walked straight past our cells; he had asked us for money, but we didn’t have a single lira on prison credit. We couldn’t buy anything, no newspapers, no cigarettes for Luciano.
For two hours each day we were released into a ten-by-thirteen-foot pen that they called fresh air. We thought up a thousand scenarios about who could have framed us. It wasn’t prison that tormented us as much as the fact that a month had passed without anyone coming to visit. We knew very well that it was the silence of death.
How many, we wondered. And who.
Then one night, they made us gather our things and led us to the high-security block, cell number seventeen. Our legs refused to move; the officer had to shout to get us to budge.
Inside, we found that some Blood Brother had arranged a welcome for us: a stack of newspapers on the top bunk.
Luciano had no one on the outside, so he was the one to read. I lay on the lower bunk, closed my eyes, and waited. I could hear the pages turning. The rest of the block was silent. They respected our grief.
Finally, Luciano recited the list: Santoro, Alfio, Natalia, Bino, my father. Tonino was in critical condition.
I sunk into a deep sleep, my only defense against the crushing annihilation. Luciano suffered as much as I did, but in a different way. The pain that had been doled out to my mother, my sisters, my brother, to Anna, to Chiara, to Alfio’s family, was entirely of my own making.
I thought about us as kids, those first heists we’d pulled off so we could dress better at school. Luigi would greedily count the spoils, while Luciano, in his imploring, even prophetic tone, would say, “Let’s stop while we’re ahead.” But I was the one who drove us forward, and now a river of hatred coursed through my body, sweeping up everyone in its path, though the person I most detested was myself.
Even though he was more broken by what had happened than I was, Luciano acted like my nurse. He never left me alone, telling me the same story a thousand times.
After more than a month, they called me to visitation hours. Luciano shaved me, forced me into the shower, and made me put on clean clothes. “You’re everyone’s rock,” he told me, “you have to keep your head up.”
My brother had come alone. That surprised me. He was reactive, maybe too much; his hatred exceeded his pain, and he wanted to destroy the world.
I talked to him quietly, calmed him down, and asked him to walk me through everything that had happened. After our arrest, Sasà and Luigi had disappeared from circulation and hadn’t been heard from again. Santoro and Alfio had been driving on the west ring road when their police car was overturned by a heavy truck whose driver had fallen asleep at the wheel. Natalia was found dead from a massive overdose of tranquilizers. Our old men had been slaughtered while opening the gate to my father’s own goat fold; he and Bino hadn’t wanted to leave their animals penned up when they went into hiding at Stefano’s, as Santoro and Alfio had recommended. The assassins had desecrated their bodies, completely disfiguring poor Bino, who was almost a hundred years old; a flutter of wings would have been enough to take him down. This time, no one could have held back the Doberman, Tonino, who escaped Stefano’s restraint in the dead of night to search for the old men after they’d failed to show up. The assassins were waiting for him, and unloaded their rifles into his chest before they fled, assuming they’d killed him. Marshal Palamita loaded Tonino into his jeep and took him to the hospital; the barrier of muscle he had in place of a human chest had taken all the bullets, shielding his organs. His recovery had been slow.
Almost no one had attended the old men’s funerals; only the Aurora, and some of the elders who lived in the countryside, plus a couple of boys for whom gratitude was stronger than fear. But Leonardo Brambilla had gone down to mourn his friends and comfort their relatives. He stayed for a week, trying, in vain, to get my brother to come back up with him when he left.
Don Peppino had made an appearance, too, and in good company, to offer his condolences. He patted my brother’s shoulder and said, “You can put your hearts to rest, tell your brother and Luciano I’m through.”
Our visiting time was up. Giulio and Ciccio were waiting for my brother outside.
I rejected my brother’s proposals for revenge and told him that as long as I was alive, I would be the one to make the decisions.
“Go stay with Stefano, all of you. We won’t be cooling our heels in here for much longer.” I smiled, adding that he didn’t need to visit often, once every four or five months would do, as long as he kept our acc
ounts topped up.
He left, relieved of the responsibilities he’d thought he would have to take on.
Luciano and I spent our two hours in the courtyard for “air” everyday. We knew at least half of our fellow prisoners, though they could barely muster a greeting when they saw us and insisted on keeping their distance. So many of them had rubbed elbows with us when times were good. We’d given each of them something: a job, advice, a hookup with our influential friends during a legal dispute. But that was in the past now, forgotten. On the inside, the children of the forest succumbed to the lure of the mafia, swelling the ranks of the Blood Brothers in order to feel alive and in touch with the outside world.
Luciano and I were like lepers, tingiuti, untouchables. Walking corpses. If no one approached us, it meant we’d been marked as people to avoid.
We understood.
Our enemies were powerful, numerous. We were down, dead, buried.
The Blood Brothers had already held us a funeral with empty coffins.
But the isolation helped us, fortifying our resistance. We wouldn’t give up until we were staring down the wrong side of a shotgun. Our ancestors, indomitable hunters, had withstood the Greeks and the Romans. We only had to face one ordinary don.
We would wake up early, eat, exercise, shower, and go down for air. Hot or cold out, the weather didn’t matter. Then we went back upstairs to cook something. Then back outside again, and back in, then some reading, dinner, the evening news, and bedtime.
Every day was the same; a year passed in a flash. My brother came only rarely, while my five sisters would take the train from Rome for Thursday visiting hours. My sisters would take turns visiting, but my mother’s presence was a constant. Luciano had no relatives, so we asked and were granted permission for him to accompany me to see mine.
Black Souls Page 14