The Piranhas, The Boy Bosses of Naples

by Roberto Saviano

  “What the fuck are you saying, Nicolas? Guagliu’, ’o Maraja has lost his mind.”

  Nicolas sat down at the table, next to the computer. He took his position there and looked them all in the eye. “Think it through. Anyone willing and ready to die to get something has a pair of balls on them, and that’s that. Even if what they want is fucked up, religion, Allah, whatever the fuck it is. Anyone willing to die to get something is a real man.”

  “I think they’ve got balls on them, no question,” said Dentino. “But they’re wrong about what they’re doing. They want to attack women, they want to burn Jesus.”

  “Sure, but still, I have much respect for anyone willing to die—pe’ cchi se fa murì. I also have respect for them because everyone’s afraid of them. This means you’ve done it, adda murì mammà, you’ve done it so that everybody shits in their pants whenever they see you.”

  “You know what, ’o Maraja? I like the fact that this beard scares people,” said Lollipop.

  “It doesn’t scare me,” said Biscottino, who still didn’t have a hint of whiskers. “After all, just because you have a beard doesn’t mean you belong to ISIS.”

  “No, but I don’t mind it,” said Nicolas, and he immediately posted, “Allahu akbar.”

  A second later, underneath his post there stretched out a list of indignant comments.

  “Ua’, Maraja, they’re piling on against you,” said Briato’.

  “Let them scream, who the fuck cares.”

  “You know what I think, Maraja?” asked Tucano. “I don’t respect the ones who got rich without taking risks, because if you have money but you don’t know how to shoot, you don’t know how to take what you want. Anyone who has money because they get a massive salary, or a pension, if you ask me, that person deserves to lose their money. That is, I like people who are rich because they took risks. But no kidding around, these guys are filthy pigs: take and shoot children? No. Then you’re just a disgusting mess of a man.”

  Stavodicendo got up for another beer, shot a glance at the screen, which was showing footage of the explosion for the umpteenth time, and said: “Then again, the fact that they die? I disagree. It’s something for cocksuckers.”

  “Yeah, right,” said Drago’. “’O brother,” he went on, speaking to Nicolas, “it’s one thing for a guy, I don’t know, to get killed because he’s trying to keep control of a drug market, do an armed robbery, or ice a target. It’s another thing if he really wants to die. I don’t like that. That’s for assholes.”

  “Then we’ll just be a paranza of little bait fish,” said Maraja, shaking his head angrily, “dangling from a fishing pole. Like it or lump it.”

  “Maraja, why are you complaining? We’re becoming the kings of Naples and you know it.”

  “Pecché nun è accussi che se cagna!” Because that’s not the way you change things!

  “I don’t want to change anything,” said Tucano. “All I want is money.”

  “But that’s the point,” said Nicolas, and his dark eyes flickered with light. “That’s exactly the point. We need to command, not just make money.”

  “Amm’ ’a scassà i ciessi,” commented Biscottino. We need to knock it out of the park.

  “Pe cummannà la gente ti deve riconoscere, s’adda inchinà, adda capì che tu ci starai ’na vita.” To command, people have to recognize you, bow to you, understand that you’ll be there for the rest of their lives. “People have to fear us—they fear us, we don’t fear them,” Nicolas concluded, paraphrasing the pages from Machiavelli that he carried emblazoned in his memory.

  “But they already shit their pants when they see us!” said Dentino.

  “Dovremmo tené fora ’a porta file di gente che vò trasì int’ ’a paranza,” Nicolas responded, diving deep into dialect: We ought to have lines out the door of people eager to see the paranza. “And instead we’ve got nothing…”

  “All the better!” exclaimed Pesce Moscio. “How do you know a spy wouldn’t come in?”

  “Spy or no spy,” said Nicolas, shaking his head, “the paranza has always been thought of as something at the service of someone in particular, like the police say when they arrest whoever pulled the trigger: the paranza of what’s-his-name or such-and-such…”

  “The armed branch,” said Drone.

  “Yeah, but I don’t want to be anybody’s armed branch. We need to be more, we need to eat up the streets. So far, we’ve just been focusing on money; instead, we need to think about taking charge.”

  “What’s that mean? What the fuck are we supposed to do, in your opinion?” Tucano asked in desperation. He was starting to take this line of argument personally.

  The paranza didn’t understand; it was circling a significance without being able to grasp it.

  “If you’ve got money, you’re in charge. Period,” Dentino commented.

  “But with what money? All the money we have is what a real boss earns in fifteen days and the builder Criviello pulls down in a weekend!” Nicolas got down off the table and went to crack open a beer. “Adda murì mammà, there’s nothing we can do about it. You don’t understand, you’ll never understand a fucking thing.”

  “Anyway,” said Lollipop, to get out of the conversation, which had seized up like a beat-up old motor scooter, “that’s why I like having this beard”—and he stroked his well-groomed beard—“because it scares people, ’o Maraja.”

  “I’m not scared of a beard,” said Drago’, sprawled out on the sofa and rolling a joint. “The guys in Sanità all have long beards … but I don’t wet my pants when I see them.”

  “We don’t, but ordinary people do,” Maraja replied.

  “I don’t like these fucking long beards,” Drago’ reiterated.

  “I do, and a lot, and Nicolas likes them, and ’o Drone likes them, so why don’t you grow one: we need a uniform…” Lollipop piled on.

  “Nice idea, this thing with the uniform,” said Maraja. “But, guagliu’, if you ask me, Drago’ can’t grow much of a beard … he’s still just a kid, like Biscottino.”

  “Suck on this fish, strunzo,” Drago’ retorted, “and after all, we’ve got our wings. That’s our uniform, on our flesh, it’s not the kind of thing some barber can get rid of.”

  Nicolas had stopped listening. The markets had been divvied up, that’s true, and he’d assigned one to each of them, but actually taking them was quite another matter. No one, except for him, seemed to have focused yet on the fact that there was quite a difference between the two things—the expanse of the sea. But he also thought that seas were made to be crossed and that, if you’re born a fucker, then there are no obstacles that can stand in your way. The sky’s the limit.

  * * *

  Nicolas really did believe in his own abilities and in signs. A few days earlier, before Roipnol had settled down in Forcella like a bloodsucking tick, he’d seen Dumbo out and about on his Aprilia SportCity scooter, and behind him, arms around him, a woman in her early fifties. He hadn’t recognized her right away, because they were traveling at a crazy rate of speed, zigzagging in and out of traffic. So he’d kept an eye on Dumbo, and he’d finally figured out who she was. La Zarina, as in the Tsarina, the widow of Don Cesare Acanfora, aka Negus, and therefore the queen of San Giovanni a Teduccio and the mother of the new king, Scignacane. Her real name was Natascia and her husband had been murdered by L’Arcangelo’s men for having allied himself with the Faellas, even though he’d previously worked for years in alliance with the Grimaldis. After mourning Negus, La Zarina had set herself one goal: to become the sole supplier of heroin in Naples. Nothing less, nothing more. No shakedowns, no army, just a crew of men defending that business. And her son Scignacane had been brought up to accomplish that mission. Not a boss, a broker. Then Micione had managed to find other supply channels and the Acanfora clan’s line of business was starting to dwindle.

  Never had a nickname been more appropriate than Scignacane. He’d never really recovered from the magic mushrooms he�
�d taken at age sixteen and now, at twenty-one, whenever he used too many esses in a row in a sentence, he’d start drooling like a dog and moving jerkily, like a chimp caught off guard by a sudden noise. “You need to snort it, not jab it in your vein,” he’d say when he was talking about heroin. Because jabbing it in your vein meant you got transformed into one of the zombies from The Walking Dead, and just the sight of you was enough to make people vomit.

  Nicolas was connecting the dots. Dentino–Dumbo–La Zarina–Scignacane–heroin.

  Dentino and Dumbo were like a pair of brothers, and from there to Scignacane would just be a short step. There was a whiff of respect hovering around Dumbo, despite the fact that he was small and too soft. He’d never fired a shot in his life and violence frightened him, but he’d been through Nisida Reform School, say no more. Dumbo would never be a member of the paranza, and he knew that, but when Nicolas asked him if he could take him to see Scignacane, he didn’t blink an eye.

  “Sure” was all he said. One more dot had just been connected.

  Scignacane welcomed Nicolas the way you welcome a stranger. Mistrustfully. He was sprawled out on his bed in the apartment he kept for guests, in San Giovanni a Teduccio, stroking a contentedly purring Siamese cat. He was watching some reality show on TV. Nicolas had been ushered in after being searched from head to foot by Scignacane’s men.

  “Scignaca’, we want your heroin,” said Nicolas. No preambles, just a straight lunge to connect the last dot.

  Scignacane looked at him as if a little kid had walked up and begged to be allowed to shoot the nice gun, too. “Okay, so let’s just pretend you came over to say hi to me.”

  “’O Micione buys from other markets and you know that.”

  “Okay, so let’s just pretend you came over to say hi to me,” Scignacane repeated mechanically. In the same tone of voice, stretched out in the same position.

  “Devo parlare cu mammeta?” asked Nicolas. Do I have talk to your mother? He’d said it in a low, low voice, to reinforce the threat.

  “’O capo famiglia songo io.” Scignacane had swatted away the cat, turned off the TV, and gotten to his feet. All in the space of a second. “I’m the head of the family.” What he had in front of him was no longer a child, it was an opportunity. Maybe a leap into the void, sure, but still better than winding up crushed underfoot by Micione, who’d started buying from the Syrians lately. “But you need to pay me directly for the heroin.”

  “I can give you thirty thousand.”

  “Fuck, that’s the price I’m paying for it.”

  “Exactly, Scignaca’ … the heroin that we ship? Everyone needs to want it. I set the price at thirty-five euros a gram … these days, they’ll sell you ordinary shit at forty, and really good shit at fifty. We offer the very best shit at thirty-five. Three months, Scignaca’, and there’ll be nothing but your heroin anywhere in Naples. Yours and yours alone.”

  The prospect of covering the city with his merchandise convinced Scignacane and, even while he was accepting, Maraja already had his next move in mind. That step was the more complicated one, because straightforward lures wouldn’t be enough, nor would spectacular phrases, or paranza fishing lamps, useful only for small fry. Now he was going to have to explain the whole strategy in detail. He went to get himself another beer, and amid the shouts of the brothers who had started playing a round of Call of Duty, he texted Aucelluzzo.

  This time he had no difficulty setting up the meeting.

  * * *

  Nicolas had to choose among the drunk, the fisherman, and the tough guy—’o guappo. The ceramics of Capodimonte were there, in front of him. This was the price he’d have to pay to Professoressa Cicatello. He went over to the sales clerk in the shop in the Tribunali quarter and pointed uneasily to the display case crowded with bombonières and statuettes.

  “Which one?” she asked.

  “That one…” he said, extending his hand and pointing at random.

  “Which one?” asked the clerk again, her eyes trying to follow Nicolas’s vaguely wavering finger.

  “That one!”

  “This one?” she asked, grabbing one.

  “Yeah, okay, whichever one you think is best…”

  He put it into his backpack, fit the full-face helmet over his head, started up the T-Max, and took off.

  Entering Conocal was harder than usual; by now they knew his face. In spite of the helmet, he was afraid he might be recognized by Micione’s men. He was sure of his paranza, these days, good soldiers that they were, they didn’t enter unauthorized territories. Nicolas drove along, glancing right and left. He was afraid of a gunshot, or else a narcotics cop pulling up on him without warning. Because of that full-face helmet, the risk was by no means an unlikely one. He pulled up where Aucelluzzo had told him to wait: outside the butcher shop owned by L’Arcangelo’s cook. In the blink of an eye, Cicognone hopped on the back of the T-Max. Now Nicolas was shielded, he had the benediction to enter the district.

  He parked in the underground garage of the ocher-yellow apartment house. It was no longer time to win an arsenal of weapons. The paranza’s dope markets needed to be supplied with grass, and a dozen or so yards overhead was the man who could do that for him.

  L’Arcangelo was sitting on a modular chair that reminded Nicolas of the ones they use in America for death row executions. Running out of L’Arcangelo’s arms were four tubes connected to a machine with a blinking screen and, up high, a flask with dialysis solution. In spite of the complexity of the gadget, the welter of tubes, the red blood flowing through them, the unsettling, unmistakable presence of the purification filter, the patient’s forced immobility, there was no sign of tension, nor did the machine produce any sound other than the barely perceptible beeping of the monitors.

  “Don Vitto’, aren’t you well?”

  Before answering, L’Arcangelo waved his free hand at the male nurse to move away from the armchair.

  “What are you talking about? I’m fine.”

  “Then how come you’re stuck in this armchair?”

  “Do you think they awarded me house arrest out of the goodness of their hearts? The doctor told them that my kidneys are clogged up, and getting that documentation cost me a small fortune. Which means I can stay here under house arrest. And it’s never a bad idea to get your blood cleaned up. If you ask me, at my age, clean blood makes you live longer, right?”

  “Of course it does…”

  “Maraja,” said L’Arcangelo, and he uttered the words that followed with a smile, “I know that you’re making good use of the weapons I gave you. You’re shooting in all directions.” Nicolas nodded, clearly flattered. L’Arcangelo went on: “But you’re shooting badly.” He paused to take a look at the device that was pumping blood. “All the weapons you use, you’re using them without gloves. You’re leaving spent shells all over the place. Can you really be so dumb? What the fuck? Do I have to teach you the most elementary rules? You really are just kids.”

  “But they’ll never catch us,” said Nicolas.

  “Why did I put my trust in a child? Why?” he asked, looking at Cicognone, who’d appeared in the kitchen doorway.

  “Okay, should I just leave, Don Vitto’?” asked Maraja.

  L’Arcangelo went on, without even listening to him: “The first rule that makes a man a man is that he knows that things won’t always go well; in fact, he knows that things might go well once and then go wrong a hundred times. Instead kids think that things will go right for them a hundred times and will never go wrong at all. Maraja, nowadays you need to think like a man, you can’t think that they won’t get you anymore. If they want to get you, you need to make them sweat blood, they need to work hard. Maraja, so far you’ve just fired at the sides of apartment buildings…”

  “No, that’s not true, I’ve killed a person.”

  “Eh, no, non l’hai acciso tu … You didn’t kill him. Some stray bullet, fired at random by who knows which strunzo from your paranza.”

&n
bsp; Nicolas opened his eyes wide. It was as if L’Arcangelo not only had spies but was looking directly into their heads.

  “I trained by shooting at negroes…”

  “Good for you! So now you feel like a man? What’s it take to shoot at negroes? I was wrong, I never should have given you a thing…”

  “Don Vittorio, we’re taking over the center of Naples … what the fuck are you talking about?”

  “Aggi’a parlà con mammeta, Maraja. I’m going to have to talk to your mother. All these curse words, do you ever hear a guappo talk like that? Since you’re not here talking to your father, curb your tongue. Or else get out of here right away.”

  “Excuse me … Or actually, no, excuse me nothing. I don’t report to you, I’m doing you a favor.” Then he raised his voice: “Adda murì mammà, I’m in charge of more than you are, you have to admit it, Don Arca’, today I’m bringing you the oxygen that ’o Micione is trying to choke off here.”

  Cicognone walked over. He could sense the air heating up and he didn’t like it. Nicolas’s tone of voice wasn’t appropriate. L’Arcangelo reassured him with one hand.

  “Give us your shit, the stuff you can’t sell here. I can be your legs and your hands. I’ll take over the markets, conquer the piazzas, one after the other … your shit is just rotting here. You can’t afford to sell it at fire-sale prices, otherwise you’ll look desperate, but no one will come all this way to buy it. Only junkies come, and you can’t live off junkies.”

  L’Arcangelo continued to hold off Cicognone with that raised hand. Nicolas wasn’t sure whether he should go on or stop. But by now he’d crossed the Rubicon, there was no turning back.

  “A dying man, Don Vitto’, even if he says that he feels fine, isn’t about to come back to life.”

  Now L’Arcangelo was gripping the armrest with his left hand.

  “You’re taking over the markets, are you? Actually, ’o Micione has everything under control. He owns Forcella, the Spanish Quarter, Cavone, Santa Lucia, Central Station, Gianturco … should I go on?”