Gold Coast

by Nelson DeMille

  He didn’t even hesitate. “You ask, you get. I owe you my life.”

  I nodded. “Well, let me think about it. Maybe I can come up with a bigger and better favor.”

  “Sure. Hey, stop by again.”

  I opened the door, then turned back to him. “Hey, these Indians are standing on the beach, you know, and Columbus comes ashore and says to them, ‘Buon giorno,’ and one of the Indians turns to his wife and says, ‘Shit, there goes the neighborhood.’” As I closed the door behind me, I heard him laughing and coughing.

  Thirty-six

  I finally decided to go to my Wall Street office to tidy up my affairs there. I sat in my office, my father’s old office, and wondered how I could have wasted so many years of my life in that place. But by an act of pure will, I got down to work and did for my firm and my clients basically what I’d done in the Locust Valley office; that is, I wrote memos on each client and each case, and I parceled everything out to specific attorneys who I thought would be best suited to each case and each client. That was more than my father had done, and more than Frederic Perkins had done before he jumped from the window down the hall.

  Anyway, despite my loyalty and conscientiousness, I was as welcome at 23 Wall Street as a four-hundred-point drop in the Dow. Nevertheless, I soldiered on for over a week, speaking to no one but my secretary, Louise, who seemed annoyed at me for having left her holding the bag for the last several months, trying to answer all sorts of questions from clients and partners regarding Mr. Sutter’s files and cases.

  Anyway, in order to put in long days in the Wall Street office, and for other reasons, I was living at the Yale Club in Manhattan. This is a very large and very comfortable establishment on Vanderbilt Avenue, and the rooms are quite nice. Breakfast and dinner aren’t bad either, and the bar is friendly. There’s a stock market Teletype off the cocktail lounge so you can see if you can afford the place; there’s a gym with a swimming pool and squash courts, and the clientele is Yale. What more can a man ask for? One could almost stay here forever, and many members in my situation would do just that, but the club discourages overly long stays for wayward husbands, and in recent years, wayward wives. Regarding the latter, one could get into trouble at the club, but I had enough trouble, so after dinner I would just read the newspapers in the big lounge and have a cigar and port like the other old tweedbags, then go to bed.

  I did bring Jenny Alvarez to dinner one night, and she said, apropos of the club, “What a world you live in.”

  “I guess I never gave it much thought.”

  We chatted about the World Series, and she needled me about the Mets’ pathetic four-in-a-row loss to the Yankees. Who would have believed it?

  Anyway, we talked about everything except Bellarosa, television news, and sex, just to show each other, I guess, that we had a solid friendship based on many mutual interests. Actually as it turned out, other than baseball, we shared almost no interests. We wound up talking about kids, and she showed me a picture of her son. And though it was obvious that we were still hot for each other, I didn’t ask her up to my room.

  Well, I wound up spending nearly two weeks at the Yale Club, which was convenient in regard to not having to deal with friends and family on Long Island. On the weekend, I visited Carolyn and Edward at their schools.

  By the middle of the following week, I had about run out of excuses for staying away from Lattingtown, so I checked out of the Yale Club and went back to Stanhope Hall to discover that Susan was about to leave for another visit to Hilton Head and Key West. You may envy people like us for the time and money we have to spend avoiding unpleasantness, and you may be right in being envious. But in my case, at least, the money was running out and so was the time, and the hurt was no less acute than if I’d been a contractor or a civil servant. Clearly, something had to be done. I said to Susan before she left, “If we move away from here, permanently, I think I can come to terms with the past. I think we can start over.”

  She replied, “I love you, John, but I don’t want to move. And I don’t think it would do any good anyway. We’ll solve our problems here, or we’ll separate here.”

  I asked her, “Are you still visiting next door?”

  She nodded.

  “I’d like you not to.”

  “I have to do this my way.”

  “Do what?”

  She didn’t reply directly, but said to me, “You visited next door. And you’re not his attorney anymore. Why did you go?”

  “Susan, it’s not the same if I go there as when you go there. And don’t piss me off by asking why it isn’t.”

  She replied, “Well, but I will tell you that perhaps you shouldn’t go there either.”

  “Why not? Am I complicating things?”

  “Maybe. It’s complex enough.”

  And on that note, she left for the airport.

  • • •

  Well, despite Susan’s good advice, about a week later, on a raw, drizzly day in November, I decided to go collect the money that Bellarosa still owed me and, more important, to collect a favor. Because of the wet weather I went by way of the front gate. The three FBI men there were particularly officious, and I was briefly nostalgic for Anthony, Lenny, and Vinnie.

  As I stood under the eave of the gatehouse, I could see this one FBI guy inside glancing at me through the window as he spoke to someone on the phone. Two other FBI guys stood near me with their rifles. I said to them, “Is there something wrong with my passport? Is Il Duce not receiving? What’s the problem here?”

  One of the agents shrugged. After a while, the other guy came out of the gatehouse and informed me that Mr. Bellarosa was not available. I said, “My wife comes and goes here as she pleases. Now you get back on that fucking telephone and get me cleared pronto.”

  And he did. Though he seemed upset with me for some reason.

  So I was escorted up the cobble drive by one of the guys with the rifles, was turned over to another guy with a tie at the door, and got myself processed for dangerous metal objects. What they didn’t understand was that if I wanted to kill Bellarosa, I would do it with my bare hands.

  I noticed that the flowers were all gone now and the palm court looked somehow bigger and emptier. Then I realized that all the bird cages were gone. I asked one of the FBI men about that, and he replied, “There’s no one to take care of them. And they were getting on some of the guys’ nerves.’’ He smiled and added, “We only have one songbird left. He’s upstairs.’’ So I was escorted up the stairs, but this time to Bellarosa’s bedroom.

  It was about five P . M ., but he was in bed, sitting up though not looking well.

  I had never been in the master bedroom of Alhambra, but I could see now that the room I was in was part of a large suite that included a sitting room off to my left and a dressing room to my front that probably included a master bath. The bedroom itself was not overly large, and the heavy, dark Mediterranean furniture and red velvets made it look smaller and somewhat depressing. There was only a single window against which the rain splattered. If I were sick, I’d rather be lying in the palm court.

  Bellarosa motioned me to a chair beside the bed, the nurse’s chair I suppose, but I said, “I’ll stand.”

  “So, what can I do for you, Counselor?”

  “I’m here to collect.”

  “Yeah? You need that favor? Tell me what you need.”

  “First things first. I’m also here to collect my bill. I sent you a note and an invoice over two weeks ago.”

  “Oh, yeah.’’ He took a glass of red wine from the night table and sipped on it. “Yeah . . . well, I’m not a free man anymore.”

  “Meaning what?”

  “I sold myself like a whore. I do what they say now.”

  “Did they tell you not to pay my bill?”

  “Yeah. They tell me what bills to pay. Yours ain’t one of them, Counselor. That’s your pal Ferragamo. But I’ll talk to somebody higher up for you. Okay?”

  “Don’t b
other. I’ll write this one off to experience.”

  “You let me know.’’ He asked, “You want some wine?”

  “No.’’ I walked around the room and noticed a book on his night table. It was not Machiavelli, but a picture book of Naples.

  Bellarosa said to me, “What really hurts me is that I can’t take care of my people anymore. For an Italian, that’s like cutting off his balls. Capisce?”

  “No, and I never want to capisce a damned thing again.”

  Bellarosa shrugged.

  I said, “So you work for Alphonse Ferragamo now.”

  He didn’t like that at all, but he said nothing.

  I asked him, “Can you tell me what those bulldozers are doing at Stanhope Hall?”

  “Yeah. They’re gonna dig foundations. Put in roads. The IRS made me sell the place to the developers.”

  “Is that a fact? My whole world is fucked up, and now you tell me I’m about to be surrounded by tractor sheds.”

  “Whaddaya mean tractor sheds? Nice houses. You’ll have plenty of good neighbors.”

  It wasn’t my property that was being subdivided or surrounded anyway, so I didn’t really care. But I asked him, “What’s happening to the Stanhope mansion?”

  “I don’t know. The developer has some Japs interested in it for a kind of rest house in the country. You know? Those people get all nervous, and they need a place to rest.”

  This was really depressing news. A rest house for burned-out Japanese businessmen, surrounded by thirty or forty new houses on what was once a beautiful estate. I asked him, “How did you get the zoning changed?”

  “I got friends in high places now. Like the IRS. I told you, they want big bucks, so I got to get rid of everything with their help. And Ferragamo started a RICO thing against me so he’s trying to get his before the fucking IRS gets theirs. They’re like fucking wolves tearing me apart.”

  “So you’re telling me you’re broke?”

  He shrugged. “Like I said once, Counselor, give unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s. Well, Caesar is in the next fucking room, and he wants his.”

  I smiled. “But never more than fifteen percent, Frank.”

  He forced a smile in return. “Maybe this time he got more. But I can do all right on what’s left.”

  “That’s good news.’’ I regarded him a moment, and indeed he looked like a beaten man. No doubt he was physically not well, but in a more profound way his spirit seemed crushed and his spark was gone. I guess this was what I’d hoped to see when I saved his life, but I wasn’t enjoying it. In some perverse way we can all relate to the rebel, the pirate, the outlaw. His existence is proof that this life does not squash everyone and that today’s superstate cannot get us all into lockstep. But life and the state had finally caught up with the nation’s biggest outlaw and laid him low. It was inevitable, really, and he had known it even as he made plans for a future that would never come.

  I said to him, “And Alhambra?”

  “Oh, yeah, I had to sell this place, too. The Feds want this house bulldozed. What bastards. Like they don’t want people saying, ‘Frank Bellarosa lived there once.’ Fuck them. But I worked it out with them that Dominic gets to build the houses for the guy who’s going to buy the land. I’m going to make Dominic put up little Alhambras, nice little stucco villas with red tile roofs.’’ He smiled. “Funny, huh?”

  “I guess. And Fox Point?”

  “The Arabs got it.”

  “The Iranians?”

  “Yeah. Fuck them. So all you bastards that didn’t like me here on this street, you can all watch the sand niggers driving to their temple in their big cars, wailing all over the place.’’ He laughed weakly and coughed.

  “Are you all right?”

  “Yeah. Just a goddamned flu. That fucking nurse is a bitch. They fired Filomena one day without telling me and deported her or something, and they only let Anna come a few days at a time. She’s in Brooklyn again. I got nobody to talk to here. Except the fucking Feds.”

  I nodded. The Justice Department could indeed be nasty and petty when they chose to, and when you had the IRS on your case at the same time, you might as well put your head between your legs and kiss your ass good-bye. I said, “And you let all this happen in exchange for what? For freedom?”

  “Yeah. For freedom. I’m free. Everything’s forgiven. But meantime I got to rat out everybody, and I got to let them play with me like I was a toy. Jesus Christ, these guys are worse than commies.’’ He looked at me. “That was your advice, wasn’t it, Counselor? Sell out, Frank. Start a new life.”

  I replied, “Yes, that was my advice.”

  “So, I took it.”

  “No, you made your own decision, Frank.’’ I added, “I think the operative part—the thing that is important—is that you start a new life. I assume you’ll be leaving here under the new identity program.”

  “Yeah. I’m under the witness protection program now. Next, I graduate to new identity if I’m good. In my new life I want to be a priest.’’ He forced a tired smile and sat up straight. “Here, have some wine with me.’’ He took a clean water tumbler from his nightstand and poured me a full glass. I took it and sipped on it. Chianti acido, fermented in storage batteries. How could a sick man drink this stuff?

  He said, “I’m not supposed to tell nobody where I’m going, but I’m going back to Italy.’’ He tapped the book on his nightstand. “Funny how we say ‘back,’ like we came from there. I’m third-generation here. Been to Italy maybe ten times in the last thirty years. But we still say ‘back.’ Do you say back to . . . where? England?”

  “No, I don’t say that. Maybe sometimes I think it. But I’m here for the duration, Frank. I’m an American. And so are you. In fact, you are so fucking American you wouldn’t believe it. You understand?”

  He smiled. “Yeah. I know, I know. I’m not going to like living in Italy, am I? But it’s safer there, and it’s better than jail and better than dead, I guess.’’ He added, “The Feds got it all worked out with the Italian government. Maybe someday you can come visit.”

  I didn’t reply. We were both silent awhile, and we drank our wine. Finally, Bellarosa spoke, but not really to me, I think, but to himself and maybe to his paesanos, whom he was selling out en masse. He said, “The old code of silence is dead. There’re no real men left anymore, no heroes, no stand-up guys, not on either side of the law. We’re all middle-class paper guys, the cops and the crooks, and we make deals when we got to, to protect our asses, our money, and our lives. We rat out everybody, and we’re happy we got the chance to do it.”

  Again I didn’t reply.

  He said to me, “I was in jail once, Counselor, and it’s not a place for people like us. It’s for the new bad guys, the darker people, the tough guys. My people don’t lay their balls on the table no more. We’re like you people. We got too fucking soft.”

  “Well, maybe you can work that farm outside of Sorrento.”

  He laughed. “Yeah. Farmer Frank. Fat fucking chance of that.’’ He looked me in the eye. “Forget the word ‘Sorrento.’ Capisce?”

  “I hear you.’’ I added in a soft voice, “A word of advice, Frank. Don’t trust the Feds to keep your forwarding address secret either. If they send you to Sorrento, don’t stay too long.”

  He winked at me. “I was right to make you a Napoletano.”

  “And I suppose Anna is going with you, so watch the postmarks on the letters she sends home. Especially to her sister.’’ I asked, “She is going, right?”

  He hesitated a moment, then replied, “Yeah. Sure. She’s my wife. What’s she going to do? Go to college and work for IBM?”

  “Is she as unhappy about the move as she was about moving here?”

  “You got to ask? She never wanted to leave her mother’s house, for Christ’s sake. You know, you think about them immigrant women coming here from sunny Italy with nothing and making a life here in the tenements of New York. And now those women’s daughters and gra
nddaughters have a fit when the fucking dishwasher breaks. You know? But hey, we’re no better. Right?”

  “Right.’’ I said, “Maybe she’ll adjust better to Italy than to Lattingtown.”

  “Nah. All Italian married women are unhappy. They are happy girls and happy widows, but they are unhappy wives. I told you, you can’t make them happy, so you ignore them.’’ He added, “Anyway, my kids are still here. Anna is going nuts about that. Maybe they’ll want to come over and live. Who knows? Maybe someday I can come back. Maybe someday you’ll walk into a pizza joint in Brooklyn, and I’ll be behind the counter. You want that pie cut in eight or twelve slices?”

  “Twelve. I’m hungry.’’ Actually I couldn’t picture me in a pizza joint in Brooklyn, nor could I picture Frank Bellarosa behind the counter, and neither could Frank Bellarosa. Some of this was just an act, maybe for me, maybe for the Feds if they were listening. A guy like Bellarosa may be down for a while, but never out. As soon as he got out from under the thumb of the Justice Department, he’d be back in some shady business. If he was ever in a pizza joint, it would be to shake down the owner.

  He said, “Well, you got me wondering about that favor I owe you.”

  I put down my glass of wine and said, “Okay, Frank, I’d like you to tell my wife it’s over between you two and that you’re not taking her with you to Italy, which is what I think she believes, and I want you to tell her that you only used her to get to me.”

  We stared at each other, and he nodded. “Done.”

  I moved toward the door. “We won’t see each other again, but you’ll forgive me if I don’t shake your hand.”

  “Sure.”

  I opened the door.

  He called out. “John.”

  I don’t think he’d ever called me by my first name before, and it took me by surprise. I looked back at him sitting in bed. “What?”

  “I’ll tell her I used her if you want, but that wasn’t it. You gotta know that.”

  “I know that.”

  “Okay.’’ He said to me, “We’re both on our own now, Counselor, and in years to come we’ll think of this time as a good time, a time when we took and we gave and we got smarter by knowing each other. Okay?”