Английский язык с Крестным Отцом

Clemenza and Tessio embraced him again. Hagen held the door open for the Don, who

paused to look at him for a moment. Then the Don put his hand on Hagen's cheek,

embraced him quickly, and said, in Italian, "You've been a good son. You comfort me."

Telling Hagen that he had acted properly in this terrible time. The Don went up to his

bedroom to speak to his wife. It was then that Hagen made the call to Amerigo

Bonasera for the undertaker to redeem (выкупить /заложенные вещи/; возместить;

искупить) the favor he owed to the Corleones.

Book 5

Chapter 20

106

The death of Santino Corleone sent shock waves through the underworld of the nation.

And when it became known that Don Corleone had risen from his sick bed to take

charge of the Family affairs, when spies at the funeral reported that the Don seemed to

be fully recovered, the heads of the Five Families made frantic efforts to prepare a

defense against the bloody retaliatory (to retaliate [ri’tжlieit] – отплачивать, отвечать

тем же самым; применять репрессалии; retaliatory [ri’tжlitri] – ответный,

ответный удар; репрессивный) war that was sure to follow. Nobody made the mistake

of assuming that Don Corleone could be held cheaply because of his past misfortunes.

He was a man who had made only a few mistakes in his career and had learned from

every one of them.

Only Hagen guessed the Don's real intentions and was not surprised when emissaries

were sent to the Five Families to propose a peace. Not only to propose a peace but a

meeting of all the Families in the city and with invitations to Families all over the United

States to attend. Since the New York Families were the most powerful in the country, it

was understood that their welfare affected the welfare of the country as a whole.

At first there were suspicions. Was Don Corleone preparing a trap (западня)? Was he

trying to throw his enemies off their guard? Was he attempting to prepare a wholesale

massacre to avenge his son? But Don Corleone soon made it clear that he was sincere.

Not only did he involve all the Families in the country in this meeting, but made no move

to put his own people on a war footing (привести в боевую готовность) or to enlist

allies. And then he took the final irrevocable (неотменяемый, окончательный,

безвозвратный [i'revkbl]) step that established the authenticity of these intentions

and assured the safety of the grand council to be assembled. He called on the services

of the Bocchicchio Family.

The Bocchicchio Family was unique in that, once a particularly ferocious branch of the

Mafia in Sicily, it had become an instrument of peace in America. Once a group of men

who earned their living by a savage determination, they now earned their living in what

perhaps could be called a saintly fashion. The Bocchicchios' one asset (имущество

/часто об одном предмете/; ценное качество /разг./) was a closely knit structure of

107

blood relationships, a family loyalty severe even for a society where family loyalty came

before loyalty to a wife.

The Bocchicchio Family, extending out to third cousins, had once numbered nearly

two hundred when they ruled the particular economy of a small section of southern

Sicily. The income for the entire family then came from four or five flour mills, by no

means owned communally, but assuring labor and bread and a minimal security for all

Family members. This was enough, with intermarriages, for them to present a common

front against their enemies.

No competing mill, no dam that would create a water supply to their competitors or

ruin their own selling of water, was allowed to be built in their corner of Sicily. A powerful

landowning baron once tried to erect his own mill strictly for his personal use. The mill

was burned down. He called on the carabineri (полицейские /итал./) and higher

authorities, who arrested three of the Bocchicchio Family. Even before the trial the

manor house of the baron was torched (подожжен; torch – факел). The indictment

(обвинительный акт [in'daitmnt]) and accusations were withdrawn. A few months later

one of the highest functionaries in the Italian government arrived in Sicily and tried to

solve the chronic water shortage of that island by proposing a huge dam. Engineers

arrived from Rome to do surveys while watched by grim natives, members of the

Bocchicchio clan. Police flooded the area, housed in a specially built barracks.

It looked like nothing could stop the dam from being built and supplies and equipment

had actually been unloaded in Palermo. That was as far as they got. The Bocchicchios

had contacted fellow Mafia chiefs and extracted agreements for their aid. The heavy

equipment was sabotaged, the lighter equipment stolen. Mafia deputies in the Italian

Parliament launched a bureaucratic counterattack against the planners. This went on for

several years and in that time Mussolini came to power. The dictator decreed that the

dam must be built. It was not. The dictator had known that the Mafia would be a threat