The Pope of Greenwich Village Page #7

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A man died.

Why don't you tell

the whole f***ing world?

There's a way out of this.

There's 50 grand we got.

Yeah, back in the closet.

That could be our way out.

It could be our restaurant.

Are you crazy? What do we do?

Do we sit in our restaurant

and wait for the police to show up

or some psychotic criminal to come

and find you and chop you up?

Oh, man.

You listened to that fool, Charlie.

He's an idiot.

He lives in a fantasy, Charlie.

Look,

Paulie has nothing to do with this.

- Diane, I made my own decision.

- Paulie uses you, Charlie.

Don't you see what you get

for your loyalty to family?

He uses you.

Why are you always one inch away

from becoming a good person, huh?

Maybe, I don't know...

maybe you're too soft.

I'm just too soft?

What are you? Some tough guy?

The men up in Maine make you and Paulie

look like spoiled little brats.

I was raised to believe

that criminals...

criminals were too weak,

too weak to make it honestly.

Diane, maybe that sh*t works in Maine.

Here, on the streets, it don't work.

Okay? It don't work.

Such a pathetic excuse, you know?

You just miss... you just miss by a...

another f***ing inch, you know,

and you could really be someone special.

But you're all caught up

in your tribal loyalty,

your neighborhood, Paulie...

Diane, maybe I don't

wanna change, all right?

You ever think of that? Huh?

If I don't wanna change,

what the f*** are you doing with me?

What the f*** have you

been doing with me all this time?

I always knew this would happen.

What the...

Hit me again. See if I change.

Come on. Hit me again. Come on.

- Huh? Huh?

- Let go of me.

Charlie!

Nicky Dum Dum found out

who robbed my money.

Well, that's great.

How come it wasn't you that found out?

Hey...

all my guys

been knocking their brains out.

So Nicky got there first. Good for him.

Maybe you got there first

and you forget to tell me.

What the hell are you talking about?

Somebody ratted.

It was that kid from Carmine Street.

Paulie somebody.

The kid you call your nephew?

Hey, Paulie don't rob safes.

He's a f***ing waiter.

He's a scumbag, that's what he is,

him and whoever was with him.

Aw, man another 200-a-week hard on

looking to sh*t on anybody

who ain't driving a Coupe de Ville.

- Guy's doing his job.

- Yeah?

- What did you drag me up here for?

- Come on in. Come on in.

What's up?

Paulie. They're gonna nail him, Charlie.

I can smell it. He left the file behind.

- So what?

- Fingerprints!

F***ing sh*t. God damn him.

And he's gonna feed them me.

He won't give you up.

There's blood there.

Blood. That f***ing kid's blood.

We're third cousins. He's...

With Italians, that's like

twin brothers with the Irish.

And when he feeds me to them,

they're gonna press me

to give them you, Charlie.

They're gonna press me hard.

And if I clam up, you skate away,

clean as a whistle.

Yeah? For what? How much?

Charlie, it's not what you think.

My end of this, I want it for my kid.

I leave that money with my wife,

they'll take it off her in 12 minutes.

I need somebody who'll make sure my wife

gets that money if I take a fall.

Whoa, Barney. Whoa.

There's got to be some other way.

No, no, I've been making lists up

in my head for hours.

I got no one else, my friend.

Why don't you just split

with the money now?

I can't.

I can't leave those two

until I'm backed dead into a corner.

And I can't go on a lam

with a 25-year-old

needs the side of his crib

pulled up every night.

Barney, you can't lay this on me.

Can't lay this on me.

- Charlie, I'm making you a deal.

- Open the door.

- You got a sense of honor.

- Open the door.

- I can smell it in ya.

- Open the f***ing door, come on.

It's saltwater. Briglia wants

to toughen up her legs.

He's from the South.

She looks like a f***ing joke

rather than a racehorse, you know?

Joke? What are you talking about?

I got five grand on this horse, Paulie.

It better be no joke.

I know, I know.

It's just that I never seen a horse

with its legs in no garbage can.

What do you know

about training a horse, huh?

Waiting tables is what you know.

Making cheese is what I know.

Let's stay with what we know here.

You know about making cheese?

Not for nothin', Jimmy,

but my mother sent me over

a hunk of mozzarell'

from your place last week.

It was no big bargain.

Tough, tat mozzarell', and it ain't

the first time I noticed it, either.

- Your mozzarell' is tough sometimes.

- Are you nuts?

The Garguzzos never sold a piece

of tough mozzarell' in our life.

Tough like f***ing shoe leather,

that mozzarell'.

- Hey, Paulino.

- Hi, Uncle Pete. I was gonna call you.

Let's go talk private.

Where do you come off

to steal from Eddie Grant?

You ain't even a full-time thief.

You're a waiter, for Christ's sake.

- Can you bail me out, Uncle Pete?

- I'm treading water myself.

Oh, man.

You pay attention,

'cause your life depends on this.

If you won't say

who was with ya, Paulie,

your head gets hung

on your mother's doorknob.

He wouldn't really do that, Pete.

And he'd sit down to a steak pizzaiol'

right after.

Come on.

And what if I rat?

He's still gonna do

a Bed Bug Eddie number on ya.

Man.

He'd be making me a cripple.

He wants to crush me. And for what?

For what? I didn't rape his daughter.

I didn't spit in his fat face.

I took money from him.

I took f***ing money.

It don't call for this, Pete.

I gotta take a leak.

Come on.

Oh, man.

Hey.

What would you do,

you was in my shoes, Pete?

Me?

First espresso I carried to the bastard

would have a cupful of lye in it.

What do I do?

I can't put lye in Eddie Grant's coffee.

But I can't rat either.

I ain't built that way.

Paulie, in my life,

I never told nobody to rat.

But it ain't the old days.

Wise guys rat people out now.

I can't, Pete!

What happens to anyone what was with me?

- Who knows?

- Oh, man.

What about the money?

What did you bag?

50 large. That's what my end came to.

Gimme... gimme 43 to bring Eddie.

Just say you blew the rest.

The maniac'll...

The maniac will hardly even count it.

What do they want?

This ain't no joke, Paulie.

I had a partner, Pete.

I was with another guy.

Some old Irish hard-on from the Bronx.

I don't owe him nothing.

Barney. Fixes clocks.

Castle Hill and Westchester Avenue

in the Bronx.

An old guy.

An old-time thief.

Paulie, nothing ever hurts

like you think it will.

You go numb.

Then you wrap

your belt around your wrist

and you get yourself

to the nearest emergency room.

Oh, Uncle Pete.

Oh, Uncle Pete...

Oh, Uncle Pete. Uncle Pete.

Uncle Pete.

Uncle Pete!

Can you believe it?

Bed Bug had that kid's thumb taken off.

Jesus Christ.

He's like some Arab sheik

walking around with that crazy bulldog.

Yeah, but that's why Little Italy

got their own law and order.

Wanna know something?

It's the only neighborhood in the city

where little kids and old ladies

can still walk the streets at night.

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