This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters, locations, incidents, historical facts that existed or that are in existence portrayed in this book are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead is entirely coincidental.

All rights for this book are reserved and belong exclusively to the author.

Dedicated to:

my children, Alexander and Nicole

my wife, Alessandra (the Red Farmhouse Detective)

my mom and dad, Marisa and Augusto

my sister, Tatiana

my in-laws, Ines and Sandro

and… to all my friends and relatives who remain in the telephone directory and who will purchase at least one copy. For the rest, you are consigned to a good and fair God who will strike you down with lightening until you burn to a crisp.

“Imagination is a quality that was given to man to compensate for what he is not, and a sense of humour is provided to console him from what he is.”

Oscar Wilde

Prologue

Toxic white smoke rings slowly surfaced upward, joining the dense cloud of smoke that had already enveloped the room. The pungent odor of cigar filled the study, clinging to every object. The walls of the room were so saturated by the fumes, they seemed to be the very cause of the stale and emanating smell.

The man sitting at the head of the table was the cause of this miasma, mechanically blowing smoke from his mouth while meditating intently on a memory. A fresh memory that hurt deep down and would scar him forever, leaving dark circles under his eyes. His name is Joe Santini, and he had just witnessed the murder of his brother, Angelo, whose death was an image that no man could erase from memory.

Of the other three men in the room, only Carmine D'Abbate sat with him at the table in silence, pouring himself a glass of red wine and staring at Joe with bulging, haggard eyes.

Frank “Drummer” Colombo stood leaning against the windowsill watching the rain pour down, drumming his fingers in rhythm with the chomping and snapping of his chewing gum. Drummer's apparent calm had been proven an illusion many times, given his ability to kill a man with the same understated manner as perusing the morning edition of The New York Times.

The third man, Johnny Greco, chain smoked and paced restlessly back and forth like a pendulum. Only one single, lewd word kept coming out of his mouth. “Fuck, fuck, fuck…”

Carmine spoke in his usual calm and reassuring way, “Here Joe, have another glass. It'll do you good. This is the good stuff, not that crap from the supermarket. This comes from Italy.”

Johnny, high-strung by nature, couldn't stand the apathy and resignation one second longer. “Knock it off with the fuckin' wine, already! You trying to get him drunk? He's still gotta tell us what the fuck happened!”

Carmine was from the old school and didn't like Johnny's foulmouth language. “All you know how to say is 'fuck'. Cut it out. Besides, can't you see he's still in shock? Damn, show a little respect! He just lost his brother, for crying out loud.”

“That's exactly my point. I respect him. And I've always respected Angelo. I've been standing around for two hours doing nothing and I'm sick and tired of wasting time. I want to know right this minute who did it so I can go tear his head off with my bare hands. Fuck!”

Carmine stood up fast, knocking the chair to the floor. Pointing his finger at Johnny, he said, “I swear to you, if you say that word one more time, I'll rip the tongue out of your mouth and feed it to the dogs!”

“What do you want, hah? I can't even talk now? What are you, my mother? If I want to say fuck, I'll say it as much as I want: fuck, fuck, fuck,” said Johnny with all the arrogance and insolence his youth could muster.

Carmine was as good as his word. “I warned you, you stupid idiot! Now I'm gonna crack your dumb skull open so you can fill it with all the filthy language that you want!”

Johnny loved nothing more than a challenge. “Come on, fat-ass. You're full of shit. You think I'm afraid of you?” dared Johnny.

While they both attacked each other, wrestling like a couple of kids over a toy, Frank pulled his silver revolver out of its holster and shouted, “Knock it off for Christ's sake, you're grown men and you're acting like a couple of spoiled brats. If you don't stop it right now, I'll shoot you both in the knees. That'll give you something to cry about.”

Heedless to Frank's threat, they kept brawling until Joe spoke in a faint voice, “Knock it off or this lunatic will shoot both of you.”

Shocked by Joe's tone, they immediately stopped fighting. All three moved close to the table in reverent silence, waiting to hear what he had to say.

“It was supposed to be a two-man job because we didn't want to attract too much attention,” said Joe. “At least that's what the Boss told us. We were supposed to wait on that damned hill about three hundred yards away for the armored van to pass, hit the tire with the sniper rifle, then wait for our accomplice to get out after he'd knocked out his partner, grab the briefcase with the diamonds and run to the hideout. Clean and easy, just like that. But I knew better. There is no such thing as an easy job where everything goes smooth as silk. Anyway, when Angelo took his shot, both tires exploded and the van went off the road, rolled into a ditch and flipped over.

“We watched and waited, but nobody got out. Pretty soon, a gray Chrysler came speeding up, and two guys with rifles got out and opened the doors of the van and opened fire like crazy on those poor guys, shooting them like dogs. Angelo and I looked at each other and decided to do the only thing that we could think of. We fired a couple of shots into the air just to get their attention and try to figure out who they were. As it turned out, they were from the Lucchesi family and had organized the same heist as us. Since nobody knew which one of us had fired the first shot at the van, a heated argument started over territorial rights. We even had a map spread out on the hood of the car. We said the van belonged to us, since the loot came from a jewelry shop in our neighborhood at Bowry and Baynard Streets. But they insisted that the van was found outside of Manhattan in a neighborhood in their district. They ended up pointing their guns at us in hopes of scaring us… but they didn't realize who they were up against, and that's when Angelo lost control. A fight broke out and Angelo killed both of them. But just before one of them took his last breath, he told us that he was the nephew of Don Salvatore Lucchesi and that we could rest assured that his death would be vindicated.

“Then we saw a couple of cars coming toward us and we figured that their back-up had arrived, so we decided to split up and meet up at the hideout later. Angelo grabbed the briefcase with the diamonds and we took off in separate cars.

“When Angelo got here, he had a hole in his gut and he started boasting about how he had told them to go to hell after they'd caught him. He knew he was as good as dead, but he made me make a promise.”

Joe stopped talking, threw back the last of the wine in his glass and turned to look at his dead brother laying in a pool of blood. The other three men looked down at Angelo “The Comedian” who always loved a good joke, sharing the pain of knowing that now he'd only be telling jokes on the other side.

“Joe, what did he make you promise him?” prompted Frank, hoping to bring him out of the trance that he had fallen into.

“He was worried about his son, Benito. No, not worried. He was terrified that his boy would end up like him. As he'd sworn to his wife on her deathbed, he made me swear that I would never, ever tell Benito about him and that he would never have anything to do with the 'family'. He told me that not knowing would protect him. So I made that promise.”

Finished with his monologue, Joe punched the table hard, making the three men jump. “And now I'm asking you to do the same! Swear on your cousin's corpse that you will respect his last wish. Swear it!” They hesitantly stood up, looked surreptitiously at the dead body of their cousin and one by one, swore themselves to secrecy.

It was Johnny who broke the silence, formulating the question that he, more than anyone, wanted to ask. “So now that we've all sworn our honor, did he tell you where the loot is?”

The other two men shook their heads, appalled at Johnny's disrespect and materialism. Frank, especially offended, said, “You never change! How can you think of money at a time like this?”

Johnny didn't even try to justify himself. He just carried on accusing Frank of being a hypocrite. “What do you want from me? Don't tell me that you're not thinking the same thing?”

Joe held up his hand to stop the argument. “Let him ask, he has every right. Business is business. I only wanted you to swear on your honor, and you did.”

They all held their breath, waiting for what was to come.

Frank urged him on, “So? What did he say?”

Joe turned and stared at Carmine. “You know, Carmine, before he passed away, he mentioned you a few times and then he stammered his final, delirious words just before he died.”

Carmine was surprised that Angelo had thought of him at the moment of his death. “Joe, what words?”

“Words?” asked Joe, looking as dazed and confused as ever, paused as if trying to remember something. “He said, 'the diamonds… the key… the angel.'.”

“And what the fuck is that supposed to mean?” asked an exasperated Carmine, with no thought at all to foul language.

A roll of thunder followed by a flash of lightening illuminated the tableau: the lifeless face of “The Comedian” went aglow for the last time, displaying a strange grimace that no one was likely to ever forget.

Chapter 1

Thirty-three years later

There are times when you suddenly feel that inexplicable, magical, electric moment where you know that your life is about to radically change forever, for the better. Some have experienced this feeling upon hearing their newborn's first cry; for others, the sound of the clerk tearing off a thick strip of colorful winning lottery tickets; or at the altar, feeling that thrill when your bride pronounces “I do”, even if that prelude to your happiness will require confirmation later down the road.

Whatever it is and wherever it happens, the fact is, if you're able to hear that enchanting little voice, it doesn't always mean that you will be able to associate it to the actual circumstances. There is always a risk that your mind will alter and transform how the events truly played out.

Completely by surprise, on the day of his thirty-fifth birthday, that little voice boldly made itself heard in Ben's mind, whose given name was Benito (a great source of embarrassment to him). What he thought he was hearing, was in reality, what he wanted to hear; his big moment had finally come. According to Ben, this was the moment he would be launched to stardom.

He sat excitedly in front of the mirror of his squalid, third-rate dressing room, not bothered in the least by his dreary surroundings. This was part of paying his dues, the price that all artists happily pay. At least that's what he was counting on.

“You're on, Ben. Concentrate and do your best. All the fame and success that you've always dreamt of are about to come true. The audience is waiting and they expect the best of the best. You gotta blow 'em away, but keep 'em on the edge of their seats. You want them begging for more, so they don't know if they should applaud you or just listen. Your father will be proud of you! Knock 'em dead. You can, you…”

The monologue was abruptly interrupted by two men entering the dressing room. One was Karl Grimm, the manager who had interviewed Ben for the job. The other guy, heavyset with a greasy beard, must have been the owner. Completely oblivious to his own rudeness, he pointed his finger at Ben and said, “Who the hell is he talking to? I told you he looked like a moron.”

Unsure if he should defend Ben or be seriously worried, Karl decided to intervene. “He's an artist. He was rehearsing, right?”

Frightened, Ben stuttered, “Y-ya… sure, I was… was rehearsing, sir.”

It was an awkward moment, the three of them staring at each other in silence with Ben's eyes darting between the two men, hoping for some kind of signal. The situation was uncomfortable and he didn't dare speak, while at the same time worried that he would appear incompetent.

The owner finally broke the silence. After readjusting his ridiculous toupee and lighting his smelly cigar, with an air of provocation he said, “I don't see the showgirl. Where's the showgirl?”

“What showgirl?” asked Ben, taken aback.

“Whaddya mean, 'What showgirl'? The one with the big tits and her ass hanging out. What are ya, a queer? For fifteen years, I been payin' that dried up magician, Jeff McPride, who couldn't get a trick right if his life depended on it, only because he brought a floozy every night. Now I'm asking you, where's yours?”

The man stared hard at Ben, like a bulldog ready to attack. Luckily, Karl stepped in, in an attempt to subdue him. “Bill, relax. The kid is good, trust me. About the girl, you can't see her because…,” Karl cleared his throat, stalling for time while trying to catch Ben's eye to let him know that he was on his side, “…here's why, he wants to bring her on as a surprise! Ya, it's a surprise. He wanted to make a good impression, a great impression, eh! Eh?” Making a vulgar hand gesture, he burst out in laughter, goading Bill with his elbow.

It took him a few seconds, but finally Bill snorted with laughter, too, ending with a phlegmy and hacking cough. For a minute, Ben thought his boss was going to collapse dead on the floor just before he was about to go on stage. Karl saved the day, pulling out a flask and making him drink until he stopped spluttering. Still out of breath, Bill carried out his warning, “All right, do your damned performance, but I hope for your sake that there'll be plenty of female flesh, otherwise I'll personally kick your ass out of every club in New York! Understood?”

While Ben listened with shock to what seemed like absurd ranting, he caught a glimpse of Karl's hands shooting up behind Bill's gigantic bulk, signaling him to be calm. So he didn't utter a word, only nodded his head repeatedly in affirmation to Bill's request.

The smelly and sloppy boss finally left, leaving him disheartened and at the mercy of Karl's false smile. “Would you explain what I'm supposed to do now? Where in the heck am I going to find a… an… assistant? What do I need an assistant for anyway?” he whispered worriedly.

“Don't worry about it. Relax. I've already got an idea how to save the cow and the cabbage.”

“The cow? The goat and cabbage, not the cow!” said Ben.

“Who cares? Same thing, they're all animals. Anyway, listen, I want you in top form. Don't think of anything except the show. And above all, relax.”

Karl's words seemed to have the desired effect. “You're right, all I have to do is stay focused and give them an unforgettable show. You'll see, I won't need any half nude woman on the stage,” said Ben. So he straightened his jacket, licked his fingers and combed his eyebrows and took one last look in the mirror, feeling satisfied with his appearance and sure of himself.

The manager watched Ben and decided that he was going to be all right. Just as he was about to leave the dressing room, he asked him the question he was dying to know. “By the way, do you use a rabbit or a dove in your show?”

Ben's explosion was more visual than verbal; his big, green eyes turned into red spheres ready to pop out of his head. Enunciating through clenched teeth, he said, “I. Am. A. Stand. Up. Comedian. A showman. I don't use a rabbit, let alone a dove. Listen up, I'm not a damned magician! You got that?”

Karl realized that Ben's outburst had cleared the kid's head of any nervousness that had been building up till then. “All right already, you're not a magician. No need to lose your cool. You artists are all a bunch of weirdoes. Go figure…” He limped off, grumbling all the way.

The last hard jazz notes of the piano played away, mixing with the stale air in the club. The ventilator was probably broken again, but that didn't seem to bother anyone. The feeble applause coming from who knows where, accompanied the indignant musician off the stage with him not even bothering to look at the public.

From the dusty red slit in the curtain that had swallowed up the exiting musician, the smiling head of Karl Grimm appeared, followed by the rest of him, decked out like a circus ringleader.

He took off his flashy and inappropriate top hat and took a deep bow to the audience. “Ladies and gentlemen, a big round of applause to our great Albert Alba for his amazing piano exhibition.”

The only response was a loud thud from a drunkard who had fallen unconscious off his chair. His white t-shirt slipped up, leaving his huge belly exposed as it swayed back and forth like a mass of jelly, none of which appeared to disturb anyone in the club.

“I know you've all been waiting impatiently for our great Jeff McPride to amaze you with his magic, just like every Wednesday. Unfortunately, something a little unexpected came up, so this evening he won't be able…”

Karl was suddenly called backstage. He peeked through the curtains to speak with his assistant and then stepped back to his place on the stage wearing a concerned expression on his face. “Ah! I see… ladies and gentlemen, I've just been informed that the little 'something unexpected' has transformed into fulminating cirrhosis of the liver. God rest his soul. Now I would like all of you to join me in memory of this great artist, who gave us his last magic trick, disappearing from this world only to reappear on the other side. I would ask for five minutes of silence to commemorate him, but I know time is precious, so we'll just do five seconds. I know he would have done the same for all of you…” During the five seconds, a few knocked on wood, but most chose to avoid any bad luck by touching something else a little more explicit.

“All right. For one great man who has left this stage, let's make room for another artist, of whom I'm sure you will all grow very fond of. It is my honor to present Ben Santini!”

Ben made a shy appearance, encouraged by Karl's energetic applause that filled the embarrassingly lifeless silence of the club.

“One last thing before I leave him to it.” Karl leaned toward the audience and held his hand next to his mouth, and whispered loudly, “He's a good kid, but whatever you do, don't call him a magician! He's a tiny bit sensitive.”

Resigned to his fate, Ben tried to display his best smile. “Hey everyone! My name's Ben, Ben Santini. And as Karl, our Master of Ceremonies mentioned, I'm here tonight to give you a couple of laughs, even if Jeff McPride's unexpected passing has certainly upset you, as I can see. All right! Enough sadness now. If you're here tonight, then you're here to party, enjoy some good company, have a drink… even if Jeff had done his share of that, just like that guy over there laying on the floor. I guess he's gotten plastered one too many times. Either that or he's feelin' really down in the dumps. But don't worry about it, 'cause I'm pretty sure that tonight, he won't be driving. It's a blessing in disguise when they tow your car away the same day you decide to get smashed.”

The spotlight suddenly moved to his right, leaving him in the dark. Ben looked up and tried to get the technician's attention to no avail, so he stepped over back under the light.

“No worries, here I am. That was the electric company getting revenge cause I was late paying the bill. And don't tell me you've never been late paying a bill… like you! Ben pointed to a guy wearing a muscle shirt with a bushy beard and tattooed forearms.

“Who, me?” he asked in a gruff voice.

“Ya, you. Have you ever forgotten something important?”

“Well, once I served three years cause I forgot to cover myself.”

“You served three years in prison because you went out naked?” asked Ben.

“What, are you crazy? When I got into Sing Sing, I had my clothes on. It was those damned Japanese digital cameras that busted me cause I had a gun in my hand and no balaclava.”

Ben thought it better to change the subject, so he cut him off gently. “I know what you mean. Damned hi-tech, state-of-the-art, pain-in-the-ass Asian technology. And you?”

He pointed to a shriveled up woman in her forties, dressed like a sixteen-year-old with stiff, blond ringlets. The “young lady” took the gum out of her mouth and knocked back the last sip of her whiskey.

“Well, let's see… off the top of my head, the only thing that I can think of is the time I wanted a little outfit that cost a hundred bucks over on Seventh Avenue, but I forgot my ex-husband's credit card at home. So that pig of a sales guy wanted a little under-the-table job in exchange for the dress, like I was the last bimbo on the street.

Ben butt in, in an attempt to blurt out a moral to the story for those who heard an “under-the-table job”.

“So Miss, you forgot your credit card and had to pass up the dress…”

But the woman wanted to clarify for the record, “Like hell I did! I gave him a professional job. Too bad the owner walked in and caught us. The bastard fired the salesman's ass right there on the spot and kicked me out of the store without the dress, hollering and threatening to call the guards.”

Some laughter broke out from the back of the room accompanied by a few obscene offers.

“Hey, if you like my wife's coat, we can make a deal!”

Ever the lady, she responded with her middle finger. “Make a deal with this, asshole!”

While disgusted by all the vulgarity, Ben tried to get a hold of the situation. “What I meant was, we are all subject to ill fate, but more often than not, it depends on our reactions. For example, when I was sixteen, I fell madly in love with gorgeous woman. She was a lingerie model for a well-known magazine. I thought about her all day long in my room, and not only…”

Ben suddenly stopped talking when he saw his manager frantically pointing to the cocktail waitress dressed up like a bunny, serving the tables. Then he remembered Bill's warning and figured he'd better find a way to use her in the show.

“…Hey! My model looked just like that waitress there holding the tray. Could you step up here on the stage for a minute, just to help me make my story a little more convincing?”

The girl smiled. It was obvious that she was embarrassed but flattered to be compared to a model. “Who, me? You want me to get on the stage?”

“Sure! I don't see any other beautiful waitresses in the room.”

She blushed at the compliment. As she made her way to the stage, someone from the audience yelled, “Yeah! It's about time we get to see a little T & A!”

Ben did his best to calm the girl, who was a more than a little worried about those stoked and impatient men.

“No, our young lady won't be showing you her tits. I invited her up here with me only to help me out.”

“What about her ass, then?” asked someone, adding insult to injury.

“Nope. Sorry, not even her ass,” said Ben.

“Jeez, you could've told us it was gonna be a show for boy scouts!”

The menacing glare from the owner was a little more than frightening.

“All right, you beautiful creature, can you tell us your name?” asked Ben, doing his best to be as polite as possible.

“Oh… thank you… my name is Susan…”

After looking hesitatingly around, she wisely decided not to disclose any more personal information.

“Just Susan!” she said through clenched teeth, as if she were telling a joke.

“Ok, 'Just Susan'. Do you, by chance, work for a lawyer? If so, maybe you could interrogate all of us! All kidding aside, let's give a round of applause to Miss Just Susan!”

While she kept staring into the empty space, Ben decided to motivate the audience.

“And your long, shapely legs?” He kneeled in front of her with his fingers imitating the lens of a camera focusing on her legs like a director and the small crowd broke into a pretty convincing applause.

“Ah, that's more like it. So, I was telling you about the day that I decided to get the courage to go meet my model. I knew my chances of getting into her studio were about the same as an eighty-year-old winning the New York marathon, but I decided to give it my best shot. I was convinced that I was going to meet her, and that she was the woman of my life, not just some adolescent fantasy. The next morning when I got up, I saw the horror of my face. A big, huge, gigantic abscess sat front and center on my forehead! There it was, standing out, staring at the world like a little Nazi.”

Ben gesticulated like a Latino while telling the story. “Panic hit me like the Titanic rapidly approaching the iceberg. I absolutely had to get rid of it, so I decided to pop it. In front of the mirror, I tried squeezing and pinching it with my fingers in the hopes that a fountain of yellow pus would break out.”

Disgust was displayed by most, except for one of the fat spectators, wearing a Texas cowboy hat, devouring a giant hamburger dripping with mayonnaise.

“After a few tries at destroying the little volcano, the only thing that exploded was the worst headache I've ever had in my life, adding to the fact that the boil was so red and irritated by my attempts at popping it, that my face looked like a tomato pizza pie. I decided to call a friend of mine who was a true expert in pimples; his nickname was Minefield. Anyway, he delivered… good ol' Minefield.”

Squeezing his throat with his fingers, he imitated the crackling voice of an obnoxious teenager. “Boil some water and rock salt, then take some cotton and wet it with the mixture and rub it on the pimple. It'll dry it right up. Bye.”

Ben waited a second for some applause, or at least a few smiles. Only Bill's growling could be heard, growing in intensity, like a rhinoceros getting ready to charge.

“So I did exactly like Minefield said. Except I didn't have a saucepan, so I had to use a big pot. I filled the pot, boiled the water and then brought it to cool on the balcony. Unfortunately, while I was carrying the pot of boiling water to the balcony, I tripped and the whole pot spilled out onto the street. All I could hear was the screaming and cursing from someone below, while I hid…”

Bill spit the cigar smoke from his mouth and got up from his chair. With a red-hot, angry face on the verge of a violent eruption, he yelled, “You! You! You filthy piece of shit! It was you! You ruined my life. I'm gonna kill you, I'm gonna skin you alive. I'm, I'm… come here, dammit!”

Beautiful Susan hid behind Ben, using him as a shield as soon as she saw the owner pick up one of the tables with one hand.

“Get outta the way, you stupid idiot. I'm gonna break this bastard's head open!”

“Please, calm down, Mr. Jerkoff. I think there's…,” begged Ben.

“Jercov! The name's Jercov! My father was from Yugoslavia. That was me screaming in pain from the street! That creep there ruined my life! Look at what he did!”

He set the table back down and took off his toupee, showing everyone his head, almost completely without skin, like a roasted and peeled red bell pepper… or more precisely, a gigantic male genital.

The sight of Bill's head triggered a chorus of disgusted exclamations from the spectators. “Now do you get why I gotta kill him?”

Shouting like a maniac, he cleared the path to the stage's stairs, while Ben frantically looked for an escape through the curtains that led backstage. But a pair of huge, possessed madmen, dressed like Tweedledee and Tweedledum from Alice in Wonderland, suddenly stepped in front of him, blocking his departure.

Bill jumped onto the stage with surprising agility, given his size, and with a satanic sneer, stood in front of poor Ben who was so terrorized that he ran to hide behind the girl.

It was Susan who grabbed the microphone, using it as an arm to ward off the three men who were moving in closer and closer. “Don't move or you'll be sorry!”

At first, caution made them slow down, then it backfired, egging them happily along.

“Thanks for the advice, honey. We're gonna use that contraption on and in your little friend.”

“I'm warning you! Don't make me…” Grabbing the mic like a baseball bat, she lassoed it by its cord, where it wrapped around one of the twins' ankle, tripping him over. The other guy tumbled and fell on the stage, flying into one of the tables, knocking over three drunken sailors. Furious over their wasted beers, the inebriated sailors tried to stand, rocking back and forth on their feet.

Then the microphone started whistling with ear-piercing feedback and everyone covered their ears in a desperate attempt to muffle the loud screeching, trying to mute the noise as Bill had picked up the mic and started bashing it.

The tension in the club gained more and more momentum every minute until an inevitable no-holds-barred brawl broke out. In all the confusion, it became obvious that any object was a potential weapon: bottles, chairs, tables, people, coins, ashtrays. During the hurricane that followed, an enormous bearded man with a patch over his left eye started yelping and crying. Someone had stepped on his ingrown toenail. His reaction was like a bull in a rodeo, ramming the cowboy wearing the Stetson, launching him across the room. The unlucky cowboy was a failing dwarf actor who had spiraled into big screen anonymity, but was still famous enough to land a guest spot in an occasional TV series. Both were lifted from the ground and flung right onto the stage where they collided with Bill, who saw the little man's landing just a second before the impact.