бенефицием священник; /здесь/ букмекер, пользующийся своим доходным местом)
to remain in their bookmaking and policy number spots. As a bonus he had a foothold
(точка опоры) in the unions of the garment center which in later years was to prove
extremely important. And now that he had settled his business affairs the Don found
trouble at home.
Santino Corleone, Sonny, was sixteen years old and grown to an astonishing six feet
with broad shoulders and a heavy face that was sensual but by no means effeminate.
But where Fredo was a quiet boy, and Michael, of course, a toddler (ребенок,
начинающий ходить; to toddle – ковылять; учиться ходить), Santino was constantly
in trouble. He got into fights, did badly in school and, finally, Clemenza, who was the
boy's godfather and had a duty to speak, came to Don Corleone one evening and
informed him that his son had taken part in an armed robbery, a stupid affair which
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could have gone very badly. Sonny was obviously the ringleader, the two other boys in
the robbery his followers.
It was one of the very few times that Vito Corleone lost his temper. Tom Hagen had
been living in his home for three years and he asked Clemenza if the orphan boy had
been involved. Clemenza shook his head. Don Corleone had a car sent to bring Santino
to his offices in the Genco Pura Olive Oil Company.
For the first time, the Don met defeat. Alone with his son, he gave full vent to his rage,
cursing the hulking (громадный, неуклюжий, неповоротливый; hulk – большое
неповоротливое судно) Sonny in Sicilian dialect, a language so much more satisfying
than any other for expressing rage. He ended up with a question. "What gave you the
right to commit such an act? What made you wish to commit such an act?"
Sonny stood there, angry, refusing to answer. The Don said with contempt, "And so
stupid. What did you earn for that night's work? Fifty dollars each? Twenty dollars? You
risked your life for twenty dollars, eh?"
As if he had not heard these last words, Sonny said defiantly (с вызовом), "I saw you
kill Fanucci."
The Don said, "Ahhh" and sank back in his chair. He waited.
Sonny said, "When Fanucci left the building, Mama said I could go up the house. I
saw you go up the roof and I followed you. I saw everything you did. I stayed up there
and I saw you throw away the wallet and the gun."
The Don sighed. "Well, then I can't talk to you about how you should behave. Don't
you want to finish school, don't you want to be a lawyer? Lawyers can steal more
money with a briefcase than a thousand men with guns and masks."
Sonny grinned at him and said slyly, "I want to enter the family business." When he
saw that the Don's face remained impassive, that he did not laugh at the joke, he added
hastily, "I can learn how to sell olive oil."
Still the Don did not answer. Finally he shrugged. "Every man has one destiny," he
said. He did not add that the witnessing of Fanucci's murder had decided that of his son.
He merely turned away and added quietly, "Come in tomorrow morning at nine o'clock.
Genco will show you what to do."
But Genco Abbandando, with that shrewd insight that a Consigliori must have,
realized the true wish of the Don and used Sonny mostly as a bodyguard for his father,
a position in which he could also learn the subtleties (subtlety – тонкость,
изощренность, хитрость; subtle – тонкий, нежный; утонченный) of being a Don. And
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60
it brought out a professorial instinct in the Don himself, who often gave lectures on how
to succeed for the benefit of his eldest son.
Besides his oft-repeated theory that a man has but one destiny, the Don constantly
reproved Sonny for that young man's outbursts of temper. The Don considered a use of
threats the most foolish kind of exposure (выставление /на солнце, под дождь/;
подвергание /риску/; to expose – выставлять, подвергать действию /дождя, солнца/;
подвергать риску); the unleashing (to unleash – спускать с привязи) of anger without
forethought as the most dangerous indulgence (потворство своим слабостям
[ın'dΛldG∂ns]; to indulge – позволять себе удовольствие, давать себе волю). No one
had ever heard the Don utter a naked threat, no one had ever seen him in an
uncontrollable rage. It was unthinkable. And so he tried to teach Sonny his own
disciplines. He claimed that there was no greater natural advantage in life than having
an enemy overestimate your faults, unless it was to have a friend underestimate your
virtues.
The caporegime, Clemenza, took Sonny in hand and taught him how to shoot and to
wield a garrot (владеть гарротой /шнуром для удушения/). Sonny had no taste for the
Italian rope, he was too Americanized. He preferred the simple, direct, impersonal
Anglo-Saxon gun, which saddened Clemenza. But Sonny became a constant and
welcome companion to his father, driving his car, helping him in little details. For the
next two years he seemed like the usual son entering his father's business, not too
bright, not too eager, content to hold down (удержать, не потерять) a soft job.
Meanwhile his boyhood chum and semiadopted brother Tom Hagen was going to
college. Fredo was still in high school; Michael, the youngest brother, was in grammar
school, and baby sister Connie was a toddling girl of four. The family had long since
moved to an apartment house in the Bronx. Don Corleone was considering buying a
house in Long Island, but he wanted to fit this in with other plans he was formulating.
Vito Corleone was a man with vision. All the great cities of America were being torn by
underworld strife (борьба, раздор). Guerrilla wars by the dozen flared up, ambitious
hoodlums trying to carve themselves a bit of empire; men like Corleone himself were
trying to keep their borders and rackets secure. Don Corleone saw that the newspapers
and government agencies were using these killings to get stricter and stricter laws, to
use harsher police methods. He foresaw that public indignation might even lead to a
suspension of democratic procedures which could be fatal to him and his people. His
own empire, internally, was secure. He decided to bring peace to all the warring factions
in New York City and then in the nation.
Мультиязыковой проект Ильи Франкаwww.franklang.ru
He had no illusions about the dangerousness of his mission. He spent the first year
meeting with different chiefs of gangs in New York, laying the groundwork, sounding
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them out (to sound – зондировать, измерять глубину /лотом/; испытать), proposing
spheres of influence that would be honored by a loosely bound confederated council.
But there were too many factions, too many special interests that conflicted. Agreement
was impossible. Like other great rulers and lawgivers in history Don Corleone decided
that order and peace were impossible until the number of reigning states had been
reduced to a manageable number.
There were five or six "Families" too powerful to eliminate. But the rest, the
neighborhood Black Hand terrorists, the free-lance shylocks, the strong-arm
bookmakers operating without the proper, that is to say paid, protection of the legal
authorities, would have to go. And so he mounted what was in effect a colonial war
against these people and threw all the resources of the Corleone organization against
them.
The pacification of the New York area took three years and had some unexpected
rewards. At first it took the form of bad luck. A group of mad-dog Irish stickup (налет,
ограбление) artists the Don had marked for extermination (уничтожение) almost
carried the day (to carry the day – одержать победу) with sheer Emerald Isle йlan (с
чисто ирландским напором, стремительностью: йlan [eı’lα:ŋ] /франц./; Emerald Isle
= Ireland). By chance, and with suicidal bravery, one of these Irish gunmen pierced the
Don's protective cordon and put a shot into his chest. The assassin was immediately
riddled with bullets but the damage was done.
However this gave Santino Corleone his chance. With his father out of action, Sonny
took command of a troop, his own regime, with the rank of caporegime, and like a
young, untrumpeted (trumpet [‘trΛmpıt] – труба; to trumpet – трубить, возвещать,
восхвалять) Napoleon, showed a genius for city warfare. He also showed a merciless
ruthlessness, the lack of which had been Don Corleone's only fault as a conqueror.
From 1935 to 1937 Sonny Corleone made a reputation as the most cunning and
relentless executioner the underworld had yet known. Yet for sheer terror even he was
eclipsed by the awesome man named Luca Brasi.
It was Brasi who went after the rest of the Irish gunmen and single-handedly wiped
them out. It was Brasi, operating alone when one of the six powerful families tried to
interfere and become the protector of the independents, who assassinated the head of
the family as a warning. Shortly after, the Don recovered from his wound and made
peace with that particular family.
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By 1937 peace and harmony reigned in New York City except for minor incidents,