/особенно телесному/ [t∫жs’taız]). Never cloying (слащав; to cloy – пресыщать) in the
tender of his condolences, yet never was he offhand (импровизированный; /здесь/
бесцеремонный). Once a family used Amerigo Bonasera to speed a loved one on
(проводить, отправить в последний путь близкого человека), they came back to him
again and again. And he never, never, deserted one of his clients on that terrible last
night above ground.
Usually he allowed himself a little nap after supper. Then he washed and shaved
afresh, talcum powder generously used to shroud (посыпать, укрыть; shroud – саван;
пелена, покров) the heavy black beard. A mouthwash always. He respectfully changed
into fresh linen, white gleaming shirt, the black tie, a freshly pressed dark suit, dull black
shoes and black socks. And yet the effect was comforting instead of somber. He also
kept his hair dyed black, an unheard-of frivolity in an Italian male of his generation; but
not out of vanity. Simply because his hair had turned a lively pepper and salt, a color
which struck him as unseemly for his profession.
After he finished his soup, his wife placed a small steak before him with a few forkfuls
of green spinach oozing yellow oil. He was a light eater. When he finished this he drank
a cup of coffee and smoked another Camel cigarette. Over his coffee he thought about
his poor daughter. She would never be the same. Her outward beauty had been
restored but there was the look of a frightened animal in her eyes that had made him
unable to bear the sight of her. And so they had sent her to live in Boston for a time.
Time would heal her wounds. Pain and terror was not so final as death, as he well knew.
His work made him an optimist.
He had just finished the coffee when his phone in the living room rang. His wife never
answered it when he was home, so he got up and drained his cup and stubbed out his
cigarette. As he walked to the phone he pulled off his tie and started to unbutton his
shirt, getting ready for his little nap. Then he picked up the phone and said with quiet
courtesy, "Hello."
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The voice on the other end was harsh, strained. "This is Tom Hagen," it said. "I'm
calling for Don Corleone, at his request."
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Amerigo Bonasera felt the coffee churning (churn – маслобойка, мешалка; to churn
– взбивать /масло/; взбалтывать, вспенивать) sourly in his stomach, felt himself
going a little sick. It was more than a year since he had put himself in the debt of the
Don to avenge his daughter's honor and in that time the knowledge that he must pay
that debt had receded. He had been so grateful seeing the bloody faces of those two
ruffians that he would have done anything for the Don. But time erodes gratitude more
quickly than it does beauty. Now Bonasera felt the sickness of a man faced with
disaster. His voice faltered as he answered, "Yes, I understand. I'm
listening."
He was surprised at the coldness in Hagen's voice. The Consigliori had always been
a courteous man, though not Italian, but now he was being rudely brusque. "You owe
the Don a service," Hagen said. "He has no doubt that you will repay him. That you will
be happy to have this opportunity. In one hour, not before, perhaps later, he will be at
your funeral parlor to ask for your help. Be there to greet him. Don't have any people
who work for you there. Send them home. If you have any objections to this, speak now
and I'll inform Don Corleone. He has other friends who can do him this service."
Amerigo Bonasera almost cried out in his fright, "How can you think I would refuse the
Godfather? Of course I'll do anything he wishes. I haven't forgotten my debt. I'll go to my
business immediately, at once."
Hagen's voice was gentler now, but there was something strange about it. "Thank
you," he said. "The Don never doubted you. The question was mine. Oblige him tonight
and you can always come to me in any trouble, you'll earn my personal friendship."
This frightened Amerigo Bonasera even more. He stuttered, "The Don himself is
coming to me tonight?"
"Yes," Hagen said.
"Then he's completely recovered from his injuries, thank God," Bonasera said. His
voice made it a question.
There was a pause at the other end of the phone, then Hagen's voice said very quietly,
"Yes." There was a click and the phone went dead.
Bonasera was sweating. He went into the bedroom and changed his shirt and rinsed
his mouth. But he didn't shave or use a fresh tie. He put on the same one he had used
during the day. He called the funeral parlor and told his assistant to stay with the
bereaved family using the front parlor that night. He himself would be busy in the
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laboratory working area of the building. When the assistant started asking questions
Bonasera cut him off very curtly and told him to follow orders exactly.
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He put on his suit jacket and his wife, still eating, looked up at him in surprise. "I have
work to do," he said and she did not dare question him because of the look on his face.
Bonasera went out of the house and walked the few blocks to his funeral parlor.
This building stood by itself on a large lot with a white picket fence running all around
it. There was a narrow roadway leading from the street to the rear, just wide enough for
ambulances and hearses (hearse [h∂:s] – катафалк, похоронные дроги). Bonasera
unlocked the gate and left it open. Then he walked to the rear of the building and
entered it through the wide door there. As he did so he could see mourners already
entering the front door of the funeral parlor to pay their respects to the current corpse.
Many years ago when Bonasera had bought this building from an undertaker planning
to retire, there had been a stoop of about ten steps that mourners had to mount before
entering the funeral parlor. This had posed a problem. Old and crippled mourners
determined to pay their respects had found the steps almost impossible to mount, so
the former undertaker had used the freight elevator for these people, a small metal
platform, that rose out of the ground beside the building. The elevator was for coffins
and bodies. It would descend underground, then rise into the funeral parlor itself, so that
a crippled mourner would find himself rising through the floor beside the coffin as other
mourners moved their black chairs aside to let the elevator rise through the trapdoor
(люк, опускная дверь; trap – ловушка, капкан; /вентиляционная/ дверь /в шахте/).
Then when the crippled or aged mourner (скорбящий; to mourn – скорбеть,
оплакивать /кого-либо/) had finished paying his respects, the elevator would again
come up through the polished floor to take him down and out again.
Amerigo Bonasera had found this solution to the problem unseemly (неподобающий,
непристойный) and penny-pinching (мелочный, скаредный, экономящий на копейке;
to pinch – щипать; сжимать; скупиться). So he had had the front of the building
remodeled, the stoop done away with and a slightly inclining walk put in its place. But of
course the elevator was still used for coffins and corpses.
In the rear of the building, cut off from the funeral parlor and reception rooms by a
massive soundproof (звуконепроницаемый) door, was the business office, the
embalming (to embalm [ım'bα:m] – бальзамировать; balm – бальзам) room, a
storeroom for coffins, and a carefully locked closet holding chemicals and the awful
tools of his trade. Bonasera went to the office, sat at his desk and lit up a Camel, one of
the few times he had ever smoked in this building. Then he waited for Don Corleone.
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He waited with a feeling of the utmost despair. For he had no doubt as to what
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services he would be called upon to perform. For the last year the Corleone Family had
waged war against the five great Mafia Families of New York and the carnage had filled
the newspapers. Many men on both sides had been killed. Now the Corleone Family
had killed somebody so important that they wished to hide his body, make it disappear,
and what better way than to have it officially buried by a registered undertaker? And
Amerigo Bonasera had no illusions about the act he was to commit. He would be an
accessory to murder. If it came out, he would spend years in jail. His daughter and wife
would be disgraced, his good name, the respected name of Amerigo Bonasera,
dragged through the bloody mud of the Mafia war.
He indulged himself (позволил себе) by smoking another Camel. And then he
thought of something even more terrifying. When the other Mafia Families found out that
he had aided the Corleones they would treat him as an enemy. They would murder him.
And now he cursed the day he had gone to the Godfather and begged for his
vengeance. He cursed the day his wife and the wife of Don Corleone had become
friends. He cursed his daughter and America and his own success. And then his
optimism returned. It could all go well. Don Corleone was a clever man. Certainly
everything had been arranged to keep the secret. He had only to keep his nerve. For of