who's next? asked the Post on September 18, 1991, the day after Nino Carti's sentencing. The gist of the article was that there now existed an unprecedented power vacuum at the top of the Mob. Vincente Delgatto, sixty-nine, was the highest-ranking member of the Pugliese family not in custody, but sources quoted in the article doubted that he would ever see the solemn interfamily ceremony that signaled the coronation of a Godfather. "He's a competent administrator," said one Mob watcher, "but an old man with old ideas who no longer inspires fear. His moment has passed." Warned another expert, "There are four other Mafia families in New York, and if they see this as an opportunity to wrest power from the Puglieses, it won't be pretty."
But the gang war hinted at in the Post didn't happen—at least not right away—and an article in the Times a couple of weeks later suggested why. Prosecutors were crowing about the broader applications of the RICO case they had built against Carti. Having firmly established the Mafia as "an ongoing criminal enterprise," authorities could now bring charges against anyone who headed that enterprise. Boasted one FBI source, "The way it is now, it's like a shooting gallery. The first duck that pops up is the first duck that gets nailed."
Given this situation, it became ever clearer that the Mob was floundering. Hierarchies were breaking down; lines of jurisdiction were blurring. And the Mafia's lack of leadership was costing it. sicilians losing ground to chinese gangs in garment district, reported the Times in March of'92. irish toughs flex muscles on the docks, said the Post in April.
Then, in May, Newsday scooped the competition and surprised the experts by reporting that, at a subdued and formal sit-down at a social club in Queens, Vincente Delgatto, seventy, had in fact been ratified as capo di tutti capi.
Details of the ceremony were lacking, of course. But the reporter's unnamed source did offer the following analysis: "The Mob needs a boss. Delgatto knows that, everybody knows it. What's unusual, though, is that, typically, bosses have been driven by greed, blood lust, ego. Delgatto seems to be accepting the crown out of duty. It's become a lousy job."
Taking his cue from this remark, the reporter dubbed the new leader "The Reluctant Godfather."
Arty Magnus looked up from the screen and said the phrase aloud. His voice sounded a little strange in the empty office. That's good newspaper work, he thought: Get the story first and be the first to put a spin on it. Reluctant Godfather. Smart.
He blinked, his eyelids felt rough as they ground together and almost stuck, and he realized quite suddenly that he was fried. He looked at his watch; it was nearly midnight.
He felt suddenly jittery and suddenly depleted: midnight under fluorescent lights with a green computer screen in front of him and nothing but three beers and a bag of pretzels in his skinny gut. He yawned, got up from his desk, and stretched. He switched things off, headed for the door, and on the way downstairs he was laughing at himself for the wise, well-meaning, patronizing way he'd been trying to tell Joey Goldman there was a snowball's chance in hell that his old man had a story.
The editor unchained his ancient fat-tire bicycle and climbed aboard.
The Reluctant Godfather. The nickname was still rattling around inside his head, and he added to it another phrase, a private joke, a distorted echo: The Reluctant Writer. He tried to chuckle over that one, but nothing resembling a laugh came out. He pedaled off down Duval Street. Slurred and whiny music still spilled out of mostly empty bars; here and there couples strolled, leaned against each other, purred and giggled. Being tourists, they were trying much too hard to have a good time, there was something bleak about the effort, but Arty Magnus grudgingly acknowledged that maybe, just maybe, they were succeeding. The word reluctant would not let go of him. He rode home tiredly, wondering all the way if maybe he was just a reluctant sort of guy.
5
Two days later, a gorgeous Saturday, Gino Delgatto showed up in Joey Goldman's driveway with a bimbo on his arm.
This should not have been surprising; Gino always traveled with a bimbo, sported one like a Brit carries an umbrella, would have felt as at sea without one as a musician on the road without the comfort of his cello. Certain things about Gino's bimbos varied, others always stayed the same. Hair color might be blond or red or black, but it was always the kind of hair that looked immaculate on beauty parlor day and then got wilder and spikier through the week. Eyes might be any shape and any hue but were always graced with unlikely lashes and surmounted by brows plucked slenderer than anchovies. Chests were always prominent, the rest of the torso seeming to fall back from the boobs as in some trick of exaggerated perspective; hips tended to be slim, buttocks flat, the whole tail section suggesting something of the mermaid.