"She was caught red-handed with cocaine," Sutton hammered on. "Not a little stash for personal use. A lot of cocaine."
"You're telling me she's a dealer?"
"I'm telling you she got off with a suspended sentence and probation. Part of the probation—no contact with felons. Like Gino. Like Vincente. Arty, listen to me. We tell what we know, we show the pictures, she goes away for two, three years. She won't be the same person when she gets out, believe me."
Arty sat. Something seemed to be pushing down on his shoulders, sapping the starch from his posture. He thought about thrall. The thrall of his pledges to Vincente, now the more visceral thrall of desire, of the joyful and reckless beginnings of love. He looked at the picture of Debbi, then said miserably to Sutton, "Just what the hell do you want from me?"
By way of reply, the agent reached into his briefcase again. He pulled out an infrared image of Arty and Vincente at the metal table on Joey's patio, placed it next to the other photo. Vincente had his finger raised in a Socratic gesture. Arty had his notebook on his lap.
"I think the pictures tell the story," said Mark Sutton. "You lied about why you go to that house, Mr. Magnus. You looked us in the eye and you lied. But OK, no hard feelings. Let's keep it practical. Over here, you've got the girl. Over here, the Godfather. You can protect one of them, Mr. Magnus. You can't protect both."
Arty splayed his hands out on his desk, let out a long slow breath. Behind him the droning air conditioner dribbled condensation onto the rotting floor.
"I'd like to know what you're hiding," said the agent. "Maybe you'd like to tell me what you and Delgatto talk about. Maybe you'd like to show me what's in that little notebook."
"And if I tell you it's got nothing to do with you?"
Sutton frowned down at the picture of Debbi Martini. "I think we both know that's not good enough," he said.
43
"Certain things in life," the Godfather was saying, "they just ain't supposed ta happen."
He and Arty were sitting around the low metal table on Joey Goldman's patio. It was dusk. The still swimming pool gave off a sapphire glow; in the west, behind the aralia hedge, slabs of flat red cloud were squeezed between layers of green and yellow sky.
"A child dies," Vincente said. "Shouldn't happen. A beautiful woman gets a cancer in her breast. A rotten son of a bitch gets to de end of his life wit'out it ever catches up wit' 'im. A son turns against his father. These things make any sense to you, Ahty?"
The ghostwriter sat with his spiral notebook spread open on his lap. His cheap pen was in his hand. Now and then he broke through his own preoccupations long enough to scrawl a phrase, but his mind wandered. For the first time he thought he truly understood what Vincente meant when he spoke of being overstuffed with secrets.
"On'y way it makes any sense at all," the Godfather went on, "is if ya figure maybe there's some crazy balance, it's got nothin' ta do wit' good and bad, right and wrong, who deserves a break and who deserves a hot poker up de ass, it's just some crazy way that things, like, average out."
Slowly, stiffly, the old man reached forward toward his glass of wine. Arty watched him. He didn't look tired, exactly; he looked drained and jittery together, at that point of fatigue and strain where one has forgotten what it is to rest. His hand trembled slightly as he raised his glass; his lower lip pushed out to meet the rim as in an awkward unsure kiss. Then he said, "An' this is where God comes into it. Ya see what I'm sayin', Ahty?"
"No, Vincente, I don't think I do."
"If it's all just averaging out, random like ... I mean, lemme ask ya this. Which d'ya think is worse: Ya don't b'lieve in God at all; or ya wanna b'lieve, ya try, but ya look around and y'end up sayin', Wait a second, what kinda cruel sick bastard could He be? I mean really, which is worse?"
For this Arty had no answer. The Godfather didn't seem to notice. He took a wheezing breath and reached under the lapel of his satin smoking jacket.
"OK," he went on. "So say it all comes down t'averaging out. So whaddya do? Ya do what ya can ta help the percentages, improve your odds. An' 'at's where this comes in."
He pulled his hand out of his jacket. It was holding the snub-nosed .38.
Arty's mouth fell open. He'd never seen a gun in someone's hand so close to him. It looked obscene, disgusting. The barrel had a dull industrial sheen, the muzzle was dark as the bottom of a mine.
"Yeah, ya get yourself a gun," the Godfather resumed, absendy gesturing with the weapon, "an' ya tell yourself you're helping your chances, improving your odds, it's less likely you're gonna be the one that gets fucked. But ya know what, Ahty? Y'ain't doin' nothin' about your odds. Nothin' ya do does nothin'. That's the joke. Innee end, things either work out or they don't."