He could recite all of the lines spoken by the star, and the end always excited him. A downfall, a table of scattered coke, then the shoot-out: no pain, a grand death, a man who would never grow old. Marcantonio had little time for the world of business and investment, the milking of public contracts and alliances with other families. To Marcantonio, what mattered was creating fear, winning admiration, being able to walk tall on the street, men bobbing their heads to him and girls edging forward to make the offer. And to kill. He had never fired a machine pistol in the way Al Pacino did, but he had strangled, he had put a live woman into acid and he had shot one round into the back of the head of the man who’d cheated his grandfather. He watched the film: it was near to the shoot-out.
The rain hammered on the windows. He had business later in the day – some shit from abroad. He didn’t do drugs – his grandfather would turn him out of the house if he did. There was another family, further north in the mountains, whose eldest son had been identified, by a Squadra Mobile bug in a car, as a rampant homosexual. The information had been leaked, and the kid was disowned – as was the kid of another family who dressed as a woman. His grandfather would have thrown him out if he believed that Marcantonio did drugs. It was bad to use them, but good to deal in them. A wide grin played on his face, and the movie came to its conclusion.
His grandmother was in the kitchen and seemed not to notice the amplified soundtrack. She never criticised him, whatever he did. The rain was incessant. He had a man to meet, would weigh and evaluate him, then tell his grandfather what he thought. Marcantonio was trusted, the favourite . . .
Not many stood their ground when Bentley Horrocks’s temper flared. ‘What are we supposed to do in this fucking place?’
Jack understood the need to bend with the wind and had made it an art form. ‘Good shout, Bent. What are we supposed to do?’
‘Leaving me hanging about!’
‘Wrong, that.’
‘And where’s the fucking eagle? I pay him enough. He leaves me here, in this dump, and the rain’s pissing down. Does he think he has free rein to let me hang about? Nowhere to go, nothing to do. He’ll hear my tongue – and so will the local man. He’s a big man, the eagle said. He’d better be – and he’d better be ready to crack a good deal, after keeping me cooling my heels. Who do they think they are – and who do they fucking think I am? You tell me.’
It was all said in a whisper, close to Jack’s ear, while a game show played on the TV. The eagle was Humphrey. Between them, a legal man – solicitor or barrister – was always an eagle. Humphrey had said that the family would visit later in the day. They could barely see the beach. The cloud was almost flush with it: grey skies, grey beach, grey shoreline. The street running through the strip development of Brancaleone was nearly a river, and the traffic threw up water in waves. The sliding doors leaked at the base and the rain was pooling there. Jack knew enough of his man to sense insecurity. He did the massage of the ego bit, which kept him in his place at Bent’s side and good money in his pocket. There had been people before Jack who had thought themselves close to Bent, and hadn’t been . . . That had made for a bad future.
‘And they deserve it, Bent, your tongue. No call to be leaving you cooling your heels. Who do they think they are? That’s what I’m wondering, Bent.’
They were trapped in the room. The smoke alarm in the ceiling was disconnected, the battery removed, and Bent went steadily through his cigarettes. No one had come up from Reception to challenge it – and where else was there to smoke? If you opened the balcony door, the rain came in at an angle, blown on a gale. Bent was a big man at home and owned Crime Squad detectives. He lived well, but always needed to push on. He couldn’t stand still and was no good at treading water. Too many little bastards circling, watching, hoping to sniff weakness. He needed a big move forward, which the journey would bring – but insecurity gnawed at him. He had no language and was off his territory.
‘Best we can hope for, Bent, is that it lifts and we can take a turn outside.’
‘Are you some sort of fucking moron? You see a hole in that lot? I don’t. It’s solid. I tell you, when this old bastard turns up he’ll be in no doubt what I’m thinking, left in this hole. He may be the top man but he’ll need some answers before I’ve finished with him.’
‘It’s what you deserve, Bent, answers from the top man . . .’
The bunker leaked.
He had the lights full on. Water came out from under the unit on which the microwave was placed and lay on the vinyl there, glistening from the bulbs above. More water had gathered on the carpet towards the chemical toilet. Only in exceptional rain did the container fail to repel the damp.
He had the television on.