Gangster (3 page)

    Paolino knelt before her and pointed to her bulging stomach. We have another child, he whispered. We must do all that is possible to raise this one in the right way in the right place. Far from here. Far from these people.

    We are these people. Francesca fought back the tears she had shed each day since the rainy morning when she had laid her son to rest. That cannot be changed, no matter how far away we run. We are this place. And we are these people.

    I'm not, Paolino said, standing.

    But my next child will be, she said with a chill.

     *     *     *

A THIN LINE of oil had made its way down from the engine room. It circled around one of the many small fires built from damp wood and rags, attempts by the passengers to allow shreds of light into their dark world. The oil licked at the edges of the fire, coming to rest just beneath a rusty kettle boiling dark brown water. The fire embraced the oil, causing sparks and flames to widen and spread and rush down the sides of the room like an agitated snake.

    The boat rocked from the strength of the storm, heel to hull slapped by vicious waves. The stifling heat mixed uncomfortably with the cold blasts of air and ocean water that shot through cracks in the galley walls. The ship's engines cranked wearily away, trying to keep pace with the storm, sprays of heat and moisture blasting into the crowded hold. A half dozen oil lines were now flowing out of the battered engine room, sliding past feet and rodents, inching close to the heat of a dozen small fires.

    They heard the screams before they smelled the smoke and then the panic took control.

    Soon, heat and flames were at full attack, sending people running in a mass for the one door leading out of the cargo hold. They climbed over one another, forsaking friendships and family for the sake of one clean breath. The rush to escape left no room for the weak and the elderly who were so easily cast aside. The fires spread quickly and plumes of dark gray smoke covered the hold like mounds of old wool. A young woman, the shorn ends of her dress swallowed by fire, stood with her arms held out and her head tilted back, welcoming the rush of the heat and the call to death. A child was left alone against a wet wall, his small hands covering his ears, his eyes shut, willing himself to another, safer place. An old man sat on a crate in the center of the hold, a hand-rolled cigarette in his mouth, a picture of peace in a place gone mad with fear.

    This cannot be God's will, a lone woman wailed, her body crushed by the rush of bodies. We have done nothing to deserve this much hatred.

    Look around you, a man shouted back at her. And tell me how you can still believe that there is a God.

     I will believe in Him till the day I die, the woman insisted, her body weak, her eyes defiant.

    That day has already begun, the man said and squeezed past her, hoping to make it out of the inferno.

     *     *     *

PAOLINO VESTIERI STOOD and watched the rush of flames inch their way to the engine room. He knew it was now down to a question of minutes. He looked at Francesca, overcome by the smoke, white strands of spittle dotting her lips and sweat streaking her brow. He reached over and stroked her face, rubbing his dirty fingers across soft cheeks, and kissed her gently on the lips.

    Ti amo, cara, he said to the woman he loved.

    Filomena, the midwife, a scarred old woman in a worn black dress and tattered shawl, leaned her bulk forward and pressed against Francesca's stomach. Francesca moved her legs farther apart, her feet resting against the back of an old man. She pulled her head up and held her eyes shut, waiting for the pain in her stomach to pass. The screams and cries around her seemed to exist in a faraway place, the smoke that seared her lungs arrived from a territory untouched by madness and ruin. The sharp pangs had been coming at a steady rate for the last hour, knifelike stabs that forced her to dig her nails into the splintered floorboards, covering her fingers in blood.

    She opened her eyes and looked up at the midwife.

    Is there enough time? she asked.

    Only the angels know, Filomena said.

    She rubbed and massaged Francesca's legs and thighs with rough, thick hands, inching the baby along, one painful movement at a time.

    What do you need me to do? Paolino asked, standing over the midwife's shoulders.

    Filomena turned her head, arching one heavy eye up toward Paolino, staring at him for several moments. Do you love this woman? she asked.

    Very much, Paolino said, avoiding eye contact.

    Then stay behind me and look nowhere but into your wife's eyes. Filomena then turned back to Francesca, leaned closer to her and shouted above the din around them. It is time now, little one, she said, the smoke from the fire enveloping both of them, its force thick enough to hold. Take full breaths if you can and push with all your strength. The rest you will leave to me.

    Francesca Conti Vestieri nodded and looked around her one last time as she said a silent prayer, wishing that out of all this debris, filth, fire and danger a healthy child would be born. She looked above the midwife at her husband. Promise me one thing, she said.

    What? He reached over Filomena, grabbing both of his wife's hands, holding them tight, the blood from her cuts rubbing against the soot and scabs on his skin. He stared into her eyes and through her pain and the heat, the anger and the fear around them, could still taste her fierce hatred.

    You will build a good life in this new country for this child, Francesca said. Promise me that.

    I promise, Paolino said.

    Promise me! Francesca shrieked.

    Paolino leaned in closer to his wife, his lips brushing against the side of her cheek.

    I promise you, he whispered. As your husband and as a man.

    Francesca nodded, her head and body damp with sweat and blood, her torso cramped.

    Paolino stepped away from her, his eyes burning with tears, smoke charring his nostrils and filling his lungs. He looked around, saw bundles of people climbing above one another, reaching for a sky they could not see. The hold was a cauldron of flames, strewn bodies, water bursting through galley holes, cries for help and shouts of despair all blended as one. The hull of the ship was tilted to the right, its aged body tired of the fight, eager to surrender to an ocean that knew no mercy.

    The youthful promises of what had once been Paolino Vestieri's dreams of a simple life were now reduced to charred rubble and warm ashes.

     *     *     *

FILOMENA WAS CRUNCHED down, her elbows sliding on the floor, her hands buried inside Francesca's legs, feeling for signs of a new life. A full fire was burning just behind her, but the old woman ignored all but the task of her chosen profession.

    I see the head, Filomena shouted above the crowd noise, lifting her own head ever so briefly. With a full dose of her strength she tore at the lower rungs of her dress, not stopping until her hands were crammed with cloth. Filomena wiped the blood from the sides of Francesca's legs with the remains of her torn dress, smiling down at the drained young woman.

    Francesca bit down on her lower lip, cutting into the skin. How much longer, signora? she asked through blood and clenched teeth.

    That is up to you, Filomena said. Crumpled bodies, victims of the crush and the smoke, surrounded them. The tilt of the ship was forcing them to grip even deeper into the wet, soiled boards.

    Push, my child, Filomena whispered. With all that's left of your strength.

    Francesca arched her head back and let out a scream loud enough to echo off the sweaty walls of the cargo hold. Her breath came in spurts and her eyes bulged from the pain. The midwife looked down between Francesca's legs, her hands gently gripping the top of the baby's head, and saw the large well of blood building up around her feet. It was more blood than she had seen in many a birth, and the old woman knew that only the kindness of a grudging God would allow her to walk from this with two lives intact. There was no feeling of time in the cramped hold, each moment gripping its own eternity, each second packed with a lifetime of dark memories. The fire strolled among a people accustomed to life and death entering their world without invitation. They all knew, each and every person in that room, what it meant to be touched by the cold hands of the unwelcome.

     *     *     *

THE WAVE CRASHED hard, bending the side of the wall closest to Filomena and Francesca. The bolt sent them, along with Paolino, veering down the slope of the floor. Their backs touched flames, their hands cast aside the dead. Filomena ended up facedown, her head cut by a sharp piece of rusty iron. Blood rushed down the sides of her neck.

    Let me help you, Paolino said, tugging at the old woman's shoulders.

    Forget me, she said in a groggy voice. Get to the child.

    The infant is who needs you now. The only one you can help. She reached up and grabbed Paolino's shirt and forced his face down closer to hers. The only one, she said.

    Paolino turned to look at his wife, resting in a heap against the cold metal of an oil-slicked wall.

    You're wrong, Paolino said in a voice that was filled more with fear than conviction. She will live. They will both live.

    You don't have the time, Filomena said, thick plumes of smoke rushing by her face. You must go and save what can be saved.

    Paolino rested the midwife's head on the floor and covered it with a patch of cloth torn from her dress. He crawled over to his wife, the smoke engulfing him, the flames spouting in all directions. He pulled at his wife's back until she rolled over with a thud, splashing his face and chest with thick streams of dark blood. Paolino looked down at his wife's legs and rubbed his hands against the waist of his shirt, his eyes searching for the face of his child among the ruin of her body. He pulled a rag from his back pocket, cleared some of the blood and sweat from his wife and then reached down to hold the baby's head. His right hand gripped its soft top and for several long seconds he was afraid to do more than hold it. He looked up and saw his wife's beautiful face, now smeared with grease and dirt, her cheeks glowing red, her lips tinged a dangerous shade of blue. He spotted the flutter in her eyes and wanted to reach up, hold her and tell her how much he loved her. Tell her how sorry he was for all the pain he had caused.

    But he said nothing. Instead, Paolino lowered his head and once again began tugging at his child, trying to ease the baby from the safety of a mother's womb. The head was hanging silent and low as Paolino pulled the shoulders out and then watched as the rest of the body quickly slid forward. He ignored the screams and shouts around him. He closed his eyes to the explosions that now rocked the hold and the angry waves that lashed at the outside of the boat. He ignored the inferno surrounding him as well as the cold ocean waiting to swallow up anyone foolish enough to escape.

    He held the umbilical cord in the palm of his right hand, the final connection between mother and baby, and looked around for a sharp object with which to cut it. He stripped a wooden shank off one of the floor panels and began to cut frantically at the cord, desperate to break the baby free. With a final frenzied tug, he cut it clean away and lifted the child from Francesca's body. Holding him at eye level, Paolino slapped him twice on the back with the flat of his palm. He waited for what seemed to be nothing short of a lifetime for a sign of life.

    He smiled when he heard the baby's cry rise high above the screams and shouts, roar past the moans of approaching death. His son now cradled to his chest, Paolino brought him close to Francesca's face.

    Look, amore, Paolino whispered. Look at your son.

    Francesca looked at her baby through smoke-ravaged eyes and managed a weak smile.

    E un bello bambino, she whispered, gently stroking the infant's forehead. She then closed her eyes for the final time, her hand slipping off her husband's leg down to the floor.

    Paolino Vestieri stood, cradling his minutes-old son in his arms, his feet resting against his wife's body, and looked around the hold. He saw the fire now raging out of control. Bodies rested in rows on the floor, many surrounded by the elderly, sitting quietly, resigned to their fate. Mothers rocked back and forth on their knees holding their dead while fathers blindly tossed their children toward the apparent safety of the crammed stairwell. The strength of the fire had reached the engine room, flames wrapping themselves around old pipes, churning pistons and rusty crankcases. The ocean continued its assault, intent on toppling the old ship and bringing her to rest.

    For such a young man, Vestieri had seen more than his fair share of death. He had killed a son and buried him in the dry soil of his native land, alongside the violated body of his own father. He had watched his wife die bringing new life into a world she had grown to despise. And how he stood, staring at an out-of-control fire that would so easily welcome him and his child. Vestieri lowered his head, held his child closer to his side and disappeared into the thick smoke of a sinking ship.

    There were 627 passengers aboard La Santa Maria, even though the official log registered only 176 names. Eighty-one of them survived the ice storm and the engine fire on that frigid February night in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.

    Paolino Vestieri was one.

    His son, Angelo Vestieri, was another.

     *     *     *

I LOOKED AWAY from Mary and stared down at the old man in his bed. He had always told me that destiny was nothing more than a lie believed by foolish men. You choose your path, he said. You decide the curves of your life. But I couldn't help wondering if he had been wrong. That maybe a life such as his, that began stained by the darkness of death, had already been placed on a preordained track. Such a start could place a hole in a man's heart that no amount of time could repair. It would split his spirit in ways that might chisel it away from basic decency and harden his views and judgments. It could easily help turn him into the man Angelo Vestieri grew to become.