In his room it was cold. There was a strange hum in the air. He went to the window and closed it. The hum ceased. The green and yellow lights crossing the ruins were much nearer. He looked at his watch. It was nearly eight o'clock. He felt suddenly weak and feverish, nausea made him sit on the bed. The ache that had been burie
Eddie Cassin parked the jeep in front of the church. He wait around die side entrance and up the steps to the steeple. He knocked on the door; there was no answer. He waited, then knocked again. On the other side of the door, Yergen's voice came, unexpectedly clear, “Who there?”
Eddie said, “It is Mr. Cassin.” Yergen's voice said, “What do you want?” Eddie Cassin said, “Frau Meyer sent me with a message.’
The bolt slid back mid the door opened. Yergen stooi by it, waiting for him to enter. The room was dark, except for one little table lamp the comer, and beneath this lamp, pn a small sofa, Yer-gen's daughter held a book of fairy tales. She rested against great cushions piled against the wall.
“Yes, what is it?” Yergen said. He looked much older, his slight figure was thinner, but his face was still sure, still proud.
Eddie put out his hand. Yergen shook it. Eddie said with a smile, “Come, we've known each other a long time, we've had many a drink together. Is this a way to act with me?”
Yergen smiled reluctantly. “Ah, Mr. Cassin, when I worked in the Metzer Strasse I was a different man. Now—”
Eddie said slowly, sincerely, “You know me, I wouldn't trick you. I've come for your benefit. My friend, Mosca, wants his money and cigarettes back. What he paid for the defective drugs.”
Yergen was watching him intently, then said, “Of course, I will do that. But tell him not immediately. I cannot.”
Eddie said, “He wants you to come see him tonight”
“Oh, no, oh, no,” Yergen said. “I will not go to see him.”
Eddie looked at Yergen's daughter lying on the sofa. She had opened her eyes into a wide, blank stare. It made him uncomfortable.
“Yergen,” he said, “Mosca and I are leaving tomorrow for Marburg. When we come back he leaves for the States. Now if you don't come to see him tonight, he will come here. If he becomes angry, he will frighten the little girl when he quarrels with you.”
As he had known it would, this last argument took effect. Yergen shrugged, then went to get his coat. Then he went to his daughter.
Eddie watched them. Yergen with his heavy fur-collared overcoat and neatly combed brown hair, his look of quiet dignity and seriousness, knelt humbly, sadly, to whisper nto his daughter's ear. Eddie knew he was giving her the signal, so that when he returned and knocked on the door, [he little girl would slide back the iron bolt He could see the little girl's blank eyes watching him over her father's shoulder and he thought, what if she forgot the signal, what if she never answered her father's knocking on the door.
Yergen rose, took his briefcase, and they went out. Yer-gen paused, waited until he heard on the other side of the door the sound of iron sliding over wood, until he knew that his daughter was locked away from the world.
They got into Eddie's jeep. Once during the ride through the dark streets, Yergen said, “You wiU stay with me when we meet?” And Eddie said, “Sure, don't worry.”
But now in Eddie Cassin rose a vague uneasiness. They drove into the light of the Metzer Strasse and the billet. Eddie parked the jeep and they got out. Eddie looked up. There was no light in Mosca's room. “Maybe he's at the party,” Eddie said.
They went into the billet. On the first landing, Eddie said to Yergen, “Wait here.” He went into the party but saw no sign of Mosca. When he went out into the hall, Yergen was waiting for him. He could see that Yergen's face was pale, and suddenly Eddie Cassin felt a terrible sense of danger. Through his mind flashed everything Mosca had said and he felt it was all false. He said to Yergen, “Come on, Til take you home, he's not here. Come on.”
Yergen said, “No, let us finish this. I am not afraid. No more—”
But Eddie Cassin started to push Yergen down the steps. He was certain, almost overwhelmed with suspicious terror, and then suddenly he heard Mosca's voice above them, cold and with controlled fury say, “You fuckin” Eddie, let him go.” Yergen and Eddie looked up.
He stood on the landing above them and in the weak hall light his face was sickly yellow. Two great red fever sores blistered his thin mouth. He stood very still. The green combat jacket seemed to make him bulkier than he really was. “Come on up, Yergen,” he said. One hand was hidden behind his back.
“No,” Yergen said in an unsteady voice, “I am leaving with Mr. Cassin,”
Mosca said, “Eddie, get out of the way. Come up here.”
Yergen held on to Eddie's arm, “Don't leave me,” he said. “Stay here.”
Eddie held up his hand to Mosca and said, “Walter, for Christ's sake, Walter, don't do it”
Mosea took two steps down. Eddie tried to pull free from Yergen, but Yergen clutched his arm and cried out, “Don't let me stand alone— Don't, don't—” Mosca took another step down. His eyes were black, opaque, the red fever sores on his mouth burned in the hall light. Suddenly the pistol was in his hand. Eddie flung himself away from Yergen, and Yergen alone, with a despairing cry tried to turn, tried to run down the stairs. Mosca fired. In his first step Yergen fell to his knees. He raised his head, the faded blue eyes staring upward, and Mosca fired again. Eddie Cassin ran up the steps past Mosca and kept running to the attic,
Mosca put the gun back in his pocket. The body rested fiat on the landing, the head dangling over to the descending steps.
From the rooms below came a great wave of laughter, the phonograph began a loud waltz, there began a great stamping of feet and loud yodeling cries. Mosca ran up the stairs quickly to his room. Dark shadows stretched through the window. He waited and listened He went to the window.
There was no alarm, but the ruins of the city, the great hills of rubble crawled with a mass of brilliantly hued caterpillars, bobbing lanterns that lit the coming winter night with long tracers of green fire. A great rash of sweat poured over his face and body. He began to tremble, a great circling blackness sickened him and he pushed the window open and waited.
Now, in the street below, he could hear the children singing. The lanterns he could not see swung in his mind and heart, and as the choral died away, he felt an extraordinary release from fear and tension. The cold air rushed over him and the sickness and blackness left his body.
He picked up the packed suitcase and ran down the stairs, over Yergen's body, past the party noises. Nothing had changed. Out of the billet he started walking across the back plateau of ruins, then turned for one last look.
Four great stages of light cast a burning shield against the darkness of the city and the night and from each tier came a long rolling wave of music and laughter. He stood outside that shield of light feeling no remorse, only thinking that he would never see his child or Eddie Cassin, his country or his family again. He would never see the mountains around Marburg. Finally he had become the enemy.
Far across the ruins, toiling upward toward the black and falling winter sky he could see the green and red of the children's lanterns, but he could no longer hear their song. He turned away from them and walked toward the Strossenbahn that would take him to the railroad station.
It was all familiar to him, the farewells to time and place and memory, and he felt no sorrow, no desolation, that finally there was no one, no human being to speed him on his way, only the wind which swept'across the ruined continent he could never leave. Before him h
e saw the round bright glare that was the headlight of the Strossenbahn and heard the cold crystal clanging erf its bell. Out of habit he began to run to catch it, the suitcase bumping against his leg, but after a few steps halted, knowing it made no difference whether he caught this one or the next
Q&A with Mark Winegardner
Q. When did you first read The Godfather?
A. When I was about twelve. Like a lot of kids who grow up to be writers, I started reading books meant for adults, looking for the dirty parts. I had good reason to believe there might be worthwhile moments there. When I heard Random House was looking for an author, I read it again with new appreciation.
Q. Why did you want to write it?
A. I feel like my entire body of work has been about the mythology of America, and this book fits squarely within that. It's a magnificent opportunity to write about characters that people already know and are invested in, and in some ways, it's as big a thrill as if I were writing about Jesse James or Abraham Lincoln. Particularly when I saw how much more story there was to be told, and how little The Godfather had touched on the glory years of the mob in the late 1950s, I was thrilled to have the chance to take a whack at all of that.
Q. Are you nervous about what the reaction will be?
A. I've been writing almost every day of my life for the past twenty years, and it's a wonderful thing to be the author of a book people are waiting for, whether they're sharpening their knives for it or drooling for it. A lot of writers are working away, saying, “Who will ever read this? Who will ever publish this?” The book will come out and either people will like it or not, but it's going to be read, and I'll move on and write other books after this one. There's no downside.
Q. Is this a sequel to the novel or the movies?
A. The novel, definitely. Mario Puzo's book ends in 1955. The Godfather Returns will cover the period from 1955 to 1965.
Q. But what about The Godfather II? Isn't there some overlap?
A. The parts that weren't in Mario Puzo's novel covered only one year, 1958-1959. A lot of other wicked things were going on that can be revealed only now. I don't address events in the films that aren't in the novel, but I don't contradict them, either. Everything fits together, and I hope readers will be surprised to discover some of these unexplored avenues. It turns out there's a lot we didn't know about the Corleone family.
Q. Like what?
A. Sorry. I must obey the laws of omerta.
Q. You're a creative writing professor and you're not Italian. Are you qualified to be writing about the Mafia?
A. I'm not Sicilian, it's true. Not even Italian American. I'm just a novelist with a vision of how to continue this American saga. I understand I am, however, German Irish, same as Tom Hagen. And he did just fine in this world.
Q. What would you like the book to accomplish?
A. I want it to be a good book, first and foremost. I was always impressed with the way Random House approached this book—that they always seemed quite interested in this not being any kind of publishing gimmick, but a good, literary, page-turner, and I want it to be that. All things being equal, an author shouldn't think too deeply about the the-matics of his own book. I'm out to write the best book humanly possible.
Q. Why has The Godfather become an American myth?
A. A Jot of people have pointed out the story of this family in particular and the mob in general has superseded the western as the core American mythological story. It's something that I was circling around in my last two novels, and I'm glad to have a chance to come in this time for the kill.
The Dark Arena is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
A Ballantine Book
Published by The Random House Publishing Group
Copyright © 1953, 1955 by Mario Puzo
Copyright renewed 1981, 1983 by Mario Puzo
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
Ballantine and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
www.ballantinebooks.com
eISBN: 978-0-307-48355-3
v3.0
Mario Puzo, The Dark Arena
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