The meeting was friendly. Sonny told him all that had happened—who’d been knocked down, who the new captains were, and so forth. Joey Massino, the fat guy I had seen hanging around social clubs, was made captain. Sal Catalano, another Toyland guy, was made street boss of the zips, the imported Sicilians. And Caesar Bonventre, the slick young zip who was with Galante when he got whacked, was made captain—at twenty-eight, the youngest in the family. Sonny gave Lefty a choice to go with him or with Joey Massino. But Sonny wanted him.

“So I says, ‘Yeah, I’ll be with you.’ ”

In mob business you ask questions about aspects that pertain only to you. Normal curiosity is not normal curiosity for a wiseguy. A wiseguy does not go around asking who clipped the boss. Look too curious and you draw attention to yourself. If the cops did break something, the first thing everybody thinks is that there was an informant. I didn’t want anybody saying, “Why was Donnie so curious about everything?”

I didn’t go out of my way to learn what intelligence the FBI might have been getting about the murder from informants. I didn’t want to know more than I could logically know as a connected guy. It could be just as risky to know too much as to know too little. I didn’t want the burden of having to sort out what I should know from what I shouldn’t.

The murder of a boss doesn’t get talked about much on the street. Business policy doesn’t change. There’s only one policy in the mob: You earn money and you kick your money upstairs. Only the personalities change, and ordinary wiseguys or connected guys don’t have anything to say about that. You go about your business while the power is sorted out by leaders of the factions.

“When Rusty gets out of the can,” Lefty said, “things are gonna be different.”

He liked Philip “Rusty” Rastelli. They were old buddies. I had never seen Rastelli because he had been in the can since 1975 for extortion.

It was strange walking down Mulberry Street past CaSa Bella and realizing that Mike Sabella was no longer a power.

For a time, Lefty said, nobody would be making any big moves. He was back to his check scams and numbers rackets. He decided that our fish-and-chips place would become a fast-food fried-chicken takeout place instead and, with his daughter running it, would be a steady source of income from the projects nearby. He wanted to buy the bar on the corner, but for that we would have had to come up with $60,000, and there was no way the Bureau wanted to get into that kind of money, and no way I wanted to be tied down running a bar.

Meanwhile I had some freedom to move around and contribute to other operations. Other agents could introduce me as a connected guy and a friend of theirs from New York, and that would enhance their credibility with the badguys they were working on. I told Lefty I had to start making some bigger money, so I wanted to check out a few things here and there. I worked short stints on various Bureau undercover investigations, ranging from New England to the South-west. Some of these operations are continuing, some came to nothing. Some I can’t talk about.

Larry Keaton, the agent working out of L.A., had an operation going on in a suburban town involving a gang of blacks engaged in political corruption, gambling, and drug dealing. He wanted to show these guys that he had mob connections. He wanted me to come out to Las Vegas and pose as a Mafia member representing a boss. He had another guy lined up to play the part of the boss.

My supposed role was to see if these guys had projects worthy of putting before the boss. And if they did, I was to prepare them for meeting the boss, tell them how to act.

I went out to the Desert Inn where we had a big suite. These four guys arrived, tough, slick-looking dudes dressed in the latest outfits. We arranged the guys around the room and I told them how to sit. One guy put his feet up on the coffee table and I kicked them off. “You think you can talk to a boss with your feet up that way?” I say. “You got no respect for furniture?” I tell another guy, “Don’t slouch on the sofa that way! Sit up and look like you’re interested in meeting a boss.”

“See,” Larry says, “this guy ain’t fucking around. You misbehave in front of the boss when he comes in, you’re gonna get me in a jam. Because everything here is a reflection on me.”

Everybody now is sitting up straight and tall and paying attention. I go at them one at a time. “You, what’s your name again? What’s your gig?” They tell me they move some coke, some marijuana, run a gambling place. I say, “We have to be assured that you guys can guarantee protection with the local politicians and sheriffs.” I start to draw them out on what they can do, because I have to justify taking the boss’s time. They say, “We got some politicians in town, the sheriff.” They really want to convince me they are worthy of meeting the boss. They give me names, dates, amounts, plans.

“Hey! Slow down,” I say. “When the boss comes in, you have to talk slow, make everything clear, because he doesn’t want to have to ask for anything to be repeated, and he’s not used to talking to blacks or hearing black street talk.”

Also, we had the room bugged and wanted to make sure we got everything.

I said that when he comes in here, they should show respect, stand up. They should not expect to shake hands. Nobody touches the boss. They shouldn’t speak unless they’re asked to speak. They shouldn’t expect the boss to speak to them because the boss doesn’t speak directly to ordinary citizens. The boss is only coming here as a favor to Larry because he thinks a lot of him. We got everybody all tensed up, concentrating on doing everything right, sitting straight, talking slowly and clearly.

Then I went into the next room to get the boss.

The boss, an agent going by the name of Steve, was perfect. He was dressed up in a black suit with a white tie and a white carnation in his lapel. Stocky guy, dark face, heavy five-o‘clock shadow. He looked like Frank Nitty from the old Untouchables TV show.

I make a big production of bringing him in, pulling out a chair for him to sit down.

“Okay, Donald,” the boss says, “introduce me to the gentlemen.”

One by one I introduce them. I say that I told the boss the whole thing, and he’s very pleased that you guys are dedicated in this, and capable of making the scores, because he thinks a lot of Larry. He doesn’t want to put Larry in any position that’s going to be adverse for him.

Oh, no, they say, we wouldn’t do that.

Steve the boss doesn’t say a word. He just nods. I ask if they have any questions they want to ask the boss. No, no, no. Then I say to Steve, “Boss, anything you want to say to these gentlemen?”

He says, “Just tell them that I’m glad everything’s going to work out.”

I repeat his words, then say, “Okay, that’s it.” And I walk the boss out.

The whole thing took maybe forty minutes.

I didn’t have anything more to do with that case. Larry got them all convicted.

Lefty and I spent a lot of time around Miami—vacationing, losing money at Hialeah or the dog tracks, looking for deals. Miami was considered more or less open territory, like Las Vegas, where the different mob families could operate so long as nobody stepped on anybody else’s toes. Lefty was always scheming about how to crack into Florida where the big money was. He was always on the lookout for a bar or lounge to buy, once we made a big score and had some cash. “That’s how you make a fortune,” he would say, “grab yourself a good lounge.”

We would often stay at the Deauville or the Thunderbird where a lot of the wiseguys that he knew stayed. He introduced me to wiseguys here and there, including some Bonanno guys that lived in the area. The Deauville was a favorite of Lefty’s because the manager, a straight guy named Nick, was a friend of his. Lefty always talked to him about getting a lounge or a game room going in one of the hotels, and Nick was always keeping his eye open.