But the flip side was that nobody else played the song anymore. All the regulars, the owner Sal Calcagno, the waitresses, everybody, they were sick to death of ‘Ti Amo.’ It was a good song, and for a long time it had been Johnny LaGuardia’s favorite, too.

Now, though, as he came up off the sidewalk behind the grilled fence, past the couples drinking their espresso or cappuccino or Peroni beer or sirops, he wasn’t too thrilled to hear it because hearing it meant that the Angel was there already and he wouldn’t have time to ask one of the boys why he’d been summoned down here again.

Not that he should be too worried. Mr Tortoni was his godfather. But he was also his employer, and certainly he was no one to get on the wrong side of, and this thing last night-having to explain Ingraham’s disappearance, being six hundred dollars short-had not made him happy. Which Johnny understood. Johnny wasn’t happy himself. He had never been short before. But Johnny thought he had explained it.

As always, Mr Tortoni was sitting all alone at the back of the room, back to the wall, under the poster of the Leaning Tower, at the small white table. Two of the other boys were playing pool, and Johnny nodded to them and then presented himself to Mr Tortoni, who took a sip of espresso and then motioned for Johnny to sit next to him.

“Can I get you something, Johnny?” the Angel asked in Italian.

It was amazing how quietly the man talked, how small and frail he looked. You didn’t have to talk loud to get heard; physical strength was a small part of having power. These things Mr Tortoni had taught him.

Johnny realized his throat was dry and he said he thought a mandarino sirop would be good, and Mr Tortoni whispered up to Sal Calcagno at the counter and in two seconds Johnny’s drink was in front of him.

“You wanted to see me?”

Mr Tortoni put his cup down and fiddled for a moment with a short cigar, which Johnny lit for him as it got to his mouth. “You’ve been busy, have you?” he asked through the smoke.

“Okay,” Johnny said. “Trying to-”

“So maybe-no, not maybe, I’m sure it’s an oversight.”

Johnny waited. Mr Tortoni smoked some more. Johnny took a drink of his sirop. Billiard balls clicked behind him. ‘Ti Amo’ was over and ‘Love Will Keep Us Together’ came on, and Mr Tortoni made a motion to Sal Calcagno, who walked to the jukebox and pushed the button in the back before Toni Tenille could finish saying ‘You belong to me now’ Bobby Darin came on with ‘Volare’ and Mr Tortoni nodded, smiling, at Sal, then lost the smile and looked at Johnny.

“Well?”

“Whatever it is, I’ll fix it,” Johnny said.

“You don’t know? It could be you forgot. The excitement all last night, this Ingraham problem.”

Johnny nodded, without a clue.

“Ingraham is five hundred dollars. I get reminded today-bookkeepers, you know, they keep track of things.”

Johnny still didn’t see it. He was thinking, Five hundred?

Mr Tortoni put his hand over Johnny’s, soft as a kitten. “Doreen Biaggi,” he said. He went back to his coffee. “It’s a small thing, Johnny, but then again, it isn’t. Ingraham was five, Doreen Biaggi is one. Last night you’re six short. I think maybe you’re nervous, you got mixed up.”

In spite of the sirop, Johnny’s throat was sticking together when he swallowed. How could he be so dumb? He had tacked Doreen’s vig onto Ingraham’s, making up a bullshit story to Rusty about Mr Tortoni’s interest rates going up to cover expenses-hell, Johnny knew Rusty would be able to come up with another hundred a week. So Johnny had gotten used to thinking of Ingraham as a six.

“So you collect from this Doreen?”

“Sure, like always.”

“Then you got the hundred? Her hundred?”

Johnny reached into his back pocket, praying to every saint in Heaven that he had an even hundred in his wallet.

“You still nervous, Johnny? Is something wrong?”

Madonna mia! A hundred-dollar bill. He took it out and put it on the table. “I don’t want to disappoint you, Mr Tortoni.”

Angelo Tortoni palmed the bill and laid a hand softly against Johnny’s cheek. “As I say, it’s not a big thing. A hundred dollars. But the principle of it-am I right?”

“Absolutely.”

“Maybe get a book,” Mr Tortoni said. “Keep track who’s a six and who’s a five. And who’s a one.” He puffed at his cigar. “That Doreen Biaggi, she’s got to be a pretty girl now with the nose fixed?”

Mr Tortoni stared now at Johnny, making sure he got the message that nothing was a secret around here.

“You know, Johnny,” he said, quietly, gently, “we all got our own businesses to run. Your line of work, the temptations when you’re working with cash, no records… I know what it can be like. You figure old man Tortoni”-he smiled, nodding-“yeah, I’m an old man, that’s okay… you figure old man Tortoni, he just needs his five grand, whatever it is, every week, and so long as you come up with that, you’re covering your end of the business. But, Johnny, that leaves out my side of the business. You might think-I’m not saying you do, I’m just saying I know the temptations and it might cross your mind-you might think you’ll strong-arm somebody for more than the vig I charge ’em. Cut somebody else, maybe a girl, huh, a little slack.”

Johnny couldn’t say a word. Mr Tortoni was holding the thin cigar in his right hand, the one nearest Johnny, and he put that hand over Johnny’s, the wet butt end of the cigar flattening out against the back of Johnny’s hand.

“I know you hear what I’m saying, Johnny.”

“I wouldn’t do anything like that,” he managed to get out.

“I put a man like you in a position of trust. He represents my interests to the community. A man betrays that trust, I got no use for him. Lean closer to me, Johnny.”

The hand still covered his, gripping tightly.

“I kiss you now and you’re a dead man.”

Johnny swallowed, trying to breathe. Mr Tortoni’s mouth was inches from his cheek. “If this is going on,” he whispered, “it has to stop.”

The strains of ‘Ti Amo’ began again. Mr Tortoni leaned back in his chair. He took the flattened tip of the cigar into his mouth like a nipple and drew on it. “I love this song,” he said.

Frannie wasn’t sure it had been a good idea, letting Dismas stay here. It was stirring things up.

Earlier, he’d almost gone back to his own house, suddenly worried that staying here was putting her in some danger. He just wasn’t thinking clearly. There was no connection that could bring Louis Baker from Hardy’s place to hers, and she had told him that. He was safer here and he was staying and that was final.

Now, closing in on midnight, she lay in the king-size bed, Dismas out at the kitchen table, probably staring out at the street as he’d done in every minute of his spare time since he’d been here, watching to see if Louis Baker would show up.

It wasn’t like Diz. Just sitting there, brooding, with that damn gun out on the table, drinking decaffeinated coffee and waiting for Abe Glitsky to call him.

Which didn’t seem like it was going to happen tonight.

Dismas had come in around six-thirty from his day of touring gun shops, excited that he’d proved something -Rusty Ingraham had indeed put in an order for a gun on Wednesday afternoon at a place called Taylor’s in the Tenderloin district. He’d needed the gun as protection against Baker. Also, Louis Baker had evidently come by the Shamrock looking for Hardy. So he had placed a call to his friend Glitsky and thought with the new information, Glitsky would have enough at least to take Baker off the streets.

Frannie hadn’t really understood. “So what if Ingraham ordered a gun? How does that help you?”

“Well, Abe’s problem here seems to be Rusty as much as anything else. Since they haven’t found his body, he is somehow not as real a victim as Maxine Weir.”

“Well, maybe he’s not.”