Английский язык с Крестным Отцом

And it followed inevitably, that since Fanucci wished to take seven hundred dollars

from him by force, why should he not kill Fanucci? Surely the world could do without

such a person.

There were of course some practical reasons. Fanucci might indeed have powerful

friends who would seek vengeance. Fanucci himself was a dangerous man, not so

easily killed. There were the police and the electric chair. But Vito Corleone had lived

under a sentence of death since the murder of his father. As a boy of twelve he had fled

his executioners and crossed the ocean into a strange land, taking a strange name. And

years of quiet observation had convinced him that he had more intelligence and more

courage than other men, though he had never had the opportunity to use that

intelligence and courage.

And yet he hesitated before taking the first step toward his destiny. He even packed

the seven hundred dollars in a single fold of bills and put the money in a convenient side

pocket of his trousers. But he put the money in the left side of his trousers. In the right-

hand pocket he put the gun Clemenza had given him to use in the hijacking of the silk

truck.

Fanucci came promptly at nine in the evening. Vito Corleone set out a jug of

homemade wine that Clemenza had given him.

Fanucci put his white fedora on the table beside the jug of wine. He unloosened his

broad multiflowered tie, its tomato stains camouflaged by the bright patterns. The

summer night was hot, the gaslight feeble (слабый, хилый). It was very quiet in the

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apartment. But Vito Corleone was icy. To show his good faith he handed over the roll of

bills and watched carefully as Fanucci, after counting it, took out a wide leather wallet

and stuffed the money inside. Fanucci sipped his glass of wine and said, "You still owe

me two hundred dollars." His heavy-browed face was expressionless.

Vito Corleone said in his cool reasonable voice, "I'm a little short, I've been out of work.

Let me owe you the money for a few weeks."

This was a permissible (позволительный) gambit. Fanucci had the bulk (объем;

большие размеры; основная масса) of the money and would wait. He might even be

persuaded to take nothing more or to wait a little longer. He chuckled over his wine and

said, "Ah, you're a sharp young fellow. How is it I've never noticed you before? You're

too quiet a chap for your own interest. I could find some work for you to do that would

be very profitable."

Vito Corleone showed his interest with a polite nod and filled up the man's glass from

the purple jug. But Fanucci thought better of what he was going to say and rose from his

chair and shook Vito's hand. "Good night, young fellow," he said. "No hard feelings (без

обиды), eh? If I can ever do you a service let me know. You've done a good job for

yourself tonight."

Vito let Fanucci go down the stairs and out the building. The street was thronged with

witnesses to show that he had left the Corleone home safely. Vito watched from the

window. He saw Fanucci turn the comer toward 11th Avenue and knew he was headed

toward his apartment, probably to put away his loot before coming out on the streets

again. Perhaps to put away his gun. Vito Corleone left his apartment and ran up the

stairs to the roof. He traveled over the square block of roofs and descended down the

steps of an empty loft (чердак; верхний этаж /торгового помещения, склада/)

building fire escape that left him in the back yard. He kicked the back door open and

went through the front door. Across the street was Fanucci's tenement apartment house.

The village of tenements extended only as far west as Tenth Avenue. Eleventh

Avenue was mostly warehouses and lofts rented by firms who shipped by New York

Central Railroad and wanted access to the freight (фрахт, груз) yards (that

honeycombed (honeycomb – медовые соты; to honeycomb – изрешетить,

продырявить) the area from Eleventh Avenue to the Hudson River. Fanucci's

apartment house was one of the few left standing in this wilderness and was occupied

mostly by bachelor trainmen, yard workers, and the cheapest prostitutes. These people

did not sit in the street and gossip like honest Italians, they sat in beer taverns guzzling

(to guzzle – жадно глотать; пропивать) their pay. So Vito Corleone found it an easy

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matter to slip across the deserted Eleventh Avenue and into the vestibule of Fanucci's

apartment house. There he drew the gun he had never fired and waited for Fanucci.

He watched through the glass door of the vestibule, knowing Fanucci would come

down from Tenth Avenue. Clemenza had showed him the safety on the gun and he had

triggered it empty. But as a young boy in Sicily at the early age of nine, he had often

gone hunting with his father, had often fired the heavy shotgun called the lupara. It was

his skill with the lupara even as a small boy that had brought the sentence of death

upon him by his father's murderers.

Now waiting in the darkened hallway, he saw the white blob (капля; маленький

шарик /земли, глины/) of Fanucci crossing the street toward the doorway. Vito stepped

back, shoulders pressed against the inner door that led to the stairs. He held his gun out

to fire. His extended hand was only two paces from the outside door. The door swung in.

Fanucci, white, broad, smelly, filled the square of light. Vito Corleone fired.

The opened door let some of the sound escape into the street, the rest of the gun's

explosion shook the building. Fanucci was holding on to the sides of the door, trying to