Danny's Book

“Oh no, what does he want now?”

The buzz racing through my brain to attempt a mind meld with Don Marchetti to know why he wants to see me keeps up it’s constant chatter like the birds flying south for the winter lined up on the telephone lines.

When Harry the Longtooth calls me for Don Nicholas Agosti Marchetti, the boss of my boss, I know only that it’s something he wants, something he needs, something for me to do – something.

Tracy watches me jump past the bottom three steps to the front hallway. “You need that gun. It’s loaded, right?” Tracy checking on me, as always.

“Yeah, I’m good. Loaded for the works. But enough of that, he calls, I come.” A kiss and I’m off.

I drive past Marchetti’s building, the stained brown brick walls, with barred windows, rising five levels over the street and dominating the block of walk up apartments. I see Harry leaning against the railing, having a smoke. As I climb the steps, Harry waves me in, then ducks inside to dodge the rain.

The quiet in the circle of the Don’s office makes the rain pounding on the white dome windows overhead take center stage. Chairs are arranged in a partial circle, something like a horse shoe, with the ends butting up against the Don’s desk. Soon we hear the four slow knocks. We stand as if rising for a judge, and hear the rain slow to silence. Marchetti enters, the black tie leading the way in tandem with the shine of his fitted black suit.

Sitting at the desk, the Don begins. “I’ve invited Mr. Abednego to join us.” Sandor Abednego, Esquire, follows Harry from the door to the circle of chairs taking the other reserved seat next to the Don’s desk across from Harry.

“I need your talents. That’s why you are all here.” Don Marchetti leans forward, interlinking his fingers.

“It happened more than once and what I need from you is to tell me what happened and what it means.”

I think I actually hear the necks of each of us turning one way then the other. He wants us to tell him why we are there. The man can’t be serious.

Clearing his throat, Abed peers at the Don, and in his accent from half a world away, asks the question.

“What... happened?”

Bodies slide forward on the leather seats. Cigarettes are left to dangle, frozen in their poses.

“The dream. Every night. Always the same. And with your special abilities I don’t need to tell you.”

“How, sir?” says Benny Baganails,, with the Italian chutzpah to ask.

“How, sir?” comes back the mocking response. “You don’t ask me, how sir. You tell me, and you tell me what it means.”

Then he looks at me. I know that look. It’s the one that got me the job. The one that keeps telling me that, for reasons that I will never know, I can know what will happen before it happens. It’s a thing. I don’t know where it came from. I didn’t ask for it. And for years, until I learned the truth, I thought everyone could do it.

“Danny,” Marchetti rises straight up from his chair like an exclamation point. “Danny Giordano, you can do this. Why not? You see things before they happen. So now do this. If you do, any of you, that’s what the twenty-K is for.”

Antonius Mantin hears this and asks, “What twenty grand?”

“You, Antonius Mantin, or you, Daniel Giordano, or any of you. Be the first to tell me the dream, and what it means, and its yours.” He turned to Abed and nodded.

The Egyptian reaches for his bag, and fills the desk with fifties and hundreds.

“It’s all there, gentlemen, for the taking.” The Don grabs a fistful of cash, hands it to Abed. The wad goes full circle from hand to hand, with not one bill missing as it lands back where it started.

“Sir, nobody can tell you your dream,” Antonius says. “It’s enough to know what a dream means. Right, Danny?”

I nod.

He continues. “Don Marchetti, this is impossible. We are not gods or angels, but mere men”

The fist slamming on the Don’s desk broke the calm.

“This is not a game,” the Don shouts, his syllables finding their echo off the walls.

“Do as I say, and there’s more where this came from,” his arm sweeps loose bills onto the floor before us. “Much more. But upon my wish ... no my challenge to you...” He stops mid-sentence, leaving it up to our imaginations, dark as he knows they are.

“It is now dinner time. By tomorrow morning, one of you will tell me what I need to hear.”

Harry precedes the Don out of his chair, opens the door, and the Don was gone. The door closes with Harry leaning towards us, his grin still creeping along his face.

“Well, gentlemen. It’s real. Tomorrow. Maybe Saint Rita the will visit you overnight. One can hope.” He opens the door and steps to the side. “And pray.”

“Well, we could use the money,” I tell Tracy, a fork swirled round with spaghetti poised before me.

“Yeah, well, keep dreaming. How can you tell him his dream? It’s crazy.”

How does one see someone else’s dream? Maybe the patron saint of dreams can provide some help. But who was Saint Rita? Maybe I should read the encyclopedia to find out.

“Let’s see what happens,” I finally say.

Rising from the table, grabbing the dinner plates, Tracy looks at me with those eyes of practiced indulgence. “You do that. But before you do, my sweet knight, these dishes don’t wash themselves.”

And there it is. I reach to the night stand to check that the “S” volume of the Britannica Encyclopedia is still there. Last night it gave me just the jolt that I needed. In the pitch black room, I roll off the bed. I grab my black book from the dresser, and creep through the door into the hallway.

With the overhead light breaking through the dark, I sit and write. By the time I finish I can smell the new leather interior of the car that the twenty-grand would buy me. Yes, it was a good night, but even a better morning is slowly awakening.

It is as if we had never left. The only difference is that the soft pearl white of the morning light glows through the overhead dome, beckoning the sun to counter the gloom from the night before.

Then again comes the four knocks and again we all stand.

“I see that I made the right impression last night. It’s a good thing. A beautiful thing.” Don Marchetti wastes no time. “And we have a winner, no?” He glances at Abed, with the bag perched on his lap.

Benny sighs, “It ain’t like that. I mean,” Benny stammers. Giving the guy a break, I stand, placing my hand on his shoulder offering the comma that he so desperately needs.

“Uh, Don... let me help Benny here.” Benny looks up and starts to speak, but I cut him off.

“I think that you won’t be disappointed.” And as I start to reach into my jacket toward the inner pocket, several clicks inform me that loaded guns are pointing at me.

“It’s just my little black book,” I say, slowly opening the jacket, gazing from Abed to Harry and back, noticing the stiffness of the Don just waiting for my next move. My hand slides inside the jacket, my fingers lifting the book and slowly raising to where the black becomes visible to all. The guns lower.

“This,” I explain, opening the book, “is where I write my dreams.”

“Go on,” the Don approving of my intention.

“I know your dream, Don Marchetti. And more, I know what it means for you. Abed, can I see the reward money first?” He opens the bag wide, and there are the bills, neatly piled inside.

“And if my guess is right, just a few hours ago the dream was back.” The Don nods, a bit of a grin upturns on his lips.

“Just as Harry here guessed, I was visited by Saint Rita. She told me your story, your dream. If I may.” The Don just smiles.

“Each night, as you lay stretched out on your bed, you worry of what the future holds for you.” I stop, and look around the room. “But being the most powerful man, with the power to do as you wish, what is this vision trying to tell you?”

“That’s why you’re here, Danny,” he says.

I open my little black book. There it is, laid out before me.

“It’s a statute. A giant statute. I am right, right?”

“Hideous. And every night. But go on.”

“It was truly frightening, but most striking. It’s head, pure gold. The chest, arms, and hands laden with silver as reflective as that mirror that you shaved in front of this morning.” The Don smiles, and reaches to rub his clean chin.

“It’s middle, the belly, the hips, are carved in bronze. For the strongest support, the legs were steel. But the base, the feet, bare of shoes, found a mix of iron and ceramic. These are the details. I saw it all.”

“A marvel,” the Don exclaims, rising to his feet. The chairs slide back, stopping only by the waive of the Don’s hand to remain seated.

“If I gave partial credit, half the cash would be yours. But it’s all or nothing. Now we are all in the know of my dream. That, my friend, is entirely, one-hundred percent accurate.” As he leans forward, he says to me, “So what’s it mean?”

I close the book and slide it back into my pocket. “Don Marchetti, if you don’t like what I am about to tell you, please remember, I am just the messenger, as always. They say that knowledge is power, and knowledge of the future is the most powerful of all. It gives you the ticket to change your destiny.”

“Go on, Danny, we are all friends here.”

“The head of gold, that is you Don Marchetti. The strongest, the most successful Don of all.” I can hear their heads nodding. “The silver torso and arms, that’s the Argento family. They’ve been muscling in from the north. The mid-section bronze, the Milanis from Ohio claim that spot. I know they’ve been working to get a piece of your action too. But the most interesting of all, the feet, combining iron and ceramic, that had me stumped for a bit.”

I look around, seeing nothing but rapt attention.

“Then I saw it. From New Jersey, it’s the Starsky group, but because they can’t keep their house in order, they take in even non-Italians. But Don Marchetti, Starsky is not your problem.”

“Then what? The cash is waiting. As am I.”

“It’s the last part of the dream. The most frightening of all. A stone, the size of a mountain, falling from the sky, thrusting thousands of shards of the exploded statute to the winds.”

Don Marchetti folds his arms.

“Like I said, boss, this isn’t me. Its Uncle Sam and his Justice Department. They are everywhere, and the explosion that I saw, that you see every night, is the result of the years that they have been targeting you, us.”

He sighs, leans back his head and closes his eyes for a moment.

“Seems right,” he says. “Danny, oh, Danny, it’s yours. Abed, the bag.”

I feel twenty thousand dollars lay a crevice in my lap.

“We call a counsel, today. Gentlemen, take your leave, and return. We need to plan and take action. And from now on, it’s all about the future.”

With that he stands, we all stand, wondering where we go now.