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everything so skillfully they were never caught. Naturally on the records they sold to

stores the artists and original production company received not a penny. Michael

Corleone noticed that Johnny Fontane had lost a lot of money owing to this

counterfeiting because at that time, just before he lost his voice, his records were the

most popular in the country.

He asked Tom Hagen about it. Why did the Don allow the counterfeiters to cheat his

godson? Hagen shrugged. Business was business. Besides, Johnny was in the Don's

bad graces, Johnny having divorced his childhood sweetheart to marry Margot Ashton.

This had displeased the Don greatly.

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"How come these guys stopped their operation?" Michael asked. "The cops got on to

them?"

Hagen shook his head. "The Don withdrew his protection. That was right after

Connie's wedding."

It was a pattern he was to see often, the Don helping those in misfortune whose

misfortune he had partly created. Not perhaps out of cunning or planning but because of

his variety of interests or perhaps because of the nature of the universe, the interlinking

of good and evil, natural of itself.

Michael had married Kay up in New England, a quiet wedding, with only her family

and a few of her friends present. Then they had moved into one of the houses on the

mall in Long Beach. Michael was surprised at how well Kay got along with his parents

and the other people living on the mall. And of course she had gotten pregnant right

away, like a good, old-style Italian wife was supposed to, and that helped. The second

kid on the way in two years was just icing.

Kay would be waiting for him at the airport, she always came to meet him, she was

always so glad when he came back from a trip. And he was too. Except now. For the

end of this trip meant that he finally had to take the action he had been groomed for

over the last three years. The Don would be waiting for him. The caporegimes would be

waiting for him. And he, Michael Corleone, would have to give the orders, make the

decisions which would decide his and his Family's fate.

Every morning when Kay Adams Corleone got up to take care of the baby's early

feeding, she saw Mama Corleone, the Don's wife, being driven away from the mall by

one of the bodyguards, to return an hour later. Kay soon learned that her mother-in-law

went to church every single morning. Often on her return, the old woman stopped by for

morning coffee and to see her new grandchild.

Mama Corleone always started off by asking Kay why she didn't think of becoming a

Catholic, ignoring the fact that Kay's child had already been baptized a Protestant. So

Kay felt it was proper to ask the old woman why she went to church every morning,

whether that was a necessary part of being a Catholic.

As if she thought that this might have stopped Kay from converting the old woman

said, "Oh, no, no, some Catholics only go to church on Easter and Christmas. You go

when you feel like going."

Kay laughed. "Then why do you go every single morning?"

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In a completely natural way, Mama Corleone said, "I go for my husband," she pointed

down toward the floor, so he don't go down there." She paused. "I say prayers for his

soul every day so he go up there." She pointed heavenward. She said this with an

impish smile, as if she were subverting her husband's will in some way, or as if it were a

losing cause. It was said jokingly almost, in her grim, Italian, old crone fashion. And as

always when her husband was not present, there was an attitude of disrespect to the

great Don.

"How is your husband feeling?" Kay asked politely.

Mama Corleone shrugged. "He's not the same man since they shot him. He lets

Michael do all the work, he just plays the fool with his garden, his peppers, his tomatoes.

As if he were some peasant still. But men are always like that."

Later in the morning Connie Corleone would walk across the mall with her two

children to pay Kay a visit and chat. Kay liked Connie, her vivaciousness, her obvious

fondness for her brother Michael. Connie had taught Kay how to cook some Italian

dishes but sometimes brought her own more expert concoctions over for Michael to

taste.

Now this morning as she usually did, she asked Kay what Michael thought of her

husband, Carlo. Did Michael really like Carlo, as he seemed to? Carlo had always had a

little trouble with the Family but now over the last years he had straightened out. He was

really doing well in the labor union but he had to work so hard, such long hours. Carlo

really liked Michael, Connie always said. But then, everybody liked Michael, just as

everybody liked her father. Michael was the Don all over again. It was the best thing that

Michael was going to run the Family olive oil business.

Kay had observed before that when Connie spoke about her husband in relation to

the Family, she was always nervously eager for some word of approval for Carlo. Kay

would have been stupid if she had not noticed the almost terrified concern Connie had

for whether Michael liked Carlo or not. One night she spoke to Michael about it and

mentioned the fact that nobody ever spoke about Sonny Corleone, nobody even

referred to him, at least not in her presence. Kay had once tried to express her

condolences to the Don and his wife and had been listened to with almost rude silence

and then ignored. She had tried to get Connie talking about her older brother without

success.

Sonny's wife, Sandra, had taken her children and moved to Florida, where her own

parents now lived. Certain financial arrangements had been made so that she and her

children could live comfortably, but Sonny had left no estate.

Michael reluctantly explained what had happened the night Sonny was killed. That

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Carlo had beaten his wife and Connie had called the mall and Sonny had taken the call

and rushed out in a blind rage. So naturally Connie and Carlo were always nervous that

the rest of the Family blamed her for indirectly causing Sonny's death. Or blamed her

husband, Carlo. But this wasn't the case. The proof was that they had given Connie and

Carlo a house in the mall itself and promoted Carlo to an important job in the labor

union setup. And Carlo had straightened out, stopped drinking, stopped whoring,

stopped trying to be a wise guy. The Family was pleased with his work and attitude for

the last two years. Nobody blamed him for what had happened.

"Then why don't you invite them over some evening and you can reassure your

sister?" Kay said. "The poor thing is always so nervous about what you think of her

husband. Tell her. And tell her to put those silly worries out of her head."

"I can't do that," Michael said. "We don't talk about those things in our family."

"Do you want me to tell her what you've told me?" Kay said.

She was puzzled because he took such a long time thinking over a suggestion that

was obviously the proper thing to do. Finally he said, "I don't think you should, Kay. I

don't think it will do any good. She'll worry anyway. It's something nobody can do

anything about."

Kay was amazed. She realized that Michael was always a little colder to his sister

Connie than he was to anyone else, despite Connie's affection. "Surely you don't blame

Connie for Sonny being killed?" she said.

Michael sighed. "Of course not," he said. "She's my kid sister and I'm very fond of her.

I feel sorry for her. Carlo straightened out, but he's really the wrong kind of husband. It's

just one of those things. Let's forget about it."

It was not in Kay's nature to nag; she let it drop. Also she had learned that Michael

was not a man to push, that he could become coldly disagreeable. She knew she was

the only person in the world who could bend his will, but she also knew that to do it too

often would be to destroy that power. And living with him the last two years had made

her love him more.

She loved him because he was always fair. An odd thing. But he always was fair to

everybody around him, never arbitrary even in little things. She had observed that he

was now a very powerful man, people came to the house to confer with him and ask

favors, treating him with deference and respect but one thing had endeared him to her

above everything else.

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Ever since Michael had come back from Sicily with his broken face, everybody in the

Family had tried to get him to undergo corrective surgery. Michael's mother was after

him constantly; one Sunday dinner with all the Corleones gathered on the mall she

shouted at Michael, "You look like a gangster in the movies, get your face fixed for the

sake of Jesus Christ and your poor wife. And so your nose will stop running like a

drunken Irish."

The Don, at the head of the table, watching everything, said to Kay, "Does it bother

you?"

Kay shook her head. The Don said to his wife. "He's out of your hands, it's no concern

of yours." The old woman immediately held her peace. Not that she feared her husband

but because it would have been disrespectful to dispute him in such a matter before the

others.

But Connie, the Don's favorite, came in from the kitchen, where she was cooking the

Sunday dinner, her face flushed from the stove, and said, "I think he should get his face

fixed. He was the most handsome one in the family before he got hurt. Come on, Mike,

say you'll do it."

Michael looked at her in an absentminded fashion. It seemed as if he really and truly

had not heard anything said. He didn't answer.

Connie came to stand beside her father. "Make him do it," she said to the Don. Her

two hands rested affectionately on his shoulders and she rubbed his neck. She was the

only one who was ever so familiar with the Don. Her affection for her father was

touching. It was trusting, like a little girl's. The Don patted one of her hands and said,

"We're all starving here. Put the spaghetti on the table and then chatter."

Connie turned to her husband and said, "Carlo, you tell Mike to get his face fixed.

Maybe he'll listen to you." Her voice implied that Michael and Carlo Rizzi had some

friendly relationship over and above anyone else's.

Carlo, handsomely sunburned, blond hair neatly cut and combed, sipped at his glass

of homemade wine and said, "Nobody can tell Mike what to do." Carlo had become a

different man since moving into the mall. He knew his place in the Family and kept to it.

There was something that Kay didn't understand in all this, something that didn't quite

meet the eye. As a woman she could see that Connie was deliberately charming her

father, though it was beautifully done and even sincere. Yet it was not spontaneous.

Carlo's reply had been a manly knuckling of his forehead. Michael had absolutely

ignored everything.

Kay didn't care about her husband's disfigurement but she worried about his sinus

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trouble which sprang from it. Surgery repair of the face would cure the sinus also. For

that reason she wanted Michael to enter the hospital and get the necessary work done.

But she understood that in a curious way he desired his disfigurement. She was sure

that the Don understood this too.

But after Kay gave birth to her first child, she was surprised by Michael asking her,

"Do you want me to get my face fixed?"

Kay nodded. "You know how kids are, your son will feel bad about your face when he

gets old enough to understand it's not normal. I just don't want our child to see it. I don't

mind at all, honestly, Michael."

"OK." He smiled at her. "I'll do it."

He waited until she was home from the hospital and then made all the necessary

arrangements. The operation was successful. The cheek indentation was now just

barely noticeable.

Everybody in the Family was delighted, but Connie more so than anyone. She visited

Michael every day in the hospital, dragging Carlo along. When Michael came home, she

gave him a big hug and a kiss and looked at him admiringly and said, "Now you're my

handsome brother again."

Only the Don was unimpressed, shrugging his shoulders

and remarking, "What's the difference?"

But Kay was grateful. She knew that Michael had done it against all his own

inclinations. Had done it because she had asked him to, and that she was the only

person in the world who could make him act against his own nature.

On the afternoon of Michael's return from Vegas, Rocco Lampone drove the limousine

to the mall to pick up Kay so that she could meet her husband at the airport. She always

met her husband when he arrived from out of town, mostly because she felt lonely

without him, living as she did in the fortified mall.

She saw him come off the plane with Tom Hagen and the new man he had working

for him, Albert Neri. Kay didn't care much for Neri, he reminded her of Luca Brasi in his

quiet ferociousness. She saw Neri drop behind Michael and off to the side, saw his

quick penetrating glance as his eyes swept over everybody nearby. It was Neri who first

spotted Kay and touched Michael's shoulder to make him look in the proper direction.

Kay ran into her husband's arms and he quickly kissed her and let her go. He and

Tom Hagen and Kay got into the limousine and Albert Neri vanished. Kay did not notice

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that Neri had gotten into another car with two other men and that this car rode behind

the limousine until it reached Long Beach.

Kay never asked Michael how his business had gone. Even such polite questions

were understood to be awkward, not that he wouldn't give her an equally polite answer,

but it would remind them both of the forbidden territory their marriage could never

include. Kay didn't mind anymore. But when Michael told her he would have to spend

the evening with his father to tell him about the Vegas trip, she couldn't help making a

little frown of disappointment.

"I'm sorry," Michael said. "Tomorrow night we'll go into New York and see a show and

have dinner, OK?" He patted her stomach, she was almost seven months pregnant.

"After the kid comes you'll be tied down again. Hell, you're more Italian than Yankee.

Two kids in two years."

Kay said tartly, "And you're more Yankee than Italian. Your first evening home and

you spend it on business." But she smiled at him when she said it. "You won't be home

late?"

"Before midnight," Michael said. "Don't wait up for me if you feel tired."

"I'll wait up," Kay said.

At the meeting that night, in the corner room library of Don Corleone's house, were