She tipped her malevolent witch's face forward. "You goin' after Anselmo now, ain't you?" she cackled. Clapping her wasted hands, Angela Scubisci grinned, flashing black gums and a sorry trio of sharp brown teeth. "You get him for what he do to his poor father's memory," she said happily. "He think it's enough he get that kike lawyer of his to pay for me to stay here. He tella me he have me thrown out if I don' pass on his filthy, traitorous mail." Her Halloween smile broadened. "You getta him good now, Remo." She seemed delighted to say his name. "Him and those Napoli bastards."
"Napoii?" Remo asked. "Naples, right?"
Angela Scubisci spit on the shabby floor. "Don' talka to me about those diavola tonno." She spit again, wiping drool from her chin with the back of one ancient hand.
"What's wrong with Naples?" Remo asked. This time, the widow Scubisci tried to spit at him. He twisted and it slapped viciously against the ratty wallpaper.
"Chiun?" Remo asked, confused. The old man stood near the door.
"She is Sicilian," he explained with growing impatience. "Clan warfare has divided both provinces for generations."
"And my Anselmo has got on his knees for them Napoli dogs," Angela Scubisci snarled. "Iffa my Pietro was alive, it woulda been different. The family always come first to him." She raised both hands above her head. Loose black sleeves rolled back to reveal flesh-draped biceps. "Oh, if he wassa here now, I'd make him some of the fried peppers he love so much. And after he eat, he woulda have one of his caporegime shoot that traitorous boy of his right inna the face."
"Must've missed a lot of Mother's Days," Remo commented aridly to Chiun.
"I am not interested," Chiun hissed. "Now come. We have dallied here long enough." In a whirl of kimono skirts, he ducked back into the hallway.
Remo looked once more at Angela Scubisci. The old woman's withered hands were still upraised. Sitting in her chair, she was stretching toward the ceiling, muttering soft invocations.
"Oh, Pietro," she intoned, her hopeful, damp eyes turned upward, "thissa fine boy gonna pay back Anselmo for what he done to poison your memory."
She waved her prayerful arms from side to side. At the door, Remo thought of all the schemes of old Don Pietro that CURE had been forced to thwart, of all the innocents who had fallen victim to the evil old man.
As he slipped through the door, he called back to the ancient widow of Pietro Scubisci, his tone icy cold.
"If you want to get to your husband, lady, you're reaching in the wrong direction."
Chapter 23
"Anselmo Scubisci's not the top dog after all, Smitty," Remo announced. He was on a pay phone in the lobby of the retirement home. "Sounds like he's running things from jail for somebody else."
"To you know who?" Smith asked.
"Nope. Mrs. Scubisci didn't know."
"Mrs. Scubisci?" Smith questioned.
"Or Mother Scubisci, depending on which one of her Riff Raff Sam relatives we're talking about. Weird thing, Smitty, but I was just thinking she's one of the few members of that family I've met that I haven't killed. Not that the temptation wasn't there."
"I found her to be charming," the Master of Sinanju disagreed. He was standing at Remo's elbow. He seemed to be attempting by restless expression alone to hurry the conversation along.
"I'm not surprised," Remo said to Chiun. "She's the first mom I ever met who opted for capital over corporal punishment." To Smith, he said, "The nasty old battle-ax wants us to ice her own son. She's pissed at him for throwing in with some foreign investor for Raffair."
Chiun shook his head testily. "Not just any foreign investor, Emperor Smith," he called. "The man he has taken up with is from Naples."
With his last word came a phlegmy sound from down the hall. A fresh wad of spit flew out the door of Angela Scubisci's room.
"I'm glad I'm not in charge of mop duty around here," Remo commented. "Anyway, Chiun's right. She wasn't upset that junior was a murderous son of a bitch, just that he'd gone into business with someone from the dreaded N-province."
"I understand why," Smith said. "It is an odd arrangement, given the fact that the Scubisci Family has its origin in Sicily."
"Sicily, Naples-I still don't know what the big deal is," Remo said.
"There is a very old rivalry between crime interests in both cities. Although it exists now throughout Italy, Sicily is the traditional home of the Mafia. The branch from which the Scubisci Family extends is quite strong there."
Remo didn't know how it came to him. But at Smith's use of the word now, something sparked in his brain. He felt his hand tighten on the receiver.
"Now," he stressed, stunned at his own deduction.
"What is it?" Smith asked, curious.
"You said exists now," Remo said excitedly. "What about before? Like years ago?"
"I do not follow."
"Remember East Africa? The defense minister there made a deal with some kind of old Italian crime syndicate. Dinty Morra or something like that."
An instant's hesitation on the other end of the line as Smith picked up the thread. "Camorra," he announced, the shock of realization in his steady voice.
It was during CURE's last crisis. Renegade forces within the government had threatened to turn the African nation of East Africa into a haven for crime. The defense minister of that country had made a deal with an old rival of the Mafia thought to have been extinct since the early part of the twentieth century. Camorra. This underground syndicate intended to use nuclear devices to decimate the ranks of the visiting crime lords, hoping to assume dominance of the world's crime scene.
Remo and Chiun had thwarted their plans, and the secret fraternity had scuttled back into the shadows. In the intervening months, Smith had been unable to locate them, and they had made no more noises of their desire to expand beyond Italy's borders. Until now.
"Is it possible?" Smith asked. He was still amazed that something like Camorra had evaded detection for so long.
"You tell me," Remo answered. "I've got a letter here from Italy. By the sounds of it, Scubisci was getting stuff sent to his mother and his lawyer was bringing it to him."
"Bring the letter to Folcroft," Smith said crisply.
"I was gonna FedEx it," Remo said. "And anyway, Chiun says it's just some kind of congratulations thing. It might not be anything."
"I will not know that until I see it."
"C'mon, Smitty. Chiun's itching to go after the guys who torched our house. Besides, the note's in Italian. You don't know Italian."
"Actually, I do know some," Smith said. "And Master Chiun will be able to fill the gaps in my knowledge. As for the men responsible for burning your home, I have had no luck. There have been no credit-card usages by Fungillo since yesterday. Aside from a large cash withdrawal in his name from a Boston ATM a few hours after you saw him flee the scene, he has disappeared. At least electronically."
Beside Remo, the Master of Sinanju's face grew dark. "You confessed to Smith before me?" he hissed.
When Remo offered a sheepish shrug in explanation, the old man exhaled disgust. He marched away from his pupil and took up a sentry position at the main doors, glaring malevolence at Mott Street. The activity outside had grown since their arrival at the retirement complex.
"I don't know about Raffair," Remo muttered, "but my stock's dropping like a rock." He tore his eyes away from his teacher's indignant form. "Why don't you let us go after Scubisci right now?" he whispered to Smith. "For my sake? After all, as top dog he's ultimately to blame for what happened to our house. Maybe that'll get Chiun off my back."
"It will not," the Master of Sinanju called. "I want he who struck the match, not he who holds the leash."
As Remo felt himself deflate, Smith chimed in. "This time, I agree with Chiun," the CURE director said. "No one will miss a hoodlum like John Fungillo, but I would prefer not to send you into a federal penitentiary after Anseimo Scubisci."