He steered the boat out of the marina and into the choppy waters of Long Island Sound. Caruso stood a few feet away, the collar of his jacket raised against the wind despite the fact that the cabin was entirely enclosed.
“You know, I never cared for the water,” Tony told him.
Caruso watched the churning waters apprehensively. “I fucking hate it, being in a fucking boat.”
“Why’s that?”
Caruso looked embarrassed. “I never learned to swim.”
Tony revved the engine, and the boat lurched forward so abruptly that Caruso grabbed the metal railing to his left. “Jesus.”
Tony turned the wheel to the right and the boat made a broad loop, bouncing roughly in the churning waters until it came to a halt and sat, weaving unsteadily in the heaving waves.
“Okay, here it is,” Tony said. He shut off the engine and faced Caruso. “I know Eddie talked to you. I know because I told him to do it. So if anything happened to him, I’m to blame.”
Tony could see that Caruso was trying to play it cool, but that he was nonetheless growing edgy and uncertain.
“I wanted Eddie to talk to you and find out what was going on with my father,” Tony continued. “I know he’s looking for Sara, and I figure he’d put you on the job.”
Caruso’s eyes drifted over to the roiling, foam-spattered sea. “I told you all that.”
Tony guessed that Caruso was trying to calculate exactly how much he could tell him without betraying the Old Man.
“You think I’m just a gofer, right?” Caruso asked sharply.
“I know you work for my father, that’s all,” Tony answered.
“Everybody thinks I’m just a fucking gofer,” Caruso said. “But I ain’t. He gives me important things to do. Looking for your wife, he wouldn’t put me on that. He’d say, ‘Vinnie, find a guy to do this thing.’ That’s what he’d say. And that’s what I’d do.”
“Is that what you did?”
Caruso looked as if he’d been challenged to stand and deliver. “Yeah, as a matter of fact. Goddamn right I found a guy.”
“So it’s not you that’s looking for Sara?”
“No.”
“Who is?”
“Like I just told you, some other guy.”
“What’s this other guy’s name?”
“I don’t know.”
“Vinnie, don’t fuck with me,” Tony warned.
Caruso’s eyes swept over to Tony, fear like small blue flames leaping inside them. “I swear I don’t know,” he said.
“But you told Eddie about this other guy?”
“Yeah.”
“What did you tell him?”
Caruso didn’t answer.
“What did you tell him, Vinnie?”
Caruso drew in a deep breath. “If your father knew that I was-”
Tony stepped over to him. “Listen to me,” he said. “I know you work for my father, but this thing’s between my wife and me. It’s none of his business, but he made it his business anyway. Just like he has since I got married. And it wasn’t any of Eddie Sullivan’s business, but I pulled him into it. So the thing is, I got two people to worry about now. And the whole fucking thing is because my father stuck his nose in where it didn’t belong, and I let him do that. The whole thing is my fault, Vinnie. My fucking fault. And so it’s for me to straighten this thing out, you understand?”
Caruso remained silent, and so Tony drew in closer.
“He’s a bad man, Vinnie,” he said.
Caruso chuckled. “No, he ain’t.”
“My father is a very bad man,” Tony repeated emphatically.
Caruso waved his hand. “He’s been good to me, your father, treats me like a-” He stopped. “Treats me good is what I’m saying.”
It was then Tony saw it, the weird loyalty Caruso had for the Old Man. “You don’t owe him anything, Vinnie. You know why? Because he wouldn’t lift a finger for you. And something else. No matter what you do, he’ll never give a shit about you.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about, Tony,” Caruso said in a voice that struck Tony as curiously childlike, a piece of wishful thinking, like a little boy clinging against all evidence to his belief in Santa Claus.
“Yeah, I do,” Tony said almost gently. “I do know because he’s done it before.”
“Done what?”
“Gotten a guy to try to please him, do everything he could to please him,” Tony answered. “And this other guy did his best too. Because he was like you, Vinnie. He just wanted to feel like the Old Man loved him.”
Caruso looked at him doubtfully. “What guy you talking about?”
Tony felt relieved that he’d finally figured it out, the whole rotten scheme. “Me,” he said with a small, sad smile. “That other guy was me.”