Dr. Axeworthy assumed a pained expression. “Please. I am a cosmetic surgeon. ‘Plastic’ sounds so...tacky.”

  “That is why you have been summoned here,” Smith continued. “And that is why you are being paid handsomely for your services. If you require me for any reason, I will be in my office.”

  Dr. Axeworthy looked down at the tiny Oriental, who stood resolute on the other side of the operating table.

  “And you?”

  “I will assist.”

  “You are a doctor?”

  “No. But I will guide you to correctness.”

  “I work only with colleagues of my own choosing,” Dr. Axeworthy said firmly.

  Smith paused at the door. “Chiun administered the anesthetic. He will be responsible for the patient’s continued state of unconsciousness.”

  “Acupuncture? asked Dr. Axeworthy, suddenly understanding.

  “Perhaps,” said the old Oriental, looking away.

  Dr. Axeworthy whispered, “I’ve used it myself, you know. My patients love being on the cutting edge of exotic procedures.”

  “Please keep me informed,” said Smith, closing the doors after him.

  After Smith had gone, Dr. Axeworthy took up a blue surgical marking pen and began marking the patient’s face, an X over the lump on the forehead and other lines to indicate preliminary incisions.

  “We will start with the nose,” said the tiny Oriental.

  “Have you anything particular in mind?”

  His hazel eyes darting to the closed double doors through which Harold Smith had disappeared, the old Asian withdrew a rolled tube of parchment from one colorful sleeve.

  “I have made several designs,” he confided, “all of which are usable. We have only to select the most suitable one.”

  “If you don’t mind,” said Dr. Axeworthy, “my fee is being paid by Dr. Smith. I will follow his wishes.”

  The old oriental drew closer. He tugged on Dr. Axeworthy’s white gown conspiratorially.

  “Name your price. I will double what Smith has promised you.”

  “Sorry.”

  “What I have in mind calls for subtlety. No one will ever know….”

  Chapter Eleven

  Carmine (Fuggin) Imbruglia first arrived in Boston with a spring in his step, a smile on his face, and an ancient brass key clamped in one beefy hand.

  A car was waiting to meet him outside the Rumpp Shuttle terminal. It was a Cadillac. As black as caviar. A present from Don Fiavorante.

  There was a cop hovering by the Cadillac, looking unhappy.

  “Is this your vehicle, sir?” he asked.

  “What of it, Irish?” The guy looked Irish. Carmine hated Irish cops. They were all drunk with power.

  “It shouldn’t be here. This is a bus stop.”

  “So I’m a fuggin’ scofflaw. Sue me.”

  Silently the cop carefully wrote out a ticket and slipped it under a windshield wiper. He started away.

  Carmine wadded it up and tossed it past the Irish cop’s shoulder and into a green wire trash basket.

  “I laugh at parkin’ tickets, copper. Back in Brooklyn, I usta wallpaper my john with these things. And when I ran out of wall, I’d tape ’em together and hang ’em up on a hook by the commode. Get the picture?”

  The cop kept walking.

  “I’m gonna rule this town,” Carmine said as he settled into the back of the Caddy.

  “First thing we’re gonna do,” he told his driver during the ride in, “is muscle in on the construction. I hear this town is positively booming.”

  “Not no more.”

  “Whatdya mean?”

  “There’s no construction.”

  “What is it–the fuggin’ off season? Like huntin’? They only build when the weather’s nice?”

  The driver shrugged his side-of-beef shoulders. “They just stopped building.”

  “When the fug did this calamity happen?”

  “After the last governor lost the presidential election.”

  “The Greek? Okay, so there’s no construction. It’ll come back after the shock wears off. So can we get in on the ponies? Set up a nice horse parlor?”

  “No horses up here. Only trotters. And they stopped runnin’ the trotters a couple of years back when they closed Suffolk Downs.”

  “No horses? What kinda burg is this?”

  “The dogs are still runnin’, though. Over at Wonderland.”

  “Dogs! Who the hell plays the dogs?”

  “Up here,” said the driver, “all the guys that used to play the ponies.”

  “You can’t fix a dog race. No jockeys. What about the sports book? I hear this is a big, big sports town.”

  “Well, the Red Sox are in the cellar, where they’ve been for the last hundred years, the Celtics are losers, the Patriots are threatening to leave the state, but the Bruins are playin good.”

  “I never heard of these Broons. What are they–jai alai?”

  “They’re hockey.”

  “I never heard of a hockey book in my entire life. What about shylocking?” asked a suddenly subdued Carmine Imbruglia. “Surely that ain’t dead.”

  “You can shylock all you want up here. Lots of guys need the dough.”

  “Great. It’s settled. We shylock.”

  “Of course, with unemployment bein’ what it is, collectin’ is gonna be another matter entirely.”

  “Don’t you worry. I know how to collect,” said Carmine Imbruglia. “By the way, what’s your name, pal?”

  “Bruno. Bruno Boyardi. They call me ‘Chef.’”

  “Chef, huh? Can you cook?”

  “That’s how I been supportin’ myself until I got the word you were takin’ over.”

  “Hey, that’s pretty funny,” chortled Carmine Imbruglia. “I like a guy with a sensa humor.”

  Behind the wheel, Bruno (The Chef) Boyardi sat with a stony expression. He hoped there was money in shylocking. He hated restaurant work. It made his hair greasy.

  They had emerged from a long tunnel that seemed to be perfumed with carbon monoxide. Carmine looked around. The storefronts were surprisingly bare. Many were empty.

  “How’s the restaurant trade doin’?” he wondered aloud. “Can we get in on that? Do a little shakedown on the side?”

  “What little there’s left of it is sucked dry.”

  Carmine leaned over the front seat. “What you mean, ‘what little there’s left of it’? This is fuggin’ Massachusetts, land of fuggin’ Miracles.”

  “Not no more, it ain’t,” said Chef Boyardi.

  Carmine watched the endless blocks of vacant storefronts pass by his window. Two in three had windows that were papered in faded newsprint and hung with “CLOSED” or “FOR LEASE” signs.

  “What happened to this town. An earthquake?”

  “No one’s sure,” said Bruno the Chef. “Ever since the Greek lost the election, this whole territory has gone to hell. It was like a balloon that had been pumped up too much and exploded.”

  Carmine made shooing motions with both hands. “It’ll come back. It’ll come back. Don’t you worry. I’m kingpin of this town and I’m tellin’ you it’ll come back.”

  Carmine Imbruglia’s first sight of the North End brought the broad smile back to his face. It was a slice of Little Italy. Even the pungent aromas were identical.

  “Say, this is more like it,” he said happily.

  The Salem Street Social Club was more to his liking too.

  Carmine strode up to the front door, and after inserting the ancient brass key in the lock, turned it.

  He stepped in. His heart swelled. It was just like the old Neighborhood Improvement Association. Only it was his, and his alone.

  The back room was simply furnished. There were a card table and a great black four-burner stove with a double oven. The kind they had in restaurants.

  Carmine Imbruglia’s pig eyes fell on the computer terminal that sat square in the middle of the card table.

  “What the fug is that thing doin’ there?” he wanted to know.

  “It’s a computer, boss.”

  “I know it’s a fuggin’ computer. I asked what the fug is it doin’ here, not what its species was.”

  “It’s a present from Don Fiavorante. Here’s the instruction book.”

  Don Carmine accepted the blue leather notebook. He squinted at the cover, which had stamped in silver the strange word “LANSCII.”

  “Is this Pilgrim, or what?” he muttered.

  “I think it’s computerese.”

  “Computerese? What does Don Fiavorante think we’re runnin’ up here, fuggin’ IDC? Get rid of it.”

  “Can’t. Don Fiavorante’s orders.”

  Don Carmine tossed the book back onto the table. “Ah, I’ll worry about it later. Go hustle me some lunch.”

  “What’ll you have?”

  “Pizza. A nice hot pizza. Everything on it.”

  “Squid rings too?”

  Carmine turned like a tugboat coming around. “Squid rings? Whoever heard of squid rings on pizza? Hell, if that’s how they do it in Boston, pile ’em on. I’ll try anything once. Some vino. And some cannoli. Fresh ones. Don’t let em give you day-old.”

  “Don’t worry. I’m going to the restaurant where I work nights.”

  After you get the food, give ’em your notice. Nobody moonlights anymore. This ain’t the fuggin’ merchant marine I’m runnin’ here.”

  · · ·

  When the food came, Don Carmine Imbruglia took one look at the pizza and went white with rage.

  “What the fug is this? Where’s the tomato sauce? And the cheese? Don’t they have cows up here? Look at that crust. This fuggin’ pie is all crust.”

  “That’s how they do pizzas up here. Taste it. You might like it.”

  Carmine tore off the point of one dripping slice with his teeth. He spat it out again.

  “Tastes like cardboard!” he said between explosions of dry crust.

  “Sorry. Have some vino,” said Bruno the Chef, pouring.

  Carmine waved him away. “I can always drink later. I’m hungry.” He lifted a cannoli to his mouth. He bit down. The brittle shell cracked apart. He tasted the sickly green filling.

  And promptly spat it on the linoleum floor.

  “What’d they fill these things with–used toothpaste?”

  “This is Boston, boss. It’s not like New York. They do things a little different up here.”

  “They don’t do them good at all! Get rid of this junk and get me some real food.”

  “What kind?”

  Don Carmine jerked a thumb at the heavy black stove.

  “You’re the fuggin’ chef. Fuggin’ surprise me.”

  Over a puffy calzone bursting with pinkish-gray tentacles salvaged from the pizza, Don Carmine began to feel better about Boston.

  “So where are my soldiers?” he asked, shoving a rubbery tendril of squid into his mouth with a greasy thumb.

  “I’m it.”

  Carmine’s apish jaw dropped. The tentacle slithered back onto the plate. “Where’s the rest of my fuggin’ crew?” he demanded hotly.

  “Dead or in jail. Rico.”

  “Them fuggin’ Puerto Ricans are everywhere. Hey, what am I worried about? I can make guys now. I’m a fuggin’ don. I’m absolute boss of Boston. I need soldiers, I’ll just make ’em.”

  “I know some guys. Vinnie the Maggot. Bugs. Toe Biter–”

  Carmine’s face assumed a doubtful expression. “With names like those, make sure they got all their shots before you bring ’em around,” he said. “Got that?”

  At that moment the phone rang.

  As Don Carmine resumed his meal, Chef Boyardi went to answer the phone.

  “This squid tastes a little gamy,” Don Carmine muttered. “You sure they didn’t stick you with octopus?”

  “I asked for squid.”

  “Tastes like fuggin’ octopus.”

  “Yeah?” Bruno (The Chef) Boyardi said into the telephone. “Yeah, he is. Boss, it’s for you.” The Chef clapped a hand over the ancient black Bakelite mouthpiece. “It’s Don Fiavorante.”

  Carmine grabbed the phone.

  “Hello?” he said through a mouthful of tentacular matter.

  “Don Carmine. How is my friend this day?” came Don Fiavorante’s smooth-as-suntan-oil voice.

  “It’s great up here,” Carmine lied. “Really wonderful.”

  “You have seen the computer?”

  “Yeah, yeah. Nice. Appreciate it. Always wanted one of my own.”

  “Good, good. You will need it to keep track of your rent payments”

  Carmine stopped chewing. “Rent?”

  “Rent is due Friday. Every Friday you must pay me twenty thousand dollars for the privilege of running Boston.”

  Don Carmine gulped. “I may need a few weeks to get on the ball here–”

  “Every Friday. The next Friday is two days from now.”

  “But I don’t got that kind of money. I just got here!”

  “If you cannot pay me twenty thousand dollars on this first Friday,” said Don Fiavorante, “I will understand.”

  “That’s good, because I barely blew into town.”

  “However, if you cannot pay your first week’s rent, then you must pay me forty thousand on the following Friday.”

  “Forty!”

  “Plus, of course, your second week’s rent of twenty thousand dollars.”

  “But that’s sixty thousand bucks!” exploded Don Carmine Imbruglia. He wiped spittle off the mouthpiece with his sleeve.

  “And if you cannot pay on the second Friday, that, too, I will understand. So on the following Friday after that, your combined rent will be, for the first two Fridays, eighty thousand dollars. Plus of course the third-Friday rent.”

  Don Carmine felt the room spinning. He had never seen that kind of money in his entire life. “What if I can’t pay on the third Friday?” he wailed.

  “This is not done, and I know you will not fail to repay the trust I have placed in you, Don Carmine, my good friend, to whom I owe my current high estate.”

  Carmine swallowed a tentacle tip that his tongue discovered wedged between two loose molars.

  “I will do as you say, Don Fiavorante,” he gulped.

  “I know that you will, Don Carmine. I know that you will. Now, all you need to get started you will find in the blue book called ‘LANSCII.’”

  “That name sounds kind of familiar,” Carmine muttered vaguely.

  “It should. You have any trouble with the system, you just call the number inside the cover. Ask for Tony.”

  “Tony. Got that.”

  “Tony is a friend of mine. He will help you.”

  “Any friend of yours is a friend of mine too. You know that.”

  “You are a good boy, Don Carmine,” said Don Fiavorante. “I know you will not let me down. The future of this thing of ours is in your hands.”

  The line went dead.

  Don Carmine Imbruglia hung up. Woodenly he walked over to his unfinished meal. With a sweep of his arms he cleared it from the table.

  “You don’t like my calzone?” asked Bruno (the Chef) Boyardi.

  “It tastes like fuggin’ octopus,” snarled Carmine Imbruglia, dragging the computer terminal over to the place where his plate had been. “I got no time to eat anyway. I just hit town and I’m already twenty G’s in the fuggin hole.”

  He squinted at his brutish reflection in the terminal screen.

  “Oh, mother of God,” he said hoarsely.

  “What? What?”

  “I don’t see any channel changer on this thing. I think we got a defective computer. Where did Don Fiavorante get this pile of junk anyway?”

  “Maybe the changer fell off when it fell off the truck.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Dr. Rance Axeworthy made the unpleasant discovery less than an hour into the operation.

  “This man has had plastic surgery before,” he muttered, discovering the telltale scars behind the ears.

  “Many times,” said the tiny Oriental.

  “Then I shouldn’t be doing this. Repeating the procedure can have a catastrophic effect on the plastic tissues. Odd that there is so little scarring.”

  “He heals well.”

  Dr. Axeworthy paused. He attempted to calculate the risks of facial scarring. High. The chance of a malpractice suit. Low. This was too irregular an arrangement for anyone to sue. Then he recalled the exact sum of his fee.

  “I was going to bring out the cheeks,” he said thoughtfully, “but I see that this has been done. I will instead fill out the face somewhat. Resculpture the ears. Ears are a telltale identifying mark.”

  “I am more concerned with the eyes,” said the old Oriental.

  “I have my orders,” Dr. Axeworthy said stiffly.

  “A slight tightening of the corners would not be noticed,” the tiny man said hopefully.

  “I’m going to have to do something to effect an overall change,” said Dr. Axeworthy, as if he had not heard.

  He stared at the strong face in repose. He could not believe that he was operating without qualified assistance. Still, the fee more than made up for that slight inconvenience.

  The patient’s earlier history created enormous problems. This required more time. And because there was no time, he remarked, “I’m going to remove the tumor while I think this through.”

  He injected a strong nerve block into the lump, to further ensure no regrettable complications, such as the patient waking up in hysterics. Tracing the blue ink marking, he made a simple X with the scalpel, bringing forth surprisingly little blood. Using a Metzenbaum scissors, he laid the four triangular flaps of skin aside.

  What he saw made him gasp and nearly drop the scalpel.

  “Good Lord!”

  The old Oriental leaned in to peer at the exposed anomaly.

  “Ah, the orb of Shiva,” he breathed.

  “My God. That can’t be a tumor. Can it?”

  “It is not.”

  “It looks almost like...an organ.”

  Using a blunt probe, Dr. Axeworthy touched the thing.

  It was soft, like a human eye. Only it was as black as a gelatinous marble. There was no retina or iris. No white at all. No sign of veining. It could not be an eye, he told himself. It looked more like a great black fish egg.