It loverlike but really to feel her pulse. It was galloping. He'd get her tonight and he'd

solve the mystery, what the hell ever it was. Fully confident, Dr. Jules Segal fell asleep.

Lucy watched the people around the pool. She could never have imagined her life

would change so in less than two years. She never regretted her "foolishness" at

Connie Corleone's wedding. It was the most wonderful thing that had ever happened to

her and she lived it over and over again in her dreams. As she lived over and over again

the months that followed.

Sonny had visited her once a week, sometimes more, never less. The days before

she saw him again her body was in torment (мука ['to:m∂nt]). Their passion for each

other was of the most elementary kind, undiluted (to dilute [‘daılju:t] – разжижать,

разбавлять) by poetry or any form of intellectualism. It was love of the coarsest nature,

a fleshly love, a love of tissue for opposing tissue.

When Sonny called to her he was coming she made certain there was enough liquor

in the apartment and enough food for supper and breakfast because usually he would

not leave until late the next morning. He wanted his fill (хотел насытиться) of her as

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she wanted her fill of him. He had his own key and when he came in the door she would

fly into his massive arms. They would both be brutally direct, brutally primitive. During

their first kiss they would be fumbling at each other's clothing and he would be lifting her

in the air, and she would be wrapping her legs around his huge thighs. They would be

making love standing up in the foyer of her apartment as if they had to repeat their first

act of love together, and then he would carry her so to the bedroom.

They would lie in bed making love. They would live together in the apartment for

sixteen hours, completely naked. She would cook for him, enormous meals. Somtimes

he would get phone calls obviously about business but she never even listened to the

words. She would be too busy toying with his body, fondling it, kissing it, burying her

mouth in it. Sometimes when he got up to get a drink and he walked by her, she

couldn't help reaching out to touch his naked body, hold him, make love to him as if

those special parts of his body were a plaything, a specially constructed, intricate

(запутанный, замысловатый, сложный ['ıntrıkıt]) but innocent toy revealing its known,

but still surprising ecstasies. At first she had been ashamed of these excesses on her

part but soon saw that they pleased her lover, that her complete sensual enslavement

to his body flattered him. In all this there was an animal innocence. They were happy

together.

When Sonny's father was gunned down in the street, she understood for the first time

that her lover might be in danger. Alone in her apartment, she did not weep, she wailed

aloud, an animal wailing (to wail – вопить, выть). When Sonny did not come to see her

for almost three weeks she subsisted on sleeping pills, liquor and her own anguish

(мука, боль, острая тоска). The pain she felt was physical pain, her body ached. When

he finally did come she held on to his body at almost every moment. After that he came

at least once a week until he was killed.

She learned of his death through the newspaper accounts and that very same night

she took a massive overdose of sleeping pills. For some reason, instead of killing, the

pills made her so ill that she staggered out into the hall of her apartment and collapsed

in front of the elevator door where she was found and taken to the hospital. Her

relationship to Sonny was not generally known so her case received only a few inches

in the tabloid (малоформатная газета со сжатым текстом; бульварная газета)

newspapers.

It was while she was in the hospital that Tom Hagen came to see her and console her.

It was Tom Hagen who arranged a job for her in Las Vegas working in the hotel run by

Sonny's brother Freddie. It was Tom Hagen who told her that she would receive an

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annuity (ежегодная рента [∂'nju:ıtı]) from the Corleone Family, that Sonny had made

provisions for her. He had asked her if she was pregnant, as if that were the reason for

her taking the pills and she had told him no. He asked her if Sonny had come to see her

that fatal night or had called that he would come to see her and she told him no, that

Sonny had not called. That she was always home waiting for him when she finished

working. And she had told Hagen the truth. "He's the only man I could ever love," she

said. "I can't love anybody else." She saw him smile a little but he also looked surprised.

"Do you find that so unbelievable?" she asked. "Wasn't he the one who brought you

home when you were a kid?"

"He was a different person," Hagen said, "he grew up to be a different kind of man."

"Not to me," Lucy said. "Maybe to everybody else, but not to me." She was still too

weak to explain how Sonny had never been anything but gentle with her. He'd never

been angry with her, never even irritable or nervous.

Hagen made all the arrangements for her to move to Las Vegas. A rented apartment

was waiting, he took her to the airport himself and he made her promise that if she ever

felt lonely or if things didn't go right, she would call him and he would help her in any

way he could.

Before she got on the plane she asked him hesitantly, "Does Sonny's father know

what you're doing?"

Hagen smiled, "I'm acting for him as well as myself. He's old-fashioned in these things

and he would never go against the legal wife of his son. But he feels that you were just

a young girl and Sonny should have known better. And your taking all those pills shook

everybody up." He didn't explain how incredible it was to a man like the Don that any

person should try suicide.

Now, after nearly eighteen months in Las Vegas, she was surprised to find herself

almost happy. Some nights she dreamed about Sonny and lying awake before dawn

continued her dream with her own caresses until she could sleep again. She had not

had a man since. But the life in Vegas agreed with her. She went swimming in the hotel

pools, sailed on Lake Mead and drove through the desert on her day off. She became

thinner and this improved her figure. She was still voluptuous but more in the American

than the old Italian style. She worked in the public relations section of the hotel as a

receptionist and had nothing to do with Freddie though when he saw her he would stop

and chat a little. She was surprised at the change in Freddie. He had become a ladies'

man, dressed beautifully, and seemed to have a real flair (чутье) for running a gambling

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resort. He controlled the hotel side, something not usually done by casino owners. With

the long, very hot summer seasons, or perhaps his more active sex life, he too had

become thinner and Hollywood tailoring made him look almost debonair

(жизнерадостный, веселый [deb∂’nε∂]) in a deadly sort of way.

It was after six months that Tom Hagen came out to see how she was doing. She had

been receiving a check for six hundred dollars a month, every month, in addition to her

salary. Hagen explained that this money had to be shown as coming from some place

and asked her to sign complete powers of attorney so that he could channel the money

properly. He also told her that as a matter of form she would be listed as owner of five

"points" in the hotel in which she worked. She would have to go through all the legal

formalities required by the Nevada laws but everything would be taken care of for her

and her own personal inconvenience would be at a minimum. However she was not to

discuss this arrangement with anyone without his consent. She would be protected

legally in every way and her money every month would be assured. If the authorities or

any law-enforcement (enforcement – давление, принуждение; принудительный)

agencies ever questioned her, she was to simply refer them to her lawyer and she

would not be bothered any further.

Lucy agreed. She understood what was happening but had no objections to how she

was being used. It seemed a reasonable favor. But when Hagen asked her to keep her

eyes open around the hotel, keep an eye on Freddie and on Freddie's boss, the man

who owned and operated the hotel, as a major stockholder (акционер), she said to him,

"Oh, Tom, you don't want me to spy on Freddie?"

Hagen smiled. "His father worries about Freddie. He's in fast company with Moe

Greene and we just want to make sure he doesn't get into any trouble." He didn't bother

to explain to her that the Don had backed the building of this hotel in the desert of Las

Vegas not only to supply a haven for his son, but to get a foot in the door for bigger

operations.

It was shortly after this interview that Dr. Jules Segal came to work as the hotel

physician. He was very thin, very handsome and charming and seemed very young to

be a doctor, at least to Lucy. She met him when a lump (опухоль, шишка) grew above

her wrist on her forearm. She worried about it for a few days, then one morning went to

the doctor's suite of offices in the hotel. Two of the show girls from the chorus line were

in the waiting room, gossiping with each other. They had the blond peach-colored

prettiness Lucy always envied. They looked angelic. But one of the girls was saying, "I

swear if I have another dose I'm giving up dancing."

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When Dr. Jules Segal opened his office door to motion one of the show girls inside,

Lucy was tempted to leave, and if it had been something more personal and serious she

would have. Dr. Segal was wearing slacks (широкие брюки) and an open shirt. The

horn-rimmed glasses helped and his quiet reserved manner, but the impression he gave

was an informal one, and like many basically old-fashioned people, Lucy didn't believe

that medicine and informality mixed.

When she finally got into his office there was something so reassuring in his manner

that all her misgivings fled. He spoke hardly at all and yet he was not brusque, and he

took his time. When she asked him what the lump was he patiently explained that it was

a quite common fibrous (волокнистый, фиброзный ['faıbr∂s]) growth that could in no

way be malignant (злокачественный [m∂’lıgn∂nt]) or a cause for serious concern. He

picked up a heavy medical book and said, "Hold out your arm."

She held out her arm tentatively (неуверенно; tentative ['tent∂tıv] – пробный,

опытный). He smiled at her for the first time. "I'm going to cheat myself out of a surgical

fee," he said. "I'll just smash it with this book and it will flatten out. It may pop up again

but if I remove it surgically, you'll be out of money and have to wear bandages and all

that. OK?"

She smiled at him. For some reason she had an absolute trust in him. "OK," she said.