Free Bad Company by Jack Higgins Page B

Berger said, “Because of me, my attitudes, my pride, the stupid von Berger seven-hundred-year-old pride.”
    “Hey,” Marco said, “that applies to me, too, doesn’t it?”
    Von Berger wiped a tear from his eye and smiled. “Quite true. Now let’s go and perhaps have some supper, a drink, but most of all a chat.”
     
    Later, in the Great Hall in front of a blazing log fire, the butler served coffee brandy.
    “That’s fine, Otto,” von Berger told him. “We’ll manage. You’ve made arrangements for Herr Rossi?”
    “Yes, Baron, the Imperial Suite.”
    “Fine. Good night.”
    The butler disappeared into the gloom of the hall, footsteps echoing. Rossi said, “Before anything else is said, I must tell you one thing.”
    “And what is that?”
    “As I told you, my uncle, Tino Rossi, was Mafia, but there’s more to it than that. He was an important capo. You know what that means?”
    “Of course.”
    “When he died, he left my mother hugely wealthy, and with her death, that all comes to me. I need nothing from you. That’s not why I’m here. I’m here for my mother and out of respect for my father. I know all about you. You were a great soldier and a great man.”
    Von Berger waved it off. “Tell me about yourself.”
    “I spent my early years in Palermo, of course. Neither my mother nor my uncle wanted me in the Mafia, which was difficult, because all my extended family, my cousins, were.”
    “Judging by the way you demolished a brute like Klein, they failed in their wishes.”
    “I spent too much time as a boy on the Palermo streets. You learn fast there. I had a fine education, the best, but I suppose the Mafia was somehow in my blood. A kind of arrogance.” His hand came out of his pocket holding an ivory Madonna; he pressed a button and a blade flashed. “And this… I keep it always. My uncle gave it to me for my tenth birthday.” He folded it.
    Von Berger said, “So what came with maturity?”
    “I was sent to Yale University at seventeen, studied economics, business. I did well enough, had a flair for computers. Then I went home and joined the Italian air force, and ended up getting shot down and on the run behind Serb lines in Bosnia.”
    “That must have been difficult.”
    “You could say that.”
    “And you want to go back to it?”
    “Why not? Within three months of qualifying, I was in the Gulf War, attacking Basra. Bosnia a few years later, Kosovo. It has a special feel, life on the edge. I don’t have a girlfriend at the moment. A little action and passion wouldn’t come amiss.”
    “I can understand that. Pour me another brandy.”
    Marco did so, lit a cigarette and said calmly, “As I’ve said, I didn’t come to seek any advantage from you. In your position, however, I’d be wanting a DNA test.”
    “And that might be a good idea,” the Baron said. “But only for one reason – to secure the line, to legitimize you. You’re quite obviously my son. I have no dispute with it; in fact, I welcome it. I only dispute this nonsense of you returning to the air force. You’ve taken the pitcher to the well far too often. Enough is enough.”
    “So what do I do?”
    “You’ve got a first-class business background, you’re a war hero, and it appears you’re a rather ruthless young man if someone crosses you. A street fighter.”
    “What did my father do to the Ukrainians who butchered his wife and my half-brother? I come from a long line of warriors.”
    “Exactly, which is why I wish you to choose to stay with me. To be my right hand.” The Baron shook his head. “Dammit, I’ll be eighty next year and to have my son beside me would be such a benison. I realize you are wealthy and…”
    Marco Rossi, filled with an emotion he had only experienced with his mother, said, “No – please.” He dropped to one knee, took the Baron’s hand and kissed it. “You have no idea what this means. To be the son of a man like you.”
    “But I do.” Von Berger put a hand to