The Godfather

 “The Godfather” By Mario Puzo
 
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Two days after Nino’s funeral, Moe Greene was shot to death in the Hollywood home of 
his movie-star mistress; Albert Neri did not reappear in New York until almost a month 
later. He had taken his vacation in the Caribbean and returned to duty tanned almost 
black. Michael Corleone welcomed him with a smile and a few words of praise, which 
included the information that Neri would from then on receive an extra “living,” the 
Family income from an East Side “book” considered especially rich. Neri was content, 
satisfied that he lived in a world that properly rewarded a man who did his duty. 
Book Eight
Chapter 29
Michael Corleone had taken precautions against every eventuality. His planning was 
faultless, his security impeccable. He was patient, hoping to use the full year to prepare. 
But he was not to get his necessary year because fate itself took a stand against him, 
and in the most surprising fashion. For it was the Godfather, the great Don himself, who 
failed Michael Corleone. 
* * *
On one sunny Sunday morning, while the women were at church, Don Vito Corleone 
dressed in his gardening uniform: baggy gray trousers, a faded blue shirt, battered 
dirty-brown fedora decorated by a stained gray silk hatband. The Don had gained 
considerable weight in his few years and worked on his tomato vines, he said, for the 
sake of his health. But he deceived no one. 
The truth was, he loved tending his garden; he loved the sight of it early on a morning. It 
brought back his childhood in Sicily sixty years ago, brought it back without the terror, 
the sorrow of his own father’s death. Now the beans in their rows grew little white 
flowers on top; strong green stalks of scallion fenced everything in. At the foot of the 
garden a spouted barrel stood guard. It was filled with liquidy cow manure, the finest 
garden fertilizer. Also in that lower part of the garden were the square wooden frames 
he had built with his own hands, the sticks cross-tied with thick white string. Over these 
frames crawled the tomato vines. 
The Don hastened to water his garden. It must be done before the sun waxed too hot 
and turned the water into a prism of fire that could burn his lettuce leaves like paper. 
Sun was more important than water, water also was important; but the two, imprudently 
mixed, could cause great misfortune. 

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