All day he’s asking me, “Donnie, didn’t you forget something today? Isn’t something supposed to happen today?”

“Nothing I can think of. Everything’s under control.”

Finally, at ten o‘clock that night, he and Rossi and I are sitting at our round table at the club and Lefty is grumpy. I say, “Lefty! I forgot! It’s your birthday!”

“Hey, that’s right.” He grins.

I lean over and give him a kiss and hand him an envelope. In it, wrapped in tissue, are seven diamonds, confiscated by the FBI. “This is from Tony and me. Happy birthday!”

He opens it. “Aw, Donnie, you didn’t have to do this. What a great present! I’ll give one to my wife, one to each daughter, one to each grandchild.”

“Tony and me figured you’re worth it.”

“Aw, gee.” He gives me a big hug and kiss. “What’s Tony giving me?”

Rossi is sitting right there.

“The diamonds are from both of us,” I say.

“Donnie, I can’t tell you, that’s the nicest present. That’s why I love you. You make mistakes, but times like this are just—What about Tony, he forget?”

“Left, we both are giving you this.”

“Is Tony gonna give me anything?”

Finally Rossi gets up, goes into the office, puts three $100 bills in an envelope, comes back, and gives it to Lefty. “Happy birthday, Lefty,” he says.

“Aw, Tony, you didn’t have to do this. You could have shared with Donnie and both give me the diamonds, that would have been enough.”

We decided to hold our first Las Vegas Night on Friday, May 9. Sonny sent down a roulette wheel, blackjack tables, cards, dice, and so on, by the Airborne Airfreight Company. The sender on the bill was

“Danny Manzo, Italian Veterans Club, 415 Graham Ave, Brooklyn N.Y.” We made up a sign announcing the event and saying that proceeds would go to the Italian-American War Veterans Club.

Captain Joseph Donahue of the Pasco County Sheriffs Office made one of his regular visits to the club. As usual, he was not in uniform and came during the afternoon when the club was closed. Donahue was in his early sixties. He liked to brag that he had been a cop in New York City for sixteen years, something we could never confirm.

Rossi told him we were planning a Vegas Night. Donahue assured him he would keep everything under control. If a deputy did show up, Rossi asked him, could he be barred at the door, since this is a private club? Donahue said that a deputy couldn’t be kept out but that no locked rooms could be searched without a warrant. Donahue said that he would stay on duty during Las Vegas Night to make sure there was no trouble.

Rossi gave him $200 for the visit.

We set up the club as a game room. In another room we had a long table with a free buffet—cold cuts, salads. Sonny came down with Lefty and a couple of pros Sonny provided to work the games. Maybe two hundred people came to that first Vegas Night. Rossi had paid off the cop, Donahue, $400 to make sure we weren’t hassled. Everything was going smoothly until a couple of sharpshooters tried to hustle an old guy running one of the crap tables.

We had imported a couple of old-timers from Miami to run the tables. These guys were good at running street games, but they weren’t used to the complexities of the real Las Vegas crap table. So these two customers are trying to bulldoze the old guy, whose name was Ricky.

Ricky comes over to me. “Donnie, a couple of guys working together are murdering us at the table. To be honest with you, I can’t handle this table as well as I thought I could. They’re too fast for me, and I know they’re cheating.”

I walk over to take a look. I know these two Greek guys, a couple of heavy-hitting gamblers. I see that they are claiming bets they didn’t make and intimidating Ricky. So I intervene.

I step in front of these guys and speak so that the whole club can get the message. Also, I know that Sonny’s eyes are on me, and this is the first time he’s seen me in action.

“You guys are trying to burn this table,” I say. “This is an honest game. You got a fair shot at cleaning house. But I’m telling you now, you don’t come in here and fuck with any of our people or our games. Because you do it one more time, I will personally carry you out of here. And before I carry you through the door, I will take all the money you got in your pockets.”

“Oh, no, we weren’t trying to do anything... just got on a hot streak... playing it straight.”

“You can stay at the table. Wherever I am in the club, I’ll be watching you.”

They stayed. I had caught them early, and they had already pocketed a couple grand off the table. Now Ricky went back at them. He recovered it all.

We went all night. Sonny was pleased with the crowd and the performance and the few G’s that he walked away with. It would help lead to a meeting with Santo Trafficante. He said we should make a deal with owners of other clubs that we’d run Vegas Nights in their clubs, and they could keep the liquor sales and a piece of the Vegas money.

Sonny wanted us to try a lot of things. He asked me if I had any cocaine or marijuana connections in the area, because he wanted to increase his sources. “I used to have some contacts in Miami,” I said, “but lately I haven’t been fucking around with dope. Two or three months ago I was getting it for forty-eight grand a key, but I don’t know what it would be now, or whether I could get back with the same people.”

He said that his man Bobby in Orlando had cars to transport drugs to New York. He wanted us to keep our eyes open for outlets for plywood, paint, and counterfeit designer jeans that he had access to. He wanted me to check around and see if a numbers business would be a good idea, and if it was, he could send a guy down from New York to run it.

“I’ve already got a book set up for the football season,” I say.

“I’m gonna talk to Rusty about putting some family money in here,” Sonny says. “Rusty knows about your work here. I want to bring Stevie down to look at it because he’s handling the money for the family. It’ll probably take a couple of weeks to get it. You’ll have to pay it back at one and a half points.”

Steve “Stevie Beef” Cannone was the consiglieri of the Bonanno family. Naturally I would welcome a chance to meet him.

Sonny said he had a deal going in New York where he had to put up $400,000 for loads of some semipre cious metals that would bring him $1 million. “The guy that owns some factories that produce this stuff is supposed to be giving up these loads to me. He promised a load and he didn’t come through with it. I burned down one of his factories. I’ll burn down another building every time he fucks me around with a load.”

When we were alone, Sonny says, “What’s going on with Lefty? There’s something wrong between him and Rossi.”

The night before Las Vegas Night, we had all gone out to eat, and Lefty had invited some of the hostesses from the club. He ordered several bottles of expensive wine. Then he stuck Rossi with the tab. Sonny didn’t like that. He wouldn’t say anything at the dinner because he’s not going to embarrass a wiseguy in front of citizens. Also, he wanted the facts first.

But I have to be careful about what I say. Anytime I am brought into a situation between wiseguys, it is like walking on eggshells. I don’t want to offend or insult anybody, because I want to keep the operation going. But I have to act like a stand-up wiseguy. Here’s a captain asking me about one of the top wiseguys in his crew. I don’t want him to think I give up a guy right away. On the other hand, maybe it’s a good time to put a clamp on Lefty’s bleeding of Rossi. I lay it off on Rossi.

“Well, Sonny, Rossi’s been complaining to me that Lefty’s bleeding him too much. He doesn’t mind the two hundred and and fifty bucks a week. But all the other stuff—meals, trips.”