Chapter 21: Not the Don

The bullet went into the plaster above the altar, and a saint's painted face came away in a shower of white dust.

Massimo had not been hit by it.

He had been hit by the man.

Wynne saw it from the floor, with her veil torn off and her cheek on the cold step.

The gunman had been tackled in the second pew by a boy from the church door.

The pistol had gone off into the wall as they fell.

The driver's cousin sat on his back and twisted the gun away.

Then Wynne saw the red.

It was spreading along Massimo's left sleeve from the shoulder down, bright and quick.

He was on one knee at the rail, with his right hand clamped over it.

"Don't," he said, when she crawled to him. "It's nothing. A graze."

"It's not a graze."

"It's a fast graze."

She tore the lace off her skirt in a long strip and bound it round his arm, hard.

He hissed through his teeth.

"I told you to get down," he said.

"I was looking at you."

"I know. I'd like it if you stopped doing that when people have guns."

She laughed, and it hurt, and she pressed the knot tight.

Behind them the church was shouting.

Aurelio had not moved from his pew.

He stood with one hand on the polished wood, looking at the empty air where the gun had been.

The carnation in his lapel had been crushed.

The oldest capo walked up the center aisle with his hands behind his back.

He was a huge, slow man, and he stopped at the end of Aurelio's pew.

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