Gomorrah: A Personal Journey into the Violent International Empire of Naples’ Organized Crime System Read Online Free PDF Page A

than ten years. The clan won’t cover their legal costs or guarantee assistance to their families. But there’s the roar of the exhaust in their ears and Rome to reach.
    A few of the barricades came down slowly, depending on the degree of pent-up anger. Then everything fizzled. The clans weren’t afraid of the revolt. As far as they were concerned, Parco Verde could burn for days, the inhabitants could all kill each other. Except that the uproar meant no work, no reserves of cheap labor. Everything had to return to normal right away. Everyone had to get back to work, or at least be ready if they were needed. This game of revolt had to end.

    I went to Emanuele’s funeral. In certain spots on the globe, fifteen is merely a number. In this slum neighborhood, dying at fifteen is more like fulfilling a death sentence than being deprived of life. The church was filled with grim-faced kids, and every now and then they’d let out a moan. Outside, a small chorus was even chanting, “He’s still with us, he’ll always be with us …” what soccer fanatics shout when some old glory retires his number. It was as if they were at the stadium, but the only chants were ones of rage. The plainclothesmen did their best to keep out of the aisles. Everyone had recognized them but there was no room for a skirmish. I’d spotted them right away; or rather they’d spotted me, not finding any trace of my face in their mental archives. As if attracted by my sullenness, one of them came up to me and said, “They’re all doomed here. Drugs, stealing, dealing in stolen goods, holdups … some are even streetwalkers. Not one of them is clean. The more of them who die here, the better it is for everyone.”
    Words that deserve a punch or a head butt in the nose. But everyone was really thinking the same thing. And maybe they had a point. I looked at them one by one, those kids who’ll do life for stealing 200 euros—the dregs, stand-ins, pushers. Not one of them over twenty. Padre Mauro, the priest performing Emanuele’s funeral, knew whom he was burying. He also knew the other kids were hardly the picture of innocence.
    “This is not a hero who has died today …”
    He didn’t hold his hands open as priests do when they read the parables on Sunday, but instead clenched his fists. And there was no note of homily in his voice, which was strangely hoarse, as if he’d been talking too long. He spoke with anger—there was no light punishment for this creature, no delegating anything.
    He seemed like one of those priests during the guerrilla uprisings in El Salvador, when they’d finally had enough of performing funerals for murder victims, when they stopped having pity and started shouting.But no one knew Romero here. Padre Mauro had unusual energy. “For all the responsibility we can assign to Emanuele, the fact remains that he was fifteen years old. At that age the sons of families born in other parts of Italy are going to the pool, taking dance lessons. It’s not like that here. God the Father will take into consideration the fact that the mistake was made by a fifteen-year-old boy. If in the south of Italy fifteen means you’re old enough to work, to decide to steal, to kill and be killed, it also means you’re old enough to take responsibility for certain things.”
    He inhaled deeply the foul air inside the church. “But fifteen years are few enough that they let us see more clearly what’s behind them, and they require us to apportion the responsibility. Fifteen is an age that knocks at the conscience of those who merely play at legality, work, and responsibility. An age that doesn’t knock gently, but claws with its nails.”
    The priest finished the homily. No one was completely sure what he really meant or who was to blame. The kids got all riled up. Four men carried the casket out of the church, but all of a sudden it lifted off their shoulders and floated above the crowd, swaying on a sea of hands, like a rock star who