[TheStellarEnsemble.com] The Godfather - Mario Puzo

Shortly after, the Don recovered from his wound and made peace with that particular family.By 1937 peace and harmony reigned in New York City except for minor incidents, minormisunderstandings which were, of course, sometimes fatal.As the rulers of ancient cities always kept an anxious eye on the barbarian tribes rovingaround their walls, so Don Corleone kept an eye on the affairs of the world outside his world. Henoted the coming of Hitler, the fall of Spain, Germany’s strong-arming of Britain at Munich.Unblinkered by that outside world, he saw clearly the coming global war and he understood theimplications. His own world would be more impregnable than before. Not only that, fortunescould be made in time of war by alert, foresighted folk. But to do so peace must reign in hisdomain while war raged in the world outside.Don Corleone carried his message through the United States. He conferred withcompatriots in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Cleveland, Chicago, Philadelphia, Miami, andBoston. He was the underworld apostle of peace and, by 1939, more successful than any Pope,he had achieved a working agreement amongst the most powerful underworld organizations inthe country. Like the Constitution of the United States this agreement respected fully the internalauthority of each member in his state or city. The agreement covered only spheres of. influenceand an agreement to enforce peace in the underworld.And so when World War II broke out in 1939, when the United States joined the conflictin 1941, the world of Don Vito Corleone was at peace, in order, fully prepared to reap the goldenharvest on equal terms with all the other industries of a booming America. The Corleone Familyhad a hand in supplying black-market OPA food stamps, gasoline stamps, even travel priorities.It could help get war contracts and then help get black-market materials for those garment centerclothing firms who were not given enough raw material because they did not have governmentcontracts. He could even get all the young men in his organization, those eligible for Army draft,excused from fighting in the foreign war. He did this with the aid of doctors who advised whatdrugs had to be taken before physical examination, or by placing the men in draft-exemptpositions in the war industries.And so the Don could take pride in his rule. His world was safe for those who had swornloyalty to him; other men who believed in law and order were dying by the millions. The only flyin the ointment was that his own son, Michael Corleone, refused to be helped, insisted onvolunteering to serve his own country. And to the Don’s astonishment, so did a few of his other196