What a mailed fist this young man would be for Don Croce. What a warrior chief in the field. Don Croce forgave the fact that Guiliano was at present a thorn in his side. The two bandits imprisoned in Montelepre, the feared Passatempo and the clever Terranova, had been captured with the Don's approval and complicity. But all this could be forgiven, bygones were bygones; the Don never held a grudge that impaired his future profits. He would now track Turi Guiliano very carefully.

Deep in the mountains, Guiliano had no knowledge of his growing fame. He was too busy making plans to build his power. His first problem was the two bandit chiefs, Terranova and Passatempo. He questioned them closely about their capture and came to the conclusion they had been betrayed, informed upon. They swore their men had been faithful and many had been killed in the trap. Guiliano pondered all this and came to the conclusion that the Mafia, which had acted as fences and go-betweens for the band, had betrayed them. When he mentioned this to the two bandits they refused to believe it. The Friends of the Friends would never break the sacred code of omerta which was so central to their own survival. Guiliano did not insist. Instead he made them a formal offer to join his band.

Don Croce was now fully aware of Turi Guiliano and full of admiration for him. What a true Mafioso youth. He meant the usage, of course, in the old traditional form: a Mafioso face, a Mafioso tree, a Mafioso woman, that is, a thing foremost in beauty in its particular form.

Passatempo, an old-fashioned bandit who believed in rape, small-time extortion and the murder of shepherds, immediately began pondering how he could profit by this association and then murder Guiliano and take his share of the loot. Terranova, who liked Guiliano and was more grateful for his rescue, wondered how he could tactfully steer this talented young bandit on a more prudent path. Guiliano was now looking at them with a little smile, as if he could read their minds and was amused by what they thought.

He explained that his purpose was not only to survive but to become a political force. He emphasized that they would not rob the poor. Indeed half of the profit the band earned would be distributed to the needy in the provinces around the town of Montelepre reaching to the suburbs of Palermo. Terranova and Passatempo would rule their own subordinate bands but would be under Guiliano's overall command. These subordinate bands would not launch any money-making expedition without Guiliano's approval. Together they would have absolute rule over the provinces that held the great city of Palermo, the city of Monreale, and the towns of Montelepre, Partinico and Corleone. He impressed upon them that they would take the offensive against the carabinieri. That it would be the field police who would go in fear of their lives, not the bandits. They were astonished by this bravado.

Pisciotta was used to the grand ideas of his lifelong friend. He believed. If Turi Guiliano said he could do something, Aspanu Pisciotta believed he could do it. So now he listened.

In the bright morning sunlight that lit their mountains with gold they all three listened to Guiliano, spellbound as he told how they would lead the fight to make Sicilians a free people, uplift the poor and destroy the power of the Mafia, the nobility and Rome. They would have laughed at anyone else, but they remembered what everyone who saw it would always remember: the Corporal of the carabinieri raising the pistol to Guiliano's head. The quiet stare of Guiliano, his absolute confidence that he would not die, as he waited for the Corporal to pull the trigger. The mercy he had shown to the Corporal after the pistol misfired. These were all acts of a man who believed in his own immortality and forced others to share that belief. And so now they stared at the handsome young man, and they were impressed by his beauty, his courage and his innocence.

The next morning Guiliano led his three men, Aspanu Pisciotta, Passatempo and Terranova, down out of the mountains on a path that would let them out on the plains near the town of Castelvetrano. He came down very early to scout the ground. He and his men were dressed as laborers.

He knew that truck convoys of foodstuffs passed by here on the way to bringing their wares to the markets of Palermo. The problem was how to get the trucks to stop. They would be going at high speed to foil hijackers and the drivers might be armed.

Guiliano made his men hide in the underbrush of the road just outside Castelvetrano, then sat himself on a large white boulder in plain view. Men going out to work in the fields stared at him with stony faces. They saw the lupara he was carrying and hurried on. Guiliano wondered if any of them had recognized him. Then he saw a legend-painted large cart coming down the road, drawn by a single mule. The old man driving was known by sight to Guiliano. He was one of the line of professional carters so plentiful in rural Sicily. He hired out his rig to haul bamboo from the outlying villages back to the factory in town. Long ago he had been to Montelepre and had done some hauling of produce for Guiliano's father. Guiliano stepped into the middle of the road. The lupara dangled from his right hand. The driver recognized him though there was no expression on his face, just a momentary flicker of the eyes.

Guiliano greeted him with the familiar style he had used as a child, calling him Uncle. "Zu Peppino," he said. "This is a lucky day for both of us. I am here to make your fortune and you are here to help me lighten the load of the poor." He was genuinely delighted to see the old man and burst into laughter.

The old man didn't answer. He stared at Guiliano, his stony face waiting. Guiliano climbed up on the cart and sat beside him. He put the lupara out of sight in the wagon and then he laughed again with excitement. Because of Zu Peppino he was sure this would be a lucky day.

Guiliano relished the freshness of the late autumn, the beauty of the mountains on the horizon, the knowledge that his three men in the underbrush commanded the road with their guns. He explained his plan to Zu Peppino, who listened to him without a word or change of expression. That is, not until Guiliano told him what his reward would be: his cart full of food from the trucks. Then Zu Peppino grunted and said, "Turi Guiliano, you were always a fine, brave, young lad. Good-hearted, sensible, generous and sympathetic. You have not changed since you became a man." Guiliano remembered now that Zu Peppino was one of those old school Sicilians given to flowery speech. "Count on my help in this and all other things. Give my regards to your father who should be proud to have such a son."

The lead truck driver blew his horn and inched his truck so that it nudged the nearest cart. The man on the cart turned and gave him such a look of malevolence that he immediately halted his truck and waited patiently. He knew that these carters, despite their humble profession, were proud fierce men who, in a matter of honor, their right to the road over motorized vehicles, would stab him to death and go on their way with a song on their lips.

The other two trucks ground to a halt. The drivers got out. One of them was from the eastern end of Sicily and one was a foreigner; that is, he came from Rome. The Roman driver approached the carters unzipping his jacket, shouting angrily for them to get their damn mules and shitboxes out of the way. And leaving one hand inside his jacket.

The convoy of three trucks laden with foodstuffs appeared on the road at noontime. When they turned the curve that led straight out on the Partinico plain they had to stop. A cluster of carts and mules blocked the road completely. This had been contrived by Zu Peppino, to whom all the carters of the area owed favors and obedience.

Meanwhile Passatempo, more excitable than the others, yanked the first trucker out of his vehicle and threw him on the road at Guiliano's feet. Guiliano extended a hand and lifted him up. By that time, Pisciotta had herded the driver of the rear truck up to join the other two. The Roman had withdrawn his empty hand from his jacket and erased the anger from his face. Guiliano smiled with genuine good will and said, "This is a fortunate day for the three of you. You won't have to make the long trip to Palermo. My carters will unload the trucks and distribute the food to the needy of this district, under my supervision of course. Allow me to introduce myself. I am Guiliano."

Guiliano jumped off the cart. He didn't bother to get his lupara out of the wagon nor did he bother to draw the pistol in his belt. He gave a signal to his men waiting in the underbrush and they ran onto the road holding their weapons. Terranova split off to walk to the rearmost truck so that it could not be moved. Pisciotta slid down the embankment and confronted the raging Roman truck driver.

The three drivers immediately became apologetic and affable. They were in no hurry, they said. They had all the time in the world. In fact, it was time for their lunch. Their trucks were comfortable. The weather was not too warm. Indeed, it was a happy chance, a stroke of fortune.

Guiliano saw their fear. "Don't worry," he said. "I don't kill men who earn bread by the sweat of their brow. You will join me for lunch while my people do their work, and then you will go home to your wives and children and tell them of your good fortune. When the police question you, help them as little as possible and you will earn my gratitude."

Guiliano paused. It was important to him that these men should feel no shame or hatred. It was important that they should report their good treatment. For there would be others.

They let themselves be herded to the shade of a giant boulder by the side of the road. They voluntarily offered Guiliano their pistols without being searched. And they sat like angels as the carters unloaded their trucks. When the carters were finished, there was still one fully loaded truck whose contents could not fit into their wagons. Guiliano put Pisciotta and Passatempo into this vehicle with a driver and told Pisciotta to deliver food to the farm laborers of Montelepre. Guiliano himself and Terranova would supervise the distribution of the food in the district of Castelvetrano and the town of Partinico. Later they would rendezvous at the cave on top of Monte d'Ora.

What they did not know was that the goods had been destined for the warehouse of Don Croce.

In only a month Guiliano had informers everywhere -- telling him what rich merchants traveled with black market money, the habits of certain noble persons and those few wicked people who gossiped with highly placed police officials. And so the rumor came to Guiliano of the jewels that the Duchess of Alcamo sometimes flaunted. It was said that for most of the year they were kept in a bank vault in Palermo but that she took them out on some occasions to wear to parties. To learn more about what he sensed might be a rich prize, Guiliano dispatched Aspanu Pisciotta to the Alcamo estate.

With this one deed Guiliano was on the road to winning the support of the whole countryside. What other bandit had given his spoils to the poor? The next day the newspapers all over Sicily had stories about the Robin Hood bandit. Only Passatempo grumbled that they had done a day's work for nothing. Pisciotta and Terranova understood that their band had gained a thousand supporters against Rome.

In early November the great estates of Sicily harvest their grapes, and to do so hire laborers from the nearby villages. Pisciotta reported to the town square and let himself be recruited for work on the Duke of Alcamo's estate. He spent the first day in backbreaking labor, filling baskets with clusters of black purple fruit. There were more than a hundred people in the vineyard -- men, women and small children who sang together as they worked. At midday, a huge lunch was served outdoors.

Pisciotta sat alone, watching the others. He noticed one young woman who brought a tray of bread from the castle. She was pretty but pale; obviously she rarely worked in the sun. Also she was better dressed than the other women. But what struck Pisciotta was the disdainful pout on her face, and the way she avoided all contact with the other workers. He learned that this girl was the personal maid of the Duchess.

Twenty miles southwest of Montelepre, the estate of the Duke and Duchess of Alcamo was walled, its gates manned by armed guards. The Duke also paid "rent" to the Friends of the Friends, which guaranteed that his livestock would not be stolen, his house burglarized or any member of his family kidnapped. In ordinary times and with ordinary criminals this would have made him safer than the Pope in the Vatican.

Pisciotta knew immediately that she would serve his purposes better than anyone else. Guiliano, who knew Pisciotta's ways, had ordered him strictly not to shame any of the local girls in the process of getting information; but Pisciotta considered Turi too much a romantic and too innocent in the ways of the world. The prize was too rich, the girl too pretty.

When she came out with another huge tray of bread, he lifted it out of her hands and carried it for her. She was startled, and when he asked her name, she refused to answer.

Pisciotta put down the tray and grasped her by the arm. He gave her a ferocious smile. "When I ask you a question, answer me. If you don't, I'll bury you in that mountain of grapes." And then he laughed to show he was joking. He gave her his most charming smile, spoke in his gentlest voice. "You're the most beautiful girl I've seen in Sicily," he said. "I had to speak to you."

The maid was both terrified and enticed by him. She noted the dangerous cutting knife dangling from his waist, the way he carried himself, as if he too were a duke. Now she was interested. She told him her name was Graziella.

When the workday was finished Pisciotta boldly knocked at the back kitchen of the castle and asked for Graziella. The old woman who opened the door listened to him, then said curtly, "The servants are not allowed to receive visitors." She slammed the door in his face.

That night Aspanu Pisciotta wore the special silk shirt tailored for him in Palermo. He waited for her in a valley formed by mountains of cut grapes on every side. When Graziella came to him he embraced her, and when she lifted her mouth to be kissed he brushed her lips with his and put his hand between her legs at the same time. She tried to twist away but he gripped her firmly. They kissed more deeply and he lifted her woolen skirt, surprised to find that she was wearing silken undergarments. She must have borrowed them from the Duchess, Pisciotta thought. She was a bold little piece, and a bit of a thief.

The next day Pisciotta took the tray Graziella was carrying and whispered to her that he wanted to see her after work. He slipped a little gold bracelet over her wrist as he caressed her arm. She promised she would slip out after dark and meet him in the empty vineyard.

They wrapped themselves in the blanket and hugged each other. He told her that he was working to earn some money to enter the University of Palermo, that his family wanted him to be a lawyer. He wanted her to think he was a good catch. Then he asked her about herself, how she liked her work, what kind of people were her fellow servants? Gradually he directed the conversation to her mistress, the Duchess.

He pulled her down to the blanket he had spread on the ground. They lay there together. She was kissing him passionately and he could feel her response through the silk underpants. With a quick movement he pulled them down and the warm wet flesh was in his hands. She was unbuckling his belt and as they continued to kiss he pushed his trousers down to his ankles. He rolled over on top of her, took his hand away, and then thrust inside her. Graziella gave a little moan and bucked upward with astonishing strength and Aspanu Pisciotta felt himself rising and falling, rising and falling, and then suddenly Graziella gave a little shriek and lay still. Damn, Pisciotta thought, she was too quick. But it was just as well. His main purpose was information, his own satisfaction could wait.

Aspanu said, "Fresh air is all very well, but when can I come into the house and make love to you properly?"

"Well, on Christmas Eve she always lets me wear a necklace for the evening." So as Guiliano had guessed, the jewels would be in the house for the holiday season. He needed to find out one more thing, but suddenly she was straddling him, trying to keep the blanket over her shoulders. Aspanu was fully aroused, the blanket fell away, the skirt flew over Graziella's head and the force of their thrusts carried them into the wall of grapes. When they were done, their exhausted bodies were covered with the sticky juice of the fruit and of their own bodies.

Graziella put Aspanu's hand back between her legs and then told him how beautiful the Duchess looked dressed in her fine clothes and jewelry, and how she, Graziella, was a favorite and was allowed to wear the out-of-fashion frocks the Duchess discarded.

"I would like to see you in your mistress's finery. Does she let you try on her jewels, too?"

"Not while the Duke is here. When he goes on his trips to Palermo, the household is more lax. Next month, he will go away for several weeks, just before Christmas."

Aspanu smiled. And now that he had all the information he needed, he paid full attention to the job at hand. He pounced on Graziella's body and pinned her again to the blanket, making love with a ferocity that made the girl helpless with pleasure, and frightened her a little. Just enough that she would want more of him in the month ahead.

Five days before Christmas, Guiliano, Passatempo, Pisciotta, and Terranova pulled up before the gates of the Alcamo Estate in a wagon drawn by mules. They were dressed in the hunting garb of well-to-do peasant landowners, bought in Palermo with the spoils of their truck raid: corduroy trousers, red woolen shirts, heavy shooting jackets that held boxes of bullets. Two security guards barred their way. Since it was broad daylight they were not alert and kept their weapons on their shoulders.

Guiliano strode toward them briskly. He was unarmed except for the pistol hidden beneath his rough carter's coat. He smiled at them broadly. "Gentlemen," he said. "My name is Guiliano and I've come to wish your charming Duchess a good Christmas and beg for alms to help the poor."

The guards were frozen with astonishment when they heard the name Guiliano. Then they started to swing their guns loose. But by that time Passatempo and Terranova had them covered with machine pistols. Pisciotta relieved the guards of their guns and threw the weapons into the wagon. Passatempo and Terranova were left to stroll with the guards in front of the gates.

The approach to the mansion consisted of an enormous stone courtyard. In one corner a group of chickens fluttered around an old woman servant scattering grain. Beyond the manor house, the four children of the Duchess were playing in a garden, supervised by governesses in black cotton dresses. Guiliano walked up the path to the house, Pisciotta beside him. His information was correct, there were no other guards. Beyond the garden was a far larger piece of land, which served to grow vegetables and held a grove of olive trees. In this field six laborers toiled. He rang the bell and then pushed the door just as the maid was opening it. Graziella was startled by Pisciotta's appearance at the front door and stepped aside.

Guiliano said gently, "Don't be alarmed. Tell your mistress we are sent here by the Duke on business. I must speak to her."

Still puzzled, Graziella led them into the drawing room where the Duchess was reading. The Duchess waved the maid from the room, annoyed by the unannounced intrusion and said sharply, "My husband is away. Can I help you?"

Guiliano could not answer her. He was stunned by the beauty of the room. It was the largest he had ever seen and, more amazingly, it was round rather than square. Golden drapes guarded the huge French windows, the ceiling above was hollowed to a dome and decorated with frescoes of cherubim. Books were everywhere -- on the sofa, the coffee tables and in special cases along the walls. Great massive paintings in rich oils hung on the walls and huge vases of flowers were everyplace. Silver and gold boxes were scattered on tables that kneeled before massive stuffed chairs and sofas. The room could hold a hundred people easily and the only person using it was this solitary woman dressed in white silk. Sunlight and air and the shouts of the children playing in the garden came through the open windows. For the first time Guiliano understood the seductiveness of wealth, that money could create such beauty, and he was reluctant to mar that beauty by any crassness or cruelty. He would do what he must do and not leave a scar on this lovely scene.

The Duchess, waiting patiently for an answer, was struck by this young man's handsome virility. She saw he was impressed by the beauty of the room, and she was a little annoyed that he did not notice her own beauty. She thought it was too bad he was so obviously a peasant and did not move in her circles, where a little innocent flirtatiousness would not have been inappropriate. All this made her say more charmingly than she ordinarily would, "Young man, I'm so sorry, but if it's business about the estate you will have to come back another time. My husband is not at home."

Guiliano looked at her. He felt that flush of antagonism a poor man feels for a rich woman who is in some way asserting her superiority to him because of her wealth and social position. He bowed politely, noticing the spectacular ring on her finger, and said with an ironic submissiveness, "My business is with you. My name is Guiliano."

But the irony of his submissiveness was wasted on the Duchess, who was too accustomed to the slavishness of her servants. She took it as a matter of course. She was a cultured woman, interested in books and music, and took no interest in the daily affairs of Sicily. She rarely read the local newspapers; she considered them barbarous. So she only said courteously, "I am pleased to make your acquaintance. Have we met in Palermo? At the opera perhaps?"

Guiliano, a little angered by Pisciotta's laughter but charmed by the Duchess's ignorance, said firmly, "My dear Duchess, we have never met. I am a bandit. My full name is Salvatore Guiliano. I think of myself as the Champion of Sicily, and my purpose in coming to see you today is to ask you to donate your jewelry to the poor so that they may enjoy and celebrate the birth of Christ on Christmas day."

Aspanu Pisciotta, who had been observing the scene with amusement, laughed openly and strolled over to the French windows so as to intercept any servant who might come from that direction.

The Duchess smiled unbelievingly. This young boy whose face and body aroused an unfamiliar hunger in her could not possibly mean her harm. And now with the hint of danger she was positively intrigued. She would tell this story at the parties in Palermo. So she said with an innocent smile, "My jewels are in the bank vaults in Palermo. Whatever cash is in the house you may have. With my blessing." No one had ever doubted her word in her whole life. Even as a little girl she had never lied. This was the first time.

Guiliano looked at the diamond pendant around her throat. He knew she was lying, but he was reluctant to do what he must do. Then he nodded to Pisciotta, who put his fingers between his teeth and whistled three times. In just a few minutes Passatempo appeared at the French windows. His short, squat ugly figure, his evil scarred face could have come out of the puppet shows. His face was broad with hardly any forehead, and his thick bushy black hair and bulging eyebrows made him look like a gorilla. He smiled at the Duchess and showed huge discolored teeth.

"No," Guiliano said. "My dear Duchess, I'm a soft-hearted man. But my colleagues are different propositions altogether. My friend Aspanu, though handsome, is as cruel as that little mustache he wears that breaks so many hearts. And the man at the window, though he is my subordinate, gives me nightmares. Don't make me unleash them. They will sweep into your garden like hawks and carry your children away into the mountains. Now bring me the rest of your diamonds."

The appearance of the third bandit finally frightened the Duchess. She undid her necklace and handed it over to Guiliano. "Will that satisfy you?" she said.

Guiliano meanwhile had opened the jewelry box and his heart jumped with elation at the sight of the precious gems. He knew the contents of this box would feed the entire city of Montelepre for months. And it was a greater source of joy that they had been bought by the Duke with the money sweated from the hides of his laborers. Then as the Duchess was wringing her hands he noticed again the huge emerald on her finger.

The Duchess fled into her bedroom and returned in a few minutes with a box of jewelry. She had been quick-witted enough to hide a few valuable pieces before she brought it out. She gave the box to Guiliano. He thanked her graciously. Then he turned to Pisciotta. "Aspanu," he said, "the Duchess may have forgotten a few things. Go take a look in the bedroom just to be certain." Pisciotta found the hidden jewels almost immediately and brought them to Guiliano.

"My dear Duchess," he said, "how could you be so foolish as to try to cheat me by hiding those other pieces? I would have expected that from some miserly peasant who slaved for his treasure. But how could you risk your life and those of your children for two pieces of jewelry that you would no more miss than your husband the Duke would miss the hat on his head? Now without any fuss, give me that ring you wear on your finger."

The Duchess was in tears. "My dear young man," she said, "please let me keep this ring. I will send you its value in money. But my husband gave it to me as an engagement gift. I could not bear to be without it. It would break my heart."

But Guiliano had no such sentimentality. Pisciotta would always remember the look in his eye when Turi took the Duchess's arm roughly and pulled the emerald ring off her trembling hand. He stepped back quickly and then he put the ring on the little finger of his left hand.

Again Pisciotta laughed. He did so deliberately. He was afraid that Turi would let her keep the ring out of the sentimentality of his own heart. And the emerald was obviously of the highest value.

But it was a magic moment for Turi Guiliano. For when he slipped it on his finger, he felt the transference of power. With this ring he wedded himself to his destiny. It was the symbol of the power he would win from the world of the rich. In that pool of dark green, bounded by its circle of gold, still smelling of the perfume of a beautiful woman who had worn it without ceasing for many years, he had captured a tiny essence of life that could never be his.

Turi saw the Duchess was blushing and there were tears in her eyes. His manner was once again courtly when he said, "In honor of your memories I will never sell this ring -- I will wear it myself." The Duchess searched his face for a look of irony, but there was none.

Don Croce nodded. "I must admit you speak with reason. But think of Salvatore Guiliano as a force of nature, as a scourge of God. Surely you cannot expect the Friends of the Friends to guard you against earthquakes, volcanoes, floods? In time Guiliano will be controlled, I guarantee. But think: You pay the ransom I will arrange. You will have your protection without paying my usual rent for the next five years, and under the agreement Guiliano will not strike again. And why should he, since I and he presume you will have the good sense to keep these valuables in the bank vaults of Palermo? Women are too innocent -- they do not know the lust and greed with which men pursue the material goods of this world." He paused for a moment to allow the slight smile that had appeared on the Duke's face to disappear. Then he said, "If you calculate the rent to pay for the protection of your whole estate for five years in the troubled times ahead, you will see that you have lost very little by this misfortune."

Don Croce reflected that it was time to take him very seriously indeed. He said to the Duke, "If I recovered your jewelry would you pay a quarter of their value?"

Don Croce listened without saying a word.

The Duke of Alcamo was making his complaint to Don Croce in person. Had he not paid his "rent" to the Friends of the Friends? Had they not guaranteed his immunity against all forms of theft? What were things coming to? In the old days nobody would have dared. And what would Don Croce do now to recover the jewelry? The Duke had reported the theft to the authorities, though this was futile he knew and might displease Don Croce. But there was some insurance to be collected; perhaps the government in Rome would take this bandit Guiliano seriously.

The Duke was furious. "First I pay you the rent to keep me and my possessions safe. Then, when you fail in your duty, you ask me to pay ransom. How can you hope to keep the respect of your clients if you do business in this way?"

The Duke did think it over. Don Croce was quite right about the hard times that lay ahead. He would lose more than a little by ransoming the jewels, despite the remission of five years' "rent"; who was to say that Don Croce would be alive for another five years or that he could contain Guiliano? But still it was the best bargain to be made. It would prevent the Duchess from wheedling more jewelry out of him in the years to come and that would be an enormous savings. He would have to sell another piece of land, but his ancestors had been doing that for generations to pay for their follies, and he still had thousands of acres left. The Duke agreed.

Don Croce summoned Hector Adonis. The next day Adonis made a trip to visit his godson. He explained his mission. He was absolutely straightforward. "You won't get a better price even if you sell the jewelry to thieves in Palermo," he said. "And even then it will take time and you certainly won't get the money before Christmas, which I know is your wish. And beyond that you will earn the good will of Don Croce which it is important for you to have. You have, after all, caused him a loss of respect, which he will forgive if you do him this favor."

Guiliano smiled at his godfather. He cared nothing for Don Croce's good will; after all, one of his dreams was to slay the dragon of the Mafia in Sicily. But he had already sent emissaries to Palermo to find buyers for the stolen jewelry, and it was clear that it would be a long and torturous process. So he agreed to the bargain. But he refused to give up the emerald ring.

Before Adonis left he abandoned finally his role as a teacher of romances to Guiliano. For the first time he spoke to him of the realities of Sicilian life. "My dear godson," he said, "no one admires your qualities more than I do. I love your high-mindedness, which I hope I helped instill in you. But now we must speak of survival. You can never hope to win against the Friends of the Friends. For the last thousand years, like a million spiders, they have spun a gigantic web over all of life in Sicily. Don Croce now stands in the center of that web. He admires you, he wants your friendship, he wants you to grow rich with him. But you must bend sometimes to his will. You can have your empire, but it must exist within his web. One thing is certain -- you cannot directly oppose him. If you do so, history itself will help Don Croce destroy you."

And so the jewelry was returned to the Duke. Guiliano kept half the money from the jewelry to be distributed among Pisciotta, Passatempo and Terranova. They eyed the emerald ring on Guiliano's finger but said nothing, for Guiliano refused to take any of the money from the sale of the jewels.

The other half of the money Guiliano was determined to distribute among the poor shepherds who guarded the flocks of sheep and cattle that belonged to the rich, the old widows and orphan children, all the poor around him.

He gave out most of the money through intermediaries, but one fine day he filled the pockets of his sheepskin jacket with packets of lire notes. He also filled a canvas sack with money and decided to walk through the villages between Montelepre and Piani dei Greci with Terranova at his side.

In one village there were three old women who were almost starving. He gave each of them a packet of lire. They wept and kissed his hands. In another village was a man who was about to lose his farm and land because he could not make the mortgage payments. Guiliano left him enough to pay off the mortgage in full.

In another village he took over the local bakery and grocery store, paying the owner for the goods, and distributed bread and cheese and pasta to all the village people.

In the next town he gave money to the parents of a sick child so they could take him to the hospital in Palermo and pay for the visits of the local doctor. He also attended the wedding of a young couple and gave them a generous dowry.

He only had a few packets of money left when he decided to visit his mother before nightfall. Crossing a field behind his home he encountered a little boy and a little girl who were crying. They had lost money entrusted to them by their parents and said the carabinieri had taken it from them. Guiliano was amused by this little tragedy and gave them one of the two packets of money he had left. And then, because the little girl was so pretty and he couldn't bear to think of her being punished, he gave her a note for her parents.

But what he loved most was to give money to the ragged young children who thronged the streets of all the little towns in Sicily. Many of them knew Guiliano. They gathered around him as he distributed the packets of money telling them to bring it to their parents. Guiliano watched them as they joyfully ran to their homes.

The little girl's parents were not the only ones who were grateful. The people in the towns of Borgetto, Corleone, Partinico, Monreale, and Piani dei Greci began to call him the "King of Montelepre" to show their loyalty.

What delighted him even more was his satisfaction that he had spotted Guiliano so early and judged him so accurately. What a fine upstanding lad. Who could believe that one so young could see so clearly, act so wisely, listen so temperately to older and wiser heads? And yet all this with a cool intelligence that guarded his own interests, which of course the Don admired, for who would wish to associate himself with a fool? Yes, the Don thought Turi Guiliano would be his strong right arm. And with time, a beloved titular son.

Don Croce was happy despite the loss of the five years' "rent" from the Duke. For though Don Croce had told Adonis that the Duke would pay only twenty percent of the value of the jewels, he had collected twenty-five percent from the Duke, and put five percent in his pocket.

Turi Guiliano saw clearly through all these machinations around him. He knew his godfather was sincerely concerned about his welfare. But that did not mean he trusted the older man's judgment. Guiliano knew he was not yet strong enough to fight the Friends of the Friends; indeed he needed their help. But he was under no illusions about the long run. Eventually, if he listened to his godfather, he would have to become a vassal to Don Croce. This he was determined he would never do. For now, he must bide his time.