Pigeon Tony’s head moved slowly to face Judy and he seemed to wait a moment until his eyes focused. “He say he kill my son.”
Judy felt stricken. “Your son? He admitted it?”
“My Frank. And wife, Gemma. Inna truck.”
“You mean, the truck accident?”
“No accident! He do it. He kill my son. He kill my wife. He say me, he say me! He say he destroy me, because Silvana want me! He say he destroy Frankie. Alla my family.” His voice broke slightly and tears sprang to his dark eyes, but Judy was struggling for clarity.
“So he told you he killed your son? He said he’d kill Frank, too? Your grandson Frank?”
“Si! Si!” Pigeon Tony was looking at her, but lost in the memory. Wetness brimmed in his eyes, refusing to budge. “When he say this, I go bom! I hate him, I hate him! I run and push him and break his neck! I kill him, for my son! For my wife! For my Frankie! With my hands I do it!”
Judy understood. She could almost imagine him, blind with pain and rage, avenging so many murders and saving Frank. “You killed him right then, after he said that?”
“Si, si! I kill him and he fall onna floor and they come, from the room. Alla people, come then. Tony, Feet. They see.”
Judy found herself thinking like a defense lawyer again. “Did he say he’d kill you?”
“No, no. He no kill me. He destroy me.”
Judy understood. The knowledge would make Pigeon Tony’s life a living hell. She tried another tack. “When he said this, was it loud? Did the other people hear him?”
“No, not loud. Soft. He make a laugh.” Pigeon Tony wiped tears that wouldn’t come, and Judy winced.
“Are you sure?” Couldn’t one person have heard it? She needed a witness to the conversation. “Was there a door to the room?”
“Si, si.”
“Was it closed or open?”
“Close.”
Judy considered it. No witnesses, and such a bombshell. “Why didn’t I know this? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Ogni ver non è ben detto.”
“What?”
“Alla truths not be told.”
“What?” Judy hoped she hadn’t heard him right. “You tell me everything. You want me to represent you, you be honest with me! You have to tell me.”
“Perchè?” Pigeon Tony said, and Judy translated from the challenging flash to his eyes.
“Because I said so, that’s why!”
“You tell judge?”
“No, of course not.”
“Pfft!” Pigeon Tony made a noise that accompanied a twist of his hand in the country air, and Judy figured it meant what’s-the-difference. Unfortunately, she couldn’t immediately think what the difference was legally, but she still wanted to know.
“Is there anything else you didn’t tell me?”
“No, no.”
Judy’s eyes narrowed. “Promise?”
Pigeon Tony crossed himself, which Judy decided was an acceptable substitute.
Then she remembered something. The conversation with Frank at his parents’ gravesite. Frank had said Pigeon Tony suspected it wasn’t an accident, not that he was told. Why hadn’t Frank told her? Maybe he hadn’t had a chance to talk with his grandfather after his arrest. But why hadn’t Frank told her since then? Picked up the phone? “Why didn’t Frank tell me?”
“I no tell Frank.”
Judy’s mouth opened slightly. “Why not?”
Pigeon Tony made a quick wave. “Not for him.”
“What? It’s his family. It’s his mother and father.”
“You no tell. Understand? No tell!” Suddenly Pigeon Tony pointed at Judy so sternly she was taken aback.
“I don’t tell him anything you tell me. I can’t. But why didn’t you tell him?”
“No! I no tell! Why I’m gonna tell? Break his heart?”
Judy agreed. It would hurt Frank, that much was true. Still. “But doesn’t he have a right to know?”
“Che?”
“A right. He has a right to know.” Judy fumbled for a synonym. How could she explain the concept of a legal right to someone who didn’t believe in the law? Or a moral right to someone who thought he was justified in killing? “Frank is entitled to know. He should know. It’s his business.”
“No! Is for me, not Frankie. I make vendetta, not him!” The gloom vanished from Pigeon Tony’s face as he scrambled to his feet with a tiny grunt and motioned to Judy to get up. “Come. Andiamo!”
“What?” she asked, confused, but Pigeon Tony grabbed her wrist with surprising strength, yanked her to her feet, and tugged her from the oak trees into the sun. Intrigued, she let herself be led like a child, even though Pigeon Tony was so short he reached only to her shoulder.
They passed the rock piles and stopped when they got to the edge of the muddy construction site, still hand in hand. The yellow backhoe stood at the center of the mud, its huge arm rattling and creaking, toeing the earth among the pale butterflies. Frank was at the controls, absorbed in his work.
“See!” Pigeon Tony pointed at the backhoe with his free hand. “Is sign. See?”
“The sign?” Judy didn’t see any signs. She looked around and found a painted strip on the window of the backhoe’s cab. LUCIA STONE. “The company sign?”
“Si, si! È vero! È Frankie. Alla Frankie. La macchina, l’automobile, alla. Alla Frank. Alla Lucia Stone.” Pigeon Tony’s eyes were bright with emotion and his hand squeezed Judy’s tight. “See? Frankie, he make—come se dice—he make a—che?” He turned to Judy to supply the English word.
“A company?”
“No. No.” Pigeon Tony let go of her hand and waved his impatiently, freeing them. “Frankie make a—”
“A building?”
“No! No!”
“He make a wall?”
“No! No!” Pigeon Tony faced the backhoe and threw his arms up in frustration. “You no see? Judy, whatsa matter you, you no see?”
“I don’t know what he’s making!” she answered, equally frustrated, but Pigeon Tony turned her bodily to face the construction site.
“See, Judy! See, la macchina. See sign, see alla!”
“I see, I see!”
“Frankie, he make futuro! Capisce? Futuro?”
Judy understood then. It wasn’t a company, or a wall. LUCIA STONE. “A future.”
“Si, si!” Pigeon Tony almost exploded with relief. “Futuro! Frankie make futuro. Here, for his children. For alla who come.”
“I see.” Judy’s throat caught unaccountably, but Pigeon Tony was wagging a finger at her.
“Understand? No you tell Frankie. About father, my son. Or no futuro for Frankie. Only vendetta. Only murder. Only morte. Capisce?”
Judy nodded.
“Promise?”
Judy couldn’t help but smile. She had created an Italian monster. “Yes.”
“Bene.” Pigeon Tony nodded curtly, then turned to the noisy backhoe, calm coming over him as he watched Frank make his future.
Judy watched, too, the sun warming her back, and after a time, without knowing why, she reached for her client’s small, withered hand.
Fifteen minutes later they had piled into two cars, Judy into the green Bug and Frank and Pigeon Tony leading the way in the white pickup, as they snaked from the countryside back to the highway. Judy had replaced her wilted daisy on the console with a fresh spray of blue forget-me-nots, but she wasn’t completely sorry to leave the country sights and smells. Now that she had a client again, she had a defense to stage. Not that she had resolved everything.
She hit the gas, whizzing past sunny open country that became cloudy housing developments, but Judy was lost in thought. Images of Angelo Coluzzi in death ran through the back of her mind, but the situation wasn’t black and white anymore. As an artist, she knew there were shades of gray and had always counted herself lucky for that. Dark gray underlined a stormy sky in her landscapes; light gray hollowed a human cheekbone in her portraits. So why couldn’t
there be shades of gray in a murder defense? She was painter and lawyer both; art and a defense were both her creations. So she could take responsibility for the colors in her cases. She liked the notion.
Judy took a bite of her lunch, crunching through the crusty bread and sinking her teeth into the spongy-soft mozzarella, and she became convinced the sandwich was helping her think. Mozzarella had superpowers. She followed Frank’s big truck as it climbed onto the expressway, watching him talk animatedly with his grandfather as they drove. They both used their hands when they talked, and Judy wondered briefly if Italians had more traffic accidents than normal people.
Frank’s big hands chopped the air, and she flashed on their conversation at his parents’ grave. So they had been murdered. She had been touched by Pigeon Tony’s keeping that from Frank, and though she understood his reasons for it, the knowledge burdened her. Judy had grown up in an American family, as patriotic as a military family could be, and she had been trained in law, a code of rights and responsibilities. In her view, Frank had a right to know how his parents had died; it was a truth that shouldn’t be hidden from him. And why did Pigeon Tony think it was okay to hide one truth—the way they died—and not the other—the way Angelo Coluzzi died? This case had more cultural conflicts than legal ones, and more ethical conflicts than both. She needed emergency mozzarella.
Judy took another bite. If she ate enough of it, she could figure out how to do all the work she had been ignoring this weekend. She remembered the unfinished article on her laptop; she would have to get to it tonight. Sunday wouldn’t be enough time, and she didn’t want to face Bennie on Monday. Judy glanced out the window, and the sky was tinged with gray.
She couldn’t help but think it was appropriate.
16
CONGRATULATIONS, SOUTH PHILLY COMBINE! read a white plastic banner that hung from the flat roof of the clubhouse, oddly parallel with the yellow plastic crime-scene tape that sagged across the front door. The clubhouse, a brick rowhouse used for the purpose, stood by itself on the city block, because the other houses had been leveled and the lots strewn with brick and mortar rubble, bottles, and other debris. Judy climbed out of the truck, and Frank helped Pigeon Tony to the curb.
“See that guy on the corner?” Frank asked, and Judy looked over. A heavyset man sat in a black Cadillac at the far end of the street, apparently reading a newspaper. “That’s Fat Jimmy Bello, works for the Coluzzis.”
“So?”
“So I told you, I don’t like it. He’s watching the clubhouse. You sure you gotta go in there?”
“Yes,” Judy said. “I have to see it.”
“We can’t come back another time?”
“No, I have the D.A.’s permission to do it now, and it’s best to see the crime scene as soon as possible.”
Frank glanced again at the corner. The man was still sitting in the driver’s seat, reading a newspaper. “That means you have five minutes in there.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m not taking any chances. Hurry. I’ll wait here. Go!”
NO BEER OUTSIDE, read a handmade sign on the wall of the small room, which would have been the living room of the original rowhouse. The floors were of lime green and white linoleum, and the walls were lined with chicken wire cages, twelve on a side, their doors double-fastened with plastic clothespins. A makeshift wooden bar sat against the far wall, stocked with cases of beer and soda, with forks and spoons stuck in a chipped mug. Steel folding chairs sat in rows facing a table at the front of the room, as if for a meeting. On all of the walls, like a border atop the cages, hung a line of framed black-and-white photographs, one of men in suits and women in fancy dresses, seated at a roomful of banquet tables, and others in groups. Judy caught one of the handwritten captions as they hurried by. South Philly Pigeon Racing Club, June 14, 1948.
She went into the back room, with Pigeon Tony ahead of her. She glanced around and realized it had once been the dining room of the rowhouse. “Where was he when you came into the room?” she asked when they were inside.
“There.” Pigeon Tony pointed. “Near shelf.”
Judy looked where the bookshelves were leaning against the plywood wall and at the supplies and vitamin jugs scattered on the floor. She knew how they’d look in crime-lab photos and blown up as Exhibit B. “Okay, he was standing in front of the bookshelves?”
“Si, si.”
“You open the door and you see him. What happens next?”
“I kill him.”
Judy winced. “Slow down. Remember the fight you told me about. How exactly did it start? Who spoke first?”
“He.”
“How loud was his voice?”
“I say you, no loud. Whisper.”
Judy nodded. “Okay, what did he say, exactly?”
“He laugh. He say, in Italian, ‘Look who come in. A buffoon. A weakling. A coward.’ ”
“Why did he say that? What did he mean?”
“I no avenge Silvana. I run away, to America.”
Judy didn’t understand. “That was wrong?”
“Si, si.” Pigeon Tony’s face reddened, even under his fresh sunburn. “If I honor vendetta, my son be alive.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I know. Coluzzi know.”
“But if you had killed Coluzzi, his son would have come after your son. Isn’t that how it works? An eye for an eye?”
Pigeon Tony paused. “No matter. I must honor vendetta, like man. Coluzzi come after my son alla way. He come after Frankie.”
Judy didn’t want to get into it. She had an idea. “Now tell me. He says this to you and what do you do? Besides hate him.”
“I hate him and I make a fight.”
“Show me.”
Pigeon Tony’s eyes widened. “You want me to make a fight with you? A woman?”
“Si, si,” she said, a close-to-perfect impression, and he smiled.
“Okay,” he began, his impression not as good as hers, to her ear. Suddenly his face darkened, as it had back at the oak grove. “I say to Coluzzi, ‘You are pig. You are scum. You are worse coward than me, for you kill defenseless woman.’ ”
Judy wondered how Silvana had died but said nothing. She didn’t want to interrupt his story.
“And he laugh, and he say to me, ‘You are a stupid fool, you are too dumb to know I destroy you. I kill your son, too, and his wife. I kill them in truck and soon I kill Frank and you will have nothing.’ ” Pigeon Tony trembled with pain, and though Judy’s heart went out to him, she had to keep him on track.
“Then what did you say?”
“I no say nothing. I no can believe. My heart, is full with odio. So much hate.”
“Did you do something?”
“Si, si.”
“Show me what you did.”
Pigeon Tony thought a minute. “I run and I push him.”
“Pretend I’m Coluzzi. Push me how you pushed him.”
Pigeon Tony hesitated, then took a step toward her slowly, then another. “I run at him, fast. I no think, I run.”
Judy nodded. “I understand.”
“And I come to him”—at this Pigeon Tony gripped her arms, reaching only to her elbow—“and I push him, I shove at him. I no can believe how hard!”
Judy’s idea took shape. “And then he fell back? Against the shelves?”
“Si, si. And shelf, is metal, is tin, it falls down. And I make noise, I no can believe it come, and alla people come in—Tony, Feet, alla club. I break his neck!”
“How do you know that?”
Pigeon Tony looked at her like she was crazy. “His neck”—he gestured to the floor—“all crazy, all crooked. Alla people say, ‘You broke neck.’ ”
Judy considered it. This could work. And it was consistent with what the coroner would say. “Then what did you do?”
“I no do nothing. I look at him. I no can believe Coluzzi dead. Tony, Feet, they take me out, they make me go home. Coluzzi’s friend in club, Jimmy,
he shout at me. He make a fight to me. He call police. Tony, Feet, they get me, and I go to home. I feed birds and police come.”
“So the one push broke Coluzzi’s neck.” Judy remembered what Dr. Patel, the medical examiner, had said. Pigeon Tony’s story would be consistent with it. “His neck snapped?”
“Si, si.”
“You didn’t touch him again after that?”
“No.”
Judy’s heart lifted. She had a defense, and it was perfect. One last detail. “How long would you say you were in the room?”
“Che? How long?”
“I’m wondering about the time. How many minutes were you in the room before you pushed Coluzzi?”
Pigeon Tony snapped his fingers. “Two, three minute. No time.”
Judy tried out her theory. “So maybe you didn’t mean to kill him. Maybe you just meant to fight with him, or hurt him, and he fell back and broke his neck.”
Pigeon Tony frowned. “No, I want to kill him. I try to kill him.”
“Did you? Are you sure?”
“Si, si! I want to kill him. For Silvana. For Frank. For Frankie. You no capisce?”
Judy capisced just fine, but she was visualizing her opening argument. “But nobody will know that you wanted to kill him, from the way it happened. From the way it happened, from what everybody will say, even the prosecution witnesses, you went in the room and you were only in there a few minutes. All you did was you push him, and he fell back and broke his neck. That’s not murder.”
Pigeon Tony broke into a grin of recognition. “Bravissima, Judy! Is no murder! I say you, before. Is no murder! Coluzzi kill my wife. And my son!”
Judy shook her head. “No, it’s not murder because you didn’t mean to kill him.”
“No! No!” Pigeon Tony bristled. “I kill him! I want to!”
“The jury won’t know that.”
Pigeon Tony cocked his head. “What means jury?”
“Jury. It’s the people who sit at your trial and decide if you’re guilty of murder.”
“Si, si. I tell jury. I tell judge. I say I kill him but no è murder.”
Judy stilled him with her hands. They were back to square uno. “No, you don’t say anything. Listen to me. In the law, the prosecutor, or the district attorney, has to prove you intended, or wanted, to kill Coluzzi when you pushed him. In fact, they have to prove you were lying in wait to kill him, for murder in the first degree. They can’t prove you meant to kill him from the facts they have. And they can’t prove it from the physical evidence.” Judy touched Pigeon Tony’s skinny shoulder, her excitement growing. “It may be manslaughter, but they didn’t charge you with manslaughter. They overcharged, like they always do. They charged you with murder. We’re gonna win! You’ll go free.”
The Vendetta Defense Page 12