by Peter Watson
“How’s Martell taking it?”
“Hard. He’s angry, feels he’s failed.”
“Does he suspect anything?”
Angelo shook his head. “We were lucky with those illegals. That made it real.”
“And Liotta?”
“Mad as hell. Bewildered as a wasp that’s hit the windowpane. What would you expect? He knows something funny is happening, but he ain’t sure what. He must be working on his revenge right now.”
Silvio shook his head. “Not if he’s smart. If he’s smart he’ll stay cool, allow the heat to go out of the situation. If he acts too soon he’s the obvious suspect. So, for once, he won’t act too quick—and that gives us time, and the initiative. He’ll plan something careful, something spectacular to show he hasn’t lost his touch. But it has to be safe from his point of view. That will take a while. For once, we’re ahead of him. Phase two worked perfectly.”
“Which means … phase three can begin?”
“Today is February eleventh. We need to move fast for some of the same reasons Liotta won’t. Say three weeks from now. Make sure it’s a dark, rainy night. And that Liotta’s in town.”
“See, you turn this key here, put the engine on the track, release the lever—and watch!”
Silvio took off his glasses and watched as the miniature railroad engine ran along the tracks, going ’round and ’round in a circle. He was enchanted, both by the machine—one of the new clockwork models from Germany—and by the boy. Edward was dark, like Madeleine. He had Madeleine’s brown eyes, her voice, her skin, the same pucker to his lips when he laughed. And he laughed a lot. Stella had done a good job, Silvio thought, and so had her husband, who was with his steamboat today. Apparently he loved gadgets and machines, and had treated his adopted son to this magnificent toy.
So far the lunch was turning out to be a great success. It had begun awkwardly, but that had been Silvio’s fault. Though he told himself that in theory he liked children, he was in practice rather nervous around them; they were so adult one minute and so childish the next. Then Edward had come up to him and asked point-blank, “Are you my real father?”
“No,” said Silvio sadly. “I wish I was. But I knew your mother well. You can be proud. She was a fine person.” The boy was just like him, an orphan.
“That’s what Stella says. I can’t remember her really, except her smell. I was two when she caught the fever.”
Stella had looked at Silvio, her eyes imploring him to keep up the pretense. She had said that she hid nothing from the boy, but clearly that didn’t extend to the cause of Madeleine’s death.
“Do you visit your mother’s grave?” Silvio asked.
“Sometimes. We take flowers.”
“Would you take me? I don’t know where it is.”
Edward looked at Stella.
She nodded. “Come back afterward. I’ll have coffee ready.”
The boy led Silvio along St. Philip’s Street and then onto Chartres. Silvio double-checked that his bodyguard was nearby. There was no need for the child to know, but he wasn’t taking any chances.
At the convent, Edward rang the bell. After a moment the gate was opened by a nun.
“I’ve come to visit my mother’s grave,” said Edward seriously. “This is an old friend of hers.”
The nun smiled and let them in. “You know where to go?”
Edward nodded. “Thank you, Sister Bridget.”
Inside, he led Silvio across a cloister and through an arch. Something about the convent—the smell perhaps, or the peace—reminded Silvio of Quisquina.
Through the arch was a green patch of ground with trees and carved headstones. Edward walked straight across to a headstone beneath a tree. “Here,” he said. “Look, it says, ‘Madeleine Dupont, fallen angel.’ I can read.”
Tears were forced into Silvio’s eyes, but he held them back. Be hard on the inside, he told himself. He had known Madeleine was dead, of course he had. But seeing her grave like this, he felt her loss all over again. And seeing her grave, with her child playing and skipping by the headstone, set his mind in a whirl.
Madeleine was dead but she lived on in Edward. The similarity was uncanny. His thoughts tumbled over themselves. Nino would live on in Annunziata, as Angelo would in Anna-Maria. Even Anna-Maria had children. He, Silvio, was the odd one out—orfano, no parents, no children, no bloodline to continue after him.
He placed the flowers he had brought on the grave and stood up again. Silvio suddenly felt very lonely. He had brains, and had used them to fashion a niche here in New Orleans. Yet, he now understood, that wasn’t enough. He had become too obsessed by Liotta. Settling his scores was important, but it shouldn’t be the whole of his life. The other half was Annunziata. Madeleine had been taken from him but Annunziata hadn’t, not yet. There was still time to do something about that. It would complicate matters, might even fuck up the Cathedral Plan completely, but it was possible.
He looked down at Madeleine’s headstone a final time. He was glad he had come. She had helped him see what he must do.
21
David Martell was not a tall man. His chief characteristics were a bushy, drooping mustache and a floppy fedora, which he always wore when he was outside. Of Irish extraction, his father had been a detective in New Orleans, and his brother was a detective in Memphis. He was unmarried and lived with his mother on Franklin Street. He was, in fact, married to his job and worked in his office most evenings until eight or nine. No matter how late he worked, he always made an early start the next day.
On Tuesday, March 23, 1891, he worked late at City Hall as usual. He finally took his fedora from the hat stand just inside his office door at 8:40 P.M. and went out. A light rain was falling. His first stop was Dominick Virgut’s oyster restaurant on Rampart and Poydras streets. After policing, Martell’s only other passion was oysters, and Virgut’s had the best.
The chief was in the restaurant for over an hour, chatting and eating oysters and drinking milk—he never drank alcohol. He left Virgut’s about ten-twenty-five. It was still raining, and he rolled up his trousers to keep them clear of the mud.
To reach home he had to walk west on Rampart, before turning north on Girod. It was dark that night, and not only because it was raining. The new electric streetlights were temperamental, dimming and brightening every so often for no apparent reason.
As he reached the corner of Girod and Basin streets, Martell was passed by a boy of twelve or thirteen, going in the opposite direction. As the boy went past he looked up at Martell, his eyes searching the chief’s face. Martell walked on. A few moments later the boy whistled. This whistle would later be recalled. It was a low-pitched, two-tone whistle, and carried in the evening air.
Martell turned left on Basin Street and approached Franklin. About halfway along this block there was a small shack, a break in the tall houses but with a covered porch in front that extended over the sidewalk. When he reached the porch, Martell stopped to light a cigar. As he fumbled for the matches in his pocket, a shot rang out in the dark from across the street. Martell was hit in the shoulder and his body was thrown back against the shack. Dropping his cigar, he reached for his own gun, but more shots resounded in the night and he was hit again, in the stomach and legs. Nevertheless, Martell’s fingers found his gun and dragged it from its holster. He stumbled into the street. Before he could pull the trigger, however, more shots came out of the darkness, spattering his chest and arms.
Still Martell came forward. He got off one or two shots into the night, but they coincided with a fourth fusillade from across the street. This time he was jerked one way and another, the gun fell from his hand, he sank to his knees, and pitched facedown into the mud.
The sound of the last fusillade died on the night, leaving just the hiss of the rain. For a brief time Martell’s body lay in the street, being rained on, with no other sound. Then a few voices could be heard in the distance, wondering where exactly the shooting was coming from.
/> In the immediate vicinity all was quiet. No one moved or stirred. No one wanted to be next.
Then a clatter of footsteps reverberated on the wooden sidewalk. Running away.
Silvio watched as Anna-Maria’s eldest child, a boy called Angelo Junior, wriggled on his grandfather’s lap, reached up, and pulled old Angie’s whiskers. At times like this, Silvio could get moody. He was still a young man, still enjoyed his afternoons and evenings at Mamie Christine’s but, more and more, he liked coming to these meetings at Angie’s. Part of him liked domesticity.
Anna-Maria appeared in the room, with a coffee jug, smiling. She really was looking trim these days. She took her son from his grandfather’s lap.
“Coffee?” said Angelo.
“Sure.” Silvio waited for Anna-Maria to take her son from the room. “Okay, tell me what you hear.” He took off his spectacles.
“Parker moved swiftly. He ordered his deputy chief of police to pick up as many of Liotta’s men as he could lay his hands on—including Vito himself. Last I heard, there were seventeen in the Parish Prison. The yellow oilskin was real foxy. At least three people spotted it, and of course remembered it from the ambush case. In fact, everything’s happening just as you said it would, that day in the cathedral. There’s only one problem.”
Silvio looked sharply at Angelo. “Which is?”
“Martell’s not dead.”
“What!”
Angelo nodded. “It’s true. He was hit eleven times—and still he lives. He’s bad, of course, very bad. But he might just recover.”
“Where was he hit?”
“Everywhere but in the head and heart.”
Silvio frowned. “How could someone be hit eleven times and live?”
“It happens. It’s happened.”
Silvio scratched his chin. This might sink his whole plan. “Is there—?”
“No,” said Angelo firmly. “We couldn’t even get into the hospital, let alone the room he’s in.”
“Is he talking?”
“I can’t say. Naturally we’re getting our information from the policemen on the payroll. And from Parker, of course. I’ll stay in touch, but we can’t make ourselves too obvious.”
Anna-Maria stuck her head back around the door. “You want the papers?”
She answered her own question and carried them into the room. She had the Mascot, the Picayune, the Times-Democrat, and the Delta. The shooting obviously occupied the front pages of each of them. POLICE CHIEF GUNNED DOWN said the Mascot. MARTELL HIT 11 TIMES IN SICILIAN ATTACK ran the Delta. But it was the Picayune that pleased Silvio the most. Its headline was just one word: VENDETTA! And below: “Sicilian racketeer and sixteen others held after police chief is gunned down. Attack believed to be revenge for arrests in the North Claiborne Street ambush case.” The main article read:
Mr. David Martell, the New Orleans chief of police, was shot several times last night by a number of assailants who attacked him on Girod Street between Basin and Franklin streets. Mr. Martell, who was on his way home after dinner and a long day at the office, attempted to return the fire, but it is not known whether he injured any of his attackers. He was rushed to Charity Hospital, where his condition was described as “critical.”
Police responded quickly to the attack and by two o’clock this morning, when the Picayune went to press, some seventeen men, all Sicilians, had been arrested and incarcerated in the Parish Prison. Among them is Vittorio Liotta, a fruit importer, who many police suspect is head of one of two Sicilian families in New Orleans who are contesting control of the fruit wharves on the Mississippi.
The attack on Mr. Martell is believed in some quarters to be a revenge assault brought about by his arrest of a number of men last year who were alleged to have taken part in an ambush of roustabouts working for the rival Priola family, which also controls part of the fruit wharves. Following that ambush, in which one man was killed and several people were injured, including innocent bystanders, Mr. Martell arrested fourteen men belonging to the Liotta faction, though not including Mr. Liotta himself. However, charges were later dropped against these fourteen, eleven of whom were subsequently released (the other three, illegal immigrants, were returned to Sicily).
Besides arresting these suspects, the police also spent the latter part of yesterday evening finding witnesses to this cowardly attack. Among the evidence known to have been collected so far are certain witnesses who saw one of the assailants wearing a yellow oilskin rain cloak. More than one policeman has remarked to the Picayune that a yellow oilskin rain cloak was worn by one of the defendants in the earlier ambush incident.
The mayor of New Orleans, Mr. Harrison Parker, has promised that “no effort will be spared in this case to search out and prosecute all felons who were responsible for this dastardly crime.” Meanwhile, the Picayune will keep readers informed of Mr. Martell’s well-being.
When he finished reading, Silvio handed the paper across to Angelo and sat thinking as the other man cast his eyes down the columns.
At length Angelo looked up.
“If Martell lives,” said Silvio softly, “he might just identify his attackers.”
“He’s on the payroll.”
“Angie! Don’t be naive. That won’t make any difference this time. It won’t matter whose payroll he’s on. If he saw who shot him, he’ll finger them. Wouldn’t you?”
There was silence between them.
Then Silvio said, “The Picayune article says exactly what we want said. Phase three is working like I promised it would. We can’t lose our nerve now.” He looked hard at Angelo. “There must be someone at the hospital, someone who owes us a lot. The article says Martell’s condition is weak. It won’t take much. There must be something we can do.”
Angelo was shaking his head. “I don’t like it. It’s too risky. We could jeopardize our whole plan—”
“There’ll be no plan if Martell lives. Don’t you see, Angie, if Martell comes out of this, if he fingers his attackers, if the world then finds out what you and I already know, we’re in trouble, bad trouble. So don’t tell me you don’t like it. Just get one of our payroll people to repay his debts. I don’t care how it’s done. Just make sure it happens, and happens soon.”
The New Orleans Charity Hospital was located on Gironde and Cannon streets, near the gasworks. It was a three-story building made up of six wings leading off a long central corridor. Ironically, it was funded by the tax levied on immigrants landing at New Orleans.
Throughout the night the mayor had led the vigil at Martell’s bedside. There were doctors, nurses, police, reporters, his widowed mother. Dominick Virgut, who owned the oyster restaurant, was there some of the time, as were various city officials.
Martell himself drifted in and out of consciousness. Around eleven the next morning, the doctors ordered everyone out of the room.
“But what about security?” complained Parker. “These people tried to kill him. They might come again.”
“Very well,” said the doctor. “One guard. But one only.”
Parker looked at the four police in attendance. His eyes settled on Frank Cassidy. “Okay, Frank,” he said. “You’re the biggest. You stay.”
Cassidy returned Parker’s stare. “Yessir!”
The rest trooped out.
Cassidy stood by the bed. He listened as the group slowly drifted down the corridor outside. He waited a few moments for the sound to disappear, then opened the door a fraction. Yes, they had all gone. There was no one within thirty yards of him.
Quickly he closed the door again and went back to the bed. He didn’t dare dwell too much on what he was about to do. But he had been receiving payoffs from the Priolas for three years now and had always known that someday he would be called on to return the service.
He eased one of the pillows from under Martell’s head. The chief stirred and appeared to wake. He opened his eyes and Cassidy froze. Then Martell’s eyes closed again and he lay still.
Without waiti
ng any longer, Cassidy gripped the pillow in two hands and laid it across Martell’s face. Later he recalled how weak the chief had been, how frighteningly easy his debt to the Priolas had been repaid. Martell had hardly struggled at all.
From the Times-Democrat.
MARTELL DEAD; LIOTTA GANG CHARGED WITH MURDER
The New Orleans chief of police, Mr. David Martell, died today, shortly before noon. Dr. Robert Coe, physician-in-chief at Charity Hospital, who certified the chief as dead, at 11:48 A.M., said that Mr. Martell died in his sleep, from complications arising from bullet and shotgun wounds sustained when he was attacked last evening.
Police Sergeant Frank Cassidy, from Metairie, was with Martell at the last. In an interview he said that the chief opened his eyes and groaned. “I went to stand next to the bed,” said Cassidy. “The chief looked up at me and then his eyes closed. He tried to say something but I couldn’t hear. I leaned down and held my head next to his mouth. Then I could hear him quite distinctly. He said, “The dagos did it.’ I didn’t know if he had died then but I thought he had. I went to fetch Dr. Coe and he certified that the chief was dead.”
Following the chief’s death, the District Attorney for New Orleans district, Mr. Clarence Foley, announced that he was charging five of the arrested Sicilians in the Parish Prison with murder, and another eight, including Vittorio Liotta, with conspiracy to murder. All thirteen have been remanded in custody until the trial, which is expected to take place in about three months.
Anna-Maria lit a cigarette and offered one to Silvio. “That was good, very good. You haven’t lost your touch.”
Silvio lit his cigarette and blew smoke into the room. “You don’t behave much like a mother.”
She laughed. “Mothers get horny, you know. God, how I get horny sometimes.” She kissed him.
“What did you tell Saltram?”
“I didn’t tell him anything. He’s not a bad lover, Silvio. He just doesn’t make me horny like you do. I have lunches with girlfriends, I go shopping, I have dress fittings, I go to the library. He won’t get suspicious so long as I’m home by five.”