Bloodline: A Novel

by Warren Murphy

Maranzano dismissed that thought with a wave of his hand. “Trust me, Lieutenant, one way or another, we—and I am speaking for Nilo—would win the case. But how much damage would be done to our Italian community if we should have to go through a long, complicated, noisy trial.” He made a spitting gesture toward the floor. “Already, the press is filled with stories of dago baby-killers. It could only get worse. All our efforts to help Italians fit into the life of this new land could be set back for years.”

  “Maybe we ought to think about things like that before we start shooting down people at random.”

  “The hotheadedness of youth. Someone wise once said that it is a shame that youth is wasted on the young. How very true. But too late an insight to resolve our problem.”

  “Just what is ‘our’ problem?” Tony asked.

  “Selvini is dead and deserves to be. He was killed in a theater by person or persons unknown. The child was killed, probably by yet another person. It would seem—”

  “Persons unknown?” Tony interrupted. “I saw Nilo leaving that theater.”

  “And you are the only person who connects him to any crime. I must ask you to ask yourself, Lieutenant: Are you certain that you saw Nilo at the theater? Are you absolutely certain? Because if you were to realize that it was not really Nilo you saw leaving that theater, then there would be no case against him. Many witnesses would testify as to his presence elsewhere at the time of the slaying.”

  “You can call in witnesses until hell freezes over,” Tony said in a soft level voice. “I will testify to the truth. I saw Nilo leaving that theater. I am certain of it. Nothing will change that truth.”

  “Look at it this way, Lieutenant. Nothing is going to bring that child back to life. That tragedy cannot be repaired. It was probably a tragic accident. Should all our people be punished for such a mishap? If you were to realize that it might not have been Nilo leaving that theater, then there will be no need for a trial. Everyone, our entire community, would owe you a great deal of thanks.”

  Tony got slowly to his feet. In even, measured tones, he said, “You can put all the fancy words around it all you want, but it doesn’t change anything. You sit here like some octopus, and every time you talk about that dead kid, you say the same thing—‘a tragic accident,’ a ‘tragedy’—as if somehow saying that makes it different. It all happened because you couldn’t control one of your thug gunmen, whether he is my nephew or not. Calling it a tragedy doesn’t wash your hands of it. It just puts a label on it so you can deal with the label, without thinking of the dead boy that’s under that label. He is dead with a bullet in his chest. His guts were spattered all over the street. You call it a tragedy all you want, but it was a fucking savage, senseless murder, and that blood is on your hands. It stays on your hands. Blowing Sicilian wind at it doesn’t get rid of the stench.”

  Tony felt his body shuddering in his anger. Through his outburst, Maranzano simply sat in his chair, waiting for the anger to subside. When Tony had finished, Maranzano smiled at him.

  “I know how terribly upset you are and how mightily you work to bring law to all our people. Nilo’s prosecution will not help that cause; it will hurt it. And it will hurt many people around you.”

  “Why, Mr. Maranzano, do you care so much about what happens to Nilo? He is my blood kin, not yours, and yet…” His voice tailed off.

  “There is blood and blood,” Maranzano said cryptically. He paused. “Things will change in this city,” he said. “It could help a police officer to have powerful friends. And no one needs powerful enemies.”

  Tony rose to his feet. “Don’t threaten me, Maranzano,” he said. “As a lieutenant of the New York City Police Department, I am now asking you formally: do you know where the suspect, Nilo Sesta, is?”

  “No,” Maranzano said. “I hear from him from time to time by telephone. That is, assuming he is still in this country. If I hear from him, I can deliver a message to him.”

  “No message,” Tony said.

  * * *

  SOFIA STOPPED NEAR the family’s restaurant, then went instead across the street to the Falcones’ apartment and, when nobody answered her soft knock on the door, let herself in with the key she knew the family kept hidden atop the doorframe.

  She walked into Tina’s room and sat on the bed, trying not to cry but failing and weeping softly. There were still some clothes of hers in Tina’s closet, left there a long time before when she had moved back across the street to her own family’s apartment. Woodenly, she began to gather the clothes into a neat pile on the bed.

  She might as well move all her belongings away, she thought. The Falcones would have no use for her after she went into a courtroom to lie for Nilo.

  The whole thing was ugly, she knew, but it was her only chance to escape the sorry trap that her life had become. She would trade the chance of love to have a chance to escape.

  She found a long white peignoir she had bought for herself while on a little shopping spree with Tina after Tina had won the Mount Carmel Church raffle. Sofia had not wanted to buy it, but Tina had insisted.

  “For your wedding day,” she had whispered into Sofia’s ear.

  She looked at it now as the bitter joke it was, then took the garment off the hanger and began to remove her clothing. Naked, she examined herself in the mirror. She was beautiful. She had always known that she was and she was especially glad about that now. Her beauty might help her in whatever her life would be from now on. It just would not be a special gift for anyone.

  She held the peignoir in front of herself. White in color. Virginal. Or the color of mourning for the Chinese, she remembered reading in one of her poems. She put it on, wiped away her tears, and smiled at her reflection.

  It was a travesty, she thought. She was here, playing dress-up, pretending to be a blushing bride. But instead, she was a slut who was her father’s mistress, who was soon to lie about fornicating, like a whore, with some common criminal in the desperate hope that another criminal might convince him to marry her. She thought bitterly that she should take the garment over to a neighbor so she could use it to wash the pigs she kept in her backyard.

  She raised her hands to her shoulders, to grab the straps, to pull the nightdress off, then stopped. No. I am a slut. This is the way a slut should dress.

  She took a little vial of lip paint from Tina’s dresser and painted a garish wide red mouth over her already-full lips. She opened the front of the peignoir and took a bottle of scent and splashed it liberally between her breasts. With her fingertip, she rubbed some on her nipples, which hardened instantly. It was not perfume, only toilet water, but it smelled of lilacs. Still, somehow, it was no longer a clean scent. It smelled of decaying flowers to her.

  She put some of the scent in her hand and dabbed it on her legs, between her thighs, on her shoulders and arms.

  This whore will wrap you in the scent of her own corruption, she told herself. Come on, boys, only a dime, only a dime.

  “Only a dime!”

  She would have sworn she was speaking quietly to herself, but then the door to the bedroom burst open and Tommy stood in the doorway.

  “Oh, my God!” he exclaimed.

  She turned slowly to face him. Her hands held the peignoir closed in front of her.

  “I … I…” he stammered.

  “It’s all right,” she said.

  “I was sleeping inside and I heard shouting. I thought there was something wrong,” Tommy explained. He seemed to be having difficulty swallowing.

  “There’s nothing wrong,” Sofia said.

  “O-okay,” he stammered. “I just—” He turned to leave and Sofia crossed the room in two strides and caught his forearm. He turned back.

  “I was just wondering,” she said. “Do you like this perfume?”

  He took a deep breath.

  “It’s nice.”

  “I put it on just for you.”

  She moved closer to him and laid her head on his shoulder.

  Tommy
did not answer. He tilted her head back and wiped her face dry with his shirtsleeve.

  “What’s the matter?” The words seemed to fight their way from his throat.

  “I was just thinking. I will miss you all very much,” she managed to sniffle.

  “Why? Are you going somewhere?” he asked. As he did, he wiped her face again, this time with his handkerchief. He looked like a little boy, intently mopping up spilled milk, she thought. He had always looked boyish.

  “Everybody goes somewhere,” she said.

  “There,” he said. “As good as new.”

  It would never be as good as new, she thought. Nothing ever would be.

  “It’s nice of you to say that,” she said, and slowly moved forward into his arms, pressing her body against his. She pulled his face to her and kissed him, and as their lips touched he took her hands and pushed them down to her sides. He held them there as he backed away. The fabric of her gown separated. She felt her body naked.

  “I’ve always wondered what you’d be like,” he said thickly.

  “I’m here now,” she said. She pulled him into the room, closed the door behind them, and pushed him onto the bed. When he reached for his shirt buttons, she slapped his hand playfully away.

  “Let me,” she said.

  She undressed him, and as she did an urgency overcame her, a need to be with him, to have him.

  For a moment, she wanted to tease him, to show he had no effect on her, by carefully folding and placing his clothes on a chair. But when she saw his war wounds on his side, his hip, his legs, the wounds she had dreamed of nursing, she felt a longing that could not wait and she tossed his clothes aside, pushed him back on the bed, and climbed atop him, hugging and rubbing, kissing and biting. He laughed at her insistence, then pulled her to him.

  She did not love him. She never really had. But for a few moments, she could pretend to, because this was like real lovemaking, gentle, tender, warm with passion, and she screamed instantly in delight.

  They stayed together for a long time afterward, holding each other, not speaking.

  “It could have been nice, Tommy,” she said.

  “It was nice.”

  “Try to remember this day,” she said.

  “How could I ever forget it?”

  But he would try to forget, she thought bitterly. Every time he thought of what she had become, he would wish this day had never happened.

  And then the glow was gone and she got up from the bed and said, “Your family will be home soon. Go. I have to get dressed and leave.”

  Confused at his sudden dismissal, Tommy left the bedroom. When he had, Sofia cried softly, then removed the peignoir, cut it in two with a pair of scissors, balled the pieces, and tossed them into the wastebasket.

  * * *

  LUCIANO WAS DRESSING to go out for the night when he was telephoned by Joe Adonis.

  “Charlie, I think I found Sesta.”

  “Where?”

  “An old warehouse Maranzano owns down near Five Points. Some rumdum who hangs out around there saw a priest going into the place earlier. From what he said, it sounded like that Father Falcone. I figure he might just have been going to see Sesta. They’re related, right?”

  “Yeah.” As Luciano wrote down the warehouse address, Adonis asked, “You want me to send some boys over to take care of this?”

  “No, no, no,” Luciano said quickly. “Just leave it to me.”

  “I don’t want Sesta to get away,” Adonis said. “I owe him.”

  “He won’t get away. None of them will.”

  A few minutes later, as Tony Falcone was cleaning up his desk at the Italian Squad to go home for dinner, his telephone rang.

  In thick Sicilian, a voice told him: “I know where to find the man you’re looking for.” Before Tony could ask any questions, the voice said, “I heard him say that tonight he’s going to be at a liquor club on One Hundred and Seventeenth Street.” The man gave the name of the club.

  “When’s he going to be there?” Tony asked.

  “Sometime tonight. I don’t know. Maybe early. Maybe late. Just tonight.”

  “Who is this? Why are you telling me this?”

  “I hate the bastard and I want you to get him.” The line went dead.

  Tony sat at his desk for a few moments, then put on his jacket and walked from the squad room. On the way out he told the duty sergeant, “Call my wife. Tell her I won’t be home for dinner.”

  As Tony drove away from police headquarters, a man in a dry-cleaning shop across the street dialed a telephone number.

  “He just left,” the man said.

  “Thanks,” said Luciano.

  * * *

  TWO HOURS LATER, the telephone rang in the Falcone apartment, where Mario and Tommy had just finished dinner with their mother. When Tommy answered it, a voice said in a hard New York accent, “Listen, Falcone. I got news about your cousin.”

  “Yeah?” Tommy said suspiciously.

  “He’s getting ready to skip the country. Right now he’s in a warehouse down near the Five Points. But in about an hour, he’s gonna be leaving. He’s there alone now, and if you want him, you can get him.”

  The guttural voice gave an address on Worth Street and hung up before Tommy could ask any questions.

  “Problems?” Mario said as he came into the room and saw Tommy holding the phone near his waist before hanging it up.

  “I don’t know. Does anybody know where Papa is?”

  Mario shook his head. “The desk sergeant called and said he went out but didn’t tell anybody where. They can’t reach him. What’s the matter?”

  “Some guy just called. He told me where Nilo is.”

  “Oh?”

  “He said a warehouse on Worth Street. He’s only gonna be there a little while. You think it’s a crank call?”

  Mario remembered his visit to the warehouse to see Nilo. “What if I told you it was true, that Nilo is there?”

  “I’d wonder how you knew. But Papa wants him picked up. I’d go and get him.”

  “We’ll go and get him,” Mario said.

  Tommy thought of protesting for a moment, then shrugged his shoulders. There was no point in arguing with Mario when he had his mind made up. “Not a word to Mama,” Tommy said softly, then went into his bedroom to get his gun.

  * * *

  LUCIANO, ACCOMPANIED BY Meyer Lansky and Bugsy Siegel, was having a quiet catered dinner with Arnold Rothstein in a private suite at the Plaza Hotel across from Central Park.

  For the last year, Rothstein, the gambler and fixer, had taken Luciano under his wing, acting as the younger man’s mentor. Rothstein knew talent and he could see that Luciano was a rising star in the crime world. In a few years, when the old-line Mafia chieftains were out of business, Luciano would be running things. This was Rothstein’s belief and he had always made it a habit to bet big on his beliefs.

  One of his projects had been to get Luciano to drop the cheap gangster image he had, like so many others, to cultivate and adopt a quieter manner of dress and speech. So he was pleased to see Luciano show up wearing a quiet, well-tailored dark suit that would have been at home in a Wall Street boardroom.

  Luciano had immediately poured himself a large Scotch and then raised a toast in the air.

  “To a wonderful night,” he said.

  “You seem pretty happy,” Rothstein said. “What’s the occasion?” He was a tall lean man with slicked back hair that he constantly pressed into place with his fingers.

  “Tonight I start squaring accounts with some pests who’ve been on my mind a long time,” Luciano said. “It’s a night for a party.”

  Siegel laughed.

  “What’s so funny, Benny?” Luciano asked.

  “Here you are, a Sicilian celebrating, and all you got with you are us three Jews.”

  “You three and me?” Luciano said. “I’ll take my chances on us. We’re the future.”

  * * *

  TOMMY LEANED FORW
ARD and told the cabdriver, “Third streetlight down on the right. Pull over there and park. We’re going to walk to that warehouse down the block. You wait for us for just thirty minutes. If we’re not back or if you hear some kind of disturbance, go get some cops quick and bring them back here. Got it?”

  The driver nodded. He had seen Tommy’s badge and had his five-dollar bill in his pocket. He could afford to wait a half hour.

  Tommy and Mario got out of the cab and moved quickly down the block. Tommy reached into his jacket and touched his service revolver.

  “Nervous?” he asked his brother.

  Mario shook his head.

  “No. Scared. And maybe most scared about what Papa’s going to say.”

  “Me too, Mario. But I’ve got to do this. Otherwise…”

  Mario grunted.

  “There’s still time for you to back out,” Tommy said.

  “What are brothers for?”

  Brothers. The word made Tommy think. Nilo once said that he and I were brothers, too.

  “Well, if we’re afraid,” Tommy said, “pity poor Nilo. He must be really scared at all this.”

  “Which means that he won’t worry about shooting us,” Mario said.

  “Can’t nothing happen to me,” Tommy said. “I brought my priest.”

  They were in the shadows across the street from the warehouse door. The light over the door was out. There were no signs of light inside the building, and up and down the block there were only a few parked cars. All of them looked empty. There were no pedestrians.

  The two brothers went down a long alley separating the warehouse from a low factory building on the next lot, looking for a back way inside the building. They found one, but the door was bolted and padlocked.

  Tommy cursed, but Mario whistled softly. “There,” he said, pointing at a window.

  The window was large and metal framed, but its base began only three feet above the ground. A rectangle cut from an old box covered one of the panes and Tommy used a penknife to cut a hole in the cardboard. He peered inside and turned back to Mario.

  “All dark. He might not even be here,” he whispered.

  “Still worth a try.”

  “Just don’t trip over your own feet, you big elephant. I’m too young and beautiful to be shot.”