Petrosino nodded. “The Secret Service and the Chief, well, things are being done queerly in this barrel case. Something’s fishy. And one of the gangsters let slip that he’s afraid of a man who goes by ‘The Fox.’ I thought it was a crook’s alias at first, but… what if it’s a rotten cop?”
“That’s not much,” Tarbell said.
“Well you’ve kept me at arm’s length, too,” Petrosino said. “I might be able to help more if you told me more about this Syndicate. Like who you think is behind it.”
Steffens and Tarbell looked at each other, and she nodded.
Steffens said, “All right, Joe, quid pro quo. We told you there was a triumvirate or maybe a quartet running the Syndicate, right? Well, we’re certain that Big Tim Sullivan is one.”
“Makes sense, a ward boss like him would run the gambling rings on the East Side.”
“We think there’s a politicker, too, who owns the gambling dives themselves. We found some real estate records and know spies who worked in Alderman Murphy’s offices.”
“That makes sense, too. Murphy owns plenty of Raines Law hotels and saloons.”
“We’re still digging for the third and possibly a fourth boss. Tammany needs a lawman to replace the old crooked Chief, Bill Devery. You knew that. We’ve got a man in the Mayor’s office who tips us, but the problem is that some of the arrows point to the federal building.”
Petrosino conjured up Flynn’s tense face in the interrogations. “How so?”
“Because a federal man could easily slip the muscle in and out of the country if they were using immigrants to do their dirty work for them.”
Petrosino’s cigar had become a soggy mess. He wrapped it in his handkerchief and hid it in a pocket. “Why are you so interested in this Syndicate? You’re not the law.”
“We do it for the same reasons you do,” Tarbell said. “You don’t do this for promotion or pay, do you? You do it because it’s right, because you can’t do it any other way, yes?”
Petrosino looked into Tarbell’s smiling eyes, and he blushed.
“Corruption is not a mere felony,” Steffens bellowed, “but a revolutionary process. If we can trace it to its source, then we might just find the cause. And then the cure.”
“Why don’t the two of you publish what you’ve got then? Expose the crooks now?”
“For a detective,” Tarbell said, “you don’t know overmuch of humanity, do you? Why would we confront the criminal about the skeleton in his closet, instead of finding the bones first, studying them at close range, and collecting evidence to prove their deathly existence?”
“Point taken,” Petrosino said. “Listen, I need one more favor of someone smarter than me.” He drew out a piece of paper with the words he copied from Schmittberger’s note. “Miss Tarbell, you studied a dozen languages in college. What’s this say?”
“Is it Cyrillic… no.” She harrumphed and copied down the words in her notebook. “Perhaps a phonetic spelling of another language or a cipher. I just can’t say.” She looked up, her brow knitted in almost angry frustration.
Petrosino found it strangely attractive. “Not used to being stumped, Miss Tarbell?”
“No, I’m not, Mr. Petrosino. As a girl, I loved looking at things under a microscope, rock salt, insects, hangnails. I was very curious to know about everything.”
“Made you feel heady, didn’t it? I think you like outdoing others, especially us men.”
She seemed to blush now. “I like being equal to the task of knowledge.” She sat up tall in her chair, chin held high, and patted her notebook. “It’s nearly tea time, Mr. Petrosino. Would you like to come to the soda jerk down the street? I could invite a linguistics professor I know, and we could have egg creams while we translate your note?”
“I would, but I have much to do. And I can’t let you show the note to anyone else. Maybe a word or two, but we can’t trust anyone with all of it since we don’t know what it says yet. I hope you don’t mind?”
“No, no, not at all,” she said, but the smile in her eyes dimmed. “Steff and I will look at some books to see if it compares, and I’ll maintain your confidence, as you wish.”
Petrosino tipped his hat, but Tarbell was already digging through her shelves for a text.
Petrosino felt strange about wanting to take afternoon tea with Tarbell. He pondered it as he walked up Lafayette Street toward the Marble Palace until he saw the sign for Saulino’s. It was the lull between lunch and dinner, and Saulino’s chairs were upside down on the tables, the door locked. He swallowed his pride and knocked gently. Adelina answered wearing that somber widow’s dress, but she seemed pleasantly surprised.
“Did I disturb your afternoon catnap?” he whispered.
“No, I was preparing the menu for dinner. Where’ve you been?”
“I could ask you the same thing. Come out, I’ll treat you to a nice egg cream.”
She held her hand out the door to test the weather. “Let me get my hat and umbrella.”
The clouds blotted out the sun, and a silvery mist fell as they walked toward the pink-and-white striped awning of the soda fountain on Houston Street. Adelina hummed to herself and spun her umbrella on her shoulder, unfazed by the gloomy skies. She wore a hat festooned with silk lilacs. When he held her hand, she looked at him suspiciously.
“Why are you trying to butter me up, Joe? You guilty about something?”
“Always.” He held open the door to the soda fountain and winked at her.
She closed her umbrella and spun it, spraying him with rainwater.
She giggled as he wiped the mist from his face and followed her swishing black dress inside. The sweetness of egg shakes and cocoa hung in the air. They breathed it in and smiled at the marble counter full of cakes and jars of hard candies. Bow-tied soda jerkers passed over each other on a sliding ladder along a wall of bottles. A glossy mosaic of phosphates, seltzers, Apollinaris minerals, ginger ales, grape juices, syrups, limeades, bromides, bouillons, and bitters.
Adelina sidled closer to him, her hips rubbing against his. “This kind of place can make you forget there are such things as murders and crooks.”
“Sure,” he said, glancing over her shoulder.
Two men were staring at them, murmuring between stiff lips. They looked like they belonged in a saloon, not a soda shop. The younger of the two was handsome despite a brown velveteen suit from the Old Country and a pint of tonic in his curly black hair. The older one had dark circles under his eyes and a hounddog look about him. He wore a black suit and a tie knotted severely at his throat, as if he enjoyed the feeling of strangulation.
“You go first, Joe,” Adelina said, “I can’t decide.”
“Egg shake with cream,” Petrosino said absently, still eyeing the two men.
“Plain ole egg cream? That’s something my father would have.” Adelina studied the chalkboard of specialties and asked the jerker, “What’s that one, the Sasparilla Sunset?”
“Yes, ma’am, that’s sasparilla, swirls of cream, orange juice, and a yeller marshmallow that’ll sink down in your drink like the sun.”
Adelina beamed approval. Petrosino nodded, but looked over his shoulder for the men.
The hounddog one was outside the front window now, resting lethargically against a lamppost, indifferent to the rain sheeting down. Steam came off him like a dying soul. The handsome one was gone. Petrosino turned back to the counter. The jerker spun out bottles and a mortar and pestle and mixed their exquisite sodas with nimble hands that reminded Petrosino of a pickpocket like Izzy. They sat at a table in the corner and sipped their drinks.
“I saw Max by himself the other day,” Adelina said. “He’s such a handsome man.”
“Where did you see him?”
“Outside your apartment building. If I didn’t know better, I’d say he was snooping.”
“You sure it was him?” Petrosino said, wondering what Max could have been doing.
“Yes.” She ate a spoonful of cre
am. “Why do all the cops hate him so?”
“Says who?” Petrosino wiped cream from his lip and looked outside again.
“Says all the ones who come in my restaurant. You cops blab, you know.”
“Well, they’re Micks. They don’t know him.”
“You admire him, don’t you?”
“Sure I do. Everyone’s always down on him. Reformers, crooks, other cops. He gets it on all sides. Like me.”
“At least you got good ink in The Times,” she said, smiling. “I saw your name and kept a copy. Is that where you’ve been?”
“What do you care? You haven’t come to see me once. You must have other ‘appointments’ to keep you busy?”
She crossed her arms. “Is that what you think of me?”
“No…” Petrosino noticed a row of blue bottles on a shelf behind her, and it made him think of his mother.
“Joe, what’s the matter?”
“When my mother had consumption, she used to spit in blue bottles of carbolic acid, so she wouldn’t spread her germs to me.”
Adelina looked over at the bottles, then reached across and held his hand. “I’m sorry.”
“No, it’s all right. After she passed, I never realized how lonely I was. Until I met you.”
Adelina smiled and kissed his hand.
He sighed and looked out the window again. The rain still fell, but the older man was gone. “How come you don’t tell me much? Like what happened to your husband? And you sneak over in the middle of the night, and you don’t even stay till morning. What, is it because I’m a cop?”
“I should go,” she said, reaching for her umbrella. “I have a lot of cooking to do.”
He said nothing, worried he’d make it worse. He just held the umbrella for her as they left the fountain and walked through the rain back to Saulino’s. She squeezed his hand once and looked as if she were searching for words. The languid rain tumbled down thick as mercury, seeping through his hat, but he felt warm and content being with her.
“I was wrong to ask,” he whispered.
“Joe, I don’t wear this dress for my husband.” She stopped on the sidewalk to look him in the eye. “It’s for my daughter.”
Petrosino heaved a sigh. “I’m sorry.”
A hand shot out from the side and grabbed Petrosino’s shoulder. He turned to see the smiling face of the handsome man from the soda fountain.
“Giuseppe Petrosino?” the man said, opening his arms for an embrace.
Petrosino stepped in front of Adelina. He squinted through the rain at the man and looked around for the other one. “Who are you?”
“It is you, my dear cousin! It’s me Paolo from Padula. Or we say ‘Paul’ in America, yes? You no remember me?”
“I don’t know you.”
“Your mamá’s uncle was married to a Vermiglio. My nona was a Pizzati, and she was second cousin for your mamá’s uncle. You see? So this make us cugini!”
Petrosino motioned for Adelina to duck under the awning of a latteria. He turned back to Paul. “I think you’ve mistaken me for someone else.”
Paul nodded toward Adelina. “She is angel from heaven, cousin. Your wife? Or maybe sister? Is better for me, ah?”
“Look, what do you want? If we’re cousins, I never heard of you. So spill it.”
Paul’s voice dropped lower. “I want help you. You are in danger, cugino.” His smile became a leaden stare. “About the poor man they find in the barrel. You know this man’s name, no? Tell to me, I help you. They want to put you out of the way…”
Petrosino opened his coat and showed his holster. “Scram, shitbird.”
“Okay, pezzonovante. Bigshot.” Paul chuckled. “But if you look so much, then maybe you find something not so good, and then you make trouble for you. And for her.”
Petrosino followed Paul’s eyes and saw the older hounddog man chatting politely with Adelina, holding her umbrella for her. Petrosino shouted, “Get away from her!”
“That’s Peter,” Paul said. “He’s just my zio. Don’t worry, he’s a so gentle, cousin.”
“’Peter’ and ‘Paul,’ huh?” Petrosino felt the rain dripping off his own nose, steaming in his eyes. “If I see your face again, cousin, I’ll squash your fucking head like a turnip.”
“You are so brave. We go now, because you make us so much afraid.”
Paul retreated backward.
Petrosino stepped onto the sidewalk toward Peter, who was wiping a speck of cream from Adelina’s nose. Peter licked the cream on his finger and smiled. Petrosino reached for his holster, but the two men tipped their hats at Adelina and quickly slinked away.
Piccola Italia a/k/a Little Italy
Chapter 19
“I don’t know how,” Schmittberger whispered across the dinner table, “but some of them had permits from 1901 to carry weapons in city limits.”
“What the devil?” Deputy Commissioner Duff Piper said, stroking his thick red beard. He spooned four mounds of sugar into his coffee, took a sip, shook his head, and added another spoonful. “Who signed permits for those goddamn gangsters to carry guns?”
“Our former Chief Devery.”
“Why, that Tammany son of a jackal. At least he’s gone, good riddance. See, lads, that’s why we have to turn out the rest of them.”
Petrosino nodded from his chair to the Deputy’s right, thinking of the two thugs who threatened him at the soda fountain. He didn’t know why, but he hadn’t told anyone about it yet, not even Max. He snapped out of his thoughts and studied Piper in the candelight of the Lafayette Hotel restaurant. Piper lived in the Lafayette during the week, and the staff treated him like a king. The waiters even knew not to take Piper’s dusty top hat. Piper kept it on his lap and constantly looked into it, making facial expressions or tossing his hair this way and that. Petrosino leaned over subtlely now, trying to see what was inside the hat.
“What else did they have on them?” Piper said. “Any counterfeit notes or bad coin on the prisoners? Or the victim?”
“None that I saw,” Schmittberger said. “Mind you, I haven’t slept in two days, but I went through the gang’s traps. Saw the usual things you might expect to find on a man, but no contraband or anything of evidence value.”
“That’s it?” Piper looked crestfallen. The waiter came with a tray and set down plates of thick steaks with mashed potatoes, bloody gravy, and steaming rolls. “Thank you.”
“Well, I did find some droll stuff.” Schmittberger picked up his steak knife. “But I didn’t think you’d be interested in that.”
“Oh, I am, Max. Sometimes you find the best clues in the queerest places.” Piper doused his plate with salt and pepper and pocketed the silver shakers. Petrosino and Schmittberger smiled curiously at the act, and Piper spoke through a mouthful of ribeye, “Old habits of the poor. I bring them home to the wife. She collects them. Go on, Max. The droll stuff…”
“Right. So Petto had a love note to a girl, pinned inside his jacket. Inzerillo kept a small glass eye, about the size of a snake’s, in his shoe. Joe says it’s to ward off Italian curses. And Pecoraro had a vial of laudanum he claimed was for piles and lumbago.”
“I wish the police surgeon would prescribe me some opium tinctures,” Petrosino said jokingly. “My ribs feel like a bag of gravel thanks to that Ox bastard.”
“What about jewelry?” Piper asked, gazing into his hat again. He sucked at his teeth and picked a piece of gristle from his gums.
“Some stickpins and a few cheap trinkets. Lobaido had an engraved watch with his initials and garnets. Morello had a similar one with an engraved M. Neither matched the old silver watch chain that was on the barrel victim.”
Petrosino chewed on his steak and listened to the rhythmic tapping of rainwater on the hotel windows. “Time mocks us,” Petrosino said. “Every minute that goes by, our chances go down. Clues wash away in the rain and witnesses disappear out of town or into the ground.”
“Aye. ” Piper ate a spoonful of p
otatoes. “So, Joe, what are you doing?”
“Max told you about those Sicilian union circulars from the Palermo Society. I’m working that and other angles.” He nodded at Max. They’d decided not to tell anyone else about the puzzling note until they knew what it said. “The victim’s gloves had the trade name ‘Laird,’ which is from Buffalo. So the barrel victim could be from upstate.”
Piper sighed, obviously disappointed. “Well, lads, I may have done you more harm than good. I know the early hours of a case are ripe, and I’m sorry about the Primrose angle.”
“That’s not on your doorstep, boss,” Schmittberger said, “It’s not the first time a loon has confessed to something he didn’t do. It had to be run down, we just got unlucky.”
“I just can’t stand to see Chesty McClusky and his evil Green Machine take over the Central Bureau. I’d like nothing more than to see him fail and you two solve this puzzle.”
“Don’t count us out yet,” Petrosino said. “As soon as we leave here, we’ve got a meeting with one of the Morello gang. Of course, he doesn’t know it yet.”
“You do?” Piper’s eyes flickered with anger. “That blackguard McClusky holds back when he briefs me. What’s doing?”
“We turned loose the youngest gangster, Vito Lobaido. He’s likely to reach The Break.”
“It was Joe’s idea to set him loose with a tail,” Schmittberger said. “Lobaido should be in his flat by now with Jimmy McCafferty watching him. We think the only reason he didn’t break already was because he was locked up with all his fellow gangsters.”
The twinkle came back into Piper’s eyes, and his teeth shone like ivory as he said, “And now that he’s all alone, you can go thump something out of him.”
“That’s right.”
“Well, what are you waiting for? I’d invite you to stay for brandy and cigars, but I’d rather have you squash that hoodlum! Hie thee, lads!”
Petrosino and Schmittberger wiped their mouths with their napkins and stood up to shake hands with Piper. When Petrosino stood over the Deputy, he got a clear look at the top hat and what was sewn inside of it: a small mirror. He laughed to himself.
THE BARREL MURDER - a Detective Joe Petrosino case (based on true events) Page 15