THE BARREL MURDER - a Detective Joe Petrosino case (based on true events)

by MICHAEL ZAROCOSTAS

  “Yes. But you were too funny for me to stay angry. Why did you get so soused?”

  “Max got in hot water at work. Is your father upset?”

  “It doesn’t matter.” She turned over and stared into his eyes. “I’ve been meaning to tell you something. I tried the other day at the soda fountain, but I didn’t finish what I was saying.”

  “I remember. You said your mourning dress was for your daughter.”

  “That’s not the only reason. I wear it so we can save face, too. My father told everyone my husband died in a mining accident.” She paused and didn’t say anything for a minute. “The bastard’s not dead, Joe. He ran out on me.”

  “You don’t have to tell me. It doesn’t matter.”

  “No, I have to tell you. It will make me feel better.” She sighed. “We couldn’t find him when I went into labor. I was alone with the midwife for two days. I’d been so happy, dreaming of how life would be, and, when it finally happened, there was a little less of me. That happiness was born in the baby. But she had the cord around her neck.” Adelina wept, and he pressed his forehead against hers. “Some of me disappeared that day, and I’ll never have it back…”

  He hugged her, and she whispered, “He came home two days later and got in bed like nothing. He’d taken the money for the midwife and went to an opium den. I got up and told him, ‘If you lay your head on that pillow, I promise you’ll wake up with your throat slit.’”

  “Where is he?” Petrosino caressed her neck, feeling closer but also terrified that she was opening up. He’d never known how heavy her burdens were, and they were suddenly his, too.

  “He went back to Italy. I heard he has a wife there, too.” She set her jaw, composing herself, and her voice steadied. “So now you know my secret. You’re the only one I’ve told.”

  “Adelina…” His heart broke for her, and he thought of revenge. “What’s his name?”

  “Edward Vinti. But I want you to promise not to do anything. I never want to see or hear of him again. I won’t have another man treat me like that. Do you understand me now?”

  He held her face and whispered, “Always.”

  NEW YORK TIMES

  Chapter 24

  In the dream, Petrosino was roaming the East Side, chasing a faceless man with a gun. The man stopped at a brownstone and pointed the gun at Adelina who sat on a stoop. The nightmare transformed into Petrosino holding a set of keys and smashing them against the man’s mouth until he was nothing but toothless, bloody gums. The bloodied face twisted into a smile and choked out, “I’ll see you in hell, Petrosino.” Then the eyelids drooped, and the face morphed into the barrel victim’s death mask.

  Benedetto Madonnia’s eyes opened wide and his decapitated head gurgled, “Save me.”

  Petrosino bolted upright in bed, drenched in darkness and sweat. He sat up, shaking his head and swallowing a Beacham’s digestion pill and a pitcher of water. He wobbled into the kitchen and flinched when he saw Adelina sitting on a stool. She was in her black dress and already had water on for tea and a frittata of egg, onion, and cheese on the stove. The dream had taken away his appetite, but he didn’t tell her.

  “What are you doing here?” He stood in his underclothes, dumbfounded. “Your pop?”

  “He knows, Joe. He tucked you in bed for God’s sake.” She got up from the stool and patted his cheek. “The whole neighborhood knows after your little concerto last night.”

  He snatched her by the waist and kissed her.

  “Joe, stop.” She grinned. “I have my reputation to consider.”

  “I’m glad I ruined it.”

  She kissed his cheek and straightened her dress, turning for the door. She stopped and looked back at him. “Are you learning violin because Sherlock Holmes plays?”

  “That’s nonsense.”

  “I knew it.” She stuck out her tongue and left.

  He went to the window and watched her cross the street and slip inside Saulino’s. He was content that she’d told him everything. He wanted more than anything to have children now for both their sakes. But there was one promise he’d break, if he found Edward Vinti. He sighed and filled his bathtub, thinking about the murder again. He kept seeing Madonnia’s face in the picture of his father on the wall and the reflections in his bath water. He dressed slowly, putting on a fresh shirt collar and a brown suit for Mr. Jerome. Too early to leave, he thought, sitting in the front room armchair, staring at the wall clock. The clock’s hands seemed to stand still. He had a feeling that De Priemo was going to sing and could hardly wait.

  He cleaned and loaded his .38 Smith & Wesson, humming Rigoletto from the recording the night before. When daylight rambled through the windows of his sparse rooms, the morning ice truck rattled outside and the ice man sent a chip up the dumbwaiter. Petrosino was loading his icebox when a knock came at the door.

  “You forgot to bill me again?” Petrosino said.

  “A message for you,” a voice said from the stairwell.

  “I can barely hear you.” Petrosino opened his door. In the dim stairwell, he saw the top of a greasy, curly head. “Who’s that?”

  The head bobbed away, down the steps, shouting, “A message from-” And that was when the first explosion filled his ears.

  Petrosino slammed the door shut and dove to the floor. A rapid series of gunshots followed. Tinny, small caliber echoes. He pulled his pistol and scrambled to the side of the door, waiting, counting a dozen pops in perfectly timed succession. And he knew that it wasn’t a gun. He ran to the front window and saw the curly head disappearing into the crowded street below, joining another man in a black suit. He couldn’t make out their faces.

  He pushed open the door with his gun and smelled gunpowder. Twelve spent Chinese firecrackers on the floor, and bits of paper floating in the air. His ears were still ringing as he raced downstairs. He thought the man had said, “A message from… Il Volpe.” The Fox.

  He hustled down the street, seeing only the men’s backs a block ahead. He shoved through the crowds, gaining ground quickly, following them all the way to the Bowery, where they slipped into a red light club. Petrosino was desperate to see their faces. He knocked over pushcart peddlers and ignored shrieks on the sidewalks as he flew past. Outside the red light club, a stout watchman was sitting on a crate, half-asleep. The watchman’s eyes nearly fell out of his head when he saw Petrosino bounding up the steps. The watchman fumbled for a silent button. A buzzer warning of a police raid.

  Petrosino knocked him off the crate and barreled into the club. He found the remnants of an orgy. The air smelled of rosewood and sex, and bodies slept in various positions on lush fur rugs and flowery silk sofas. A man and two naked women drunkenly played leapfrog, oblivious to his intrusion. Another girl was splayed on the floor, singing, “The Bowery, The Bowery. They say such things and they do strange things on the Bowery. The Bowery! I’ll never go there anymore!” A buzzer over a gilded bar counter signaled an alarm that no one heeded.

  He dashed to a grand staircase in the back, nearly running over a Negro chambermaid.

  “Two men,” he said, “which way?”

  She nervously pointed up the staircase. He gripped his gun tightly, sprinting up the carpeted stairs. A long corridor led to a sign over a red door: EXIT- SUICIDE HALL. He picked up speed, ran up, and kicked the door open. He nearly fell through and had to grab onto the splintered jamb. The door was open to the outside, no balcony, only a twenty-foot drop straight down to a grotesque pile of garbage below. Petrosino saw the two men escaping down an alley. The curly-haired one looked back. It was his “cousin” from the Old Country: Paul.

  “Curse the fishes,” Petrosino said.

  Petrosino had worked up an angry sweat chasing Peter and Paul. He changed into a fresh suit and called into Headquarters to check wires, which made him late. On the way to Centre Street, he bought a copy of The World and skimmed an article titled, Barrel Murder Unsolved. There was no mention of the victim’s identity, but there wer
e foolish quotes from McClusky that the PD would tail any gang member freed on bail. Nothing like letting a crook know he was being shadowed, Petrosino thought. He hustled up the steps of the Criminal Courts Building, nodded past the police guard, and headed upstairs. It never crossed his mind that he should tell anyone about Peter and Paul. He imagined what they would say: Firecrackers? What’s next, Sergeant? Want we should make out a report of a dog bite? He was furious with himself for not being more careful. What if those had been real gunshots? Was he careless because he was with her?

  Jerome’s secretary waved him through the waiting room, and he went through another door into a lingering trail of tobacco smoke. He turned down a corridor of rooms for the assistant attorneys, clerks, process servers, and office boys. The last office door was blank, no stenciled letters on the smoky glass. He went in and was surprised to see District Attorney William Travers Jerome’s desk empty except for an engraved gold nameplate and three favorite reference books: the Bible, Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations, and a volume of celebrated speeches. In the far corner of the expansive room, four men sat at an octagonal table with a tray of bottles and glasses. Blue smoke and chatter curled around them and a chandelier over their table.

  A cigar in Chief Inspector McClusky’s jowls stopped mid-flap, and he nodded at Petrosino, who saluted. Deputy Commissioner Duff Piper was in his old plum suit, sitting across from the Chief, scratching his red beard. Garvan, the assistant district attorney, waved a pipe. District Attorney Jerome was shuffling cards. His light brown hair was pasted down and parted, turning white over his ears. A pince-nez clung to the bridge of his nose, and a small moustache covered his lip. He was neatly dressed in a slate grey suit, vest, and burgundy bowtie. A man of great dash who looked like he could fight the Devil with fire, Petrosino thought. He’d never met a man as sharp as Jerome, and he was secretly intimidated by him.

  Jerome stopped shuffling cards and motioned Petrosino in. There was an anthill of copper on the table, which Petrosino thought odd because Jerome had famously won his office by leading raids on gambling houses with a pistol in one hand and a hatchet in the other.

  “Don’t look so surprised, Joe, it’s just penny ante.” Jerome puffed a cigarette. “I may be a Reformer, but I like to gamble a bit myself. A man can get all the gambling he needs in a social game with friends instead of disorderly houses. Isn’t that right, Deputy?”

  “I suppose so,” Piper said, “if he’s winning. Why’s the little Dago here? Did an organ grinder lose his monkey?” He and McClusky laughed heartily.

  Piper’s playing the game, Petrosino thought. Good.

  “Have a seat, Detective.” Jerome dealt out a hand.

  Petrosino sat between Jerome and McClusky.

  “My father and Uncle Leonard taught me the game,” Jerome said. “But my mother was a very pious woman, and she said to me one day, ‘A great deal of time is wasted, dear, is there not, in playing cards?’ I said, ‘Yes, mother, there certainly is. In the shuffling and dealing.’”

  The men coughed out laughs in the smoke.

  “So, Deputy, we’re still in the dark about the victim’s identity,” Jerome said, smiling at Piper like President Roosevelt would. “Let’s hope Petrosino’s lead is good.”

  “I wouldn’t be a wee bit surprised if it’s another Dago,” Piper said. “They’re the niggers of Europe, what with all their fornicating and fighting.”

  Petrosino stood, pretending to sulk over Piper’ insult. He put his derby back on and pointed to the door. “Should I come back another time?”

  “Sit down, Detective,” Jerome said. “You’re not like the ones Duff’s talking about.”

  “Thick skin, lad, you’re a fine Dago.” Piper smiled through the red fur of his beard. He raised the pot and flipped over three cards, all hearts. “Who’d like to see the rest of my flush?”

  “Where’s the prisoner?” Petrosino asked.

  “We’ll bring him in after this hand,” Jerome said. “See if he’s credible.”

  “Speaking of credible,” Piper said. “Have I told you the story of the Dago applying for work at a dry goods house? His appearance wasn’t prepossessing, and references were demanded. After some hesitation, he gave the name of a driver in his prior boss’s employ to vouch for him. The driver was asked if the applicant was honest. ‘Honest?’ the driver says. ‘Why, his honesty’s been proved time and again. To my certain knowledge, he’s been arrested at least nine times for stealing and every time he was acquitted!’”

  They laughed and made bets. Jerome and Garvan folded. Piper bet all his copper, and McClusky called, flipping over three kings. Piper turned over four of his cards, all hearts. Then he lingered over the last card. He flipped over a red deuce and smiled dejectedly.

  “Two of diamonds! You four-flusher!” McClusky scooped up the pennies.

  “Time for me to go,” Piper said. “You’ve bankrupted me, George McClusky. I’d say you were a cheat, but that’s a given since you’re a Democrat.”

  McClusky didn’t like that comment and his brow sunk. Jerome chuckled and waved his hand in the air. “Come now, gentlemen. We’re a bipartisan poker board here. Yes?”

  “Sure, sure.” Piper tapped out burnt pipe tobacco into his drinking glass. “All those pennies lost, I’ll have to sell my little home, probably be living in a flophouse next week. You won’t have me to kick around anymore, Gentleman George.”

  Piper picked up his top hat and looked into it as he dusted ash from his beard.

  “Duff,” Jerome said, “my driver can take you back to the Palace.”

  “I don’t like to ride. I’m for walking on my two nice big police feet. But it’s the fashion in my set these days to show it off when you’re rich and powerful, ain’t that right, George? Not to hide your light under no bushels?” Piper shook everyone’s hand except Petrosino’s. “Don’t play cards with the Italian here, unless you want a knife in your back.” And he left.

  “Pay him no mind, Joe,” Jerome said. “The Deputy is a Republican and a bad bluffer. So have you got the goods on this barrel murder or not?”

  “I think so, sir,” Petrosino said.

  “Is it a copper riveted, air tight, lead pipe cinch?”

  “It better be,” McClusky interrupted. His breath smelled like sour milk, making Petrosino’s whiskey-scorched stomach gurgle. McClusky shot his hands out from the starched cuffs of his “dude” suit and straightened himself resentfully. “Petrosino and the Jew wasted our time on a wild goosehunt to start and now that corpse is rotting away at the Morgue.”

  Jerome exhaled a smoke ring. “Detective, what say the Buffalo police?”

  “I checked the wires,” Petrosino said. “The Buffalo dicks showed Madonnia’s wife a newspaper picture of the victim. She said it looked like her husband, but she won’t accept that he’s dead. She’s bed-sick with rheumatic fever, so they’re sending the eldest son. When his train gets in from Buffalo, I’ll take him to view the body.”

  “Let’s see if your witness is on the square first. Clear the cards off the table, and let’s bring him in. He said he’s ready to make some sort of deal.”

  Chapter 25

  Two guards brought Giuseppe De Priemo into Jerome’s office. He looked less beaten down, Petrosino thought. The fresh air and train ride had done him some good, and Warden Johnson must have seen to it that he arrived presentable. His zebra-stripe uniform was new and smelled of soap and sunshine. But his shriveled raisin of a mouth was chewing away at itself.

  “Mr. De Priemo, you look harmless enough,” Jerome said, leaning back, raking over the part in his hair. “Come now, have a seat. We haven’t got all day. I have tea appointments with some other criminals this afternoon. They’re all Tammany men.” McClusky growled an objection. “Only a jest, George.”

  De Priemo took short choppy steps as if he were still wearing leg irons. Jerome pointed to the chair directly across from him, and De Priemo glanced sideways at Petrosino and McClusky before he sat and ran his ha
nds along the glossy leather padding on the armrests.

  “You know why you’re here, Mr. De Priemo?”

  De Priemo nodded, leery. “Yes, sir, but before I spill my guts. . .” He pointed at Petrosino with his chin. “This cop said I can bargain for anything I like if I talk.”

  McClusky snarled. “Anything you like? The hell you say.”

  “I don’t like Sing Sing. I want to be in Erie County Prison close to my sister and my family. And I want more time in the yard-”

  With a diplomat’s smile, Jerome held up his palm, cigarette wedged halfway through it. “You’re a prudent man, De Priemo. A bargain depends on you. Are you prepared to tell us everything you know about the barrel victim? To tell us the whole truth? To swear an oath in court against your friends in a first degree murder case?”

  “Yes, sir, I am.”

  Jerome slapped the table and grinned. He called for a stenographer and lit another cigarette, smoldering away while the stenographer made ready and read the oath. Petrosino took out his butcher’s book to jot down anything useful.

  “Mr. De Priemo,” Jerome began, “do you know the man who was found in a barrel on East Eleventh Street and Avenue D in this city on April 14, 1903?”

  “I know him. He’s my brother-in-law, Benedetto Madonnia, from Buffalo. He came to Sing Sing to see me Saturday last. Said he would start back to Buffalo the next day.”

  “What route was he taking back?”

  “Said he was stopping in Wilkes-Barre, Pittsburgh, and maybe Chicago before Buffalo.”

  “I see. Hmm. And how do you know the victim is your brother-in-law?”

  “I saw his picture in the paper, and, well…” De Priemo put his index finger on his own cheekbone. “He has a scar on his face right here.”

  McClusky leaned forward in his chair, fists taut. Petrosino would’ve expected him to react differently on hearing a positive I.D. of the victim.