Elizabeth Street (17 page)

Giovanna’s laughter was so loud and hard, the baby kicked her in protest. Rubbing her hand over her growing belly, she laughed and whispered, “Scusi.” When she had realized five months ago that she was pregnant, it was the first time since Nunzio’s death that she truly felt happiness.

Giovanna and Rocco were two of hundreds of people packed onto benches in the Teatro Villa Giulia on Grand Street to watch the star of satire and
macchiette
, Eduardo Migliaccio. Known as “Farfariello”—“The Little Butterfly”—Migliaccio had finished his opening song, and already Giovanna was laughing so hard, tears rolled from her eyes. The Little Butterfly pranced across the stage in a spangled skirt, shaking his ample bosom and buttocks. Since arriving in New York, Giovanna had taken advantage of all the theater opportunities, but the
opera buffa
was her favorite.

Rocco didn’t really like satire, nor did he understand much of it, but he accompanied his wife because he was content to be with her. In the year since their marriage, he had grown fond of Giovanna. When Teresa and Pasqualina suggested he marry Giovanna, he readily agreed because he had already noticed her in the neighborhood and thought she was certain to be a good mother to his children. Little else entered into the decision. He was pleasantly surprised that, in addition to being all those things, she was a good companion and a good card player.

For Giovanna, the first few months were extremely difficult. She was uncomfortable around Rocco. Unlike Nunzio, he spoke rarely, and unlike her father, who also used words sparingly, you couldn’t tell what he was thinking. But he had not interfered in her decisions about how to run her life and home. He only grumbled when she sent Frances back to school and said nothing when she brought Mary with her to visit patients.

Once she conceived, her feelings for Rocco changed. His status rose from “partner” to the more permanent “father of her child.” They now had a bond beyond their marriage license. But sex with Rocco was perfunctory. It was quick, and Giovanna was grateful. And although she enjoyed the warmth that followed intercourse, she looked forward to the final months of her pregnancy when she could abstain and not be questioned.

Farfariello was marching across the stage with an enormous pasted-on mustache, a sash across his chest, and a saber over his shoulder, purloining Italian patriots. Next he became the “Iceman,” “Issaman” to Italian-Americans, singing bawdy Italian folk songs. The audience knew this routine signaled the end of the show and were already on their feet, clapping and cheering. Farfariello’s baritone stretched uncomfortably into a high note, and he exited stage right with a flourish. The crowd erupted into shouts and whistles.

Rocco protectively motioned his pregnant wife to sit for a few moments to avoid getting caught in the crush of the crowd, and they sat watching the stagehands while the audience filed out. Even before the applause ended, the stagehands had begun preparing for the next show.

A heavyset bald man struggled up a rope ladder to untie a drape from a truss. His younger counterpart called, “One more
cannolo
and we won’t be able to hoist you up there!”

The man ignored him, but another stagehand joked, “Leave Saint Carmine alone. All he has is the cream in his cannolo and his
ammoratas
on Mulberry Street!”

Without saying a word, Giovanna rose and, stepping over benches, made her way directly to the stage. Rocco, concerned and confused, caught up with her.

“It’s him!” she whispered to Rocco.

“Who?”

“Carmine. Nunzio’s friend.”

With her hands leaning on the stage, Giovanna called to the man on the rope ladder, “
Prego
, signore, are you Carmine?”

Without looking down, the man answered, “Why do you want to know?”

“Because I am—I was—the wife of Nunzio Pontillo.”

Carmine stopped untying a knot and looked down. He didn’t move.

“Saint Carmine,
che cosa fa?
What are you doing up there?” yelled one of the others.

Carmine climbed down the rope, slid off the stage, and turned to look at Giovanna, studying her face and scrutinizing her eyes. “Yes, yes, surely it is you.”

They met in the cafe the next morning before the matinee. Out of respect for Rocco, they met with Lucrezia chaperoning. Though they knew each other only through Nunzio’s letters, they reminisced as if they had known each other for years, their conversation punctuated by the stirring of their spoons in their espressos.

“Did you like that pasta pot drawing? He showed it to me before he mailed it.”

“I laughed so hard. It was in that same letter Nunzio told me it was you who named the first foreman ‘Linguine con Pomodoro’!”

Lucrezia was anxious to get to the heart of the matter. “Signore, Signora Siena is suing Brooklyn Union Gas and the construction company for negligence.”

Carmine leaned back in his chair and whistled. It only took him a moment to recover. “Good! Good for you!” A lawsuit, while within the confines of the system, appealed to his anarchist tendencies. “What can I do to help?”

The older woman continued, “Her lawyer needs to prove negligence. He has eyewitness testimony, the police reports, and the press, but he still doesn’t know precisely what they were doing wrong. Everyone said that Nunzio had doubts about the job and discussed them with you. Is that true?”

“Signora, you should consider becoming a lawyer yourself,” commented Carmine, appraising her with an interested eye. Lucrezia flashed him a “stop the nonsense” look, and he continued, although Giovanna could tell Lucrezia was flattered.

“Yes, it is true. I’ll tell you everything that I remember that wasn’t lost to liquor and sorrow,” answered Carmine dramatically.

Giovanna, with pencil poised, allowed Lucrezia to continue the questioning. Giovanna didn’t understand much of what Carmine said about timbers and compromised metal and load ratios, but she dutifully wrote it all down.

“You see, signora, your husband was smart,” said Carmine, tapping his temple with his finger. “He knew from the start that they were constructing that floor ass backwards, and then he knew that they were trying to lower it in a dangerous way.”

“Did he tell anyone that?” asked Giovanna.

“Of course! And the foreman called him a stupid dago that should mind his own business.”

Giovanna winced at the thought of her maestro husband being treated with disrespect. “Why didn’t he leave the job?”

“Signora, I think you’ve been here long enough to know you do not leave a steady job with good pay. Besides, at first he thought that they knew something he didn’t and it would soon all make sense. When it didn’t, I think he figured the job was engineered by asses, but he didn’t know it was going to kill him.”

Carmine dug in his pocket. “Here, take these tickets to the show. I have to go, but I’m here for a few more days if you need to ask me anything.”

“Carmine,” whispered Giovanna as he rose, “grazie…” She tried to say more, to thank him for finding Nunzio’s body, for his loyalty, but she could not. Since becoming pregnant, she couldn’t control her emotions the way she usually could and did not want to chance crying in public.

“Say nothing, signora. It has been my honor,” answered Carmine, sweeping his cap with a flourish. Giovanna could see tears in Carmine’s eyes.

When Giovanna and Lucrezia reported on their meeting to Signore DeCegli, he insisted that they bring Carmine to his office to swear an affidavit. The lawyer felt he had to get what he could, even if it was the testimony of a dead man delivered secondhand by a traveling show-man. Unable to locate Supervisor Mulligan, who was no longer with the company, and certain that there was no complete set of blueprints for the project, although he had subpoenaed them months ago, Signore DeCegli felt he had little to make a case.

DeCegli was born in America. In fact, if he didn’t say his last name, or had changed it like many of his colleagues had, he could “pass.” He had been drawn back to his old neighborhood to practice in part because his parents were still there and in part because he believed that with a good lawyer, an Italian immigrant in the American justice system would be treated the same as any American. This case was forcing him to question his conviction.

Ironically, up until now, his belief hadn’t been tested. By locating himself in an Italian community, most of his cases were Italians vs. Italians, because he was a civil attorney whose work consisted mainly of business disagreements and the occasional divorce. This was the first time he had come up against an American monolith and had to conduct anything resembling a criminal investigation. While he knew his unfamiliarity in these matters was not helping, he also knew that no amount of experience would get him past the closed doors and roadblocks. He felt stymied at every turn. Not wanting to risk the wrath of a giant, he had decided not to sue Brooklyn Union Gas and instead made the construction company, Taylor, Wood & Co., the sole defendant. But the giant was protecting its minion and had put all its legal and engineering expertise at the construction company’s disposal.

From the workers he was able to track down and interview, he knew that they would probably have to be treated as hostile witnesses because they were so afraid. If Signore DeCegli ever had any doubt about whether this was a case of negligence, it was erased when he saw the fear that had been instilled in these men, and when he learned that his key witness had conveniently disappeared. It was rare that a man of the supervisor’s stature could disappear without a trace. Even if Mulligan had left one afternoon months after the accident, never to return, as Taylor, Wood & Co. attested, it was clear the company had no interest in finding him or the files he supposedly stole. DeCegli’s case was further encumbered by the fact that the murder weapon, the steel floor that had crushed Nunzio Pontillo, was now covered in thousands of cubic yards of gas and would never be seen again until the tanks were demolished during someone else’s lifetime.

The greatest difficulty, however, was that without the qualified testimony of respected engineers, all the evidence was circumstantial. But the money to pay for expert testimony was only part of the problem. Signore DeCegli had approached a number of engineers on a speculative basis, and while they used the excuse of no payment upfront to turn down the job, the lawyer knew it was more likely because they were unwilling to go up against a giant. All of his testimony was from Italian laborers. Could he expect the same system that didn’t value their lives to believe their testimony?

DeCegli was tempted to close the case but knew that if he did, the signora would somehow continue it on her own. That thought frightened him for two reasons: First, he had grown fond of the signora and feared for her safety, and second, given her determination and intelligence, she could possibly humiliate him by succeeding.

After reviewing the affidavit that Giovanna had compiled for the tenth time, Signore DeCegli saw something in “Pretty Boy” Mariano’s story that ignited a spark. If they couldn’t afford their own expert witnesses, they would use the experts at Taylor, Wood & Co.

James Wood, one of the principals of the company, was a former engineer known for his brash style and his ability to “get them up faster than anybody.” Brooklyn Union Gas awarded Taylor, Wood the contract because they were under pressure to meet the demand for gas in the burgeoning city. DeCegli felt certain that it had been Wood on the phone with Mulligan that day.

James Wood walked up the five flights to Signore DeCegli’s office in disgust. Not only was he furious that he had been summoned to New York in this preposterous matter, he was resentful that he was forced to pay the high hourly rates of the lawyer who huffed and puffed behind him. Answering the rap on the door, DeCegli welcomed them in. Heads rotating, disgust palpable, the men sat without being asked. The court reporter was not introduced and remained a fixture in the corner chair.

“Let’s get on with this, shall we?” pronounced Wood, by way of introduction.

Seeing Wood’s irritation and revulsion, DeCegli realized he had the upper hand and decided to lengthen the proceedings as much as possible in hopes of getting Wood to say something in anger that he would later regret.

DeCegli drew out the perfunctory questions. But when he saw the relish Wood took in reciting his credentials and that he was gaining strength from his belief in his own importance, DeCegli moved on to questions concerning the timeline and building of the gas tanks.

After a technical question, which Wood answered in arrogant detail, DeCegli quickly asked, “Did you speak with Supervisor Mulligan on the morning of the accident?”

“Yes.”

“How many times before the accident did you speak with him?”

“I don’t know, possibly three.”

“And what was the nature of those calls?”

“This was two years ago.”

“Yes, of course. Let me be more specific. Did Supervisor Mulligan express any concern about the procedure and safety of lowering this disc?”

“He was a man predisposed to worry. He left the company soon after.”

“Yes, I know. However, he had been with the company for ten years. I suppose his worry was not worrisome until this incident.”

“That is not a question, sir!” objected Wood’s lawyer.

“Excuse me. What precisely were Supervisor Mulligan’s objections to the method in which he had been instructed to lower the disc?”

“I don’t remember.”

“Sir, may I remind you, since the surroundings do not, that you are under oath.”

“I told you, he worried a great deal.”

“And I repeat, what was his worry?”

“That the disc would slip on its descent.”

“And by slip, do you mean fall?’

“That was his assessment, not mine.”

“If he was afraid of the disc falling, that would explain his reluctance to put men under the two hundred tons of steel, yes?”