The Penny Ferry - Rick Boyer (12 page)

"How do you know, Joe?" I asked.

"
'Cause the asterisk was still there in the
log, indicating a nondelivery. Sam said that before he called me back
just now he called Andy's number. No answer. Now I'm going to try
again."

And he did. Still no answer.

"Doc," he said wearily, "are you
beginning to get the same queasy feeling I am?"

"
Yep. I assume you're thinking that the guy in
the chimney just might be—"

"Andrea Santuccio. The guy who was supposed to
take possession of the papers but who wasn't there to get them."

"Where's that body now? In Boston?"

"It's en route from a Lowell funeral home to the
Suffolk County morgue, where the autopsy will continue in greater
detail. It may be there already. I'm going to make sure some locals
from Hanover Street get a look at the corpse. Now."

So he got on the phone again to Ten-Ten Comm. Ave. to
have some bluecoats from the North End take a peek at the grisly body
we'd found in the chimney. But it wasn't necessary. As soon as the
remains had come into the morgue it was identified. A subsequent
check with dental records confirmed that the man was indeed Andrea
Santuccio, son of the late and renowned Dominic.

"Well," sighed Joe as he twiddled a pencil
between his big fingers, "at least we know why Johnny was
killed, though it'll be small comfort to Sam."

"And a lot of us policemen," said Brian.
"Can you work up some sort of scenario on this thing?"

Joe rubbed,his stubble and thought for a minute. His
face darkened.

"
Old Dom Santuccio had those papers for years.
He always claimed he'd uncover some kind of evidence that would clear
Sacco and Vanzetti. But he obviously never did or he'd have been
pounding on the governor's door night and day, shouting and
screaming. Old Dom was quite a character- a fire-eater. Finally,
about a year before he died— he had the cancer already and was on
all kinds of drugs— he said he'd have a great announcement to make.
One that would shake the world. Trouble is, nobody would believe him.
Including me. He was batty by then from the pain and the drugs. Then
he had a stroke and lost his speech and most of his memory. Andy had
to hospitalize him because he got so violent. Now I say this, and I
don't like to, being Italian: if there's anything hot in that pack of
papers, I'm afraid it's something that drives the last nail in the
coffin of Sacco and Vanzetti. If not, then why didn't he let it out?"

"
Why did he will the papers to the library
then?"

"He didn't. After he died, his son, Andy,
donated them."

"Now wait," said Brian. "Is there
anyone who'd go haywire if they knew the stuff had gone into the
public domain? If so, they'd be mighty annoyed at Andy. Mad enough to
kill him."

We all considered in silence for a minute. Then Joe
cleared his throat and raised his big bloodhound eyes up at us.

"Okay. Assuming the evidence is damning— and I
can reach no other conclusion— then there's only one logical
candidate for a group who'd get totally unglued at the mere thought
of its revelation."

"Who?" asked Brian. .

"Ever hear of the Sons of Italy?"

"Oh no. No way," I said.

"That's what I hope too. After all, I'm a
lifetime member."

"Say it ain't so, Joe," I said.

"I hope— I hope to God it ain't so, Doc."

There was more silence. Then Brian spoke.

"Wait a minute, Joe. Wasn't Andy in Sons of
Italy?"

"Sure. One of the real leaders, and so— oh
shit. I see what you mean. They certainly wouldn't harm him. In fact,
the Sons wouldn't hurt anybody . . . I don't think."

"Here's what happened," I said. "After
old Dom's death Andy, being a good citizen and interested in the case
and his father's lifelong passion, donates the papers. Fine. Then
sometime later, and we'll probably never know how, he discovers that
there's something hot in the papers: a potential bombshell. He has to
get the papers back to save the last vestiges of Sacco and Vanzetti's
tarnished reputation. Because if scholars dig out the facts and
publish them, every American, and especially every Italian-American,
will have to face the truth— that Sacco and Vanzetti were indeed
robbers and killers. Right?"

"That's it. So far so good . . . But, he also
knows that somebody else wants the papers. Or else why hire Johnny
Robinson?"

"Yeah, but who wants them?"

"I don't know," said Joe. "But I've
seen the archives room at the Boston Public and it's a virtual vault.
The people who wanted the papers would have to take them from Andy
after he got them back, or else during the delivery itself."

"It would seem to me that taking them from Andy
would be easier and safer," I said.

"Yeah, but you don't know the North End like I
do. It's the tightest of all the Boston neighborhoods. Maybe they
thought pulling something against Santuccio on his home turf would be
very risky, so they took or lured young Andy away from the meeting
with Johnny. Maybe they thought he already had the packet. Under
interrogation, he tells them it's on its way via courier, but one
glance at Johnny and the dogs and the thugs know it's no-can-do. So
they know if Johnny can't make contact he'll either leave the packet
at Dependable's office or take it home, where they set up the
ambush—"

"Doesn't sound right," I said. "Let's
suppose that by eleven in the morning the bad guys already have
custody of Andy away from his house. He tells them the drop is being
made right then, and they're too late to connect. He describes Johnny
to them— maybe they're already familiar with how formidable he is—
and they set the ambush with the bomb by early afternoon. One or two
guys are in Robinson's place waiting. Another guy, stations himself
at the Santuccio house to see if Johnny comes back, which he does at
around five. Still no Andy, so he leaves and starts home. He stops to
call my office, knowing I'm waiting for the bridge. At that time he
discovers he's being shadowed."

"
Right!"

"Okay. So he's struck out twice with an
important meeting with Andy and thinks he's being tailed. 'A
complication, dontcha know,' he says. He's put two and two together
and it spells trouble. But he's cool; he's been through worse. He
does stop at Dependable to drop off the log sheet and get into his
Cutlass to head for home. He takes his pouch with him because he
wants to touch base with Andy, and me, over the weekend. Probably the
lookout notices this, and calls ahead to some guy waiting; near a pay
phone in Lowell. Johnny's coming home with his pouch: get ready."

"Yeah. So the hit goes pretty much the way we
figured it. As soon as he's dead they take Johnny's pouch and skip.
They kill the Santuccio boy so he won't talk, and as an afterthought
remove two of his digits."

"
Would you guys tell me what's happening?"
asked Brian. So we did. And he thought about it. .

"But you said the boy was tortured too. That's
terrible. It also has to be explained. Why torture the kid? Who would
want to do that?"

"Hatred," said Joe.

"Maybe. But that's only one of the three reasons
for torture," said Brian. "The other two are information,
and the verification of information."

"Ah yes. Well then, they tortured him in order
to find out about Johnny and how to get their hands on the packet,"
I said.

"Maybe," he said, "or maybe it
happened afterward . . . Maybe they tortured and killed him as a last
resort because they didn't get what they wanted."

"
They got it," said Joe. "We know they
got the pouch; we can't find it anywhere. Neither can Sam."

Brian Hannon, set fire to a Lucky, inhaled deeply,
and let the smoke stream out his nostrils like a dragon.

"Mmmmm. You can't Find it. But that doesn't mean
for sure that the bad guys have it. Yet. Johnny was no dumbbell. He
was cool and sharp. Maybe he stashed the pouch at the last second.

Who knows? All I say is, I say the torture thing is
not only ugly, it's mysterious. It needs explaining. If I were you,
Joe, I'd hang in there like a sash weight. Go at it tooth and nail;
I'll help any way I can."

We got up and left the chief's office. But Joe ducked
back in to thank Brian, which I thought was nice. Then he said:
"About that ballistics test performed at the Dedham trial. I
just want you to know a few things about it, Brian, because like any
cop I'm aware of how decisive they are nowadays. This was the first
ballistics test and comparative analysis of fired bullets ever
performed. The guy who did the test was a Massachusetts state cop,
like me. His name was Captain William Proctor. My boss remembers him.
Anyway, the results proved that one of the fatal bullets could have
been fired from the pistol Sacco was carrying at the time of his
arrest. Could have. What they didn't give Proctor a chance to say was
that it could have been Fired from any thirty-two-caliber automatic.
Later investigations by the defense showed that the spent cases had a
peculiar mark on them made by an ejector claw common only to
foreign-made automatics. Sacco carried a Colt. The defense later
showed that the pistol that tired the bullet probably belonged to
Antonio Mancini, a professional killer and member of the Morelli gang
of Providence."

Brian stared dumbstruck during this discourse. Then
Joe and I headed for Old Stone Mill Road. I had a question that was
gnawing at me.

"Joe, if the defense proved that the bullet was
probably tired by this other guy, then why didn't they let Sacco and
Vanzetti off?"

"Because they had already been electrocuted.
Read the books on the case, Doc. It's not very pretty. The whole
thing makes the Commonwealth look like a ninety-pound pile of dog
doo."

Mary was out shopping. I made a big sandwich for my
brother-in-law, and while he ate lunch I drank two mugs of coffee and
ate half a banana and some yogurt. While we ate I asked him lots of
questions about the Sacco-Vanzetti case. Then he left for Ten-Ten
Comm. Ave., taking the tapes with him. I returned to my office to
look at X-rays and do preliminary work on a mandible resection that I
was to perform the following week. After all my appointments I
stopped at the library before going home , and emerged with seven
books, all about Sacco and Vanzetti.

Quite a case.
 
 

CHAPTER SEVEN

Tom Costello was miserable, and irritable.

"But the insurance will cover everything, Tom.
Every buck."

"Great! But what about me? Know how thilly I
thound over the phone?"

"I've still got the casts; it won't take as long
as the first time."

We made the necessary appointments for the rebuilding
of the anterior bridge. It would take a lot of extra time and neither
of us was happy about it. I would not bill him for the extra hours it
would cost me, of course. As he was leaving I asked him what he knew
about Sacco and Vanzetti. He harangued me for twenty minutes about
what a raw deal they'd gotten, mostly because they were Italians.
Considering his name was Costello, it figured. But then I bumped into
Jim DeGroot at the liquor store. I asked ; him and he shrugged his
shoulders, saying that if a Massachusetts court found them guilty and
all the appeals and motions of delay and new trials didn't work, then
they probably were guilty.

"But what's the sense in talking about it now?
They're dead anyway, right?"

Figured.

Then I asked Moe Abramson, and he said that he pitied
not only the two innocent men who were sent to their deaths but the
whole sick and bigoted Yankee-WASP establishment plutocracy that set
them up. Then he went into a discourse on punishment and guilt, and
quoted by memory whole passages from Dostoevski, Freud, Malraux, and
others.

Figured.

"You know who I think really convicted them,
even more than that bastard judge Thayer? It was the jury foreman,
Ripley. He hated Italians. He was a cop who wanted more than anything
to 'get the dagos.' Can you imagine allowing ga jury like that? They
should've had some Jews on that jury. It never would have happened."

"Why?"

"Simple. Of all the people who have suffered
from prejudice and persecution, we've suffered the most. But we're
not like the other groups, who then can't wait to dish out hatred to
the next bunch of unfortunates. The Jews don't do that. We've never
done that and never will; we stay with the underdog. Listen Doc, more
than anyone else it was two Jewish men who tried to get Sacco and
Vanzetti off the hook: Felix Frankfurter and Herbert Ehrmann. Wanta
see my new tank?"

"No."

"Get in here this instant." He held his
office door open and I followed reluctantly. I stayed two feet behind
him and got ready to shield my eyes. The new tank was high and narrow
and filled with bright coral fans. Several brilliantly colored fish
wafted about. Surprise, surprise; Moe's taste was improving.

"Salt water," he said. "Those are
tangs. Nice, eh?"

"Great. I'm surprised that you—"