The Murderous Muddle On Murray Hill, --- Chapter 2...

                                                                                2.           

    “Hey, Maria. Here’s your birthday present.”  Smiling, Carol shoved a cat in my arms. The pretty little gray tabby and white kitty had a round furry face, a round body, velvety ears; her big round eyes were the yellow-green color of Ma's delicious pea and lentil soup. She blinked, looked at me benignly with her little pink tongue sticking out a bit.

   “I was coming home from work.” Carol was a secretary for the law firm of Grassi, Adelman, Ekhardt, Stefano and Pucci. She was sort of sweet on Victor Pucci, even though Vic seemed to have lots of other girls. (Carol has really lousy taste in men.)  “There was this sign outside a house saying, ‘Free Kittens’.”

   “This ain’t a kitten, Carol,” I said.  “It’s a full grown cat.”

   “I know. I know, Maria, but she’s not very old and the lady said all the cute little kittens were gone and she wanted to find a home for the mama cat. She said she wasn’t having no more kittens, not ever again. So, I got this great cat you. Enrico won’t have no problem getting along with her because she’s a girl and, anyway, you can have her fixed like Enrico is.”

  “Thanks,” I said.  I added, “You’re so unbelievably cheap, Carol. You got a birthday present for me for free.”

  Carol smiled. "Oh, it was even better than that! The lady gave me five bucks to take her. She was desperate.”

  The cat rubbed against my chest. “Her name’s Thomasina. You can see she’s a real nice cat,” Carol remarked.

   Thomasina truly was a very, very nice cat, so sweet that I sometimes called her "Dolly-baby". I put the cat down on the sofa and she immediately began licking one of her beautiful white front paws and swiping it over her ears.

   Ma came rushing into the living room. She looked flustered, her face showing two red spots on her cheeks, her eyes round and worried. She crossed herself. "Ignacio Barille got shot and the girl who was delivering him groceries got shot too! The girl's name is Rita Esposito."

   "Rita Esposito, I know her," Carol said. 

   "Yeah, so do I, although not too well. Rita's real bad news. She came into our beauty school to get her hair dyed by us students, dyed blond, she said, so she'd look tougher."

   Ma looked surprised. "Tougher?"

   "Yeah, tougher," I said. "Rita wanted to do some soldiering,' but she was told she couldn't because she's a girl."

   "What? Soldiering?" Ma looked surprised.

   "You must know, Ma, soldiering for John Scalish," Carol remarked, "It gets you respect,"

   "Hush! Where do you hear about such things?," Ma asked.

   Carol shrugged. "It ain't hard if you keep your ears even a little open."

   "You don't need your ears open to badness!" Ma sighed. "I seem to remember that the Espositos have three girls. Jorge Esposito works for the Santori Dairy, such a nice man," Ma added.

   "Nice, then, he probably don't approve at all of the way Rita's going." Carol was brushing cat fur off her black orlon sweater. It was a beautiful cardigan sweater, and the style was to wear those kind of sweaters backwards so the buttons were all up your back. 

   Of course, the guys loved this way girls wore a cardigan because they could easily remove the sweater when they were making out with them. For a while, in school cafeteria it was considered the height of witticism by scumbags to sneak up to a girl and quickly pop the hooks of her bra through the back of her sweater or blouse. Naturally, the girl would be furious, and turn on the jerk who did this while everybody laughed. Finally, some girl who had this done to her angrily asked one of these jokesters, --- "Hey, creepo, do you ever think you might go out with any of the girls in this school?" The jokester said, "Sure," all smart-ass and repulsive. "Wrong!," she said. "NO girl is ever going to want to go out with you, if she saw what you just DID! You freak, --- get your cooties away from here!"  And, most of the kids clapped. That basically put an end to the bra popping. 

   Carol waved lazily as she headed for the upstairs. Ma frowned at me. "That shooting happened only a half hour ago!" (News always travels fast on the Hill.) "Ignacio is dead, dead! They think Rita will live! You know Martin Hubert, such a polite young man, he was an officer who was there, and he told his mother that she should tell me, owing that Ignacio is my cousin by marriage. (Each generation of our family has multiple cousins... Ma had practically numerous cousins and also even more cousins by marriage, here and back in Italy.) It was a drive-by shooting. Imagine, Ignacio and the girl were just there, peacefully, and they drilled them, bang-bang-bang-bang-bang-bang! And, and, Ignacio was stone cold dead and Rita's arm was almost shot clean off!"

   I nodded. "Awful! Ummm, Rita was only delivering groceries?" Ignacio Barille was a bookie, among other things. And, Rita, well, I think she was capable of anything.

She'd really be boiling, fucking mad if her shooting arm was damaged.

   Ma continued, "Holy Mother in heaven, I don't know what this neighborhood is coming to! Why, these things didn't happen twenty years ago!"

   I just looked at her, astonished; "these things" had been happening for a long time on the Hill! Ma was at the age when some of her younger years were seeming to be the "good old days". Or, I really think she was maybe in denial most of her life. Lf course, he grew up in southern Italy, in an area of centuries and centuries of abuse on multiple levels, of ancient blood feuds, of corrupt officials and vigilante justice because of mass injustice. Of course, I knew her and pa came to America to have a much better life in general, and also to get away from all that, but it some of it just met them here again, anyway.  

   "Ma," I said, gently, "Iggy Barille had his thumbs in lots and lots of sticky, ooky pies. He was  'made' when he was in his twenties."

   She just stared at me, aghast. "How do you know such awful things?"

   "Pa and Uncle Carmine told me. They told me all sorts of stuff, about the Portello brothers and Lonardo brothers too, and Frank Milano, and more."

   "Stop, stop, Maria, forget all that, just forget it!"  Ma frowned, raised her eyes to heaven, crossed herself.

   "It's interesting," I said. 

   "Why, why? Your father, he shoulda kept such things to himself, and your Uncle Carmine, he was always such a wild one, --- your father and the people he knew! Your father's mouth was always too loose! Although, you father and me kept our precious children away from that kind of life! Yes!... People who are smart don't go around talking about such evil things! Tale male, tale corruzione!" (Such evil!! Such corruption!)

   "Ma, the Families are no secret. There are five of them. Yeah, the five main families, the big original New York families: the Columbos, Gambinos, Bonannos, Luccheses and the Genoveses. And, in Chicago starting with Johnny Torrio and Al Capone and the Capone brothers. Then, there's all the stuff here in Cleveland, that started during Prohibition too. Ma, I went to school with Charley and Angela Pinna, and Eva, Larry and Eddie Bellomo and Johnny, Frankie and Louie Occhipinti. And, you know, Carol and me, everybody in school, really, was always, always surrounded by all the Sanno kids."

   "Hush, hush, hush!  I told and told and told and told your father we shoulda sent you and your sister to a convent for you to be educated there! We shoulda found a good convent somewhere, and sent you and your sister away to there! But, it never did no good to talk to your father about this! Stupido sciocco! Oh, no, no, no, you both always went to public school, with all those wild kids and wild boys, where you had that scare when you were only fifteen, and you missed your period, for two whole months!"

(Murray Hill School, --- Murray Hill Rd., Little Italy.) 

   "Ma, it was stress, just simple stress from when Chuck Keller broke up with me because he spent that weekend with his father and brothers in New York City and met another girl."

   "Yes! He met a very fast girl there, in Brooklyn, in Bensonhurst. He met Susan. He met Susan Ann Mastrofrancesco there, where all those Mastrofrancescos live!" Ma knew most of the people in Bensonhurst, and a lot in Williamsburg, which was part of Brooklyn too. Both she and Pa had and have scads and scads and scads of relations there. Ma's eyes were intense. "There are a lot of Irish in Bensonhurst."

   "Chuck's mother was Italian."

   "Oh, do we know her family?'

   "She was a Castellano."

   "Really?" Ma suddenly looked shocked.

   "I don't think they were those Castellanos."

   "Maria, la famiglia è sempre la famiglia." (Otherwise, --- THE FAMILY is always THE FAMILY. )  "They are so, so old, the ways of the Family, I mean, you, you would have to be born there to feel it, for hundreds of years, --- the hatred and the vendettas, such violence, such cruelty, a type of life." Ma shuddered. (This wasn't the first time I'd seen her afraid, remembering her girlhood in Italy.)

   "Sure. Right, right. Sure." Ma was totally, totally right. I couldn't really understand. I was shaped by being first generation American, in much safer Cleveland, protected by strong and tough United States laws. And, Ma and Pa were shaped by growing up in a society, and a government too, that was soiled by feudal-era-type stuff, --- the vicious harsh landlord and "whipped dog" oppressed serf crap. Yeah, Ma was still afraid of all that Old World abuse she'd suffered. 

   She put her hand over her heart. Her breathing was fast."Oh, Santa Rosalia, proteggi!'  She raised her eyes to heaven again, crossed herself again and passionately kissed a medal around her neck that was with her gold cross. She scowled. "Back then, back then, when you were, you were only in tenth grade, You were a hardly more than a baby and I thought you were pregnant!" 

   "Yeah, yeah, it was a real bad scare." I never told her that would have been impossible because I was still a virgin.

   She narrowed her eyes at me. "It didn't seem to scare you that much, Maria. It didn't scare you near enough."  Ma looked suddenly very nervous. She put a hand out, palm up toward me. She shook her head. "Don't tell me about personal things. I don't wanna think about them.

   We'd had the big, big sex talk years ago, about me keeping myself pure for my husband. And, all during the talk I was wondering, worrying, hoping Ma wouldn't have a stroke. I'd never been so uncomfortable in my life. 

   Now, she shook her finger at me. "That Chuck Keller was no good! I don't care if he was the star quarterback on the football team!"

   "I know."

   "He had those bright blue eyes and wavy, thick black hair, those 'black Irish' good looks! I'm so glad you didn't marry him!"

   "I had no intention of marrying him."

   She put her chin up. "I'd prefer you marry one of our's."

   "A man with a strong Italian background."

   "Yes, far better we stick to our own."

   I felt sassy. "Would you arrange a marriage for me?"

   Ma's eyes got huge, and soft. "Oh, Maria, I can think of some wonderful young men, from wonderful families, who would make you such a fine husband! Of course, I would love to help you get married!... Si, si, I could call Missus Pesce! She could help us! Missus Pesce has such a high success rate, such wonderfl matches she has arranged!"

   I immediately felt mean, and was a little ashamed of myself. "Ma, no, really, I was just teasing! I'd never accept an arranged marriage, never! Please! And, not Missus Pesce!" Ma looked defensive. She put her hands on her hips and leaned forward. "And, what's wrong with Missus Pesce?" "MA!... Missus FISH, her name means FISH!" "So, so what if it does?" "Ma, Missus Pesce, the matchmaker!..."   Anyway, I don't want to get married, not to nobody."

   "You say that now! But, you'll change your mind plenty in five years, like your sister did!  Your sister should have had a baby right away, but, no, no, she had to wait! Albert was so weak to allow himself to be convinced by Carol to wait to start a baby! And, your brothers Anthony and Paul, Anthony's so wild and I think there's something wrong with Paul and Helen, married for years and years, and no kids! I should be enjoying a grandchild now! My sisters Teresa, Regina, Barbara, Olivetta and Gianna, and my brothers Savatore, Francis and Julius. they all have grandchildren! I have none, not even one tiny bambino! And, and, mia cara piccola Rosa, dead, all these years, at, at her birth, because, all because I went into labor in the fields, so quick, and I couldn't..."       

   I knew that Ma had a baby when she was very, very young, and for years she and Pa thought she'd never have another, and then Paulie came. Ma bent over like she felt sick. I put a hand on her shoulder. "I know, Ma," I whispered. 

   Ma sunk her teeth in her bottom lip. "No, you don't know! And, you'll never know everything! Nonna knows everything, all of it, but she'll never, ever, ever tell!"     

   Ma's eyes got huge, and she seemed to be going back, way back to those days when she was pregnant with her first child. Tears formed in her eyes, hanging on her lower lids. Her voice was such a whisper I could hardly hear it. "I was a beautiful young girl, so beautiful, so young, so innocent, just a child myself!

Una vergogna, una tale vergogna, ma io ero una ragazzina indifesa e lui era il signore, il proprietario del nostro piccolo pezzo di terra!" 

   Ma said it very fast and so soft. Did she say that she was with child by the owner of their little old country farm? What? What? Ma was raped? Then, she seemed to come back to the present. She cleared her throat, straightened, looked at me sternly."You will get married, Maria!" 

  I too cleared my throat. "My sister made a bad marriage!," I said. "I'll never do anything like my sister does, including getting married young and to maybe the wrong guy, and I especially don't want to be tied down even more by having a baby right away!"

   Ma frowned again. "A decent marriage is what you need. Such a marriage would settle you. And, I don't want to hear about your sister's marriage. Sometimes, a woman has a very, very hard bed and she has to lie in it! But, I won't have you disgracing our family with, with people talking about you! So, you need to be married soon. The sooner the better!. At least Paul has a good, although probably barren, woman." Ma sighed, deeply. "Uh, I'm taking Nonna with me in a little while. We're going over to the Barille's. Donna is so upset, her and Ignacio being married for so long, and such a sweet love match." 

   Ma left the room. In a bit she came back; Nonnie followed her wearing one of her better black dresses, one with trim, along with black patent leather pumps, instead of her sensible everyday lace-up black shoes. Nonnie smiled gently at me and playfully waggled her fingers. 

   Nonnie loved excitement, no matter what it was, even drive-by shootings, and funerals and weddings, burning buildings and houses, break-ins, car wrecks, engagements, birthings, christenings, church events. (Every year we had The Feast Of The Assumption, a four day street festival in August, only a month away now, centered on our Holy Rosary Church. It was a big deal with the parade, a band with trumpets, trombones and tubas, folks dressed in the Italian colors of green, white and red and in native costumes, and lots of pretty fireworks.)

And, Nonnie loved charity fund raisers, close out sales and flea markets, parties, reunions and dances, epidemics, tornados and thunderstorms, skinned knees and splinters, flooding sinks and toilets, car trouble, long phone calls, bus trips, lost dogs who were happily found again, litters of cute newborn kittens, a squirrel stuck in the chimney, and, of course, any and all gossip. Gossip, gossip, gossip was always fascinating, the main pastime on the Hill.

   And, don't think Nonnie was "noodles-in-her-head" because she loved that stuff. She was just plain smart, sharp as the old fashioned pearl handled straight razor Pa used to shave with, and more than that; she was wise. I just think Nonnie was totally, bored, that her life in Italy had been so tedious, hard and sad that she was forever and ever starved for any kind of diversion or fun. 

--- Copyright by Antoinette Beard/Sorelle Sucere 2021.