to help her brother when they heard of his imprisonment; he had hurried down to New York to see a lawyer, then journeyed on to Sing Sing to visit Di Priemo. But his purpose was simply to request that his brother-in-law be moved to the penitentiary at Erie, Pennsylvania, where it would be much easier for his family to visit him.
Petrosino persisted. He had experience with interrogation and knew when to hold back information and just when to reveal it. By the time that he had laid out all the police and the Secret Service knew about Benedetto, Lucy Madonia had been compelled to agree that her husband was indeed acquainted with a group of Sicilians in New York. He had “gone out on the road” for them, she admitted, shuttling by rail from Pittsburgh to Chicago and Buffalo. What exactly Madonia had done on his visits to those cities Lucy did not know, she said, but the Secret Service men to whom Petrosino showed her statement on his return to Manhattan recognized the route as one often employed by counterfeiters. This tied in well with the anonymous letter writer’s claim that Madonia had a conviction, at home in Sicily, for passing forged bills.
Mrs. Madonia had one more thing to tell Petrosino. Her brother, Di Priemo, she confided, had written to her more than a month ago to say he was in trouble. Soon after that, he had cabled urgently for funds. From somewhere, her husband had raised a thousand dollars—a large sum, and one he dared not send directly. With Di Priemo in custody pending his trial, Benedetto had instead addressed his envelope to an acquaintance in New York. Enclosed with the money was a note instructing the man to take the cash and hand it to a man in a Prince Street saloon.
It was what happened next, Lucy thought, that had sent her husbandto his death. Her husband’s friends had received the money safely, but they had done precisely nothing to help Di Priemo, neither hiring him a lawyer nor using the cash to bring influence to bear to save him. Nor would they return the unspent dollars to Madonia. Inquiries, and, eventually, letters of entreaty, had no effect on them. In the end the Buffalo stonemason decided that his only chance of recovering the cash was to visit New York himself.
Then Mrs. Madonia added something else, something that made Petrosino start. There was one man, the widow said, who might know why Benedetto had been killed. Her husband had mentioned his name to her, just once, when they were debating how to help Di Priemo. A man called Giuseppe Morello, Madonia had whispered, was the head of a “great society, a secret society, of which he himself was a member, but Morello was against him and would do nothing to aid her brother.”
Petrosino knew what that meant. It meant the maimed, implacable Morello was no mere counterfeiter with a ruthless streak.
He was something much more frightening. He was boss of the New York Mafia.
CHAPTER 2
MEN OF RESPECT
T HE MAFIA, LIKE GIUSEPPE MORELLO HIMSELF, WAS BORN IN WESTERN Sicily in the 1860s. It rooted and took shape in a land of stark beauty, grinding poverty, and frequent violence, insinuating its way into the fabric of the island until it exercised a malign, corrupting influence over most aspects of Sicilian life. It became—for the best part of a century—the richest and most successful criminal organization in the world. Yet it remained at base a study in enormous contradictions.
The Mafia was a secret society whose existence was known to every man and woman on the island. Its name was familiar to tens of thousands but was never spoken by its members. It stood for justice—or so it promised its initiates—in places where justice was hard to find, but in reality it worked hand in hand with the landed nobility to keep down Sicily’s miserable peasantry. It worshipped honor but lusted after profit—and though, in New York, the society claimed to offer protection to the lowly immigrant, the truth was that, as late as 1920, it preyed
Petrosino persisted. He had experience with interrogation and knew when to hold back information and just when to reveal it. By the time that he had laid out all the police and the Secret Service knew about Benedetto, Lucy Madonia had been compelled to agree that her husband was indeed acquainted with a group of Sicilians in New York. He had “gone out on the road” for them, she admitted, shuttling by rail from Pittsburgh to Chicago and Buffalo. What exactly Madonia had done on his visits to those cities Lucy did not know, she said, but the Secret Service men to whom Petrosino showed her statement on his return to Manhattan recognized the route as one often employed by counterfeiters. This tied in well with the anonymous letter writer’s claim that Madonia had a conviction, at home in Sicily, for passing forged bills.
Mrs. Madonia had one more thing to tell Petrosino. Her brother, Di Priemo, she confided, had written to her more than a month ago to say he was in trouble. Soon after that, he had cabled urgently for funds. From somewhere, her husband had raised a thousand dollars—a large sum, and one he dared not send directly. With Di Priemo in custody pending his trial, Benedetto had instead addressed his envelope to an acquaintance in New York. Enclosed with the money was a note instructing the man to take the cash and hand it to a man in a Prince Street saloon.
It was what happened next, Lucy thought, that had sent her husbandto his death. Her husband’s friends had received the money safely, but they had done precisely nothing to help Di Priemo, neither hiring him a lawyer nor using the cash to bring influence to bear to save him. Nor would they return the unspent dollars to Madonia. Inquiries, and, eventually, letters of entreaty, had no effect on them. In the end the Buffalo stonemason decided that his only chance of recovering the cash was to visit New York himself.
Then Mrs. Madonia added something else, something that made Petrosino start. There was one man, the widow said, who might know why Benedetto had been killed. Her husband had mentioned his name to her, just once, when they were debating how to help Di Priemo. A man called Giuseppe Morello, Madonia had whispered, was the head of a “great society, a secret society, of which he himself was a member, but Morello was against him and would do nothing to aid her brother.”
Petrosino knew what that meant. It meant the maimed, implacable Morello was no mere counterfeiter with a ruthless streak.
He was something much more frightening. He was boss of the New York Mafia.
CHAPTER 2
MEN OF RESPECT
T HE MAFIA, LIKE GIUSEPPE MORELLO HIMSELF, WAS BORN IN WESTERN Sicily in the 1860s. It rooted and took shape in a land of stark beauty, grinding poverty, and frequent violence, insinuating its way into the fabric of the island until it exercised a malign, corrupting influence over most aspects of Sicilian life. It became—for the best part of a century—the richest and most successful criminal organization in the world. Yet it remained at base a study in enormous contradictions.
The Mafia was a secret society whose existence was known to every man and woman on the island. Its name was familiar to tens of thousands but was never spoken by its members. It stood for justice—or so it promised its initiates—in places where justice was hard to find, but in reality it worked hand in hand with the landed nobility to keep down Sicily’s miserable peasantry. It worshipped honor but lusted after profit—and though, in New York, the society claimed to offer protection to the lowly immigrant, the truth was that, as late as 1920, it preyed
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