Elizabeth Street by Laurie Fabiano

Author:Laurie Fabiano
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, azw3
Tags: New York (State), historical fiction, Mafiosi, Little Italy (New York, New York (N.Y.), Family Life, General, Fiction, New York, Italian American families - New York (State) - New York, N.Y.), Historical, Crime, Italian American families, Mafia, Cultural Heritage, Domestic fiction
ISBN: 9781935597025
Publisher: AmazonEncore
Published: 2010-05-04T19:57:30.146724+00:00

Lucrezia read and translated into Italian as dramatically as the text was written. “‘The skull and crossbones flag of piracy is gone from the seas. But in our cities flourishes the Black Hand, a symbol every bit as significant of greed and cruelty—even more an emblem of cowardice and treachery. The scoundrels who lurk behind the terror of the Black Hand wax fat and daily grow more arrogant in their contempt for American law and order.’”

“What are you reading from?” Giovanna asked Lucrezia.

“It’s Everybody’s Magazine. I got it from my husband and thought you’d be interested. You haven’t told me much about your dealings with Petrosino.”

“There’s not much to tell. Read more.”

Lucrezia leafed through the article. “Here’s the part about the name that I was telling you about. ‘Back in the Inquisition days in Spain, there was La Mano Nera, a secret society that fought the government and the church. It passed, and the secret societies of southern Italy were its heirs. Twenty years ago, a false report was raised in Spain that La Mano Nera had been revived. The story lingered in the brain of a New York Herald reporter and one fine day he attempted to rejuvenate waning interest in a puzzling Italian murder case by speculating as to the coming to life of the Black Hand among immigrants in America. The other newspapers seized on the idea eagerly and kept it going.’”

“Petrosino said there is no organization, that it is a bunch of thugs.”

“Well, apparently this writer agrees with him. ‘The terror of the Black Hand now is tremendously increased by its mystery. The mystery will never be revealed, because there is nothing tangible to reveal. The police have not been battling with a complicated and secretly united murdering graft machine, but with individual produces of the opportunities for criminal education afforded by southern Italy for hundreds of years.’”

“Let me see that,” said Giovanna, taking the article from Lucrezia. A copy of a Black Hand letter was reproduced on the page and, because it was written in Italian, she read it herself.

“These people got a much longer letter than we did! Listen, ‘This is the second time that I have warned you. Sunday at ten o’clock in the morning, at the corner of Second Street and Third Avenue, bring three hundred dollars without fail. Otherwise we will set fire to you and blow you up with a bomb. Consider this matter well, for this is the last warning I will give you. I sign the Black Hand.’ This is definitely not from the same scoundrels. Even the drawing is different.”

“Yes, detective,” smirked Lucrezia.

Giovanna ignored her. “You know, Lieutenant Petrosino told me two Russian Jews used the name Black Hand to scare money out of a real estate dealer.”

Lucrezia recognized Giovanna’s intellectual interest in all this and asked, “Giovanna, tell me, what do you hope will come of all this?”

“I don’t know, Lucrezia. I’m beginning to realize that they might not find the brutti lowlifes who did it. But it doesn’t matter.

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