“Who else helped?”
“Everyone. We always do.”
“You’re sure? Everyone was there?”
“Yes, I’m sure.”
“Antonio said he and Joe went to see their uncle.”
Maria nodded. “They did. After dinner was over and we closed.”
“What did everyone else do?”
“We . . . we cleaned up. Mama was angry because Joe and Antonio didn’t stay to help. After that, we came up here, like always.”
“To this room?”
“Yes.”
“Did anybody go to check on Nainsi?”
“Valentina took some supper up to her earlier.”
“Do you know when that was?”
“I’m not sure. Probably near seven o’clock. The crowd was thinning out, and that’s usually when it happens.”
“What about after everyone came up here? Did you or anybody else go up to see how she was?”
Maria looked down at her clasped hands. “I . . . I wanted to, but Mama . . . She said we should do nothing for her.”
“But when you went up to bed, you couldn’t resist checking on the baby, could you?” Frank guessed.
Maria’s head snapped up. For a moment, he thought she would deny it, but then she sighed. “I looked in. I just opened the door a little. I could see the baby was asleep in his cradle. Nainsi was . . . She was asleep, too.”
“Did you actually see her?”
Some emotion flickered across her face and then was gone. “The room was dark, and I thought she was . . .
asleep. I didn’t want to disturb her.”
“So she might’ve been dead by then?”
For a second she looked frightened, and Frank knew she was wondering who she might have implicated. Then she remembered something, and her shoulders sagged in relief.
“No, she was alive. I remember now. When Joe came in later, he tripped on something and almost fell. He was . . .
drunk,” she explained in embarrassment. “He made a loud noise, and Nainsi called out to him to be quiet.”
“When was this?”
“I don’t know. I was asleep, and the noise woke me, too.
I helped him get into bed, and then we both went to sleep.”
“Did you hear anything else that night?”
“No, nothing that woke me up. And Joe, he was with me all night. I would know if he got up,” she added in anticipation of Frank’s impending question.
She turned at the sound of footsteps in the hall. Joe appeared in the doorway. “Maria? Why are you talking to this man?” he demanded.
“I was just asking her some questions about what happened the night Nainsi died,” Frank explained.
“She knows nothing about that. None of us do. How many times do we have to tell you?”
“Mr. Ruocco,” Frank said with a trace of sarcasm. “A woman was murdered in this house. That woman was married to your brother. Somebody in this house knows something about it.”
The color rose in his face, but he knew better than to argue with the police. If one of them accidentally broke your jaw, none of the authorities would care. Uncle Ugo might exact revenge for it, but your jaw would still be broken.
“Maria, go upstairs and take care of the baby,” he said.
Maria took the opportunity he offered and left. She didn’t look back.
“Antonio said you wanted to talk to me,” Joe said bel-ligerently.
“Tell me what you did that night after Nainsi’s baby was born.”
He looked puzzled, but he made an effort to remember.
“I . . . We all served dinner, like we do every night. All the time I was trying to think of some way to . . . to help Antonio.”
“So you decided to kill Nainsi?”
“No! I could think of nothing, so I went to see my uncle.”
“Ugo,” Frank supplied. “Did you go alone?”
“No, Antonio went with me.”
“What time was this?”
“I don’t know. After all the customers left. Maybe eight o’clock. Maybe later. I don’t know.”
“So you went to see Ugo. Where did you go?”
“He owns a place on Mott Street. That’s where you go to find him.”
Frank knew it well, a saloon where men could talk and not worry about outsiders hearing them. “What did you tell him?”
Joe sighed. “I told him about the baby, and how Mama wanted to throw them both out into the street.”
“And Ugo suggested it would be much neater if you just killed the girl.”
“No! Nobody said anything about killing her. Why would they?”
“Because she was married to Antonio. You know how hard it is for a Catholic to get a divorce.”
“He . . . he didn’t want to divorce her,” Joe claimed.
“Why not? Don’t tell me he was going to forgive her and raise the baby as his own?” Frank scoffed.
“He . . . We were talking,” he said, his hands moving nervously. “Trying to decide . . . what was the right thing to do.”
“Your mother already decided. She was going to throw Nainsi and the baby out of the house,” Frank reminded him.
“But . . . Nainsi was Antonio’s wife,” he said, gesturing helplessly.
“A wife who’d tricked him into marrying her so her bastard would have a name,” Frank reminded him.
“But . . .” He glanced around as if trying to find the correct reply written someplace in the room. “Maria,” he finally decided and nodded in approval at his choice. “Yes, Maria, she didn’t want Nainsi to leave. She didn’t think it was right. The girl is so young, she said. And the baby . . . Who would take care of them?”
“Maria wanted them to stay?” Frank asked in amazement.
“Yes, that’s right. She wanted them to stay, but she couldn’t say this to Mama. So I went to my uncle. I thought he would know what to do.”
“And did he know what to do?” Frank asked, managing not to betray his skepticism of this unlikely tale.
“No,” Joe said, heaving another sigh. “No, he did not.”
Frank opened his mouth to ask another question, but a shout and the explosion of shattering glass stopped him.
“What the . . . ?” he cried, running to the window.
“What is it?” Gino and Joe both demanded, close behind him. They jostled each other for a better view of the street below over Frank’s shoulders. The glow of torches illumi-nated the mob that was swarming down Hester Street.
Frank knew it was too early in the evening for them to be drunk enough for this to be a spontaneous act. Someone had organized them, whipping the Irish lads into a frenzy and probably arming them with sticks and stones and enough liquor to make it seem like a good idea to march down to Little Italy and teach the dagos a lesson.
“Gino, go down the back stairs and get everybody you can find at Headquarters,” Frank said.
“What are you going to do?” Gino asked.
“Try to stop this.”
