“She could’ve killed Nainsi,” he pointed out. “She had a good reason.”
“I guess she did, but the others had the same reason,” she argued. “It could just as easily have been one of them, and she seems too sensible to take a chance like that.”
The water was boiling, so Malloy got up and poured it over the leaves in the pot to steep.
“Do you think the same person who killed Nainsi killed her mother?” Sarah asked.
“That would make it nice and neat, but it might be more than we can hope for.” He paused. “I’ve got to ask you some questions about your visit with Mrs. O’Hara.”
“Of course,” Sarah said, touched that he would be reluctant to bring up an unpleasant memory.
He sat down again. “Do you know what time you were there?”
“I don’t know exactly, but I went there right after I left you yesterday morning.”
“Oh, yes, right after I told you to go straight home,” he remembered with annoyance.
She smiled sweetly, refusing to be baited.
“How long were you there?”
“Not long. Half an hour at most. Then I went straight home.”
“Finally,” he muttered. “What did you talk about?”
“I told her all the things she’d need to know to take care of the baby. I thought . . . I admit it, I thought that if she knew how difficult it would be, she might reconsider and let Maria have him. She’ll have a terrible time trying to keep him fed with goat’s milk from bottles. She’ll never be able to keep the bottles clean and getting the milk will be a constant struggle . . . Oh, listen to me, talking like she’s still alive. Anyway, I tried to make her see that the poor little fellow wouldn’t have much of a chance living with her.”
“Didn’t she believe you?”
“I think she did, but she didn’t care. She must have thought anything was better than letting the Ruoccos have him. She reminded me that one of them had killed Nainsi.
In her place, I would probably feel the same way.”
“And now one of them has killed her.”
“You don’t know that for sure,” Sarah argued.
“Two of the Ruocco boys left the restaurant last night.
We’d stationed some men to watch the place, in case the Irish made another visit, and one of them followed them to a dance house.”
“They were going dancing when a mob might attack the restaurant at any minute?” she asked incredulously.
“We thought that was funny, too, and when we went to the dance house, they weren’t there. We never did find them, either.”
“So they could’ve gone to Mrs. O’Hara’s,” Sarah mused.
“It would be a logical solution to their problems. If they killed her, she wouldn’t be around to cause any more trouble and keep demanding they give her the baby. No mobs would try to burn their house down, and nobody would want to take the baby away anymore.”
“Poor Mrs. O’Hara. I wonder if she had any idea she was in danger.”
“Tammany probably promised to protect her on top of everything else.”
Frank got up and poured a cup of tea. Then he reached into a cupboard and pulled out the bottle of whisky that he knew she kept for medicinal purposes and splashed a bit into the cup. He set it down in front of her and took his seat again.
She looked askance at the spiked tea.
“You need it,” he said. “A little sugar will cut the taste.”
She obediently put a spoonful of sugar in and stirred. On second thought, she added another. “If only we’d found the killer,” she said.
“Finding the killer wouldn’t have solved much,” Frank pointed out. “Mrs. O’Hara might still be alive, but she’d still want the baby, and somebody the Ruoccos love would be in jail. Tammany would probably still be trying to get the baby and sending mobs down to Little Italy.”
“Why would they take a chance by killing Mrs. O’Hara, though? Yes, it might stop the mob attacks, but it wouldn’t stop you from trying to find out who killed Nainsi. That’s the real danger to their family.”
“And now I’ve got an even bigger reason to find the killer. The penny press will probably be full of stories about the Black Hand cutting people’s throats, stirring up even more trouble.”
“I didn’t think of that!” Sarah said in dismay. “The Irish might even march down to Little Italy again to get revenge for Mrs. O’Hara!”
Malloy winced and rubbed his forehead. “I hope to God nobody else thinks of that.”
Sarah picked up her cup and took a sip. The whisky fumes cleared her nose and burned her throat, but she forced down a swallow. After a moment, she could feel the warmth settling in her stomach. “If two of the Ruocco boys went to kill Mrs. O’Hara last night, then one of them must have killed Nainsi, too.”
“Maybe.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean they might’ve killed Mrs. O’Hara to protect someone else in the family.”
“Like their mother,” Sarah guessed.
“Just because Ugo hates her doesn’t mean he isn’t right about her. But first, I’ve got to figure out which two of the boys went out last might.”
“If they were protecting their mother, I’d pick Joe as one of them. He’s the oldest, so it would be his duty.”
“Antonio has the biggest stake in this, so he was probably the other one.”
“But he’s so young. I don’t think I’d trust him, although Lorenzo seems too levelheaded to do something so rash.”
“Lorenzo is protective of Maria and the baby, though.
You said he stood up for them to Ugo before Joe did.”
“Now that you mention it, he’s taken an unusual interest in the baby,” Sarah remembered. “He even sat up with Maria all that first night when the baby was screaming because the milk didn’t agree with him. Even most new fathers wouldn’t do that.”
“I know I wouldn’t have,” Malloy agreed.
“And Mrs. Ruocco really wants to keep the baby now, too. She’s determined Maria will have him.”
“If Mrs. Ruocco wants the baby, then Lorenzo probably decided it belongs with them. Maybe he figured killing Mrs. O’Hara was somehow good for the family. Italians are crazy when it comes to their families. And if he thought his mother had killed Nainsi . . .”
“I still can’t see him cutting someone’s throat,” Sarah said. “Antonio is the only one who had a real reason to kill Nainsi in the first place, but wasn’t he out getting drunk the night she died?”
“According to Maria, Nainsi was still alive when he and Joe got home. She said Joe went straight to bed and didn’t get up again. If she’s not lying to protect her husband, then—”
“That leaves Antonio, but he just doesn’t seem like the type either,” Sarah argued.
“When you’re drunk and angry, bad things happen,”
Frank said grimly.
Sadly, she knew that was true. “But why would Antonio even think of killing her? His mother was going to throw her out.”
“Why would any of them? It still doesn’t make sense.
I’m missing something.”
Sarah sighed, wishing she could help. “What are you going to do now?”
“I’m going to get Antonio and take him to the station for questioning.”
Sarah winced. She knew the techniques the police sometimes used to get a confession. “He’s just a boy. If he was drunk, he might not even remember he did it.”
“That’s a myth. If you’re too drunk to remember, you’re too drunk to do it.”
“What if he really didn’t do it?”
“Then at least he’ll tell me which of them went out last night to kill Mrs. O’Hara. Once I know that, maybe everything else will start to make sense.”
