Angelina Bonaparte Mysteries Box Set, Nanci Rathbun [shoe dog free ebook txt] 📗

powerful men who mistreated the poor and the lowly.” I snuggled against his chest, ready to enjoy the story that was about to unfold. “These men were outsiders who came to the land from other places. There was no justice. The rich ones owned the judges and the courts, and they manipulated them to their advantage. The only way that the Sicilians could survive was to band together and fight against the outsiders. So they formed a kind of union, a guild. They called it La Cosa Nostra. In English, Our Thing.”

Papa’s voice was low and steady, his body was warm and comforting, and the story reminded me of Robin Hood. “Did they rob from the rich and give to the poor, Papa?” I asked.

“Mostly, they just tried to protect their families and each other,” he replied.

“Then what happened?”

“Some of the people felt that America would be a good place to live. They sailed here on big boats, started businesses and raised their families. Your grandpa was one of them. He came to America in 1922, to New York City, where he drove a truck for a grocery. Then his boss sent him to Chicago to work for another Sicilian, and when the business expanded, he moved to Milwaukee. That’s how our family ended up here.”

By then, I was yawning broadly. “Did Grandpa stay in the union?”

“Sort of,” Papa responded. “The people in America called it the Mafia. Some called it the mob. They said it had a lot to do with crime.”

I perked up. “It did?”

“Just like in any organization, Angie, there are good and bad people. Some bad people did bad things. Some people just joined to be part of the group and to have protection from others.”

“Did you join?”

“I’m not really supposed to answer that, Angel.” I waited, knowing that whatever followed would be important. “But yes, I did. When I was about eighteen, your grandpa asked me to come to a meeting. I knew that at the meeting, I’d be asked to swear allegiance to the group, and to promise never to tell its secrets to anyone. I kept that promise.”

“What about now? Are you still in the Mafia?”

“I guess you can say that. Once you’re in, you’re in for life. But now, well, things have changed.”

“Papa, if someone asks me, what should I say?”

“You say that your papa is a business man, that he runs a fruit and vegetable store. You say that your papa is a good papa and a good man, who goes to church and who takes care of his family. Then you stand up straight, look them in the eye and say nothing else. Understand?”

I nodded.

“Good girl. My little angel. Now settle down and go to sleep.” He kissed my forehead and tucked me back in. He stood in the doorway for a moment, outlined by the hallway light. “If Ricky teases you anymore, you just tell him to ask his father where they got the money for the car dealership.”

That was my introduction to the mob, the Mafia, the Family, La Cosa Nostra. After that, if I asked Papa a question about it, he’d just smile and shake his head. I was twelve when I realized that Papa and his friends weren’t the only source of information on this topic. I’d just finished writing a paper on animals of Australia, which opened my eyes to the wonders of the public library and its vast sources of information. This was pre-personal computer days, so I spent hours in the reference section of the library, and I even learned to use the index of periodicals and the microfiche reader. It was heady stuff for a young girl, having the means to find out things that her family didn’t want her to know.

I started with sex. My mom died when I was a toddler, so it was up to my aunt Teresa to have “the talk” with me when I was ten. It was all about periods and products and hygiene, and provided no information on how babies are conceived or born. Like all my friends, I wanted to know how you “do it.” I found out from a book at the library. It was so shocking that I didn’t tell anyone for a week. I made copies of the relevant pages on the library copier, folded the papers tightly and hid them in the toes of my dress shoes, at the back of my closet. Every night for a week, I took them out and snuck into the bathroom to read them. Unbelievable, I thought. People really do that? My papa did that? To my mama? Yuck.

After sex, I researched violence. Specifically, the Mafia. I read historical accounts of the Sicilian origins. I read the history of the early twentieth century gangs in America. I moved on to the Milwaukee Journal and Milwaukee Sentinel stories of illegal activity. Again, I was shocked at how close this was to me. The children and grandchildren of these men were my schoolmates. Thank God, Papa’s name isn’t in here.

***

That was the start of my detective career. I smiled as I remembered the innocence of that little girl, her confidence that truth existed and could be found in books and libraries, her belief in all that her papa told her. As I pulled into the parking space in back of my office, a sense of melancholy swept over me. She was so far away from me now that she seemed like a stranger.

I waved to Susan as I slipped into my office chair. She was on the phone, headset in place, talking to a client as she typed into her computer. Since the conversation was in Japanese, I easily tuned it out, letting it form a kind of background noise to my work.

Bart would be looking for my interview notes with Tony. As I started to enter the report into my PC, I thought about the days when only doctors carried beepers. When a person who