Blindsight

2

“I gotta do something,” Tony Ruggerio said. He was antsy and he shifted in the passenger side of the front seat of Angelo Facciolo’s black Lincoln Town Car. “We’ve been sitting here in front of D’Agostino’s grocery store for four nights. I can’t stand this doing nothing, you know what I mean? I’ve got to have action, something, anything.” His eyes nervously darted around the rain-glossed street scene in front of him. The car was parked next to a hydrant on Roosevelt Avenue.

Angelo’s head swung slowly around. His lidded eyes regarded this youthful-appearing twenty-four-year-old “kid” who’d been foisted on him. Tony’s nervousness and impulsiveness were enough to try the patience of Angelo. He thought the “kid,” whose nickname was “the animal,” was a liability in Angelo’s line of work, and he’d said as much to Cerino. But it didn’t matter. Angelo might as well have been talking to the wall. Cerino said that the kid’s asset was that he had no fear; he was wild and ambitious and had no qualms and little conscience. Cerino said that he needed more people like Tony. Angelo wasn’t so sure.

Tony was short at five-foot-seven and wiry. What he lacked in intimidation through stature, he tried to make up for in muscle. He worked out regularly at the American Gym in Jackson Heights. He told Angelo he took protein supplements and occasionally steroids.

Tony’s features were rounded, ethnic, southern Italian, and his hair was shiny, black, and thick. His nose was slightly flattened and angled to the right thanks to some amateur boxing. He’d grown up in Woodside and never finished high school, where he’d had frequent fights over his stature as well as his sister, Mary, who was, in his vernacular, a “looker.” He’d always been protective of his sister, thinking that all males had the same goals as himself when it came to females.

“I can’t sit here any longer,” Tony said. “I’ve got to get out of the car.” He reached for the door latch.

Angelo put his hand on Tony’s arm. “Relax!” Angelo said with enough threat in his voice to restrain Tony. Cerino had been right to pair them up, in a way. Angelo, the “dude,” made an excellent foil for brash Tony. He looked older than his thirty-four years. Where Tony was short, Angelo was tall and gaunt, his features sharp and hatchetlike. If Tony was sensitive about his height, Angelo was sensitive about his skin. His face bore the scars of a near-lethal case of chicken pox at age six and severe acne from thirteen to twenty-one. Where Tony was wild and impulsive, Angelo was cautious and calculating: a seemingly calm sociopath whose character had been molded by an endless series of foster homes and a final stint of hard time in a maximum security prison.

Both men were rather vain when it came to their wardrobes. Yet Tony never quite cut the figure for which he aimed; his suits, no matter how expensive, were always ill-fitting on his disproportionately muscled body. On the other hand Angelo gave even Dapper John Gotti a run for his money where sartorial elegance was concerned. He wasn’t flashy, just meticulous. He wore exclusively Brioni suits, shirts, ties, and shoes. As Tony’s muscle building was in response to his short stature, Angelo’s fastidious attire was in response to his complexion, a subject about which he did not brook any reference.

Tony leaned back in his seat. He glanced in Angelo’s direction. Angelo was one of the few people Tony feared and respected, even envied. Angelo was connected, a made man whose reputation was legendary.

“Paulie told me that Frankie DePasquale would show up at this grocery store,” Angelo said. “So we’re going to spend the next month waiting here if need be.”

“Christ!” Tony muttered. Instead of getting out of the car, he reached into his baggy jacket and extracted his.25 caliber Beretta Bantam. Releasing the spring-loaded catch in the butt, he slid out the magazine and counted the bullets as if one of the eight shells could have disappeared since he last counted them half an hour ago.

When Tony pulled the empty gun’s trigger, Angelo rolled his eyes. “Put the gun away,” he said. “What’s the matter with you?”

“All right, all right!” Tony said, pushing the magazine home and returning the pistol to its shoulder holster. “Take it easy, will you.” He glanced at Angelo, who stared back at him for a moment. Tony held up his hands. He knew Angelo well enough to know he was irritated. “The gun’s away. Relax already.”

Angelo didn’t say anything. He resumed looking toward the entrance of D’Agostino’s, watching the people coming and going.

Tony sighed heavily. “It’s been a freaking month since the mothers threw the acid in Paulie’s face. Maybe the bums have split, skipped town. That’s what I would have done. The next day I would have been outta here. Gone down to Florida or out to the coast. We might be sitting here for nothing. Have you thought of that?”

“Frankie has been seen,” Angelo said. “He’s been seen here at D’Agostino’s.”

“So how did it happen?” Tony asked. “How’d they get close to Cerino in the first place?”

“It wasn’t complicated,” Angelo said. “Vinnie Dominick called the meeting with Cerino. There were to be no weapons. Everybody had to leave his piece in his car. We even used a metal detector that Cerino had taken from Kennedy Airport. When Terry Manso started to serve coffee, he threw a cup of acid in Paul’s face. The reason we know Frankie was involved was because he came with Manso.”

“How’d Frankie get away?” Tony asked.

“The moment Paulie got the acid the lights went out,” Angelo said. “Then the place went crazy with Paulie screaming and everybody diving for cover in the dark. I was by the front window. I threw a chair through it and dove outside. That was when I saw Manso come out the front door. Frankie was already climbing into a car. It all happened so fast, few people could react.”

“How did you manage to get Manso?” Tony asked.

“It was a race,” Angelo said. “Manso lost. My car was directly in front of the restaurant with my piece on the front seat where I could get to it fast if something went wrong. I got off two shots as Manso tried to get into his car. He never made it. Both slugs went into his back.”

“How many people were involved?” Tony asked. He’d been curious about the acid episode since he’d heard about it, but he’d been afraid to bring it up.

“The way I figure it, at least two more besides Manso and DePasquale,” Angelo said. “Knowing for sure is one of the reasons we want to talk with Frankie.”

“God, it blows my mind,” Tony said with a shake of his head. “I can’t imagine how much the Lucia people promised to pay for this kind of hit.”

“Nobody knows for sure,” Angelo said. “In fact, word has it that the punks did it on their own, thinking they’d be rewarded by the Lucia people for their balls. But as far as we can tell the Lucia people haven’t even acknowledged it.”

“So disrespectful,” Tony muttered. “Acid in the face. Christ!”

“That reminds me,” Angelo said. “Did you get that battery acid?”

“Yeah, sure,” Tony said. “It’s in Doc Travino’s old doctor’s bag on the backseat.”

“Good,” Angelo said. “Paulie is going to like that. It’s a nice touch.”

Tony stretched. He was quiet for a minute. Then he cleared his throat. “What do you say to my getting out of the car for just a second? I’d like to do a set of push-ups. My shoulders are tight.”

Angelo swore under his breath and told Tony that being in the car with him was like being locked up with a two-year-old kid.

“I’m sorry,” Tony said with arched eyebrows. “I’m used to more activity than this.” Locking his hands together, he did a series of isometric exercises. In the middle of one of these maneuvers he stopped and stared out the side window.

“Holy crap, isn’t that Frankie DePasquale coming along beside us?” Tony said excitedly.

Angelo leaned forward to see around Tony. “It sure looks like him.”

“Finally!” Tony exclaimed as he fumbled to withdraw his gun and reach for the door latch. He felt Angelo’s hand on his arm. He looked at his mentor in surprise.

“Not yet,” Angelo said. “We have to make sure the kid’s alone. We can’t screw this up. It might be our only chance and Paulie doesn’t want more trouble.”

Like an eager hunting dog restraining himself with difficulty from some flushed prey, Tony watched as Frankie DePasquale disappeared into the crowded grocery store. To his surprise, Angelo started the car. “Where are you going?” he demanded.

“I’m just backing up a bit,” Angelo explained. “It appears that Frankie is alone. We’ll take him when he comes out again.”

Angelo angled back to the curb at a bus stop. He left the engine running. They waited.

Twenty minutes later, Frankie came out of the store with bundles in both arms. Angelo and Tony watched as he walked directly toward them.

“He looks like a teenager,” Angelo said.

“He is,” Tony said. “He’s eighteen. He was in my sister’s class before he started hanging around with the wrong people and dropped out of school.”

“Now!” Angelo said.

In a flash both Angelo and Tony got out of the car and confronted the surprised Frankie DePasquale. Frankie’s eyes opened wide and his jaw dropped.

“Hello, Frankie,” Angelo said calmly. “We need to talk.”

Frankie responded by dropping his groceries. The bags split when they hit the wet sidewalk and a number of cans of tomato paste rolled into the gutter. Frankie turned and fled.

Tony was on him in a flash. He grabbed him roughly from behind, knocking him to the pavement. Holding him down, he frisked him quickly, coming up with a small Saturday night special. Tony pocketed the gun, then turned the terrified boy over. Up close, Frankie looked even younger than eighteen. In fact, it didn’t look as if he shaved yet.

“Don’t hurt me!” Frankie pleaded.

“Shut up!” Tony snapped. The kid was such a drip. It was disgusting.

Angelo pulled the car up alongside them. With the engine running he jumped from the car. A few pedestrians had stopped beneath their umbrellas to gawk at the spectacle. Angelo pushed through them.

“All right, move on,” Angelo commanded. “We’re police.” Angelo flashed an old police department badge that he kept in his pocket for just this sort of occasion. The fact that it said Ozone Park when they were currently in Woodside made no difference. It was the shape and the glint of metal that caused the desired effect. The small crowd started to disperse.

“They’re not police!” Frankie yelled.

Tony responded to Frankie’s outburst by putting his Beretta Bantam to the side of Frankie’s head. “One more word and you’re history, kid.”

“In the car,” Angelo commanded.

With Angelo on one side and Tony on the other, they stood Frankie up and dragged him to the car. Opening the rear door and pushing his head down, they shoved him inside. Tony climbed in after him. Angelo ran around and jumped into the driver’s seat. With a screech of rubber they headed west on Roosevelt Avenue.

“What are you doing this for?” Frankie asked. “I haven’t done anything to you guys.”

“Shut up!” Angelo said from the front seat. He was keeping his eye on the rearview mirror. If there had been any sign of trouble, he would have turned on Queens Boulevard. But everything was quiet so he kept going straight. Roosevelt became Greenpoint, and Angelo began to relax.

“All right, punk,” Angelo said, glancing in the rearview mirror. “Time to talk.” He could just see Frankie cowering in the corner, keeping as far from Tony as possible. Tony was holding his gun in his left hand with his arm draped over the back of the seat. Tony’s eyes never left Frankie.

“What do you want to talk about?” Frankie asked.

“The job you and Manso did on Paulie Cerino,” Angelo said. “I’m sure you guessed that we work for Mr. Cerino.”

Frankie’s eyes darted from Tony’s face to Tony’s gun, then up to the image of Angelo in the rearview mirror. He was terrified. “I didn’t do it,” he said. “I was just there. It was Manso’s idea. They forced me to go. I didn’t want to do it, but they threatened my mother.”

“Who’s “they’?” Angelo asked.

“I mean Terry Manso,” Frankie said. “He was the one.”

With a sudden wicked slap, Tony cracked Frankie across the face with the barrel of his gun.

Frankie screamed and pressed the palms of his hands against his face. A trickle of blood oozed between his fingers.

“What do you think we are? Stupid?” Tony sneered.

“Don’t hurt him yet,” Angelo said. “Maybe he’ll be cooperative.”

“Please don’t hurt me anymore,” Frankie pleaded between sobs.

Tony swore contemptuously and forced the barrel of his pistol between Frankie’s fingers and into his mouth. “Your brains are going to be all over the inside of this car if you don’t smarten up and stop screwing around with us.”

“Who else was involved?” Angelo asked again.

Tony withdrew the barrel of his gun so Frankie could talk.

“It was just Manso,” Frankie sobbed. “And he made me go along.”

Angelo shook his head in disgust. “Obviously you are not cooperating, Frankie. Remember about the lights. At the same time Manso threw the acid, the lights went out. That wasn’t a coincidence. Who was screwing around with the lights? And the car. Who was driving the car?”

“I don’t know anything about the lights,” Frankie sobbed. “I don’t remember who was driving. Somebody I didn’t know. Somebody that Manso got.”

Angelo shook his head in disgust. Nothing was easy anymore. He hated this kind of dirty stuff. He had entertained vague hopes that Frankie would have spilled his guts the moment they got him into the car. Obviously that was not to be the case.

Glancing up into the rearview mirror, Angelo caught a glimpse of Tony’s face in the flickering light of the passing streetlamps. Tony was sporting one of his contented smiles that told Angelo Tony was enjoying himself. Even Angelo thought Tony could be scary on occasion.

Once they got to the Greenpoint pier area in Brooklyn, Angelo turned right on Franklin, then left on Java. The area was run-down, especially the closer they got to the water. Abandoned warehouses lined the street. Seventy-five to a hundred years ago, the area had been a thriving waterfront, but that had long since changed save for a few isolated enterprises, like the Pepsi-Cola plant up toward Newtown Creek.

In the cul de sac where Java Street dead-ended at the East River, Angelo drove through a chain-link gate. A sign over the gate said: AMERICAN FRESH FRUIT COMPANY. The car began to vibrate on the rough cobblestone surface, but Angelo didn’t slow down. When he could drive no farther, he parked.

“Everybody out,” Angelo said. They were parked in the shadow of a huge warehouse built out over the pier that stuck out almost a hundred yards into the East River. Just across the river was the monumental mass of Manhattan’s glittering skyline. Tony got out holding Doc Travino’s little black bag and motioned for Frankie to get out too.

Angelo unlocked an overhead door to the warehouse, pulled it up, and motioned for Frankie to enter. Frankie hesitated on the dark threshold. “I’ve told you everything I know. What do you want from me?”

Tony gave Frankie a shove that sent the boy stumbling forward. The click of the lightswitch echoed in the cavernous warehouse as Angelo threw the switch activating the mercury vapor lights. At first the lights merely glowed, but as they walked out the pier dragging a reluctant Frankie, they became progressively brighter. Soon it was enough to illuminate the huge stacks of green bananas that filled the warehouse.

“Please!” Frankie moaned, but Angelo and Tony ignored him. They walked to the very end, unlocking a paneled door. Angelo found the lightswitch that activated a single bulb suspended by a bare wire. The room contained an old metal desk missing its drawers, a few chairs, and a large hole in the floor. Below the hole the water of the East River looked more like oil than water as it swirled around the pier’s piling, flowing with the tide.

“I’m telling you the truth,” Frankie wailed. “It was all Manso. I was forced to go along. I don’t know anything else.”

“Sure, Frankie,” Angelo said. Turning to Tony he added, “Tie him to one of the chairs.”

Tony put Doc Travino’s bag on the desk and unsnapped it open. From within he pulled out a length of clothesline. Then, with a depraved smile, he told Frankie to sit in one of the wooden side chairs. Frankie did as he was told. While Tony tied him up, Angelo lit himself a cigarette.

Tony gave the rope a couple of yanks to test his knots. Satisfied, he stood up and nodded to Angelo.

“Once more, Frankie,” Angelo said. “Who else was involved with the acid trick? Who besides you and Manso?”

“Nobody,” Frankie sobbed. “I’m telling the truth.”

Angelo derisively blew smoke in Frankie’s face. Glancing at Tony, he said, “Time for the truth serum.”

Tony pulled a small glass bottle and an eye dropper from Doc Travino’s bag. He handed both to Angelo. Angelo unscrewed the cap and gingerly sniffed the contents. When he got a whiff, he pulled his head back quickly. “Geez, powerful stuff.” He blinked a few times and wiped tears from the corners of his eyes.

“Any chance you want to change your story?” Angelo asked calmly after walking over to Frankie.

“I’m telling you the truth,” Frankie persisted.

Angelo looked at Tony. “Hold his head back.”

Tony grabbed a handful of the boy’s hair just above the forehead and yanked Frankie’s head back.

“Tell me, Frankie,” Angelo said as he bent over the boy’s upturned face. “Have you ever heard the expression “an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth’?”

Only then did Frankie realize what was happening. But despite his attempts at clamping his eyes shut, Angelo managed to empty the eye dropper into Frankie’s lower right lid.

A slight spattering noise like water hitting a hot skillet preceded an ear-piercing shriek as the sulfuric acid ate into his delicate eye tissues. Angelo glanced at Tony and noticed that Tony’s smile had swelled to a grin. Angelo wondered what the world was coming to with this new generation. This kid Tony was having a ball. For Angelo, this was not entertainment, it was business. Nothing more, nothing less.

Angelo set the sulfuric acid bottle on the desk and took a couple more puffs on his cigarette. When Frankie’s screams had abated to choking sobs, Angelo leaned toward him and calmly asked if Frankie wanted to change his story.

“Talk to me!” Angelo commanded when it seemed that Frankie was ignoring him.

“I’m telling the truth,” Frankie managed.

“Chrissake!” Angelo muttered as he went back for the acid. Over his shoulder, he called to Tony, “Hold his head back again.”

“Wait!” Frankie croaked. “Don’t hurt me anymore. I’ll tell you what you want to know.”

Angelo put the acid back on the desk and returned to Frankie. He looked at the tears streaming out of the kid’s shut eyes, especially the one where he’d put the acid. “OK, Frankie,” Angelo began. “Who was involved?”

“You have to get me something for my eye,” Frankie whined. “It’s killing me.”

“We’ll take care of it as soon as you tell us what we want to know,” Angelo said. “Come on, Frankie. I’m losing my patience.”

“Bruno Marchese and Jimmy Lanso,” Frankie muttered.

Angelo looked at Tony.

Tony nodded. “I’ve heard of Bruno,” he said. “He’s a local kid.”

“Where can we find these guys if we want to talk to them?” Angelo asked.

“Thirty-eight twenty-two Fifty-fifth Street, apartment one,” Frankie said. “Just off Northern Boulevard.”

Angelo took out a piece of paper and wrote the address down. “Whose idea was it?” he asked.

“It was Manso’s,” Frankie sobbed. “I was telling the truth about that. It was his idea that if we did it, we’d all become Lucia soldiers, part of the inner circle. But I didn’t want to do it. They made me go along.”

“Why couldn’t you have told us this in the car, Frankie?” Angelo asked. “You would have saved us a lot of trouble and yourself some grief.”

“I was afraid the others would kill me if they found out I’d talked,” Frankie said.

“So you were more worried about your friends than us?” Angelo questioned as he stepped behind Frankie. It was enough to hurt Angelo’s feelings. “That’s curious. But no matter. Now you don’t have to worry about your friends because we’ll take care of you.”

“You got to get me something for my eye,” Frankie said.

“Sure,” Angelo said. In a smooth motion and without a second’s hesitation, Angelo pulled out his Walther TPH Auto pistol and shot Frankie in the back of the head just above the neck. Frankie’s head snapped forward, then slumped down on his chest.

The suddenness of the final act surprised Tony, who winced and stepped back, anticipating a gory mess. But there wasn’t any. “Why didn’t you let me do that?” he whined.

“Shut up and untie him,” Angelo said. “We’re not here for your entertainment. We’re working, remember?”

Once Tony had Frankie untied, Angelo helped carry the limp body over to the hole in the floor. On the count of three they heaved him into the river. Angelo watched just long enough to make sure that the running tide took the body out into the river proper.

“Let’s head back to Woodside to pay the others a social call,” Angelo said.

The address that Frankie had given was a small two-story row house with an apartment on each floor. The outer door was locked but it had a mechanism amenable to a credit card. They were inside in minutes.

Positioning themselves on either side of the door to apartment one, Angelo knocked. There was no answer. From the street they’d seen that the lights were on.

“Bust it,” Angelo said, nodding toward the door.

Tony took several steps back, then kicked the door. The jamb splintered on the first kick and the door swung in. In the blink of an eye both Angelo and Tony were in the small apartment with their guns gripped in both hands. The apartment was empty save for several half-filled bottles of beer on the coffee table. The TV was on.

“What do you figure?” Tony asked.

“They must have got spooked when Frankie didn’t come back,” Angelo said. He lit a cigarette and thought for a moment.

“What next?” Tony questioned.

“You know where this Bruno’s family lives?” Angelo asked.

“No, but I can find out,” Tony said.

“Do it,” Angelo said.