A Bandit's Tale Read online

  If I do say so, it went like clockwork every time.

  —

  Now, you may well decide that my new pursuits show that Papa was, in fact, quite right to get rid of an incorrigible young scoundrel like me. Yet, as I have remarked previously in this history, that’s where the truth of things gets a bit hard to hold on to, at least for me.

  Should I have bowed to my padrone’s orders day after day without doing anything to try to change my fate? Should I have let myself be worked to death like the cart horses I saw almost every day on the streets?

  I don’t really know. But I will tell you that there was definitely one benefit of my dangerous new pursuits: I was eating more sausages.

  —

  I stayed with Tony and Carlo only through the morning or early afternoon, and was always careful not to be spotted by Signor Ancarola or the other padroni. Since our mob mostly worked in the financial district down by Wall Street, where my padrone wasn’t likely to go, I didn’t worry about that so much.

  The highlight of the day would come around noon, after we’d made our last touch. That’s when we went for a meal.

  “Don’t you ever want to try anything besides sausages?” Carlo asked one day.

  Chewing, I shook my head. Why would I do something like that?

  As I said, the meal was the highlight of the day. When we were done, I’d leave Tony and Carlo and find a likely corner near Mulberry Street, where I’d spend the rest of the afternoon and evening banging on my triangle, or wandering around looking at things.

  Once, my padrone came upon me unexpectedly, grabbing my shoulder and growling, “I walked by here an hour ago. Where were you?”

  I wasn’t frightened. I had seventy-five cents in coins jingling in my pocket to show my progress for the day. Hidden in my shoe was another dollar—insurance. Sometimes Padrone searched our pockets at night to make sure we weren’t holding back coins.

  But since half the boys didn’t even have shoes, he’d never gotten into the habit of checking our feet. So sometimes I’d hide a few coins or even a dollar in my shoe for a rainy day, or in case I wanted to take time off from hitting my triangle to go down to the docks and see the ships—or just wander around looking at the food carts. (Or, I admit, wandering off near Greenwich Village, where I might catch sight of Mary at her work.)

  Every day, I’d tell myself I should begin saving anything I didn’t hand over to Padrone. I would hold a coin in my hand and resolve to start right away. But it was hard to get started with just one quarter, or dime, or even a dollar. Every once in a while—not often—I’d buy a roll and break it in two for Marco and Luigi to gnaw on at night. Usually, though, I’d walk by a shop and catch the scent of fresh bread or hot, spicy sausages, and my stomach would win out over my head.

  One bright summer day, after I’d told Tony I’d never seen this Central Park that Giuseppe had told me about, we even rode a horse-drawn streetcar (which we called a rattler) uptown to a huge green place. We crossed a stone bridge, threw pebbles into a lake, and lay on soft grass that tickled our ears. Best of all, we bought ice cream, so cold and sweet I had to buy two. Naturally, on the rattler on the way there, we made a touch to pay for our food.

  There was so much food, everywhere I turned. It wasn’t easy to save in a place like New York, where you could get sausages, ice cream, apples, rolls, and sweets of all kinds if you just had the money to buy it.

  Money. It was clear I needed more of it.

  —

  Then, right around my birthday in August, I came up with a brilliant new strategy: a way to get more money so that I could escape from the padroni den and still keep my stomach full.

  CHAPTER 12

  In which I make an audacious proposal of dubious merit

  It all began one day when Carlo mentioned that moll-buzzers were pickpockets who only steal from women.

  “Moll-buzzers usually have sweet faces,” he remarked. “That way, women don’t get suspicious when they come close.”

  My mind began to race with possibilities. I asked, “Have you ever tried it, Tony?”

  We were chomping down a midday dinner at Barnabo’s Restaurant on Pearl Street. I had my favorite: sausages, of course. Tony was eating chops, and Carlo was devouring pork and beans.

  “Naw. Neither Carlo or me has quite the right look,” Tony replied. “Carlo’s nose is as crooked as Mulberry Bend, and I’m too tall. You need a sweet, young face to be a good moll-buzzer.”

  “I have a sweet face,” I declared. “You said so yourself the first day we met.”

  Carlo pointed his fork in my direction. “That’s true, Tony. Just look at those soft cheeks and that pert little nose. It’s a sight nicer than mine.”

  “Just this morning, a rich old lady smiled at me,” I lied, leaning forward eagerly. “I’d be good at this. Give me a chance, Tony. Moll-buzzing could become my…um…specialty. It could help us expand into new areas of graft.”

  Then I added, trying to sound as casual as I could, “And I could be the dip.”

  Now, I’d been longing to spread my wings, to be the one to hold a gold watch in my hands, but Tony had always said no. If we took up moll-buzzing, something only I was well suited for, then I’d have to be the one picking the pockets.

  The dip. That was my goal—what I really wanted. The moll-buzzing was just a way to make it happen. I knew Tony would never give me a chance otherwise. He liked getting most of the plunder.

  If I could be the dip, I could actually begin to save a lot of money—enough to escape from Padrone before my four-year contract was up and return home to my family in triumph.

  This was my new plan—the answer to everything. I just knew it.

  I waited. It seemed a long time before Tony answered. He stared out the window, called for a refill of coffee, twirled his spoon on the table. It was as if he was searching for a reason to turn me down. He found one.

  “I hate to disappoint you, Rocco,” he said finally, frowning slightly. “You may look sweet, but you sure don’t smell sweet. You, my little friend, have guttersnipe written all over you.”

  He shook his head. “You do all right as a stall because it’s a matter of seconds, you bumping into a sucker. Hardly long enough for them to get a whiff of you.

  “With a woman, it’s different,” he declared. “You try to get close to a moll, and she’s going to back off like she’s smelled a skunk.”

  My heart sank. My plan seemed to evaporate like rain on hot pavement. While I couldn’t be sure if Tony was just trying to hold me back, determined to keep the lion’s share of plunder for himself, I had to admit there was some truth to what he said.

  I stared down at my filthy, torn pants and my grubby shirt with holes in it. My left big toe stuck out of my shoe and was black with dirt. My skin was patterned with bites and sores and covered in a layer of sweat and grime.

  “To be a good grafter, you have to do more than look the part,” Tony went on, warming to the subject. “You have to be the part.

  “Take me. I have ambition. I want to be a man of the world—visit the best dance halls, be seen at swell hotels and theaters, spend the day at the horse races. There’s real money to be made in those places, but you’ve got to fit in. You’ve got to belong.”

  “What can I do?” I asked. “I can’t get new clothes or look clean. If I took a bath even once a week, Padrone would be suspicious. We only get one bath a month. He’d be onto my secret in a second.”

  “So long as you’re a street musician marked by your padrone, there’s not much more you can do,” Tony concluded with a shrug. “You’re learning to be a good stall. Stay with it; you might have a future when the contract with your padrone is up.”

  “That’s almost four years from now!”

  “Maybe you can escape before then,” Tony suggested. “You could save enough to take the train out of here and make a new start somewhere else. I hear Boston and Philadelphia are good cities for grafting.”

  “Boston or Phila
delphia?” I had no idea where those places were, or how I could get there. “Were you…are you thinking of moving there?”

  “Me?” Tony laughed. “Naw, I’m right where I want to be. Oh, I might on occasion take a train ride to dip into the pleasures of grafting in a new pasture. But New York City is where I belong.”

  I stared down at my empty plate. “So, no moll-buzzing? No way that I can be a dip?”

  “No,” said Tony firmly. “Take it from an expert, Rocco. Being a dip is too risky for a smelly street bandit like you.”

  Credit p2.1

  Credit p2.2

  CHAPTER 13

  A little chapter containing a small but significant incident

  I can almost hear what you’re thinking: Don’t be daft, Rocco, follow Tony’s advice!

  I gave myself much the same talking-to over the next few weeks. Alas, by the time the intolerable summer stickiness had mellowed into the soft breezes of September, I’d made up my mind to completely ignore every single thing Tony had told me.

  Despite his warnings, I would use my sweet, innocent face to become a moll-buzzer, with the goal of keeping for myself every penny I earned.

  Once I’d made my decision, it took me a couple of weeks to get up the courage to put my plan into action. Then, one afternoon after I’d left Tony and Carlo and was heading back toward Crosby Street, I spotted a leather peeking up out of an old woman’s pocket. She was ambling along with a slow, steady motion, rocking to and fro like a boat.

  This is it. This is my chance, I thought.

  I bumped her gently, deftly reached into her pocket, slid out the purse, and was gone before she’d even caught her balance.

  My heart began to race as I tucked the prize under my shirt. If anyone caught sight of it, that could mean trouble. Tony had told stories of angry passersby descending on a pickpocket like a swarm of infuriated insects, holding him down until a copper showed up to haul him off to jail.

  Breathing hard, I managed to slip into a narrow alley near Hester and Mulberry. To my relief, no one was around. I was safe, at least for the moment. I stooped behind some old bins, out of sight in case anyone came. I opened the purse, hoping for riches. Instead, I found four dollar bills.

  Four dollars. Not a bad start, but not as good as most touches on Wall Street. I’d already figured that to book passage home to Italy—and bring my parents the sum the padrone would’ve paid them each year for my services—I’d need more than a hundred dollars. At this rate, it would take months. Still, I had to begin somewhere.

  Searching for something I could use as a hiding place, I spotted a loose brick in the ground. I grabbed a sharp-edged broken stone and poked at the brick till I got it free. Then I used the stone to dig a small hole underneath and tucked the money inside.

  I fitted the brick back and surveyed my handiwork proudly. Here was the beginning of my secret stash. Like I said, I’d always ended up using any money I’d hidden in my shoe to buy food or pay my padrone. But now I was determined to save these dollars—and begin turning my dreams of escape into a real plan.

  So, even though I was now a full-fledged, double-crossing rat who’d gone behind Tony’s back to strike out on my own, I just about skipped out of that alley. For the first time in months, I felt hope. I was on my way.

  CHAPTER 14

  Containing some surprising revelations and a terrible but predictable episode

  One morning not long after the aforementioned incident, Carlo arrived at our meeting place alone to say he’d stopped to get Tony at his boardinghouse, only to find him hacking and wheezing.

  “Sorry to deprive you of your sausages, Rocco, but Tony says we should take the day off,” Carlo told me.

  “Doesn’t he think we can do it without him?” I asked, feeling quite confident after my own recent exploit. “You’re just as experienced as he is, aren’t you? Don’t you want to at least give it a try?”

  Carlo peered at me, eyes wide, as though it had never occurred to him to question Tony’s instructions. Then he laughed. “Why not? What have we got to lose? I’ve always wanted a chance to be a dip myself.”

  As it turned out, we did have a lot to lose. Luckily, thanks to my superior powers of observation, disaster was averted. We’d found a potential target, and I was just about to bump into the man, with Carlo poised nearby to make the touch, when I spotted two coppers strolling down the sidewalk. Immediately I backed away from the gent, then skipped over to Carlo. I grabbed his elbow and began steering him through the crowd.

  “Hey, what’re you doing, Rocco?” Carlo hissed. “Got cold feet?”

  “Keep walking. I’ll explain later.”

  When we turned down a side street and the coppers were out of sight, I told Carlo about our close call. He gave a low whistle. “Thanks, Rocco. I might’ve been caught in the act, and I don’t have a bit of fall money put aside.”

  “What’s fall money?” I knew “taking a fall” had something to do with being arrested. I wasn’t sure about the money part.

  “We call it ‘fall money’ or ‘spring money.’ It’s money you set aside in case you get pinched. You need ready money to spring you from jail,” Carlo said. “Sometimes you can bribe a copper or even make it right with the sucker so he won’t press charges.”

  We walked along for a bit. Carlo’s usual smile had vanished. He stopped and put a hand on my arm. When he spoke, I realized he was still thinking about our narrow escape.

  “I’m grateful for what you did back there, Rocco,” he said. “Tony has only himself to worry about. He rents a room near Bandits’ Roost and can spend just about all his plunder on looking good. It’s different for me.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “I got responsibilities. My mother and my sister,” Carlo confided. “My mother isn’t strong enough to work anymore. She put in so many long hours at the factory when we were little, after my dad died. Bending close over that sewing machine, breathing in all that dust…well, it ruined her eyes, broke her health.

  “My sister, she’s got the same kind of job now, in a sweatshop. She’s lucky to bring home five dollars a week. But during slow times, there’s no work and she gets nothing. So they depend on me.”

  I’d never thought much about what Carlo and Tony did when they weren’t out on the streets. I wondered if Carlo’s mother knew how he made his money. Maybe she was afraid to ask. Or maybe she did know. Maybe she figured they had no other choice.

  “Why don’t you have fall money put aside, then?” I wanted to know.

  “Oh, I imagine Tony has a stash somewhere,” Carlo said, rubbing the side of his nose. “And if something bad happened to me, he’d put it up.”

  “Really?” I raised my eyebrows. I should’ve stopped there, as Mama often warned, and kept my thoughts to myself. Instead, they spilled out into words.

  “Tony sure asks us to trust him a lot,” I went on. “I’ve noticed lately that when he doles out our shares, we never see how much he keeps for himself. And we don’t know if he has fall money set aside for either of us.”

  Carlo stared at me, cocking his head like a quizzical dog. Then he waved my concerns away. “Ah, don’t worry about that. Tony would never let us down.”

  —

  A few days later, after we’d finished a smooth touch and a great meal, Tony put his hand on my arm. Carlo had gone, so it was just the two of us. “We need to have a little talk, kid. I hear you don’t trust me.”

  My face flushed. I could guess what had happened: Carlo had asked Tony about the fall money.

  I opened my mouth, but Tony moved his hand to grasp my wrist and held it, hard. “Let’s get something straight, Rocco. You’re just a little street bandit, nothing more. Don’t start putting ideas into Carlo’s head when I’m not around. He’s part of my mob, just like you are. You work for me.

  “And you’re lucky I took you on. Otherwise, come winter, you’d be sniveling and freezing on the street corners every day, hitting that little triangle of yours and hop
ing to get a penny.”

  “Tony, I swear. I didn’t mean anything by it,” I protested.

  “Just watch out,” he warned. “You may think you know what you’re doing, but you’ve got a lot to learn.”

  —

  Did that warning deter me? Did I abandon my plan to continue moll-buzzing on my own? No, reader, I did not. In fact, I did just the opposite.

  I became more determined than ever to make use of what I saw as my natural abilities (the heretofore discussed sweet face) to get as much money as I could, as quickly as I could.

  Almost every day now, as soon as my midday dinner with Tony and Carlo was over, I’d go scouting on my own, hoping to find another opportunity for moll-buzzing.

  And, on a fateful day in late September, I found just what I was looking for.

  I was walking back from Wall Street to take up my triangle-banging duties on Mulberry Street when suddenly I noticed a good-looking moll strolling along the sidewalk right in front of me.

  I could plainly see the tip of a wallet bulging like a fat, luscious sausage from her pocket. We walked another block. She crossed the street. I crossed behind her.

  The crowds were thick around us, but I felt sure I could move so fast no one would notice. With every step, my fingertips itched and burned. I could just feel that leather in my hands; I could imagine heading to my secret alley and stuffing more dollar bills into my hiding spot.

  I stuck my hands in my pockets. They popped out again, almost on their own. That leather was so close!

  She was a tall young woman, hurrying along, clearly on her way somewhere. She carried a cloth bag on one shoulder. She’d been to the market stalls; the lacy green tops of a bunch of carrots peeked up out of her bag.