Elizabeth Street (12 page)

“
Dio mio!
” Teresa’s screams rang through the apartment. Labor had started a month early. Giovanna was relieved when Teresa ordered Domenico to fetch the doctor who had delivered her other babies. She didn’t feel ready for the miracle of birth. Giovanna imagined that she would simply keep the children out of the way. Smiling, she thought someone might even send her to the pharmacist for belladonna as she and Signora Scalici had done to Maria Perrino’s mother. But Domenico had returned breathless and in a panic, announcing that the doctor was nowhere to be found.

Giovanna calmly sent Domenico back out, ordering him to wait on the doctor’s stoop. She closed the door behind him and turned to her sister-in-law. “Teresa, this baby is not going to wait for the doctor. Do you want me to help you?”

Having birthed three babies, Teresa knew Giovanna was right and managed to nod yes before the next contraction.

Two hours later, Domenico burst through the door with a panting American doctor who had been dragged through the streets. The apartment was quiet; Teresa was feeding her newborn, and Giovanna was scrubbing sheets.

“Why do you women all have to deliver at the same time?” groused the doctor. He pulled the blanket from the baby and gave her a quick once-over.

Giovanna didn’t stop washing but kept an eye on the doctor. She didn’t understand what he was saying, but she followed his actions.

“She’s little but looks healthy. Let’s take a look at you.” He motioned Domenico into the hall and examined Teresa. “No rips, but the baby was small.” He called over to Giovanna, “Did you deliver this baby?”

Giovanna shrugged apologetically. “
Non parlo inglese
.”

The doctor opened the door and called Domenico into the room. “Who’s this?” he asked, pointing to Giovanna.

“My aunt.”

“Did she deliver the child?”

“Of course.”

“Ask her if she’s a midwife.”

“She is.”

“Then why did you get me?”

“Mamma told me to.” Domenico looked at the doctor like the man was an idiot.

“I’ll never understand you people,” he muttered. Turning to Domenico, he said, “Tell your aunt to go see the midwife Lucrezia LaManna at 247 MacDougal Street. She needs help. There are not enough people to deliver all these Italian babies.”

“Okay. Do I tell Mamma anything?”

“Yes”—he snapped his bag shut—“tell her not to have any more children.” The doctor left and with him went the stale smell of scotch.

Giovanna waited outside the fence at Brooklyn Union Gas. It was near quitting time, and she watched the men gather their tools and tin lunch boxes. A whistle blew and sweat-stained workers streamed out of the gate; Giovanna stopped the first Italian face she saw.

“Signore, do you know Nunzio Pontillo?”

“No.” He turned quickly to another man. “Hey, is there a Nunzio Pontillo on this job?”

“No, no,” protested Giovanna. “He was working here. My husband. He was killed on the job, almost a year ago. I want to find someone who worked with him.”

The man sighed sympathetically. “I’m sorry, signora. Most of us are a new crew they brought in to line the tank.”

Giovanna noticed another man who had stopped walking but hung back. For a moment they stared at each other. “And you, signore, do your remember my husband, Nunzio?”

The first man spun around to see whom Giovanna was talking to and exclaimed, “Oh, Nospeakada! He was here when the accident happened. I think he’s the only one left.”

“Did you know Nunzio?” Giovanna repeated.

“Signora, he hasn’t spoken since the accident.”

Giovanna didn’t avert her gaze from Nospeakada. “Can you please help me?”

The other man noticed a foreman at the gate staring. “Signora, he can lose his job. It’s no coincidence that the only guy left on the job is mute. It’s best we all go.”

“Here’s my address.” Giovanna pressed a scrap of paper into Nospeakada’s hand. “Please, if you find your voice, I would like to talk.”

The other man had already walked away and was motioning for Nospeakada to join him. Nospeakada glanced back at both Giovanna and the foreman and left.

With so many hours on her hands, she walked from Brooklyn back to the Lower East Side. It became apparent that here in America you would have to find beauty in different things, but she had a hard time getting past the filth. Nunzio had never written of it; his head must have been in the clouds. Grime seemed to cover everything and even hovered in the air. If Giovanna closed her eyes and thought of a color for New York, it would have been gray; the city dulled even the brightest blue skies, patches of grass, and fruit on pushcarts.

Through his letters, Nunzio had taught her to appreciate the lines and grandeur of New York’s buildings, and she found beauty in their spires, angles, and in the shadows they cast. What she both hated and loved the most were the attempts at replicating the splendor of Italy in the tenements. She had seen Lorenzo’s idyllic little paintings of Calabrian countrysides in the foyers of tenements. They made her heart ache at their nostalgic hopefulness, while her head laughed at the absurdity of these little landscapes in the dark. The paintings didn’t amuse her as much as the burlap that was shellacked onto the walls with linseed oil in order to resemble linen in the dim light. What intrigued her most, however, were the plaster walls and wood trim painted to look like marble or granite. In this America, even if you didn’t have something, you simply created its facsimile. On the surface, nothing would be denied you in America.

Giovanna observed that Italian-American immigrants fell into two categories—those who had completely embraced their new world and those who spoke only of returning to Italy. This schism made perfect sense; loyalty for Italians was often a much stronger characteristic than reason. However, the Italians who had wholeheartedly accepted America and cursed their homeland at every opportunity still took pride in their heritage. Giovanna was amazed that two of the most prominent statues in New York were of Italians.

Downtown, Domenico had taken her to the statue of Garibaldi in Washington Square Park, near the big arch to nowhere. “When he was a boy, your Zio Nunzio would ride his donkey and pretend he was Garibaldi,” reminisced Giovanna, looking at the statue.

Domenico had looked at his aunt incredulously. “He had his
own
donkey?”

Another time, Lorenzo brought Giovanna uptown to see the new statue of Columbus at Fifty-ninth Street. Hundreds of Italians, mainly from the north of town, converged at the column on Sundays. Giovanna heard one well-dressed man exclaim that they should also put statues of Vespucci and Verrazano around the circle.

Returning home from her trek, she heard Domenico arguing with his father even before she opened the door.

“I can read and write. I speak English, what more do I need to know?”

“No! You stay in school. At least for a few more years.”

As soon as Giovanna entered the apartment, Domenico tried to enlist her support. “Zia, tell Papa I should be a newsie like the other boys!”

“Domenico, I agree with your father. You’re a smart boy who could one day write the papers, not sell them. But Lorenzo, what do you think, maybe he could work at Vito’s Grocery in the afternoons?”

Domenico turned to his father. “Can I, Papa? I know Vito would give me a job.”

“Fine. It’s settled. But only after school and weekends.”

Teresa was making sauce at the stove with the newborn slung against her chest. With every word of the conversation, Teresa’s actions became louder and louder until her furious stirring and pot slamming woke the infant. Teresa’s bitterness toward Giovanna had only grown after the birth of her daughter—she deeply resented feeling indebted to her capable sister-in-law.

Giovanna ignored Teresa, not knowing what else to do, and told Domenico about her visit to the construction site.

“Zia, you should hire a detective! They’re not policemen. I read about them in comic books. They’re called ‘sleuths.’”

“Slu-eths?”

Giovanna tried over and over again to say the word, and each time her pronunciation was met with peals of laughter from Domenico and Concetta. This was not an easy word for an Italian tongue—she even let out a big, throaty laugh herself. It was an entertaining notion, but there would be no detectives. If there was something to find, Giovanna, with the blessing of Saint Joseph, would find it herself.

A few nights later, there was a light knock at the door. Family and friends didn’t knock; they just announced themselves as they walked in. Hoping it was Nospeakada, she jumped up and opened the door without asking who was there. A stranger with dark eyes and thick lashes stood before her. She quickly closed the door to a wary crack.

Lorenzo moved behind Giovanna and asked, “Who are you?”

“I am Mariano Idone. Nunzio knew me as Pretty Boy.”

They opened the door cautiously, and Mariano limped into their kitchen.

“Sit, Signore Idone,” invited Lorenzo, pulling out a chair at the kitchen table.

“Nospeakada found me and gave me your address.” Mariano quickly continued to fill the awkward silence. “I have a pushcart now. I can’t do construction because of my leg.”

Giovanna could see why he was called Pretty Boy, but the sparkle had been stolen from his eyes. Giovanna got the impression that if you rubbed him hard enough, you would find Pretty Boy underneath.

Mariano then told Giovanna, Lorenzo, and Domenico his version of the accident as Concetta helped her mother with the two youngest children. He began by recounting the supervisor’s reluctance to follow instructions and oil the couplings from underneath. He described how when the disc didn’t lower quickly enough, everyone was anxious, and then the supervisor was summoned to a phone call. He told them how after the call, the supervisor brought all the foremen and lead men together and of the decision among the lead men to be the ones to go under the disc. He began to cry when he recounted how a foreman had assigned the eight men to the interior and perimeter. And his tears became sobs as he described how Nunzio had saved his life, switching places with him and warning him and the others seconds before the collapse.

Everyone in the room was crying.

“You see, signora, I will forever be indebted to you and your family.”

This was much more than Giovanna wanted to hear. Why couldn’t this be Nunzio telling this man’s wife the same story? She didn’t need to know her husband was a hero. He always was a hero; he didn’t need to die being one. In fact, for the first time, she was angry with Nunzio. Why had he done that? He knew she was waiting! She tried to calm down, but anger and sorrow boiled and exploded on Mariano.

“Why did you let him switch with you? You knew he was married! Why didn’t you save him?” Her voice was so loud and hard that the children clung to Teresa.

“Giovanna, please, Signore Idone is our guest!” pleaded Lorenzo.

Mariano sobbed. “I was frightened, signora. I was frightened.”

His honesty took the words from Giovanna’s mouth. A heavy silence with muffled cries hung in the room. Mariano grabbed his hat and rose. Lorenzo put his hand on his arm. “Please, don’t go. It is the shock of your story. There is more we need to know.” Mariano looked at Giovanna, who looked away but motioned him back into his chair.

Lorenzo continued, “Signore, Giovanna said people seemed afraid to talk to her at the job site.”

Mariano composed himself, grateful to talk about something that took the focus off his cowardice. “At roll call the day after the accident, the men were told that nosy reporters were asking questions that could stop the job. Everyone had to sign a paper saying they wouldn’t talk about the accident. And they all were given a ‘bonus’ for their rescue efforts. I wasn’t there. I was in the hospital, but two foremen came to my room.”

Lorenzo was puzzled and asked, “Why did they care if anyone spoke of the accident? Accidents happen at construction sites all the time.”

“I don’t know. But Nunzio thought the way they were bringing the bottom down was crazy. Carmine Martello would know better. Nunzio and I spoke at lunch, but not much about the job. I think he spoke of these things with Carmine when they walked home.”

Lorenzo remembered Nunzio mentioning a Carmine and thought that he had probably even seen him on occasion with Nunzio on Mulberry Street.

“Did they call him Saint Carmine?” Lorenzo asked.

“Yes, that’s him,” answered Mariano.

Giovanna thought of the story Nunzio had written in his letter about Carmine and the statue of Saint Gennaro. She had laughed when she read it and then said a prayer of forgiveness. She finally spoke. “Where is this Carmine?”

“I don’t know. He never came back to the job. He didn’t even get the money. Someone told me he had joined one of those traveling theater companies.”

Giovanna felt sick and couldn’t bear to hear anymore. She rose from the chair. “Thank you, Signore Idone.”

Lorenzo was embarrassed and quickly asked if Mariano would like a glass of grappa.

Mariano turned to Giovanna. “Signora, when I lie down each night, I hear the sounds and feel the pain all over again. I have no money. I can only offer you the promise that if you ever need me, I will help you.”

In the morning, when Lorenzo woke, Teresa grabbed his arm to keep him from getting out of bed. Whispering emphatically, she said, “Nunzio is dead! What good will all these questions bring? She’ll bring the
malocchio
to this house! Giovanna should be working. And she needs to take a husband before she is too old and no one wants her. You must help her, Lorenzo.”

Lorenzo considered his wife’s words. Perhaps he wasn’t helping Giovanna as he should. If she was busy, she might forget about searching for answers that didn’t exist or didn’t matter.

That night, after the children had gone to sleep, Lorenzo spoke with Giovanna. “I think now is a good time to get a job, Giovanna. Teresa has had a healthy baby thanks to you.”