coattails flapping behind them, Scalise and Anselmi sprinted across the sidewalk and leaped into the car. Carlino didn’t even wait for them to close the doors before gunning the engine. The car bolted forward, and the whining squeal of tires was louder than the roar of the eight cylinders as Frenchy turned the corner from Schermerhorn into Smith Street. He kept the gas pedal floored until he was assured by Scalise, who was in the back seat peering through the rear window, that no one was following them.
At Sagaman’s Hall, pandemonium reigned. The crescendo of wails and cries was deafening. Blood was splattered everywhere on the left side of the ballroom: on tables, chairs, the floor, and even the wall.
It looked like a battlefield. Hands, faces, bodies, legs were covered with blotches and streaks of crimson as though it had been poured on them from buckets. A dozen men and women were sprawled on the floor, some writhing in agony, others lying absolutely still. Others knelt beside the fallen ministering to their wounds or comforting them until they could be removed to a hospital.
Several frantic calls had been made to the police, but Irish Eyes Duggan had the coolest head. He phoned Kings County Hospital and pleaded for help.
“Send all the ambulances and doctors you got!” he said urgently. “Send nurses! This is a major disaster. Everybody’s been shot. They’re dying! Please, send them right away!”
The sound of Duggan’s voice convinced the night superintendent to dispatch two ambulances to Sagaman’s Hall. Minutes later, when the police phoned in their request for medical assistance and officially confirmed the full extent of the disaster, two more ambulances appeared at the hall.
The four doctors aboard those ambulances that responded were hard put attending to everyone. They worked first on the most critically wounded. Then they pressed some of the White Handers and their women into service, directing them to tie tourniquets around victims’ arms or legs to stem the flow of blood until the medics could attend them.
There were three who were beyond assistance.
Kevin “Smiley” Donovan was obviously a dead duck. There was no need even to feel for a pulse. He had caught at least three slugs on what had once been his forehead. The .45s did a good job of proving to some of his life-long kibitzers that Smiley really did have a brain.
Jimmy “Two Dice” O’Toole had been sitting with his back to the gunmen. Several bullets aerated his skull just above the neck, and the doctor who looked at him turned to one of the fifteen policemen now in the hall and said, “He goes to the morgue.”
Mary Reilly was the third and final passenger for the meat wagon. Richard “Pegleg” Lonergan’s sweetheart, she was known as “Stout-Hearted Mary” because she had raised seven younger brothers and sisters after their parents were drowned in a 1916 boating accident off Sheepshead Bay. But Mary’s heart wasn’t stout enough to withstand the impact of the .45 bullet that passed through it, exited from her back, and did an encore number on the forearm of Fred Mclnerney, who’d been seated at the same table.
Tears trickled down Pegleg’s cheeks as he knelt beside Mary’s lifeless body.
“I’ll get them for you, Mary, so help me, I’ll get them…” he choked through trembling lips.
Other men, hardened by their professional calling to regard violence and bloodletting as routine phenomena of their day-to-day lives, wept unashamedly.
Not everyone had stuck around to mourn the dead and give solace to the wounded. Wild Bill Lovett, who’d been sitting at the same table as Pegleg and Mary, miraculously escaped the bullets, and sent Ash Can Smitty, Peg McCarthy, and several other boys in pursuit of the killers.
In trying to pick up the cold trail, Ash Can and McCarthy drove past Frankie’s garage on Fourth Avenue on the chance that they might pick up some trace of the getaway car or its occupants. But the garage was closed tight and all the lights were out.
Frankie Yale hadn’t doubted for a moment that he and his gang would be suspected immediately of pulling the ambush at Sagaman’s Hall. So, as Carlino drove away with Scalise and Anselmi on their mission, Frankie, Augie the Wop, Two-Knife Altierri, and a dozen other ranking Black Handers all went to a wedding. It was an iron-clad alibi.
The reception was at the Adonis Club. While weekday weddings were a rarity, that particular one was held on a Monday night because the bride and groom had chosen to be married on Valentine’s Day.
Yale and his boys were strangers to the newlyweds, their families, and the guests, but Fury had reserved two large tables in an out-of-the-way corner of the dub for the mobsters. This was standard practice for every reception at the Adonis. Any banquet Argolia booked was arranged with the understanding that the two corner tables were reserved for “some very special customers of mine.” Fury also assured whoever was paying for the reception that there’d be no intrusion by his special guests on the party that booked the hall.
Yale and his pals didn’t occupy the tables at every banquet—only when they had to have an alibi. When five detectives walked into the Adonis a few minutes after eleven o’clock that night and spotted Yale and his boys at the corner tables, they knew they had wasted their time coming over from Sagaman’s Hall to question the Black Hand leader and his underlings about the shooting.
“Hiya, Frankie,” one of the detectives greeted. “No need to ask where you and your boys were tonight, is there?”
Yale looked up and feigned surprise. He quickly pointed a finger at the plates around the table littered with scraps of meat, pasta, and salad. “Hey, you kidding?” he asked, cocking an eyebrow at the detectives. “Can’t you see what we got here? You think we just sat down for dinner…?”
“Yeah, I know what you’re saying. Frankie,” the detective said derisively. “And I suppose every person at this reception will vouch that you and your boys were here since long before ten o’clock tonight, isn’t that right?”
Another puzzled look crossed Frankie’s face.
“Why, what happened at ten o’clock which makes you come to me?” Yale asked innocently.
“You wouldn’t know anything about the ambush at Sagaman’s Hall, Frankie, would you?” the detective asked.
Yale turned suddenly and looked at Pisano, who was sitting across from him.
“Augie, did you hear anything about that?” Frankie asked with an extra touch of curiosity in his voice.
“How could I?” Pisano said defensively. “Ain’t I been here all the time? You didn’t see me talk with nobody, didja?”
Yale turned back to the detective. “You see, we didn’t hear nuthin’.”
“That’s what we figured,” the detective said resignedly. “But we’re only doing our job, you understand that, don’t you, Frankie?” “Yeah, sure, sure, of course I understand,” Yale said condescendingly. “But tell me something—what’s this about ambush at Sagaman’s? What happened?”
“Frankie,” the detective growled, “I don’t know who your hit men were, but you can tell them when they report back to you that they made a very high score.”
“Hey, don’t say I got hit men,” Yale protested. “I am a legitimate businessman. You know what I am. An undertaker.”
The
