Sergeant Petrosino bundled deeper into his coat as he stared at the body on the ground. He looked again at the dead man. He had been found almost three hours earlier, folded in two and stuffed inside a wooden barrel normally used for food.

Petrosino was handed a crucifix removed from the dead man’s neck, his boss, Inspector George W. McClosky, telling him that neither he nor any of the other officers had figured out what to make of the necklace. It was a strange crucifix, McClosky had concluded, the insignia within it – I.N.R.I. stumping them.