Palermo, Sicily ? Italy’s No. 1 fugitive and reputed Mafia “boss of bosses” practically thumbed his nose at authorities for more than 40 years.

He counted on Sicilians’ centuries-old mistrust of the state to help him on the run, sleeping in islanders’ homes, having his children born at local hospitals, even sending the public health care system a bill for prostate treatment abroad under a false name.

But police finally caught up with Bernardo “The Tractor” Provenzano on Tuesday in a farmhouse outside his power base, Corleone – the town that inspired the family name in “The Godfather.”

In the end, Provenzano was done in not by an informer or a rival gangster, but by a delivery of clean laundry. Police tracked the package to his hideout and closed in when they saw his hand peek out of the door to take it.

Mafia boss Bernardo Provenzano is escorted by a black-hooded police officer as he enters a police building in downtown Palermo, southern Italy. Provenzano, Italy's reputed No. 1 Mafia boss, was captured Tuesday at a farmhouse near Corleone, Sicily, after more than 40 years on the run.

Provenzano had escaped capture so often since going into hiding in 1963 that he earned a place in the Italian imagination as “The Phantom of Corleone.” He got his nickname “The Tractor” for the determination he displayed in a mob career that began as a hitman.

He is believed to have taken over leadership of the Sicilian Mafia following the 1993 arrest of former boss Salvatore “Toto” Riina. During his years on the run, Provenzano was convicted in absentia and given life sentences for more than a dozen murders of mobsters and investigators.

“Bastard! Murderer!” a crowd shouted at the 73-year-old Provenzano as black-hooded policemen took him out of a sedan and rushed him into the courtyard of a police building in Palermo after driving him from the countryside.

Italy’s national anti-Mafia prosecutor, Piero Grasso, told reporters in Rome that Provenzano was “impassive” and “didn’t say a word” when arrested, but later acknowledged his identity.