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head and looked back at me. “The day I get any respect around here I’ll drop dead and be buried.”
    I said, “Eat the food around here and it’ll happen sooner rather than later.”
    Rusty Swetaggen laughed so hard that an architect looked over and frowned.
    Kevin said, “You want a Falstaff, Elvis?”
    “Sure.”
    Rusty told him to bring it to the table and led me to an empty window booth where someone had put a little
Reserved
sign. People were waiting by the maitre d’, but Rusty had saved the booth.
    After Kevin had brought the beer, I said, “You get anything on my guy?”
    Rusty hunkered over the table. “This guy I talked to, he says the people from the Seventy-seventh like to hang at a bar called Cody’s over by LAX. It’s a shitkicker place. They got dancers in little chicken-wire cages. They got secretaries go in to get picked up. Like that.”
    “Is Thurman a regular?”
    “He didn’t give it to me as a fact, but a REACT unit is a tight unit, sort of like SWAT or Metro. They do everything together, and that’s where they’ve been hanging.”
    “You got the address?”
    He told me and I wrote it down.
    “Your guy know if Thurman is mixed up in anything dirty?”
    Rusty looked pained, like he was letting me down. “I couldn’t push it, Hound Dog. Maybe I could’ve gotten more, but you want Mr. Tact. The rest is going to take a couple days.”
    “Thanks, Rusty. That’s enough for now.”
    I finished the Falstaff and took out my wallet. Rusty covered my hand with his. “Forget it.”
    I said, “Come on, Rusty.”
    Rusty’s hand squeezed. “No.” The squeeze got harder and Rusty’s jagged teeth showed and suddenly the pumpkin head looked like a jack-o’-lantern from hell and you could see what had kept Rusty Swetaggen alive and safe for twenty-four years in a black-and-white. It was there for only a second and then it wasgone, and he gently pushed my wallet toward me. “You don’t owe me anything, Elvis. I’m glad to help you, and I will always help you in any way I can. You know that.” There was something in his voice and his eyes and the way he held his hand that said that my not paying was profoundly important, as profound as anything had been or ever would be in his life.
    I put the wallet away and stood. “Okay, Rusty. Sure.”
    He looked apologetic. “I’ve got a couple more calls to make, and I’m waiting to hear from a guy. You want tact.”
    “Sure.”
    “You hungry? We got a pretty good halibut today.” Like nothing would make him happier than to feed me, to give to me.
    “I’ll see you around, Rusty. Thanks.”
    One hour and forty minutes later I parked in a McDonald’s lot about three-quarters of a mile from LAX and walked across the street to Cody’s Saloon. Mid-afternoon was late for lunch and early for quitting time, but a dozen men were lining the bar and sipping cold beer out of plain glasses. There weren’t any female real estate agents and none of the guys at the bar looked like architects, but you never know. Maybe they were politically incorrect and wanted to keep it a secret. There was a big sign on the roof of a neon cowgirl riding a bucking horse. The cowgirl looked sort of like a cheerleader from Dallas. Maybe she was politically incorrect, too.
    A young guy with a lot of muscles was behind the bar, talking with a couple of women in skimpy cheerleader outfits who were hanging around at the waitress station. A red-haired woman in an even skimpier outfit danced without enthusiasm in a chicken-wire cage behind the bar. Neither the bartender nor the waitresseswere looking at the dancer, and neither were most of the guys lining the bar. Guess it’s tough to get motivated with the chicken wire. They were playing Dwight Yoakam.
    I went to a little table across from the dancer’s cage and one of the waitresses came over with her little pad. I ordered another Falstaff. When you’ve got a forty-dollar retainer, the sky’s the limit.
    When she came back