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field interrogations.
    During their first week as partners, Roscoe started a small riot. It was in 7
-A-
77’
s
area, but Calvin Potts and Francis Tanaguchi were handling a call in 7
-A-
29’
s
area, while Harold Bloomguard and Sam Niles were handling a call in 7-A-1’s area, while Spermwhale Whalen and Baxter Slate were parked in an alley near Crenshaw Boulevard, Spermwhale receiving a listless headjob from an aging black prostitute whom he had known from his days at old University Station.
    The call had originated as a neighbor dispute, and by the time Roscoe and Whaddayamean Dean arrived, what had been a potentially dangerous situation in an unhappily mixed apartment house on Cloverdale had pretty well petered out to thename calling, face saving phase. There were two tired men involved: a black and a Mexican who did not really want to fight for the honor of their bickering wives or anything else.
    “Took a report here one time,” Roscoe observed as they climbed the stairway at nine o’clock that night. “Some abba dabba made a report that one a her cubs was missing. Had so fucking many milksuckers running around she forgot the police department summer camp was taking care a the little prick for a week. That’s what kind a people we run our kiddie camps for. Didn’t know he was gone till she had a head count!”
    Whaddayamean Dean shivered as he saw a team of roaches charge on a chunk of slimy red hamburger which lay rotting on the landing.
    There was a sign on the manager’s door which said: “No loiterers in this building. Due to lady tenants being kidnapped, molested and robbed the LAPD will arrest loiterers.”
    On the second landing they passed a staggering wine reeking black woman who ignored them. She was barefoot, wore pinned black slacks and an extra large dirty blouse which hung outside. The blouse was hiked in the back because of the lopsided hump which bent her double and reduced a woman who was meant to be of average height to a misshapen dwarf.
    Roscoe tapped the hump as he passed, winked mischievously at Whaddayamean Dean and said to the stuporous woman, “I got a
hunch
you’re for me, baby!”
    Roscoe was still giggling when they found the remnants of the once smoldering neighbor dispute. The rival factions were almost evenly divided. Two sets of neighbors, including husbands, wives, teenage and preteen children, backed the play of each injured party. Mexicans backed Mexicans, blacks backed blacks. There had been twenty-two people screaming and threatening at the height of the dispute. Now there were just the husbands of the aggrieved women. The black man had atrickle of blood running from the corner of his mouth where the Mexican had accidentally bumped him when they were pushing and shoving, preparatory to doing battle.
    The black man, a squatty hod carrier with enormous shoulders and a wild full natural hairdo, looked relieved by the presence of the bluesuits and shouted angrily, “You made me bleed, motherfucker! You gonna pay I’m gonna kick ass for this!”
    “Anytime, man, anytime,” said the Mexican, a slightly shorter man, a member of the same hod carrier’s local, who had been on many jobs with the black man and was almost a friend.
    The Mexican, like the black man, was dressed in dirty work pants and was shirtless to unnerve his opponent. He did not have such an intimidating physique in terms of musculature, but his chest, back and rib cage were crisscrossed with many scars: some like coiled rope, some like purple zippers, from old gang wars in East Los Angeles where he had fought his way through the elaborate gang hierarchy to emerge as a seasoned
veterano
covered with battle wounds and glory But then the Mexican had gotten married, fathered seven children, lost his taste for street war and in truth had not faced a foe for many years.
    “What started the beef?” Roscoe Rules asked, deciding to talk to the Mexican.
    The Mexican shrugged, touched his hand nervously to the