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voices could not be heard at the next table.”
    Joe grunted in acceptance. “I guess you’re right.”
    As they waited for their dishes, Zavala said, “Now, then, the purpose of your visit. You say that you come from national headquarters.”
    Joe Mauser nodded. “Evidently, you were contacted by one of our rank-and-file members here in Mexico City. He reported that you were one of the leaders of a loosely-organized local group which had independently come to much the same conclusions that our larger organization has.”
    Zavala looked at him. “That seems true. Have you ever drunk tequila?”
    “Yes,” Joe said, repressing an inner wince.
    “No,” Max said.
    The dentist snapped his fingers at a scurrying waiter, who hurried over.
    Their host ordered in Spanish, then said to his guests, “The tequila they have here is unlike anything that I know of in Mexico.”
    The waiter came scurrying back with a bottle of golden colored liqueur. From old and hard experience, so far as Joe Mauser was concerned, tequila was as white as vodka or gin. A plate of quartered limes and a shaker of salt came with it.
    Joe didn’t want to lose points with his host. He said to Max, “Now this is how you do it. You pour yourself a sizeable slug of the tequila. Then you take up the salt and sprinkle a bit of it on the back of your hand. You lick the salt and then take up your tequila and knock it back in one quick, stiff-wristed motion. Then, real quick, you pick up a quarter of the lime and bite into it-before you die.”
    Jesus Zavala laughed appreciatively. “With this tequila, you won’t die.”
    They went through the performance, and didn’t die. Zavala had been correct. This tequila must have been laid down in the stone age. Joe, in his experiences on the Mexican military reservations, had never tasted anything so smooth. It reminded him of French cognac.
    “Hey,” Max said. “You could build up a taste for this here guzzle.” He poured himself another.
    The dentist cleared his throat before saying, “Ah, the aging has made it smooth, but it is nevertheless potent.”
    “Yeah,” Max said happily. “And that’s what I need. Something potent. This morning me and Joe was out in the desert with five men shooting at us.”
    Jesus Zavala stiffened somewhat and looked at Joe.
    Joe Mauser said, “Evidently, the party is getting a little rough. Surely you didn’t expect it not to get rough. You don’t play at revolution.”
    “When my friends and I began to get together and discuss alternatives to People’s Capitalism we weren’t thinking in terms of violence,” Zavala said.
    “We aren’t either,” Joe told him, “if we can avoid it; But possibly we can’t. Somebody was pointing out to me just the other day that individuals among a ruling class, clique or caste, might be converted to a basic change. An extreme example is die fact that Karl Marx and Frederick Engels were both upper class: Engels, in particular, was a wealthy manufacturer. But the ruling class as a whole invariably refuses to step down to make way for a new socioeconomic system. A socioeconomic system like a living organism does not want to die and will do anything in its power to continue to live.”
    “Then your organization does advocate force and violence to overthrow People’s Capitalism, the Ultra-Welfare State?” Zavala said, somewhat coldly.
    Their food had arrived then and they held their peace until the waiter had served them and departed.
    When he was gone, Joe said, “Force, but not necessarily violence.”
    Jesus Zavala looked at him questioningly.
    Joe tasted the dish the dentist had recommended. It was the whitefish that grow only in Mexico’s Lake Patzcuaro. He decided it was the most delicate fish he had ever sampled.
    He said, “You can have force without violence. For instance, when a majority of the people vote for something they are exerting a force. Suppose you combine the two. You organize everybody in the country you can