“Not well is how they cope. Even when they play by the rules they get turned away—mean old Mr. Recession. Do you have any idea how hard it is for a sick person without money to get help in this city?”

“Sure do,” I said. “I spent ten years at Western Pediatric Medical Center.”

“Over in Hollywood?”

I nodded.

“Okay,” he said, “so you do know. Not that I'm glossing over what Dorsey did—that poor girl, every attorney's nightmare, I still lose sleep thinking about it. But he was a victim, too—as sappy and knee-jerk as that sounds. He should have been taken care of, not forced to fend for himself.”

“Institutionalized?”

His eyes turned angry. I noticed their color for the first time: very pale brown, almost tan.

“Taken care of. Not jailed—oh, hell, even jail wouldn't have been bad if that would have meant treatment. But it never does.”

“Had he been psychotic for a long time?”

“I don't know. He wasn't someone you just sat down and had a chat with—so tell me your life history, pal. Most of the time he was somewhere else.”

“Where was he from, originally?”

“Oklahoma, I think. But he'd been in L.A. for years.”

“Living on the street?”

“Since he was a kid.”

“Any family?”

“None that I know of.”

He took hold of the licorice, touched it to his lip, and used his other hand to caress his tie. Somewhere else, himself.

When he touched his phone I knew he was ready to break off the conversation.

“What kind of music do you play?” I glanced at the guitar-pick clasp.

“What? Oh, this? I just noodle around on weekends.”

“Me, too. I worked my way through college playing guitar.”

“Yeah? Guess lots of guys did.” He pulled the front end of the tie down and looked at the ceiling. I felt his interest continue to slip.

“What do you do mostly, electric or acoustic?”

“Lately I've been getting into electric.” Smile. “So what's this? Gaining rapport with the subject? Got to hand it to you. At least you didn't get into the usual police-prosecutor rap—guilt-tripping me for what Dorsey did, asking me how can I live with myself defending scum.”

“That's because I don't have a problem with that,” I said. “It's a good system and you're an important part of it—and no, I'm not patronizing you.”

He held out his hands. “Whoa.”

I smiled.

“Actually, it's an okay system,” he said. “I'll bet if you met the Founding Fathers, you wouldn't think they were such great guys. Slaveowners, fat cats, and they sure didn't think much of women and kids.”

The phone rang again. He took the call while gnawing on the remains of the licorice, talking lawyerese, bartering some defendant's future, never raising his voice.

When he hung up, he said, “We try to make the system work for the people the Founding Fathers didn't care about.”

“Who funds you?”