—Give me a Scotch on the rocks. And this time, pour it from a bottle instead of a jar.

Ol’ Man River shuffled off and came back with the drink and the change. Litsky left a nickel on the counter to show his heartfelt appreciation for the five-star service. Then he turned on his stool, leaned his back against the bar, and stirred his whiskey with a finger.

At the table by the band, the blonde was nodding her head to the beat of the claves with a that’s-more-like-it sort of smile. She took a drag from a cigarette and shot a column of smoke at the ceiling.

McNulty, that knucklehead, had heard from someone who’d heard from someone that she was a moll on the run from Chicago. Besides the fact that molls on the run don’t hide out in Hollywood, the caption didn’t jive with the candid. There was definitely a streak of the privileged class in this one. Becker, the two-bit stringer, claimed she was another Kraut flown in by von Sternberg. But that didn’t figure either. This blonde had a joi de vivre that couldn’t get a visa to the Rhineland.

She was leaning forward now to say something to Dehavvy. She pointed at the percussionist with a discerning cigarette. Dehavvy listened and nodded with the rapt attention of the newly under wing.

Who the hell is she? Litsky found himself thinking, for once.

And he would have let his mind dwell on that quandary, if down the bar two Tijuana roosters hadn’t begun disturbing the peace. Que es eso? the one on his feet was saying for the second time. The seated one turned on his stool like a spokesman for ten generations of family feuding. When he stood on principle, he knocked over his barstool. Ol’ Man River drifted downstream. He put his big black hands on the bar and told them to take it outside; but he didn’t need to. The first one spat on the floor and headed for the exit with two of his kin. The other one counted to ten, then signaled his amigos who were picking their teeth at a table nearby.

Spics.

Litsky shook his head and shifted his gaze back to the business at hand. While the blonde studied the band, Dehavvy peeked over her straw like a schoolgirl. Like a cousin from out of town. Like the ward of the king of England.

Litsky took a good, long look at Dehavvy, then back at the second pack of Tijuanans who were swaggering out the door in the footsteps of the first. Then he took his nickel back off the bar. He went to the phone near the boys’ room and dialed the 77th Street precinct.