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yours.”
    “Not a friend exactly, more of a nuisance. But I appreciate the thought.”
    “He was a friend,” said Jackie. “Sam’s uncomfortable with finer emotions,” she added to Harry.
    “Fuck all that,” I said.
    Geordie finally found his way to where we were sitting. He looked glad to see us, which I attributed to our sparkling repartee, though it was probably more about the tips.
    “What can we do for you then?” he asked.
    “We’re good for now,” said Harry, cheerfully.
    “Did you know Alfie Aldergreen?” I asked, spoiling the mood.
    Geordie grew serious.
    “Knew him well. Bloody awful.”
    “Any ideas?” I asked.
    Geordie was about forty, with a square head filled with thick black and grey hair and a blocky, fluid frame that served him well in a fight. I’d seen him in action, and though I respected his courage, I could see holes in his technique. I felt a little bad thinking things like that, but it was the habit of a long, occasionally violent fighter’s life.
    “Heard not a fookin’ thing, man,” he said. “No reason for it.”
    “You’ll tell me if anything comes up,” I said, leaning in a bit to give the exchange a conspiratorial feel.
    “Aye. I want the bastards well as you,” he said, just loud enough for me to hear.
    “Should I be feeling left out?” asked Jackie, talking across both me and Harry.
    “Not at all, Hinny,” said Geordie. “We’re just gettin’ the odds straight on the Yankees.”
    “I’d’ve thought Newcastle United was more your thing,” she said.
    “And what would you know ’bout The Toon?” Geordie smirked.
    “I was asking about Alfie,” I said. “Geordie doesn’t know any more than we do, but will keep his eyes and ears open.”
    “Alreet, then,” said Geordie.
    Jackie sat back in her seat, nearly satisfied with the answer.
    “I’ll ask the kitchen lads,” said Geordie. “Sometimes they’d feed Alfie out the back. More a social thing than charity, mind. I told him he was welcome at the bar anytime, but there was an embarrassment factor. For him, not me.”
    I believed him. Geordie was committed to social enlightenment. And not afraid to provide teaching moments to the unenlightened.
    “Sure,” I said. “Is Tommy around?”
    I was talking about a scrawny, good-natured guy from Pakistan who bussed tables at the place. He’d been at it long enough to earn a lot of friends, including me. Geordie picked up a phone behind the bar and called back to the kitchen. A few minutes later Tommy came out.
    “Hey, Sam. What shakin’?”
    “Not nearly enough. How ’bout you?” I said.
    We all shook his hand and exchanged meaningless pleasantries.
    “That thing that happen to Alfie,” he said. “What the fuck?”
    “What’re people saying?” Jackie asked.
    Tommy shook his head.
    “Nothing but nonsense. Nobody know nothing.”
    “What kind of nonsense?” I asked.
    “That there’s a redneck cult out to kill cripples and Spanish people and this was a warning to them.”
    “That’s ridiculous,” said Jackie.
    “Like I said, just nonsense. But don’t blame los caballeros . Paranoia is the immigrant’s life.”
    “No blame, Tommy,” said Jackie. “I get it.” She handed him her card. “If you hear anything else, even the ridiculous, e-mail me, okay?”
    He took the card and recorded her contact information into an iPhone, then handed it back to her. He looked at me like I was next.
    “No luck, Tommy,” I said. “Don’t even own a computer.”
    “Luddite,” said Jackie.
    When I ran R&D for that big industrial company, I wrote analytical if/then protocols that ran through a massively parallel processing array within a bank of mainframe computers covering about three thousand square feet. The room generated enough heat to melt Antarctica and is still one of the most powerful computational centers on the planet. Jackie knew this, so it wasn’t worth mounting a rebuttal. And the truth was, she was basically right. I’d had a