Hooligans

mangles the king?s English and thinks Miranda is a Central American banana republic, but he can

follow a speck of dust into a Texas tornado and never lose sight of it. And in a pinch, he?s got a punch

like Dempsey.”

Where?d you find him?”

“LAPD. The story is they recruited him to get him off the street, although nobody in the LAPD will

admit it. When I found him, he was undercover with the Hell?s Angels.”

“How?d you get him down here?”

“I told him he could bring his bike and wear whatever he pleased.”

“Oh.”

By this time the room had gathered three more men—about half of Dutch Morehead?s squad—a

strange-looking gang whose dress varied from Flowers? tweeds and brogans to Zapata?s black leather

jacket and hobnail boots. They stood, or sat, smoking, drinking coffee, making nickel talk and

eyeballing me. It was my first view of the hard-case bunch I would get to know a lot better, and fast.

Morehead sidled around so his back was to the room and started quietly giving me a rundown on the

rest of his gang.

“Sitting right behind Zapata is Nick Salvatore, a real roughneck. His old man was soldato for a smalltime Mafioso in south Philly, blew himself up trying to wire a bomb to some politician?s car. You?ll

probably get the whole story from him if you stick around long enough, but the long and short of it is

he hates the Outfit with a passion. Calls our job the dago roundup. He?s more streetwise than Zapata. I

guess you might call Salvatore our resident LCN expert. He doesn?t know that many of the people,

but he knows the way they think.”

Salvatore was dressed haphazardly at best: a T-shirt with GRATEFUL DEAD printed over a skull and

crossbones, a purple Windbreaker, and jeans. A single gold earring peeked out from under his long

black hair. It was hard to tell whether he was growing a beard or had lost his razor.

“The earring is his mother?s wedding band,” Dutch whispered.

“He?s touchy about that. He also carries a sawed-off pool cue with a leaded handle in his shoulder

holster.”

On my card it was a split decision whether Zapata or Salvatore was the worst dresser, although Dutch

gave the nod to Salvatore.

“Zapata doesn?t know any better,” he said. “Salvatore doesn?t give a damn. If you blindfold him and

ask him what he?s wearing, he couldn?t even guess.”

Dutch continued the thumbnail sketch of his gang:

“Across from him is Cowboy Lewis.” The man he referred to was as tall as Dutch, thirty pounds