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Tiyar moved back from the table. Greyesar drew his chair closer.

"They are illegal, Dad," Luz said, placatingly. "Of course the whole march will be illegal, won't it, Greyesar?"

"We don't have a permit," Greyesar said.

"In an Outlander community--" Fuego began.

"If the march is spontaneous, the magic ceremony could be, too," Luz said. "We could do that, couldn't we?"

"If we don't do it, some other group will," Fuego pointed out.

Next door, a child yelled, "Mama, mama, here they come!" Suddenly children in buildings all around them were yelling, "Mama! Mama!"

Greyesar darted out the front doors. Tiyar ran upstairs to the roof. Four police officers came in. They stayed a long time, nosing around the bar and hinting that a free drink might be politic. Fuego offered them nothing. Finally the captain gave up and signalled the rest to go.

"Listen, Ariela," he said at the door. "We know you're planning something when Uchide's body gets here. No trouble, understand? We're calm if you're calm."

"Sure. We don't want trouble, either," Fuego said. He ushered the captain out and went upstairs.

Luz met him in the hall. "Just a check," he told her. "They said Sevit's body is coming to Merced."

"Here?" She glanced around as though wondering whether the place were clean enough. Then she frowned. "It's a dumb trick. We're all supposed to wait for him to get here--"

"Yes," Fuego said.

Greyesar returned in the morning while Fuego was cleaning. "Take the picture out of the window. Adelaide says hold all flights," he told them.

"Is Sevit's body coming here?" Luz asked.

"There is no plan," Greyesar responded.

He was gone for six days. They took Sevit's picture from the window and put the red cloths in storage with the flowers. Plainclothes police sat at the bar all day, relieving one another every five hours. They moved from group to group, eavesdropping, and arrested a customer on the first night at closing time. On the next night, the customer was back, as were the police, this time in uniform. Four young toughs who worked at Fuera Rendering on the next block came to challenge them.

One pulled up a chair behind the table where the cops were playing cards. Fuego signed him to keep on his feet, but they all sat down in a ring behind the players. All leaned forward.

"Two threes, a six, a six, a ten and the J-bird," one read.

The players ingored him.

"Shut up," Fuego whispered, leaning close.

"Back off, halfbreed," the kid hissed.

The others were reading off the three remaining hands. The game went on. The kids went round again, reading the suits.

"They're still playing," one of the kids said finally.

"Can't they hear us?"

The police dealt new hands. The reading was repeated, louder, until the rest of the customers had left. The challengers resumed their taunting, calling one another Jose. That was the name they would give when they were hauled in.

"Jose, these guys are serious. They play for money."

"They got money, Jose. They got jobs downtown with the long boys."

"Hey, Jose, I bet they can't understand us. They're not real Landers. I bet they only know E-yi-ma-lian."

They read off the hands in Eyimalian. One of the players snorted.

"He's laughing at your accent, Jose."

"Aw."

"Hey, it's all right, Jose. He talks better than you because he works for the long boys. He lives with the long boys. He practically is one of them."

"What's he doing here, then, Jose?"

"Don't know, Jose. Ask him."

Fuego caught the kid's elbow before he could touch the policeman in front of him. They studied one another. The kid was barely grown, his skin pink under the close-cut hair that was supposed to be stiff and spiky but instead formed a soft halo. His eyes were wide, the eyebrows round as a baby's.

Another said, "Never mind, Jose. I know why he's down here. He's looking for some pretty butterflies, because he might think long, talk long and act long but there's one place he ain't long. Some things you just can't pretend."

"Hey is that true? Are theirs longer?"

Laughing, the rest tipped back their chairs. "Ask him, Jose, ask him."

Fuego saw that he could not stop them, so he decided to make the best of it. He reached behind the bar and pocketed the tiny camera they kept there to shoot troublemakers for the Tavern Guild.

Delighted to be in the game again, the bald kid leaned forward and asked, "Hey, mister, when you suck them off, is it true theirs take twice as long?"

Fuego stepped in to take a blow meant for the kid. "That could have killed you," he whispered, half falling onto the table. He collected himself and circled all eight to move them, still scuffling, out the door. Police ground-to-airs met them outside and they departed, one officer and one handcuffed kid per vehicle. Fuego took photographs.

The next day it was old Arturo's turn to open, but instead he came up to tell Fuego they had a holiday. All the bars and most eating places in the city were ordered closed. There had been several murders the evening before, and a house where an Eyimalian family lived was surrounded by mobs and stoned.

"He was a landlord," Arturo said with a shrug. The alternate bartender was a skinny, sad-looking man who had lost his family years before and now divided his time between Pravelany religion and drink. "It's not right, but I understand it."

"What are you going to do with your day off?" Fuego asked.

Arturo shrugged. "Go to church, I guess. Take your day early, Fuego. There's a sundown curfew."

All day Luz treated stab wounds, fractures and deep bruises. Fuego was kept busy changing bandages and sneaking people up to the hotel so they could rest until strong enough to leave. Stretchers had to come in through the cafe doors, so a brigade of children kept watch all down the street for patrols. When they spotted one, shrieks of "Mama! Mama!" filled the air. A girl who hid behind the doors jumped up and bolted them, her little brother put out the lights, and the stretcher-carriers waited, pacing up and down the walk outside or lying behind the bar within. Wounded people hid in the alley and pretended to be drunk.

Late that afternoon a patrol descended suddenly from the sky and eight Eyimalian policemen knocked on the door so hard that a shatterproof window popped out and fell on the ground. One of them reached in to pull back the bolt while Fuego was coming down the stairs.

"What do you want?" Fuego demanded. "We're closed like the order said." He touched the panic button that would alert them upstairs.

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CONTINUE.....................

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INDEX