Downtown had been redeveloped more times than politicians had promised to clean up the urban sprawl of crime and gangbangers to make the inner city user friendly. Those in the know, namely the long time residents, still held their final ballots in check, still remembering a beheading by a sword-wielding maniac in the food court of the previous version of the downtown mall. Nights in the city belonged to those with the longest knives or the biggest guns in a large part of the so-called downtown sprawl from Second Street north to PCH and east and west from the Long Beach freeway to the 605 freeway.

Alex and I learned a lot of this from a white bearded old man slumped in a deck chair outside the big fancy restaurant aboard the Queen Mary. His spindly legs shot out onto the deck walk causing passers by to skirt the sockless white sneaker-clad feet while giving him their best evil eye.

"You say you usetah live here before you went and took yourself overseas?" he asked in a drawl I couldn't quite place. Somewhere between West Texas and Virginia it sounded like. He must have been close to ninety, a pair of nicotine stained fingers tightly clutching a self rolled cigarette while ignoring the big red NO SMOKING sign almost directly over his frizzled gray haired head.

We had just finished a rather excellent if not overpriced meal in the stately appointed restaurant, the gleaming brass fitting almost as blinding to the eye as the polished silver and blue and white china plates, supposedly the same ones that had been used for decades serving rich guests crossing the Atlantic. I could almost feel the ghosts of oil tycoons and shipping magnates sitting at tables near us, raising their glasses in a welcoming toast to the two newest soon to be joining them ghost nominees. I shook my head as we finished our meals and walked out onto the companion deck where we met the old man.

"What brings you to this neck of the woods if you're so all fired up about how dangerous it is down here?" I asked lighting a cigarillo. Damn, if he could smoke his roll-your-owns so could I.

"My granddaughter, she lives over on Signal Hill. Used to be part of the old Oil Patch that stretched across all this area, rigs still perched in peoples back yards, heads nodding away, pumping the last few ounces of something getting more precious by the day. I used to be a wildcatter here shortly after the big one. Survived the Arizona. I was only in my twenties, swam out a porthole right before she went down. Lost every man buck in my division, I did. Never could get over hating them damn Japs, still do. Won't own one of their friggin' cars, God help me."

Alex winked at me and I grinned back. The old dude had led a full life it seemed.

"How old is your granddaughter?"

"Well let me see, she was born in 1970 so that would make her about thirty-six, I reckon."

"She got any kids?" Alex asked, his pedophile antenna going up.

"Oh yea, she's got three. Let me see, there Jack, he's the oldest at sixteen then there are the two girls, Melissa and Mallory. Mel is the older, she's thirteen and Mal is just turned eleven. Cutest little cup cakes you'd ever want to see," he said raising his bony rump off the wooden bench and reaching into the back pocket of his faded Levi's. He produced a well-worn leather wallet and flipped it open showing two smiling blonde haired little girls around eight or nine years old. "This ain't that new, couple of years old. They're even prettier now," he said closing the leather folder and shoving it back in his hip pocket. He flipped what was left of his cigarette over the railing into the waterway below.

"Why aren't you staying with your granddaughter?" I asked.

"Damn you gents got a lot of questions. Sure you ain't cops."

Something about his evasiveness alerted my antennae.

"You're not on good terms with your granddaughter, are you?"

He gave me a stern look, partially closing one wrinkled blue eye.

"Not that it's any of your damn business, but no, we're not."

I didn't say anything but Alex leaned slightly forward, his lips pursed to ask a further question but the negative shake of my head silenced him. He leaned back and waited. ......(cont)