The restaurant in the Hotel Bancroft was considered one of the finest in San Francisco. It was a gathering place for the elite. Located in a far corner of the dining room, four men sat at a round table. They had just finished eating. Each now had a well-fed look.
Crow spoke to the powerfully built man next to him, “Virgil, the San Francisco Police Department sure knows how to welcome visitors.”
“This is like dying and going to heaven,” Earl said through a suppressed belch. “You boys live like this all the time?”
“Hell no,” the detective answered with a bit of mischief in his voice, “but being a policeman, certain things do come our way. Times are tough right now. People are out of work, and crime is at a peak. Right now, the labor unions are agitating, saying the Chinese are taking jobs
