He has a funny look on his face; he wants to tell me something. 'Hey, Ken, you know why your boss was so insistent to open the courts and have judges paid salaries, right?' His eyes are twinkling like the sun off the Indian Ocean on the other side of this hard-scrabble court.

I'm trying to think. The boss pushed and cajoled and even put an ad in the fucking paper in the middle of the most violent days of the mission, but I can't guess the answer. 'No, Abdi, why?' I can't help but smile at the leprechaun Somali judge.

He's enjoying himself somehow. 'Because we must to give him fifteen percent of our salaries.' He shows me his pocket and pulls out the lining, big grin, eyebrows and eyes shooting sparks.

He thinks it's funny. I want to kiss him.

And I want to kill the boss. I want to drag him out into the line of fire headfirst and watch his body buckle and jerk as the bullets hit him. I want to watch him bleed to death.