"Mr. Goldman. Do you hit only the wrist?"

"Is there a nerve there, Mr. Goldman?"

"If you hit it hard, will it really break?"

Repeating the same attack several times, Goldman struck the ex-LAPD officer's arm again and again. His eyes half-closed, expressionless, the blond man attacked on cue without flinching or holding back. Finally Goldman sent the students back to their practice. Lyons returned to tutoring a group of beginners.

Goldman went to his Puerto Rican friend, Rosario. "What's with lizard eyes? Doesn't your friend have any nerves?"

"What do you mean?"

"Like pain nerves. I must've hit him ten times in the same place and he doesn't even blink. Like looking a snake in the face."

"That's the way he is," Blancanales answered. He glanced over to Lyons. Lyons patiently demonstrated the technique of advancing in stance, knees flexed, feet sliding, eyes focused straight ahead. "That's the way he is now. Recently he lost a partner — more than a partner. He's still in mourning."

"Oh, yeah. Know about that. Tough. But that's the job."

"She was more than a partner. Looked like love and marriage. And then she was gone."

"Yeah, can imagine that."

"Not really," Blancanales corrected his New York buddy. "You don't know how broken up he is. You see, it was his fault..."

"What?"

"In a way. She was hurt and he tried to stop her from making the bust. Left her behind while we went to take the bad guys. She got pissed and did something wrong and went straight into it. If he hadn't gotten protective, she'd be alive."

Across the converted basement, Lyons attempted to explain the principle of tension-nontension to a ten-year-old boy with the almond eyes and blue black hair of a Central American mestizo.

"All your strength must go outward…" Lyons exaggerated his front stance to emphasize his words. "But the strength cannot stop you from moving, and you must move with your legs strong. Then if your leg is kicked — as in an attack to your knee — nothing happens."