It was discreet because one of its cozy private dining rooms was connected 
directly to one of the back rooms of Dr. X's establishment, so that one could 
reach it by walking down a sinous inflated Nanobar tube that would have 
stretched to half a kilometer long if you extricated it from Shanghai, took it 
to Kansas, and pulled on both ends. Squinting through the translucent walls of 
the tube as he assisted Dr. X to dinner, Hackworth cloudily glimpsed several 
dozen people pursuing a range of activities in some half-dozen different 
buildings, through which Dr. X had apparently procured some kind of 
right-of-way. Finally it spat them out
into a nicely furnished and carpeted dining room, which had been retrofitted 
with a powered sliding door. The door opened just as they were sitting down, 
and Hackworth was almost knocked off balance as the tube sneezed nanofiltered 
wind; a beaming four-foot-tall waitress stood in the doorway, closing her eyes 
and leaning forward against the anticipated wind-blast. In perfect San Fernando 
Valley English she said, "Would you like to hear about our specials?"