“He’s worked hard.”

“Have you missed it? Practicing law, I mean.”

“Some,” I said. There was a seductive element to defending people accused of committing crimes, especially when the stakes were at their highest. Having the fate of a man’s life depend on both the intensity of your commitment and the quality of your work was often alluring.

Tommy Hodges, the slight and balding owner of the restaurant, showed up carrying two glasses of water and a pad.

“Don’t I know you?” he said to me.

“I don’t think so.”

“Sure you do,” Mooney said. “This is Joe Dillard, the best trial lawyer who ever set foot in a courtroom around here.”

Hodges’s eyes lit up.

“Oh, yeah!” he said, pointing at me. “I remember you! That murder, the preacher, right? That was something. Big news.”

“Yeah,” I said, “big news.”

“I ain’t heard of you since. Where you been?”

“Sabbatical,” I said.

“What?”

“Tommy,” Mooney said, “how about a couple of club sandwiches and a couple of Cokes? Is that okay with you, Joe?”

“Sure.”

He kept fiddling with a saltshaker with his right hand. After Hodges left, Mooney regarded me with a puzzled look.

“I always wondered why you were on the other side,” he said as soon as Hodges left the room. “I thought you would have made a great prosecutor.”

“The reason isn’t exactly noble. It came down to money. When I graduated from law school, I wanted to work for the DA’s office. I even went for an interview. But the starting salary was less than twenty-five grand, and I already had a wife and two kids to support. I figured I could make double that practicing on my own, so I told myself I’d learn the law from the other side and then try to get on with the DA after I made some money.”

“And before you knew it your lifestyle grew into your income.”