what I can do.”
He probably got stranger requests. I looked around the room and spotted an empty table near the window. The place was crowded, but not as bad as I might have suspected. “Not too busy?”
The Irishman shrugged. “The band cancelled.”
“What happened?”
He slid an unasked for Yuengling longneck across the bar to me. “Started drinking too early.”
“Irish?”
He smirked. “French, I think.”
“Damn French.”
“Yah, they’ll fuck up the EU, wait and see.”
I glanced back at the still-empty table. “I think I’m going to go sit over by the window.”
He swallowed a fearful dollop of what the Scots call the creature. “Yer too good to drink at the bar, Sheriff?”
“I have to meet with a lawyer.”
“Cady’s comin’?”
I took a breath as I stood. “No, and that’s something I probably need to…” It was then that I noticed Osgood standing at the front door. I raised a hand and got his attention, motioning toward the table in the corner. Ian’s looks had sharpened, either at my statement or Osgood’s appearance. “I’ll have to tell you about it later.”
“I’ll keep me eyes out fer eagle feathers.”
I took my beer and napkin to the table and eased my back against the wall, a good frontier sheriff. “Howdy.”
“How are you?”
“I’m good. Can I buy you a drink?”
He took off his suit jacket and hung it carefully on the back of his chair, loosened his tie, and rested his arms on the small table. He nodded before looking around the place. “Why’d you want to meet here? The place is a dump.”
I nodded at O’Neil and turned back to Osgood. “Cady lives only about a half a block away.”
“Oh.” That’s all he said.
Ian approached, and I noticed that Osgood didn’t bother to look up. “Scotch and water, anything over twelve years old.”
Ian looked at him for a second more, then turned and walked away. I watched Osgood. “You two know each other?”
The assistant district attorney shook his head. “Never seen him before.” I was pretty sure he hadn’t seen him just now, either. “How’s your daughter doing?”
“She’s improving, starting to have involuntary responses.” I thought about Henry. “We brought in a specialist.”
He nodded. “I hear you’re doing a little investigative work?”
I wondered where he had heard it. “Just keeping my hand in on account of Cady, nothing too serious.”
He nodded some more. “Watch out for Gowder and Katz.” He glanced out the window. “The kike is Internal Affairs and could give a shit and a shake about the truth.” He continued to look at the sidewalk outside. “They’ve been after me for years, and I have no idea why.”
Close to ten counts, I figured. “What can you tell me about Devon and Cady?”
“Well…” He pulled at the end of his goatee. “I was kind of hoping that we could share information, you know? Help each other out?”
I nodded, all innocence. “You bet.”
Ian appeared with the scotch and water and motioned to my untouched beer. “You wan’ another?”
“In a bit. Thank you.” He nodded and glanced at Osgood, who continued to study the surface of the table. His head came up after Ian had left.
He took a sip of the scotch and rested it back on the paper napkin. “I’m assuming that your focus of interest is the connection between Devon and your daughter?”
“Cady.”
He looked at me for a moment longer. “Cady.”
“You’d be right.”
“There isn’t any connection.” I looked mildly surprised. “Between what happened to Devon and what happened to your…to Cady.” He leaned in. “Devon was involved in a lot of shit in which he shouldn’t have been involved.” I took a sip of my beer and waited. “He had a little problem, if you know what I mean.” He laid a finger alongside one nostril and sniffed. “His difficulties started with this guy, Shankar DuVall, who used to provide Devon’s medication for him. They started working on a barter system, you know, medication for legal services rendered.”
I thought about the man that I’d tackled at the crack house, the one they called DuVall, but it had to be too much of a coincidence. “What’s this guy DuVall look like?”
“Black, tattoos, and one big fucker. Pharmaceuticals and firearms are his thing. Something of an aficionado, I hear.”
Not too much of a coincidence as it turns out. And big enough to throw somebody off the BFB, I figured. “So what happened with him and Devon?”
“This ass DuVall and a buddy of his, Billy Carlisle, get caught with eight kilos of designer stuff in a roach- coach at the food distribution center in South Philly. They had this bright idea to sell the stuff like ice cream.” He raised a hand, pulling on an imaginary bell. “Ding-ding, get high! They showed pictures of the truck to the jury. There were little kids licking popsicles painted on the sides. You can imagine how that went over.” He took another sip of his scotch and shook his head. “Couple of criminal masterminds here. So, anyway…DuVall and Carlisle make offers to cooperate with us and the DA picks up the tab on DuVall, leaving Carlisle to dangle, figuring anything Billy-boy knows, he got from Shankar.”
I worked on the label of my beer with my thumbnail. “Okay.”
“It happens a lot. For a number of these shit bags, cooperating with the authorities means they get a 5k1.1, which means a substantial assistance letter from the prosecuting attorney.”
“Cooperation means DuVall avoids the sentencing guidelines and mandatory minimum prison term?”
He held up four fingers. “Four years, three months. Eastern Pennsylvania leads the league with 41.1 percent of the defendants receiving reduced sentencing for playing ball.”
“And Carlisle?”
“Nineteen and seven.” He exhaled a short laugh. “All for driving an ice cream truck.”
“But with enough dope to fill up all the nostrils on Mt. Rushmore.” I thought about it. “DuVall got four and three? That seems light.”
“He played ball.”
I tried to figure a way of introducing the Roosevelt Boulevard incident, but maybe Osgood would bring it up himself. “Where does Devon enter into this?”
“He made a phone call to yours truly, wanting to see if there was anything I could do about Billy Carlisle.”
“And was there?”
He shook his head. “Nope.” He spread his hands in innocence. “I play by the rules.”
In for a penny, in for a pound. “What about Roosevelt Boulevard?”
“What about it?” His voice was stiff.
“I heard some stuff.”
His eyes stayed steady. “What’d you hear?”
“I heard you and Devon were involved in a shootout up north of here.”
He kind of laughed. “What, you got a file?”
I smiled and took another sip of my beer. He watched me, then took another sip of his drink and held it there alongside his head. “That was a Devon deal.” He sighed. “It almost lost me my job and may still if those two pricks Katz and Gowder have their way.” I tried to decide how much of what he was telling me was untrue. “Devon had a deal with these assholes, and he got scared and asked me to come along.”
