“He appears to be a very well-meaning young man,” he said, in reply to one of the questions.  “Rash, of course; very young men are likely to be rash—­and perhaps more hopeful than some of us older and—­ahem—­wiser persons might be under the same circumstances.  But he is well-meaning and persevering.  I have no doubt he will manage to pick up a few crumbs, here and there.  I may be able to throw a few in his way.  There are always cases—­ah—­which I can’t—­or don’t wish to—­accept.”

When this remark was repeated to Captain Obed the latter sniffed.

“Humph!” he observed, “I don’t know what they are.  I never see a case Heman wouldn’t accept, if there was as much as seventy-five cents in it.  If bananas was a nickel a bunch the only part he’d throw in anybody else’s way would be the skins.”

John, himself, did not seem to mind or care what Mr. Daniels or anyone else said.  He wrote a letter to New York and, in the course of time, a second-hand desk, a few chairs, and half a dozen cases of law books arrived by freight and were installed in the ex-barber-shop.  The local sign-painter perpetrated a sign with “John Kendrick, Attorney-at-law” upon it in gilt letters, and the “looking out of the window” really began.

And that was about all that did begin for days and days.  Each morning or afternoon, Sundays excepted, Captain Bangs would drop in at the office and find no one there, no one but the tenant, that is.  The latter, seated behind the desk, with a big sheepskin-bound volume spread open upon it, was always glad to see his visitor.  Their conversations were characteristic.

“Hello, John!” the captain would begin.  “How are the clients comin’?”

“Don’t know, Captain.  None of them has as yet got near enough so that I could see how he comes.”

“Humph!  I want to know.  Mr. John D. Jacob Vanderbilt ain’t cruised in from Newport to put his affairs in your hands?  Sho’!  He’s pretty short-sighted, ain’t he?”

“Very.  He’s losing valuable time.”

“Well, I expected better things of him, I must say.  Ain’t gettin’ discouraged, are you, John?”

“No, indeed.  If there was much discouragement in my make-up I should have stopped before I began.  How is the fish business, Captain?”

“Well, ’tain’t what it ought to be this season of the year.  Say, John, couldn’t you subpoena a school of mackerel for me?  Serve an order of the court on them to come into my weirs and answer for their sins, or somethin’ like that?  I’d be willin’ to pay you a fairly good fee.”

On one occasion the visitor asked his friend what he found to do all the long days.  “Don’t study law all the time, do you, John?” he queried.

Kendrick shook his head.  “No,” he answered, gravely.  “Between studies I enjoy the view.  Magnificent view from this window, don’t you think?”

Captain Obed inspected the “view.”  The principal feature in the landscape was Dr. Jameson’s cow, pastured in the vacant lot between the doctor’s home and the postoffice.