Days passed, and not a word from Farrar.  The case opened with Mr. Cooke’s friends on the front benches.  The excitement it caused has rarely been equalled in that section, but I believe this was due less to its sensational features than to Mr. Cooke, who had an abnormal though unconscious talent for self-advertisement.  It became manifest early that we were losing.  Our testimony, as I had feared, was not strong enough, although they said we were making a good fight of it.  I was racked with anxiety about Farrar; at last, when I had all but given up hope, I received a telegram from him dated at Detroit, saying he would arrive with the doctor that evening.  This was Friday, the fourth day of the trial.

The doctor turned out to be a large man, well groomed and well fed, with a twinkle in his eye.  He had gone to Narragansett Pier for the summer, whither Farrar had followed him.  On being introduced, Mr. Cooke at once invited him out to have a drink.

“Did you know my uncle?” asked my client.

“Yes,” said the doctor, “I should say I did.”

“Poor old duffer,” said Mr. Cooke, with due solemnity; “I understand he was a maniac.”

“Well,” said the doctor, while we listened with a breathless interest, “he wasn’t exactly a maniac, but I think I can safely say he was a lunatic.”

“Then here’s to insanity!” said the irrepressible, his glass swung in mid-air, when a thought struck him, and he put it down again and looked hard at the doctor.

“Will you swear to it?” he demanded.

“I would swear to it before Saint Peter,” said the doctor, fervently.

He swore to it before a jury, which was more to the point, and we won our case.  It did not even go to the court of appeals; I suppose the railroad thought it cheaper to drop it, since no right of way was involved.  And the decision was scarcely announced before Mr. Farquhar Fenelon Cooke had begun work on his new country place, Mohair.

I have oftentimes been led to consider the relevancy of this chapter, and have finally decided to insert it.  I concluded that the actual narrative of how Mr. Cooke came to establish his country-place near Asquith would be interesting, and likewise throw some light on that gentleman’s character.  And I ask the reader’s forbearance for the necessary personal history involved.  Had it not been for Mr. Cooke’s friendship for me I should not have written these pages.

CHAPTER III

Events, are consequential or inconsequential irrespective of their size.  The wars of Troy were fought for a woman, and Charles VIII, of France, bumped his head against a stone doorway and died because he did not stoop low enough.  And to descend from history down to my own poor chronicle, Mr. Cooke’s railroad case, my first experience at the bar of any gravity or magnitude, had tied to it a string of consequences then far beyond my guessing.  The suit was my stepping-stone not only to a larger and more remunerative practice, but also, I believe, to the position of district attorney, which I attained shortly afterwards.