The tall mahogany-cased clock struck three, then four. The lawyer finished his cigar and lit another. He offered a fresh one to his guest, but the offer was declined.
“No, thank you,” observed the captain. “I’ve been yarnin’ away so fast that my breath’s been too busy to keep this one goin’. There’s consider’ble left yet. This is a better smoke than I’m used to gettin’ at the store down home. I tell Ryder—he’s our storekeeper and postmaster—that he must buy his cigars on the reel and cut ’em off with the scissors. When the gang of us all got a-goin’ mail times, it smells like a rope-walk burnin’ down. Ho! ho! It does, for a fact. Yet I kind of enjoy one of his five-centers, after all. You can get used to most anything. Maybe it’s the home flavor or the society. P’raps they’d taste better still if they was made of seaweed. I’ll trouble you for a match, Mr. Sylvester. Two of ’em, if you don’t mind.”
He whittled one match to a point with his pocket knife, impaled the cigar stump upon it, and relit with the other.
Meanwhile the room had been filling up. Around each of the big windows overlooking the Avenue were gathered groups of men, young and old, smoking, chatting, and gazing idly out. Captain Elisha regarded them curiously.
“This ain’t a holiday, is it?” he asked, after a while.
“No. Why?”
“I was just wonderin’ if all those fellers hadn’t any work to do, that’s all.”
“Who? That crowd?” The lawyer laughed. “Oh, they’re doing their regular stunt. You’ll find most of them here every afternoon about this time.”
“You don’t say. Pay ’em wages for it, do you?”
“Not that I know of. Some of them are brokers, who come up after the Exchange closes. Others are business men, active or retired. Some don’t have any business—except what they’re doing now.”