It was half past eleven when he left the room. He had planned to dine at the Ostable House, and drive home afterward, but dinner would not be ready until twelve. He walked over to the hotel and, because idling and thinking were not cheerful or amusing just then, he decided to fill in the half hour by writing his reply to Seymour Covell’s letter. He did write it, expressing some doubt as to his ability to find a satisfactory position for his friend’s son immediately, but extending a hearty invitation to the latter to visit him at Harniss. He did not, however, follow Esther’s suggestion that that visit be delayed until after her European trip had begun. He saw no reason for such delay. Let the young fellow come at once, if he wanted to. What difference did it make when he came? “Send the boy along,” he wrote. “The sooner the better. And tell him for me that he can stay as long as he likes. There’s room enough, goodness knows. And the longer he stays the better chance I shall have to look him over and decide what sort of job he will fit into, when he gets ready to take it. Why don’t you come, yourself? A month or so down here in the sand will blow some of that Chicago soot out of your head. I always told you this was the healthiest place on God’s earth. You come and I’ll prove it.” After dinner, as he brought the span abreast the Ostable post office, he pulled the horses to a halt and handed the letter to a citizen who was standing on the platform. “Here, mail that for me, will you?” he said. The citizen received the letter as he might have received a commission from the governor. “Yes, sir; yes, indeed, Cap’n Townsend,” he replied, with unction. “Much obliged. And mail it right away. Don’t put it in your pocket and forget it.” “Forget it! I wouldn’t forget it for nothin’. No, _sir_!” “Well, it is more than nothing, so I don’t want it forgotten.” He waited until he saw the letter deposited in the mail slot in the post-office door. Then he clucked to the span and drove on. It was not yet four o’clock when he reached Harniss. It occurred to him that Esther would not be at home when he got there; she would have gone to that Welfare Society meeting, or whatever it was. He did not feel inclined to sit alone in the library and think; memories of that confounded Boston attorney’s “if” were still too clear to make thinking pleasant. They angered him. What was the matter with the crowd over there in Ostable? What had become of all the assured complacency with which they had greeted him at similar consultations of but a year ago? Losing their grit, were they? Letting appeals and delays and all that sort of legal drivel get on their nerves? The case was as surely his now as it was then. Flock of old hens! With what delight would he, when the long-drawn-out mess was ended and the decision his, pay them off and send them packing. Bah!