hat may never come. I am going to do
something."

CHAPTER III.

THE TIMELY ORACLE.

A year passed by. Caruthers dozed with his cob pipe between the
fingers of his limp hand, waiting for clients whose step was not heard
upon the stairs. But the office had not been wholly without business.
Once a man called to seek advice, which was given, free, as an
advertisement for more work from his neighborhood, and once Lyman had
defended a man charged with the theft of a sheep. The mutton was found
in the fellow's closet and the hide of the animal was discovered under
his bed; and with such evidence against him it was not expected that a
lawyer could do much, so, when the prisoner was sentenced to the
penitentiary, Caruthers congratulated his partner with the remark:
"That was all right. We can't expect to win every time. But we were
not so badly defeated; you got him off with one year, and he deserved
two. To cut a thief's sentence in two ought to help us."

"Among the other thieves," Lyman suggested.

"Oh, yes," Caruthers spoke up cheerfully. "A lawyer's success depends
largely upon his reputation among thieves."

"Or at least among the men who intend to stretch the law. Let me see;
we have been in business together just one year, and our books balance
with a most graceful precision. We are systematic, anyway."

"Yes," Caruthers replied, letting his pipe fall to the floor, "system
is my motto. No business, properly systematized, is often better than
some business in a tangle."

Warren, the editor, appeared at the door. "Are you busy?" he asked.

"Well, we are not in what you might call a rush," Lyman answered. "Are
you busy?" he inquired, with a twinkle in his eye.

Before answering, Warren stepped into the room and sat down with a
distressful sigh. "I am more than that," he said, dejectedly. "I am in
hot water, trying to swim with one hand."

"What's the trouble?"

"Oh, a sort of summer, fall, spring and winter complaint." He took out
a note book, turned over the leaves, returned it to his pocket and
said: "I lack just sixty-five, this time."

"Dollars?" Lyman asked.

Warren gave him a quick, reproachful look. "Now, Judge, what airs have
I ever put on to cause you to size me up that way? Have I ever shown
any tax receipts? Have I ever given any swell dinners? Sixty-five
cents is the amount I am short, Judge, and where I am to get it, the
Lord only knows. My paper is lying over yonder in the express off