freighted it. There were thirty-odd vessels in the Blue Star
fleet--windjammers and steam schooners; and Cappy was registered as
managing owner of every one.

Following that point in his career when the young fellows on the
Street, discovering that he was a true-blue sport, had commenced to
fraternize with him and call him Cappy, the old gentleman ceased to
devote his attention to the details of his business. He was just
beginning to enjoy life; so he shifted the real work of his
multifarious interests to the capable shoulders of a Mr. John P.
Skinner, who fitted into his niche in the business as naturally as the
kernel of a healthy walnut fits its shell. Mr. Skinner was a man
still on the sunny side of middle life, smart, capable, cold-blooded,
a little bumptious, and, like the late Julius Caesar, ambitious.

No sooner had Cappy commenced to take life easy than Skinner commenced
to dominate the business. He attended an efficiency congress and came
home with a collection of newfangled ideas that eliminated from the
office all the joy and contentment old Cappy Ricks had been a
life-time installing. He inaugurated card systems and short cuts in
bookkeeping that drove Cappy to the verge of insanity, because he
could never go to the books himself and find out anything about his
own business. He had to ask Mr. Skinner--which made Skinner an
important individual.

With the passage of five years the general manager was high and low
justice in Cappy's offices, and had mastered the not-too-difficult art
of dominating his employer, for Cappy seldom seriously disagreed with
those he trusted. He saved all his fighting force for his
competitors.