Steamed, quite possibly, but not shocked was Cummings & Lockwood’s Vincent M. Kiernan last December when one of the firm’s most promising clients — Stamford-based Priceline.com Inc. — decided to go public without putting C&L in charge of the legalities.

The job of issuer’s counsel to the rapidly growing Internet retailer in its $160 million initial public offering went, instead, to New York’s Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom.