“What’s all this circus about?” he broke out impatiently. “One minute, Mr. Carleton. I want to make a record which will be big enough for the men to sign; one that won’t get astray, lost, or stolen.” “What’s the matter with this?” asked Captain Joe, opening the wooden door of the new part of the shanty. “Ye can’t lose this ’less ye take away the house.” “That’s the very thing!” exclaimed Sanford. “Swing her wide open, Captain Joe. Please give me that big blue pencil.” When the door flew back it was as white and clean as a freshly scrubbed pine table. Sanford wrote as follows:— _August 29_, Shark Ledge Light. We, the undersigned, certify that the concrete disk is perfectly level except opposite the northwest derrick, where it is three tenths of an inch too high. We further certify that Superintendent Carleton orders the concrete raised six inches on the southeast segment, and refuses to permit any cut stone to be set until this is done. Henry Sanford, Contractor. “Come, Captain Joe,” said Sanford, “put your signature under mine.” The captain held the pencil in his bent fingers as if it had been a chisel, and inscribed his full name, “Joseph Bell,” under that of Sanford. Then Caleb and the others followed, the diver fumbling inside his dress for his glasses, the search proving fruitless until Captain Joe ran his arm down between the rubber collar of the diving-dress and Caleb’s red shirt and drew them up from inside his undershirt. “Now, Captain Joe,” said Sanford, “you can send a gang in the morning at low water and raise that concrete. It will throw the upper masonry out of level, but it won’t make much difference in a circle of this size.” The men gave a cheer, the humor of the situation taking possession of everyone. Even Caleb forgot his sorrow for a moment. Carleton laughed a little halting laugh himself, but there was nothing of spontaneity in it. Nickles, the cook, who, now that the cut stone was about to be laid, was permanently transferred from the Screamer to the shanty, and under whose especial care this door was placed by reason of its position,—it opened into the kitchen,—planted his fat, oily body before the curious record, read it slowly word for word, and delivered himself of this opinion: “That ’ere door’s th’ biggest receipt for stores I ever see come into a kitchen.” “Big or little,” said Captain Joe, who could not see the drift of most of Nickles’s jokes, “you spatter it with yer grease or spile it any, and ye go ashore.” CHAPTER XIV TWO ENVELOPES