If the outrage at Lincolnville had been committed in "the dead of the night," it was perfectly evident to Donald that Captain Shivernock had had nothing whatever to do with it. This conclusion was a great relief to the mind of the young man; but he had hardly reached it before the captain himself passed through the gate, and fixed a searching gaze upon him, as though he regarded him as an interloper. CHAPTER VII. LAYING DOWN THE KEEL. "What are you doing here, Don John?" demanded Captain Shivernock, as he ascended the steps of the piazza. "I came to see you, sir," replied Donald, respectfully. "Well, you see me--don't you?" "I do, sir." "Have you been talking to Sykes and his wife?" asked the captain, sternly. "I have, sir." "Have you told them that you saw me on the island?" "No, sir; not them, nor anybody else." "It's well for you that you haven't," added the captain, shaking his head--a significant gesture, which seemed to relate to the future, rather than to the present. "If you lisp a syllable of it, you will need a patch on your skull.--Now," he continued, "what do you want of me?" "I wanted to talk about the Juno with you. Perhaps I can find a customer for you." "Come into the house," growled the captain, as he stalked through the door. Donald followed him into a sitting-room, on one side of which was a secretary, provided with a writing-desk. The captain tossed his cap and overcoat into a chair, and seated himself at the desk. He picked up a quill pen, and began to write as though he intended to scratch a hole through the paper, making noise enough for a small locomotive. He finished the writing, and signed his name to it. Then he cast the contents of a sand-box upon it, returning to it the portion which did not adhere to the paper. The document looked as though it had been written with a handspike, or as though the words had been ploughed in, and a furrow of sand left to form the letters. "Here!" said the captain, extending the paper to his visitor, with a jerk, as though he was performing a most ungracious office. "What is it, sir?" asked Donald, as he took the document. "Can't you read?" growled the strange man. Under ordinary circumstances Donald could read--could read writing when not more than half the letters were merged into straight lines; but it required all his skill, and not a little of his Scotch-Yankee guessing ability, to decipher the vagrant, staggering characters which the captain had impressed with so much force upon the paper. It proved to be a bill of sale of the Juno, in due form, and for the consideration of three hundred dollars. "Surely you cannot mean this, Captain Shivernock?" exclaimed the amazed young man. "Can't I? Do you think I'm a lunatic?" stormed the captain. Donald did think so, but he was not so imprudent as to say it. "I can't pay you three hundred dollars for the boat," pleaded he.