"Yes, I do; and I know you tried to do it. If I hadn't been over by the shop, you would have done it." [Illustration: DON JOHN VISITS THE JUNO. Page 230.] "I didn't do it, I repeat. Do you think I would lie about it? Do you think I have no sense of honor about me!" "Confound your honor!" sneered Donald. "Don't insult me. When you assail my honor, you touch me in a tender place." "In a soft place, and that's in your head." "Be careful, Don John. I advise you not to wake a sleeping lion." "A sleeping jackass!" "I claim to be a gentleman, and my honor is my capital stock in life." "You have a very small capital to work on, then." "I warn you to be cautious, Don John. My honor is all I have to rest upon in this world." "It's a broken reed. I wouldn't give a cent's worth of molasses candy for the honor of a fellow who would destroy the property of another, because he got mad with him." In spite of his repeated warnings, Laud Cavendish was very forbearing, though Donald kept the boat-hook where it would be serviceable in an emergency. "No, Don John, I did not set the Maud afire. Though you went back on me this afternoon, and served me a mean and shabby trick, I wouldn't do such a thing as burn your property." "Who went back on you?" demanded Donald. "You did; when you could have saved me from being driven out of the garden, you took the trouble to say, you did not invite me," replied Laud, reproachfully. "I didn't invite you; and I had no right to invite you." "No matter for that; if you had just said that your friend, Mr. Cavendish, had come in with you it would have been all right." "My friend, Mr. Cavendish!" repeated Donald, sarcastically. "I didn't know I had any such friend." "I didn't expect that of you, after what I had done for you, Don John." "Spill her on that tack! You never did anything for me." "I took that boat off your hands, and I suppose you got a commission for selling her. Wasn't that doing something for you?" "No!" protested Donald. "I have always used you well, and done more for you than you know of. You wouldn't have got the job to build the Maud if it hadn't been for me. I spoke a good word for you to Mr. Rodman," whined Laud. "You!" exclaimed Donald, disgusted with this ridiculous pretension. "If you said anything to Mr. Rodman about it, I wonder he didn't give the job to somebody else." "You think I have no influence, but you are mistaken; and if you insist on quarrelling with me, you will find out, when it is too late, what folks think of me." "They think you are a ninny; and when they know what you did to-night, they will believe you are a knave," replied Donald. "You didn't cover your tracks so that I couldn't find them; and I can prove all I say. I didn't think you were such a rascal before." "You won't make anything out of that sort of talk with me, Don John," said Laud, mildly. "You provoke me to throw you overboard, but I don't want to hurt you."