Buckstone had boarded at the Bell River House during his former visit to Poppleton. He would be likely to go there on the present occasion. The landlord, the clerk, the chambermaids, the hall girls, the porter, the hostlers--all knew Mr. Buckstone; but not one of them had seen him on the day of the murder. Those who had the means of knowing were very sure he had not entered the hotel. It was probable that the murdered man had arrived at the Mills by the afternoon train--the same in which the Hungerford family had come; but no one had seen him. The station agent knew him, but he was no wiser than others. Mr. Buckstone and the stranger had gone over to The Great Bell in a boat--it was not possible to go in any other way, for, though some of the enthusiasts, who believed Poppleton would, at some indefinite future time, rival New York in commercial grandeur, when every foot of land would be wanted, islands included, thought that a bridge over the channel was practicable, the structure had not yet even been proposed; therefore Mr. Buckstone and the stranger must have gone over to The Great Bell in a boat. This was a logical conclusion, and Mr. Birch believed in it with all his might. Then, as it was one of the customs of society that boats should be owned by somebody, it followed, by a course of reasoning equally accurate and logical, that the boat in which Buckstone and the stranger had crossed to the island, belonged to somebody. Fortunately the problem of the ownership of this boat had already been solved, and it only remained for Mr. Birch to see the owner. He did see him; but the proprietor of the small craft was as lamentably ignorant as the rest of the world. He kept his boat on the beach about half way between the Point and the Port. He had not even missed it, for he seldom used it, until the sheriff had spoken to him about the matter. The boat contained two fifty-six pound weights, used as ballast, one of which was missing; and the painter, a piece of whale line, sixty feet in length, had been cut from the stem, and taken away; but he had not seen Mr. Buckstone, and did not even know him by sight. “When did you use your boat last?” asked Mr. Birch, who had made a memorandum of the missing fifty-six and the sixty feet of whale line. “I used it looking after the body of Goodwin the afternoon before the murder,” replied the owner. “What time did you go home?” “I hauled up the boat just before dark.” “Did you leave the sail in the boat?” “No; I always carry that up to the house.” “Where do you keep the oars?” “They are not worth much; I always leave them in the boat.” “Don’t you suppose the fifty-six was stolen by some loafer from the Settlement?” “I don’t know but it was; but it seems to me, if any one stole it, the thief would have taken the other one. He might as well be hung for an old sheep as a lamb.”