Donald felt that he was in hot water, in spite of the assurance of Captain Patterdale that he believed him innocent of all wrong, and he was sorry that he had made any bargains, conditional or otherwise, with Captain Shivernock or Laud Cavendish. The nabob would not tell him what was wrong, and he could not determine whether Laud or some other person had stolen the money. He went into the house on his return from the elegant mansion. His mother had gone to watch with a sick neighbor, though his sister Barbara was sewing in the front room.

Donald was troubled, not by a guilty conscience, but by the fear that he had innocently done wrong in concealing his relations with Captain Shivernock and with Laud Cavendish. Somehow the case looked different now from what it had before.[227] Laud had told where he got his money, and given a good reason, as it seemed to him at the time, for concealment; but why the strange man desired secrecy he was utterly unable to imagine. He almost wished he had told Captain Patterdale all about his meeting with Captain Shivernock on Long Island, and asked his advice. It was not too late to do so now. Donald was so uneasy that he could not sit in the house, and went out doors. He walked about the beach for a time, and then sat down in front of the shop to think the matter over again.

Suddenly, while he was meditating in the darkness, he saw the trunk lights of the Maud illuminated, as though there was a fire in her cabin. He did not wait to study the cause, but jumping into his skiff, he pushed off, and sculled with all his might towards the yacht. He was mad and desperate, for the Maud was on fire! He leaped on board, with the key of the brass padlock which secured the cabin door in his hand; but he had scarcely reached the deck before he saw a man on the wharf retreating from the vicinity of the yacht. Then he heard the flapping of a sail on the other side of the pier; but he could not spend an instant[228] in ascertaining who the person was. He opened the cabin door, and discovered on the floor a pile of shavings in flames. Fortunately there was a bucket in the standing-room, with which he dashed a quantity of water upon the fire, and quickly extinguished it. All was dark again; but to make sure, Donald threw another pail of water on the cabin floor, and then it was not possible for the fire to ignite again.

Although the deck had been swept clean before the launch, the side next to the wharf was littered with shavings, and a basket stood there, in which they had been brought on board, for it was still half full. Donald found that one of the trunk lights had been left unfastened, in the hurry and excitement of attending the festival at Mr. Rodman's house. Through the aperture the incendiary had stuffed the shavings, and dropped a card of lighted matches upon them, for he saw the remnants of it when he threw on the first water. Who had done this outrageous deed? Donald sprang upon the wharf as he recalled the shadowy form and the flapping sail he had seen. Leaping upon the pier, he rushed over to the other side, where he discovered a sail-boat slowly making her way, in the gentle breeze, out of the dock.[229]

Beyond a peradventure, the boat was the Juno. Her peculiar rig enabled him readily to identify her. Was Laud Cavendish in her, and was he wicked enough to commit such an act? Donald returned to the Maud to assure himself that there was no more fire in her. He was satisfied that the yacht was not injured, for he had extinguished the fire before the shavings were well kindled. He fastened the trunk lights securely, locked the cabin door, and taking possession of the basket, he embarked in his skiff again. Sculling out beyond the wharf, he looked for the Juno. The wind was so light she made but little headway, and was standing off shore with the breeze nearly aft. It was Laud's boat, but it might not be Laud in her. Why should the wretch attempt to burn the Maud?

Then the scene in Mr. Rodman's garden, when Laud had been invited to leave, came to his mind, and Donald began to understand the matter. While he was thinking about it, the moon came out from behind a cloud which had obscured it, and cast its soft light upon the quiet bay, silvering the ripples on its waters with a flood of beauty.

Donald glanced at the basket in the skiff, still half filled with shavings. It was Laud's basket,[230] beyond a doubt, for he had often seen it when the owner came down to the shore to embark in his boat. The initials of his father's name, "J. C.," were daubed upon the outside of it, for there is sometimes as much confusion in regard to the ownership of baskets as of umbrellas. Donald was full of excitement, and full of wrath; and as soon as he got the idea of the guilty party through his head, he sculled the skiff with all the vigor of a strong arm towards the Juno, easily overhauling her in a few moments. He was so excited that he dashed his skiff bang into the Juno, to the serious detriment of the white paint which covered her side.

"What are you about, Don John?" roared Laud Cavendish, who had seen the approaching skiff, but had not chosen to hail her.

"What are you about?" demanded Donald, answering the question with another, Yankee fashion, as he jammed his boat-hook into the side of the Juno, and drew the skiff up to the yacht, from which it had receded.

Taking the painter, he jumped on the forward deck of the Juno, with the boat-hook still in his hand.[231]

"What do you mean by smashing into me in that kind of style, and jabbing your boat-hook into the side of my boat?" cried Laud, as fiercely as he could pitch his tones, though there seemed to be a want of vim to them.

"What do you mean by setting the Maud afire?" demanded Donald. "That's what I want to know."

"Who set her afire?" replied Laud, in rather hollow tones.

"You did, you miserable spindle-shanks!"

"I didn't set her afire, Don John," protested Laud.

"Yes, you did! I can prove it, and I will prove it, too."

"You are excited, Don John. You don't know what you are talking about."

"I think I do, and I'll bet you'll understand it, too, if there is any law left in the State of Maine."

"What do you mean by that?"

"I mean what I say, and say what I mean."

"I haven't been near the Maud."

"Yes, you have! Didn't I see you sneaking across the wharf? Didn't I see your mainsail alongside the pier? You can't humbug me. I know a[232] pint of soft soap from a pound of cheese," rattled Donald, who could talk very fast when he was both excited and enraged; and Laud's tongue was no match for his member.

"I tell you, I haven't been near the Maud."

"Don't tell me! I saw it all; I have two eyes that I wouldn't sell for two cents apiece; and I'll put you over the road at a two-forty gait."

Laud saw that it was no use to argue the point, and he held his peace, till the boat-builder had exhausted his rhetoric, and his stock of expletives.

"What did you do it for, Laud?" asked he, at last, in a comparatively quiet tone.

"I have told you a dozen times I didn't do it," replied the accused. "You talk so fast I can't get a word in edgeways."

"It's no use for you to deny it," added Don John.

"Do you think I'd burn your yacht?"

"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."
Don John visits the Juno. Page 230. 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!"[233]

"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."[234]

"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.[235]

"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............