seven P.M.
`` If you simply said seven , he may have taken it to mean seven this evening , '' I suggested . `` He could not have thought we intended to go down the river and cross the bar in the night . '' `` I should say not ; but Captain Blastblow is a very brilliant man , and has been around Cape Horn and the Cape of Good Hope so many times that he ought to know what he is about , '' I replied , letting out a little of my pique at the commander of the Islander for his implications against me . `` Allowing that I wrote ` seven P.M. , ' or that I did not write either morning or evening , what is Captain Blastblow doing down here ? '' demanded Colonel Shepard , warmly . `` If he understood that you were not to sail till this evening , he may have brought the Islander out here to try her , and enable him to get accustomed to her ways before he took on board his passengers . That is all the explanation I can suggest , but I do n't think it will hold water .