We were taken into the drawing-room and there, sharing honours with the portraits, was a little gold ring hanging high from the chandelier rosette. While not a work of art like one of the canvases on the wall, it has its own sufficient charm—it is a mystery. The dainty gold band has hung above the heads of generations of Harrisons, and somewhere in the long line its story has been lost. Who placed the ring where it hangs, and whether in joy or in grief, nobody longer knows. But it will swing safely there while Brandon stands, for in this ancient house, down the ages undisturbed, come the mysteries and the ghosts.
That evening a wind came up and rain set in from a depressing dark-blue-calico sky. Gadabout did not take the trouble to run back into her creek harbour; but put down a heavier anchor and made herself comfortable for the night in the cove above the Brandon pier. The cradling boat and the patter upon the roof soon put us to sleep. Then something put us very wide awake again. We listened, but there was nothing to hear. The wind had died out and the boat had stopped rolling. In a moment, the long blast of a steamer whistle told what was the matter. In blanket-robe and slippers, the Commodore got quickly to a window, and found the river world all gone—swallowed up in fog.
Another weird, warning call out of the mysterious, impenetrable mist; the steamer for Richmond was groping her way up the river. To be sure, anchored as we were so far inshore of the channel, we were well clear of the steamer's course; but in such heavy fogs the river boats often go astray. As succeeding blasts sounded nearer, the Commodore became anxious and, without waiting to turn out the crew, he started for the fog-bell.
But where was the fog-bell? Not where it ought to be, we well knew. Some changes in the cockpit had crowded it from its place, and for some time it had been stowed away—but where? The Commodore scurried from locker to locker.
"Couldn't we just as well whistle?" asked Nautica.
"No, no. A boat under way whistles in a fog, but one at anchor must ring a bell."
One more locker, and, "I've found it!" triumphantly cried the Commodore; but then, in dismay, "There goes the tongue out of the thing."
Suddenly came another blast from the steamer. She sounded almost atop of us, and the whistling was followed by a swashing of water as though her propeller had been reversed.
"Why don't you call Henry?" asked Nautica.
"No time now," said the Commodore. "I must find something to pound this bell with."