She was one of those little brigs which are among the quaintest of the marine objects of the port or harbour. Her forward-deck from the main-hatchway was heaped with timber cleverly stowed, with room for a little caboose and a narrow alley to it from the hatch. Some of the running rigging lay loose about the decks, and this gave her a look of confusion. Otherwise, from the appearance of her deck cargo, it was clear that she had not been hurt by weather. A deck-house nearly filled the quarter-deck; there was just room on either hand for a man to walk. The captain stood silent for a minute staring about him. He then muttered: "Nothing moves; I see nothing alive. He may be there. Come, for it will be you to see him first." He went to the door of the deck-house, and Julia followed. Two windows stood on either side the door, and four windows ran down either wall. But when they entered the moon made so faint a light through the door and the windows that it was difficult to see. Yet distinctive features of the interior were visible: a table, three or four chairs, and a bulkhead abaft, which might screen from the living-room two holes for the skipper and his mate to sleep in. "Call him," whispered the captain, as though he stood in a dead-house. "Johnny!" cried the girl, "come to father if you are here, Johnny!" She had a wonderful spirit to say this. She felt the horrible mockery of it and the recoil of its ghastly derisiveness upon her heart, but she knew that Hardy could not be far off, and would seek her. The passion of life was strong in her, and she judged that her only chance lay in inspiriting the poor man's dreadful conviction that she could help him to find his son. "Call him again," said the captain, and again she called. He advanced a step, and she saw him in the faint suffusion straining in a posture of desperate gaze, of desperate hearkening, as though his teeth were set and the sweat of blood was on his brow, and the palms of his hands were bloody with the penetration of the finger-nails. At that moment she heard a single stroke of a bell. She started with a cry, with instant rejoicing, for she believed there were men in the vessel. "What was that?" said the captain. "A bell!" she exclaimed. "O God! it may be Johnny!" he shouted, and he rushed through the open door. She quickly followed; she was not a superstitious fool, she was a girl at sea, and, as a girl might, she supposed that if a bell were struck upon a ship's deck it was by a man. A small bell was hung betwixt the foremast and the foremost end of the galley or caboose, and immediately under it lay, bottom up, secured to the deck, a small tub of a boat. It was easy to understand why the bell should have tolled. It had been struck by some bight of buntline or clewline in the sway of the brig as she heeled to the fold, and the sharp return of the bell jerked the tongue against the metal side in a single stroke.