“I have met with an accident,” Meg explained. “In cutting up a pig the chopper caught this finger and severed it.”
“Did you wear a ring on it?” asked Adrian.
“Yes,” she replied, with sombre fury.
“How very strange!” ejaculated Adrian.
“Why?”
“Because I have seen a finger, a woman’s long finger with a gold ring on it, that might have come off your hand. I suppose the pork-butcher picked it up for a keepsake.”
“May be, Heer Adrian, but where is it now?”
“Oh! it is, or was, in a bottle of spirits tied by a thread to the cork.”
Meg’s evil face contorted itself. “Get me that bottle,” she said hoarsely. “Look you, Heer Adrian, I am doing much for you, do this for me.”
“What do you want it for?”