His reverence gave Veronica a good scolding.
"You naughty girl! Is that the way to behave? How you frightened us! Of course you were chasing a butterfly?"
"No, I was running away from one, but it caught me."
"What, the butterfly?"
"Yes, that ugly, big butterfly standing beside you."
His reverence understood as much as he was meant to, and set to work, too, to look for the ring. But they might have looked for it till Doomsday if Mr. Gongoly had not passed that way. Veronica had quite despaired of finding the ring.
"Well, well, my dear," said the nabob of Glogova, shaking back his long gray hair, "never mind, trust in Gongoly, he will find it for you. There is only one way to do it, so in an hour's time they will be making hay in this field."
Though the grass was not two inches high (it had only been cut a fortnight before), Mr. Gongoly sent his men there to mow it, with the result that next day the ring was safely resting on Veronica's finger. And for years the people spoke of the wonderful fact that in that year Mr. Gongoly's meadow gave two crops of hay, and it was always mentioned if any one spoke disparagingly of the Glogova fields.
What more am I to say? I think I have told my story conscientiously. All the same there are some things that will never be known for certain; for instance, what really became of Pál Gregorics' fortune, for there is no sign of it to this day. Was the supposed receipt in the handle of the umbrella or not? No one will ever know, not even little Matykó, who drank the water with three sparks in it. No king drinks such precious liquid as he did—if the story be true.