don't sprout on our branch!" Uvo
had put up his eyebrows in a humorous way of his. "We must keep a
weather eye open for the evil that they did living after them on
Witching Hill! You may well stare at his hands; they probably weren't
his at all, but done from a model. I hope the old Turk hadn't quite such
a ladylike----"

He stopped short, as I knew he would when he saw what I was pointing out
to him; for I had not been staring at the effeminate hand affectedly
composed on the corner of a table, but at the enamelled ring painted
like a miniature on the little finger.

"Good Lord!" cried Delavoye. "That's the very ring we saw last night!"

It was at least a perfect counterfeit; the narrow stem, the high,
projecting, oval bezel--the white peacock enamelled on a crimson
ground--one and all were there, as the painters of that period loved to
put such things in.

"It must be the same, Gilly! There couldn't be two such utter oddities!"

"It looks like it, certainly; but how did Miss Hemming get hold of it?"

"Easily enough; she ferrets out all the old curiosity shops in the
district, and didn't Berridge tell us she bought his ring in one?
Obviously it's been lying there for the last century and a bit. Bear in
mind that this bad old lot wasn't worth a bob towards the end; then you
must see the whole thing's so plain, there's only one thing plainer."

"What's that?"

"The entire cause and origin of Guy Berridge's pangs and fears about his
engagement. He never had one or the other before Christmas--when he got
his ring. They've made his life a Hades ever since, every day of it and
every hour of every day, except sometimes in the morning when he was
getting up. Why not then? Because he took off his ring when he went to
his bath! I'll go so far as to remind you that his only calm and
rational moments last night were while you and I were looking at this
ring and it was off his finger!"

Delavoye's strong excitement was attracting the attention of the old
soldierly attendant near the window, and in a vague way that veteran
attracted mine. I glanced past him, out and down into the formal
grounds. Yew and cedar seemed unreal to me in the wintry sunlight;
almost I wondered whether I was dreaming in my turn, and where on earth
I was. It was as though a touch of the fantastic had rested for a moment
even on my hard head. But I very soon shook it off, and mocked the
vanquished weakness with a laugh.

"Yes, my dear fellow, that