by in it over one or two others, and that it
slipped off and on very easily. And I used often to ask her to show it
me, partly to please her, and partly for a bit of fun. Well, now, it's
curious enough, I've missed that ring off her finger for several weeks
past. I couldn't help noticing that it was gone, for she always took
care that I should see it when she had it on. I asked her some time
back what had become of it; but she looked confused, and made some sort
of excuse which seemed odd to me at the time. But when I asked her
again, which was very soon after, she said she had put it by in her
jewel-case, for it was rather loose, and she was afraid of its getting
lost. But somehow or other I didn't quite believe what she said, so I
asked her once more, and she snapped me up so sharply that I found it
was best to ask no more questions about it. However, when I heard about
your daughter wearing a ring with a red stone in it, and that it was
looking out for an owner, it occurred to me at once that it might be
Lydia Philips's ring--that she had dropped it by accident, and didn't
like to own that she had lost it for some reason best known to herself,
and that she'd be only too glad to get it back again. So when your
daughter lent it me yesterday, I took it up in the evening; and getting
her by herself in the parlour, I pulled it out, and said, `See, Miss
Lyddy, what will you give me for finding _this_ for you?' I expected
thanks at the least; but to my great surprise she turned first very
pale, and then very red; and then, taking up the ring between her finger
and thumb as cautiously as if she was afraid it would bite or burn her,
she said--but I didn't believe her--`It ain't mine, and I don't want to
have anything to do with it.' I tried to make her change her opinion,
and told her I knew her ring as well as she knew it herself, that she
must have lost it, and that I was certain this was the very ring she had
showed me so often; but she only got angry, and flung the ring at me,
and told me to mind my own business. So I picked up the ring off the
floor, and slunk off like a dog with his tail between his legs, and I've
brought you back the ring. But it's the most mysterious thing to me. I
can't make it out a bit. I'm as sure now as I can be sure of anything
that it's the same ring I've often handled, and that it belongs to her.
Her own ring is gone from her finger, and that and this are as like as
two peas; but,