turned on its side,
lifting its crippled left hand into the air, and sank beneath the
water. My father laid the finger with the ring upon it under the
thwart, and sailed on, wishing that the boat would go faster. But the
wind was light, and before he came to the island it was already dark,
and a white creeping fog, very thin and full of moonlight, was spread
over the sea like a shroud.

As he went up the path to the house he was trying to pull off the
ring. At last it came loose in his hand; and the red stone was as
bright as a big star on the edge of the sky, and the gold was heavy in
his palm. So he hid the ring in his vest.

But the finger he dropped in a cluster of blue-berry bushes not far
from the path. And he came into the house with a load of joy and
trouble on his soul; for he knew that it is wicked to maim the dead,
but he thought also of the value of the ring.

II

My mother Nataline was able to tell when people's souls had changed,
without needing to wait for them to speak. So she knew that something
great had happened to my father, and the first word she said when she
brought him his supper was this:

"How did it happen?"

"What has happened?" said he, a little surprised, and putting down his
head over his cup of tea to hide his face.

"Well," she said in her joking way, "that is just what you haven't
told me, so how can I tell you? But it was something very bad or very
good, I know. Now which was it?"

"It was good," said he, reaching out his hand to cut a piece from the
loaf, "it was as good--as good as bread."

"Was it by land," said she, "or was it by sea?"

He was sitting at the table just opposite that window, so that he
looked straight into it as he lifted his head to answer her.

"It was by sea," he said smiling, "a true treasure of the deep."

Just then there came a sharp stroke and a splash on the window, and
something struggled and scrabbled there against the darkness. He saw a
hand with the little finger cut off spread out against the pane.

"My God," he cried, "what is that?"

But my mother, when she turned, saw only a splotch of wet on the
outside of the glass.

"It is only a bird," she said, "one of God's messengers. What are you
afraid of? I will go out and get it."

She came back with a cedar-bird in her hand--one of those brown birds
that we call _recollets_ because they look like a monk with a hood.
Her face was very grave.

"Look," she cried, "it is a _recollet_.