A strange
array of rings was there, small and delicate, huge, bizarre; great signet
rings and poison rings, love tokens, charms and amulets, rings which had
been worn by wives, by mistresses, by favorite slaves and by young girls in
convents; rings with the Madonna and rings with many other saints graven
on large heavy stones; rings French and Russian, Polish, Italian, Spanish,
Syrian. Some were many centuries old. In nine shallow metal trays they
filled the safe in Roger's room. Although its money value was small, the
Gale collection was well known to a scattered public of connoisseurs, and
Roger took pride in showing it. But what had always appealed to him most
was the romance, the mystery, stored up in these old talismans that had
lived so many ages, travelled through so many lands, decked so many
fingers. Roger had found every one of them in the pawnshops of New York.
What new recruits to America had brought them here and pawned them? From
what old cities had they come? What passions of love and jealousy, of
hatred, faith, devotion were in this glittering array? Roger's own love
affair had been deep, but quiet and even and happy. All the wild
adventures, the might-have-beens in his sex life, were gathered in these
dusky trays with their richly colored glints of light.
Of his daughters, Laura had been the one most interested in his rings, and
so he thought of Laura now as he placed in the tray the new ring he had
bought, the one he would have liked for her.
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