The whole work was quite modern.
But if the case was modern what it held was not.

Within, on a cushion of cloth of gold as fine as silk, and with the peculiar softness of old gold, rested a mummy hand, so perfect that it startled one to see it.
A woman's hand, fine and long, with slim tapering fingers and nearly as perfect as when it was given to the embalmer thousands of years before.
In the embalming it had lost nothing of its beautiful shape; even the wrist seemed to maintain its pliability as the gentle curve lay on the cushion.

The skin was of a rich creamy or old ivory colour; a dusky fair skin which suggested heat, but heat in shadow.

The great peculiarity of it, as a hand, was that it had in all seven fingers, there being two middle and two index fingers.

The upper end of the wrist was jagged, as though it had been broken off, and was stained with a red-brown stain.