In a small Jewish village in southern Russia, the same scene repeated itself every Friday on Shabbat, in the home of Itzik Nussembaum. Esther, his wife, would present her ring finger to her husband and two sons – just an ugly and battered finger on hands that were ugly and battered, she said – and, in a reverent, solemn, proud gesture, she would place on it the old family ring set with a beautiful diamond.
