Page:Arthur Stringer - Twin Tales.djvu/282

272 to any one with the brains to recognize what it is. As I say, I don't want to exaggerate. In one way it's not easy to figure out—in dollars and cents, I mean. But I'm being as reasonable as a man who says a loaf of bread is worth ten cents when I say this Titian is to-day, as it stands there, worth at least three or four hundred thousand dollars."

It was bewilderment, more than elation, that showed on her face. He even detected a touch of incredulity there as she turned back to the mellow glow of light reflected from the canvas.

"That sounds ridiculous, perhaps, but I know about such things. It has been my business to know. For instance, there was the Panshanger Raphael, sometimes spoken of as the Small Cowper Madonna, which Widener paid seven hundred thousand dollars for. And the same collector, when he brought Rembrandt's Mill, paid a cool half million for it, just as he paid a half million for a Vandyke from the Cattaneo collection. And Huntington paid four hundred thousand dollars for