Page:The Outcry (London, Methuen & Co., 1911).djvu/292

278 tract under a black cloud. "I wrote to report, fair and square, on Pappendick, but to tell him I'd take the picture just the same, negative and all."

"Ah, but take it in that way not for what it is but for what it isn't."

"We know nothing about what it 'isn't,'" said Mr. Bender, "after all that has happened—we've only learned a little better every day what it is."

"You mean," his companion asked, "the biggest bone of artistic contention?"

"Yes"—he took it from her—"the biggest that has been thrown into the arena for quite a while. I guess I can do with it for that."

Lady Sandgate, on this, after a moment, renewed her personal advance; it was as if she had now made sure of the soundness of her main bridge. "Well, if it's the biggest bone I won't touch it; Til leave it to be mauled by my betters. But since his lordship has asked me to name a price, dear Mr. Bender, I'll name one—and as you prefer big prices I'll try to make it suit you. Only it won't be for the portrait of a person nobody is agreed about. The whole world is agreed, you know, about my great-grandmother."