“How long will it take?”
“Oh—three days.”
“That won’t do. I want it by to-morrow morning.”
Antonides raised his eyebrows and shrugged his shoulders.
“Look here,” said Freyberger. “What will you charge to do it in three days?”
“You must understand,” replied Antonides, “that I do not restore marble. I do not restore pictures now myself. I am getting old, Mr Freyberger.”
“We are all doing that. What will you charge—”
“Getting old,” continued Antonides, as though unconscious of the other’s question, “costs money; one has to call in help. I have secured an assistant, an Alsatian; his name is Lermina—”
“Yes, yes, but—”
“I taught him the art of restoration, the knowledge I have placed in that man’s head,” said the old gentleman, suddenly pretending to turn savage, “is worth a king’s ransom, and he has repaid me in the oldest coinage of the world—ingratitude—”