As June listened, however, to the wheedling sneers of the one and the forthright tone of the other, almost too transparent in its honesty, she could only conclude that Uncle Si was deliberately cheapening William’s discovery for purposes of his own.
Looking at the masterpiece on the opposite wall, with what June was only too keenly aware were the eyes of ignorance, it was impossible to deny an extraordinary similarity of subject and treatment. And this, as she perceived at once, was where Uncle Si overdid it. He would not allow that to the vision of a technical expert, the possession of which he did not scruple now to claim for himself, there was the slightest resemblance. Such similarities as might exist on the surface to delude the untutored eye he explained away in a flood of words whose force was intended to convince them both. But he convinced neither. June, pinning her wits to a plain argument, smiled secretly as more than once he contradicted himself. William on the other hand, was not permitted by the love and reverence he bore his master, to submit his speeches to the scale. He took his stand upon the divine instinct that was his by right of birth. Such being the case he could but gently dissent from the old man. It was one of his peculiarities that the surer he was, the more gentle he grew. And therein, as June perceived, he differed strangely from Uncle Si who could only render conviction in terms of vehemence.
Finally, as a clincher, S. Gedge Antiques growled: “Boy, you talk like a fool!” and head in air, marched with the aid of his knobby walking stick out of William’s treasure house.
William and June having stood to talk with the old man, now sat down again.
“Thank goodness he’s gone!” said June.
William confessed that the master had puzzled him considerably.
“’Tisn’t like him to close his eyes to the facts of a case. I can’t think what has happened to the master. He hardly ever makes a mistake.”
Said June sagaciously: “Uncle Si being so wise about most things, isn’t it likely that the mistake is yours?”
“It may be so,” William allowed. But at once he added, with a divine simplicity: “I will stake my life, all the same, Miss June, that our picture is a Van Roon.”
“Or a clever forgery, perhaps.”