The witnesses moved forward in a body, silent. The old face watching them relaxed. She smiled grimly.
"Is it a Dürer?" she demanded. She was standing behind them.
They started, looking at her doubtfully. The artist shrugged his shoulders. He stepped back a little. The director shook his head with a sigh. "Who can tell?" he said softly. "The marks——"
The baroness's eyes glowed dangerously. "I did not suppose you could tell," she said curtly.
The young scientist interposed. "It is a case for science," he said quickly. "You shall see—the Roentgen rays will tell. The shutters—Berthold."
The assistant closed them, one by one, the heavy wooden shutters. A last block of light rested on the shadowy picture. A last shutter swung into place. They waited—in darkness. Some one breathed quickly, with soft, panting breath. Slowly a light emerged through the dark. The great picture gathered to itself shape, and glowed. Light pierced it till it shone with strokes of brushes. Deeply and slowly in the bluish patina, at the edge of the flowing locks, on the shoulder of the Christ, a glimmer of shadow traced itself, faintly and unmistakably.
Confused murmurs ran through the darkness—the voice of the director—a woman's breath.
"Ready, Berthold." It was the voice of the Herr Doctor.
There was a little hiss, a blinding flash of light, the click of a camera, and blackness again.
A shutter flew open.