"No, no, it can't be!" exclaimed my uncle, unable to keep his chair in his excitement, and nervously pacing the apartment. "You do not really think that Angelo would murder a fellow-mortal merely to produce a realistic picture?"
"Why not?" replied the Baronet coolly, as if the supposititious act, were the most natural one in the world. "Such instances have occurred in the history of art—science, too, has had its murders. Did not Vesalius on one occasion dissect a living man? From his boyhood Angelo has thirsted for fame as an artist. His long line of early failures, therefore, may have had the effect of disturbing his mental balance. Constant brooding over the neglect offered to his genius may have so obliterated the line that divides right from wrong as to have led him, in despair of obtaining success by any other method, to imitate the example of Giotto."
"Good God! And this man might have been my son-in-law!" cried my uncle.
"Let me congratulate you upon your lucky deliverance from such a relationship."
"If Angelo is an assassin," said my uncle, "who was the victim?"
"That is the question which the picture will answer."
"You mean that Angelo has transferred the features of the dead without alteration to the canvas?"
"That is my meaning—yes."
"And yet," remonstrated my uncle, "he exhibits his picture at Paris in a public gallery open to all. That is the very way to betray himself."