27
Just at first June was unable to realise that M. Duponnet had not taken the picture away with him. The blood seemed to drum against her brain while she watched Uncle Si turn over the cheque in his long talon fingers and then transfer it to a leather case, which he returned to his breast pocket with a deep sigh. Afterwards he took up the picture from the table on which he had set it down and then June grasped the fact that the treasure was still there.
The face which bent over it now was not that of a happy man. It was a complex of emotions, deep and stern. The price was huge for a thing that had cost him nothing, but—and there it was that the shoe pinched!—if it should prove to be a real Van Roon, he might be parting with it for a song.
June could read his thoughts like an open book.
