“Know it?” I said, seizing my advantage. “It’s my favorite painting in all the world, though I’ve only seen it in reproductions. I thought it was so magnificent, I actually had a tapestry made of it.”

“You don’t say,” he replied, dumbfounded, but also electrified at finding a fellow fanatic aficionado of the three-centuries-dead Gentileschi. “You’ll have to come to my house, then, to see the original.”

His house? Did my ears deceive me? Forget about Bible, talk art. Go for it, you lunatic! a voice inside me started to scream. You’re in the Twilight Zone anyway.

“You know,” I went on, “I can’t believe how fortunate I am that you pointed this Gentileschi out to me. The great works here always brought me a lot of comfort during my college years.” (This was somewhat true. My off-campus college apartment was only two blocks away, and during a rash of burglaries in the late seventies, our apartment building was one of the few that went untouched due to the plethora of security agents stationed at the Fogg.) “And though I always appreciated the Reniors, Monets, van Goghs, and Rembrandts, I never realized that there was actually a Gentileschi right here. I mean, every great museum has their Rembrandts, but to find a Gentileschi, that’s a real discovery.”

“I’m so glad you feel that way.” Cohen beamed. “My wife and I just have to have you over for dinner. Don’t worry, we’ve heard about those kosher rules, so we’ll prepare something you can eat.” (At this moment I would have gladly eaten the carpet at his house if this was what was being served. I figured I could work out the details later.)

“Well,” he said, “it seems like we both made a great discovery tonight. You discovered Gentileschi, and I discovered you.”

It was as if a benign heavenly light had seared through the roof and upper floor of the Fogg and was now focused exclusively on me. As we approached the original group from whom we had departed a full ten minutes before, this supernatural feeling was reinforced by the fact that they all seemed to have been frozen in exactly the same position we had left them in. Their total mortification at the previous chain of events had left them no graceful way to depart, but no graceful way to continue relating either. The spell was broken when Joe put his arm around my shoulder and said, “You folks don’t know what a treasure you have here. Why, this boy could give you a tour of this museum. He’s an absolute expert. Lisa,” he continued, “as soon as you get back to New York, I want you to arrange for Mr. Jonas and his wife to join my wife and me for dinner and drinks at my apartment. I’m so pleased you introduced us. I’m just so pleased. I’m sure our firms will be doing a lot of business together.” And with that, he went on to greet his other guests.

There was a well-known television commercial where El Exigente, the coffee taster for a major premium coffee, arrives in a small Colombian coffee-growing town once a year to sample the coffee. If he approves the single test cup, the entire town will enjoy prosperity for a full year. Everyone in the commercial waits in anxious anticipation as El Exigente sips his coffee. When he smiles and nods his head, whistles blow, church bells ring, guns are discharged, people begin to embrace wildly, and the announcers tell us in the background that “the people are happy.”