The art dealers and cataloguers of three continents last week scratched the name of a famous painting from their lists of the world's masterpieces. It was Thomas Gainsborough's portrait of the 4th Duke of Rutland, long known in art circles (by an analogy with Gainsborough's much more celebrated Blue Boy} as the Black Boy. Along with two other valuable paintings—Gainsborough's landscape, The Wayfarer, and a portrait of Charles the Bold by an unknown Flemish artist—the Black Boy came to an unworthy end.
Vienna-born Marie Hauser, 45, was deeply attached to the wife and family of her employer, Captain Daniel Sickles, art-collecting official...
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