Lost NY art resurfaces

By Jane Standley
BBC correspondent in New York

Two valuable works of art which were left on a New York subway platform have been handed in at one of the city's police stations.

The paintings were left by a column

A reward was offered for the works - a Picasso drawing and a painting by New York artist Sophie Matisse, the great-granddaughter of Henri Matisse.

An absent-minded picture framer left the two works of art on the platform of the 79th Street subway stop last week.

The leather portfolio they were travelling in was left leaning against a column as the picture framer, William Bailey, got on to the southbound number one train.

When he realised what he had lost, Mr Bailey retraced his steps and stuck up posters all around the station promising the reward to anyone who may have found the works.

And, in what is being hailed in New York as "a little Big Apple miracle", they have now turned up.

A street bookseller handed them in to the police, saying only that two men gave him the leather portfolio as they came out of the same subway station in which the picture framer had left them.