Al Reach Cabinet on eBay last night

[scooter729]

I was watching with interest the listing for the Al Reach cabinet on eBay last night. (For those not familiar, the seller listed it last year, but there were suspicions it had been stolen years ago from the NY Public Library and it was taken down.)

The seller said he had sent it to the FBI and the NYPL did not have a claim on it as being their property, so he went ahead with the sale.

Not included in the listing was a back scan. On the back was a penciled "3", which is believed to have identified it to a certain part of the NYPL's collection.

So, if the NYPL and FBI really said there was no claim, why were there only two bidders on this (one a new bidder who bid three times)? If totally clean, wouldn't this have sold for more than $1351?

Would love other's thoughts on this. Was it because of future potential claims by the NYPL? Were most people sure that this was indeed stolen property, regardless of any claims (or lack thereof) by the NYPL?

The listing:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...vip=true&rt=nc