His compliment sank through her sexual fog. It seemed sincere. “Really?” She probably shouldn’t care so much that he was impressed, but liked that he admired her. Plus, she was pretty impressed, herself. She hadn’t panicked and she’d asked the right questions. “It’s kind of fun, actually.”
He looked into her eyes and grinned, sharing the pleasure of her success, and a flash of heat stabbed straight from her fluttering heart to her pelvis, melting everything along the way. How did he do that? And damn, did she ever want to see what else he could do to her.
Footsteps sounded on the concrete floor of the work area. She pulled back guiltily and turned as Mr. Atallah walked in. He held a small cardboard box that he set on the low table before him. Without explanation he donned white cotton gloves and handed her a pair. As she pulled them on, he opened the flaps of the box, reached inside, and gently pulled out a white stone jar with an animal’s head for a lid. She noted his look of pride as he paused to appreciate what he held, stroking a finger along the smooth curve of the jar. Then, cradling it in both hands, he held it out for her inspection.
She opened her mouth, but managed to silence a gasp as she carefully accepted the jar. She recognized this. It was no more than six inches tall, creamy white and heavy. Alabaster, without a doubt. The stone was smooth and cool in her hand. The only decoration was the black paint that defined the eyes, mouth, and nose of the baboon head that formed the lid of the jar.
Her gaze flew to Mr. Atallah’s, who smiled serenely, then back to the jar. She turned it slowly, examining it from all angles.
It was undoubtedly real, and at least three thousand years old.
After a full minute of silence, Donovan’s patience apparently gave out. “What is it,” he asked.
“A canopic jar.” She had to clear her throat, a bit too awestruck to speak. “During mummification, the internal organs were removed and stored separately in four jars. There was one each for the stomach, lungs, liver, and intestines. The stoppers for the jars often depicted the four sons of the god Horus, with the heads of a baboon, a jackal, a hawk, and a man.”
He made a slightly disgusted face. “Someone’s guts were in that jar?”
“The lungs, I believe, in this one.” She glanced at Mr. Atallah for confirmation.
“Correct, Mrs. Hassan.” Grasping the baboon head, he lifted. Stone scraped against stone, and Jess stared at the open jar in her hands. Then peered inside.
She saw nothing in the tiny space, but Mr. Atallah was prepared, whipping out a small flashlight and shining it into the jar. Dried-up shreds filled the bottom of the jar. She let Donovan look, too.
“That was lungs? You couldn’t even fit one lung inside something that small.”
“They were dried first and wrapped in linen.” And after three or four thousand years, she imagined those bits of organic material were all that would be left.
“Where’s the rest of him?” Donovan asked.
“A good question.” She looked at Mr. Atallah. “There should be three more jars.”
In answer, he called out, “Majid.”
A young man came in pushing a wheeled table. On top, a square object no more than a foot high was covered by a black cloth. Majid said nothing, and Mr. Atallah didn’t introduce him. Jess didn’t care who he was, anyway; she only had eyes for the cloth-covered object on the table. She stood, stepping close without waiting for an invitation. She wanted a good look at this.
Mr. Atallah grasped the cloth, then slowly pulled it away, his gaze fastened on her.
She sensed he was hoping for a dramatic reaction, and if speechless wonder qualified, he must be more than satisfied. The small white box was carved from a solid block of alabaster and decorated with four figures of goddesses, one on each side, their arms outstretched to embrace the stone they were part of. Each side was covered with hieroglyphics, and inside, nested in their own compartments, sat the other three canopic jars. Amazement had her heart pounding. She’d seen similar things in pictures, and as far as she knew all relics of this quality were in museums.
She admired the carved jackal, falcon, and human heads, then gently fit the baboon-headed jar into the empty space in the box. Stone scraped lightly against stone and she winced, knowing how soft the calcite alabaster was, and nearly trembling with the effort to leave no mark on what had survived untouched for thousands of years.
The alabaster gleamed under the strong overhead lights. The jackal, falcon, baboon, and human guardians faced each other in the box, silently watching over the vital organs of a king. Jess felt a flash of guilt for having disturbed one of the jars. She didn’t believe in curses, but she had been imbued from childhood with a deep respect for history and cultures now long gone from the earth. This belonged in a museum, not in the back room of some black-market antiquities dealer.