“Mr. Clarke?” Lauren flashed hot, then cold. This legendary Egyptologist had been to her house and brought her mother flowers. He might even have courted Mother once upon a time. He’d never mentioned hearing that Lauren had called his ointment jar a fake. She wondered if he knew.
“Yes, hello! I hope you’re sitting down, my dear, because I have news that will sweep you off your feet.”
Lauren racked her brain for what might be coming next. “Yes? I’m sitting down, go ahead.”
“It’s Hatsudora, Dr. Westlake. Your Hetsumina’s twin. We found her.”
She nearly dropped the phone. “I’m sorry, can you repeat that?”
A warm chuckle carried over the wire. “You heard me correctly, I daresay. My team has found Hatsudora’s coffin.”
Lauren struggled to make sense of what he was trying to say, and why he was so excited. It was a French team that had found Hatsudora, and she was most likely reposing in the Cairo Museum now. Lauren had practically memorized the letter from Mr. Lythgoe about this. They’d found her on December 1, but the news hadn’t reached her until December 30.
“Hatsudora. In Cairo, you mean? In the museum?”
“No, no. A member of my team was on the spot when it appeared for sale in Luxor. This was three or four weeks ago. After my tour with you at the Met, I gave my expedition director the challenge, granting him the authority and resources to pay any price for her recovery. Now he is quite literally delivering.”
Impossible. “I don’t understand.”
“Well, seeing is believing,” he said. “Prepare to do both on Friday. I know how important this find is to you, so my instructions are to have the crate with Hatsudora in it delivered directly to the Met’s receiving room. We’ll open it together, all right?”
“What makes you so confident it’s Hatsudora?”
“They’re twins, aren’t they? I’ve seen the photographs. It’s a remarkable match for Hetsumina’s coffin. What a thrill it will be to open the crate at the Met. We can view both sisters. If not side by side, close enough. Is Friday agreeable?”
“By all means,” she managed to say, making a note to arrange it with Mr. Klein. “I’ll add it to our registrar’s schedule. Nine in the morning?”
Mr. Clarke agreed. “We’ll enjoy the discovery together. Then we can haggle about whether the Met would like to purchase her from me before your spring exhibition or simply wait it out. You know you’ll get it eventually.”
“Oh, Mr. Clarke.” She never knew how to respond to his references to his death. “Let’s hope ‘eventually’ is a very long time from now.”
He laughed. “Between you and me, if cash flow is a problem forthe museum, I may be persuaded to let you have it on loan for the duration of your show. But never mind about that now. We’ll see you soon. Take care.”
Lauren placed the receiver in its cradle.
If her instinct was right, the millionaire was about to deliver the biggest forgery they’d ever seen. Big enough to make what the Napoleon Society had done seem like child’s play.
She picked up the phone again, and waited for the connection she requested.
“Joe.” Relief broke her voice on his name when he answered. “You were right about everything. I’m so sorry for the hurtful things I said to you. Please forgive me.” Saying it didn’t feel like enough, especially not through a telephone wire. She was gutted, and all she could give him were a few paltry words and the pauses between while she pushed through the burning in her throat.
“I do, of course I do. I hated bringing that evidence to you, Lauren. I hated hurting you that way.”
She pulled in a steadying breath. “You weren’t the one who hurt me. Deep down, I think I knew that even before you left my building.”
“What’s happened since then?”
Lauren stared at Mr. Clarke’s book still open before her. “I’ll tell you everything. In person.”
CHAPTER
34
FRIDAY, JANUARY 29, 1926
Joe stood with Lauren in the dark, empty corridor outside the Met’s receiving room. “We need a confession.” He didn’t have to tell her that again but did anyway. They’d gone over the plan plenty of times before this moment. But this was the moment that counted.
They’d decided it would be best if no police were in the receiving room when Mr. Clarke arrived with his crate. He should be relaxed and willing to talk. The only people present would be Lauren, Mr. Clarke, and the registrar, who would unpack the box. They would tell Mr. Clarke that Mr. Robinson would be called as soon as the coffin was free of its packaging. Joe and Oscar, who was currently parking the police car where it wouldn’t be seen by Clarke, would stand by, ready to move in and make an arrest.
