Still As Death Read Online Free PDF

were proud offerings, but she knew as well as he did that it was an act of hostility.
    “Good day?” he asked as they tucked into the steaks.
    She swallowed. “Fruitful, anyway. I figured out where we’re going to place most of the postmortem photographs. And the catalog looks great. I think it’s coming together finally.” She washed a piece of tender meat down with a swallow of red wine. “Oh, hey. What do you know about the UNESCO convention? Something like that. It’s meant to stop people bringing Egyptian antiquities out of the country.”
    “Not just Egypt. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s 1970 Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property. It’s a mouthful, I know, but it basically said that member countries could take back illegally acquired antiquities if they could prove they’d been stolen. It was a really dreadful state of affairs, people bringing vases and things home in their suitcases. They realized they had to do something or Egypt wasgoing to lose its entire cultural heritage. What there was left of it, of course. Why do you ask?”
    “I told you Willem and I want to round out the Egyptian part of the exhibition with another piece of jewelry, right?” He nodded. “Well, I found the perfect piece today. It’s in the museum’s permanent collection but it isn’t displayed right now. I can’t imagine why because it looks fabulous in the picture, but anyway, there were all these documents showing everyone who had owned it.”
    Ian took a long sip of his wine and sat back in his chair. “There have been some high-profile cases recently of collectors who created fake documentation in order to pass off a stolen piece as legitimate. What you’d have to do is create a paper trail showing that the piece was excavated and legally acquired before 1970. There was a dealer in New York, someone I knew pretty well, good reputation and all that, who got indicted a couple of years ago for trafficking in stolen antiquities. Apparently he was knowingly buying statues from a British collector who had bought them on the black market in Egypt. They’d cooked up this whole thing where they said the statues were part of the collection of some earl who was an explorer. They forged documents and stained them with tea to make them look old. That kind of thing.”
    “I guess the stakes are high enough that it would be worth going through all that.”
    “Oh, yes. There was one piece, the head of a king, I believe, that was worth more than a million dollars.”
    Sweeney whistled.
    “That’s right. Would you like some ice cream?” He got up to clear their plates.
    “Of course I would.” She stood up halfheartedly to help him.
    “Uh-uh. Sit. I’ll do it.” She did, gratefully.
    “So how’s the exhibition coming along, anyway,” Ian asked once they’d finished their butter pecan and he’d told her about his day.
    “Fine. I’ve got a lot to do still, but the catalog looks great and the Egyptian stuff is all ready to go now. Everything—or nearlyeverything—is framed at this point and I’m going to start some of the wall label text tomorrow. We open September tenth, so I need to get moving on it.” She looked up at him. He was going to Paris on September 10. “Oh, no, I forgot you’re going to Paris. You’re going to miss the opening.”
    He looked away quickly, then said dismissively, “Well, I might be able to change it. We’ll see.” He cleared his throat and stood up, taking their ice cream dishes into the kitchen. “I talked to Peter today,” he called back. Peter was Ian’s partner in London.
    “Yeah?”
    “He thinks we need to figure out whether I’m coming back to London or not. The Boston office is doing very well, but he’s feeling shorthanded over there.”
    “Oh.” Sweeney poured herself another glass of wine, finishing the bottle.
    “Sweeney.” He came