The Djinn Read Online Free PDF Page B

tornado.”
    “Look at
whatever you want. It’s of no interest to me. Now that Max is gone . . . well.
. .”
    Anna put her
arm around Marjorie and gave her a consoling squeeze. “Don’t worry, Marjorie.
    We won’t
disturb you at all.”
    I started to
shuffle through some of the papers on the desk. There were news clippings and
diaries, old shipping tickets and folders crammed with carboned sheets. I
really didn’t know where to start. Before she left us, Marjorie handed me a
key. I recognized it from my childhood days, because it was always kept hanging
on a hook next to the turret door.
    “This is for
the turret when you need it,” said Marjorie. “I’m afraid Max put seals on the
door as well, so you may have trouble getting in. That’s if you’re still
determined to do it.”
    “You’d still
prefer us not to?” asked Anna.
    “After what
happened to Max, I think the best thing is to destroy the whole place,” said
Marjorie flatly. “I have no curiosity left.”
    “All right,”
said Anna. “We’ll try to be discreet.”
    Marjorie stood
there for a while, saying nothing. Then she nodded and walked off down the hall
with the heavy tread of someone who has resigned themselves to their
fate-whatever that fate might be. It didn’t do much to bolster my enthusiasm
for probing through Max’s papers, but on the other hand, I felt we owed it to
Marjorie to discover what had happened to him. One day, when she was over the shock,
she would want to know the truth.
    Anna began
combing the shelves on either side of the narrow study. Strangely, she seemed
to know just what she was looking for, because she tugged out various papers
and folders with quick and certain confidence. I stopped raking through the
papers on Max’s desk to watch her, and the more I watched her, the more
convinced I was that she was after something specific.
    After she found
a box folder full of background material on Persian pots and jars, I sat down
on the edge of the desk and folded ray arms.
    Anna looked up.
She held the stack of papers and files against her breasts and smiled
nervously.
    “What’s the
matter?” she said. “You look very anxious about something.”
    I nodded. “I
am. I’m anxious to know who you are, and what you’re doing here. It suddenly
occurred to me that you know just what you’re up to, yet neither Marjorie nor I
know who you really are. Apart from Just Anna, of course.”
    Anna looked at
me seriously, “Would you believe me if I told you? I mean, I didn’t tell you
because you wouldn’t believe me. You’re a very cynical person,”
    I sniffed. “I
don’t think my cynicism is anything compared to yours, my dear. You have just
deceived a grieving widow on the day of her late husband’s funeral. If you can
think of anything more cynical than that, I should send it off, if I were you,
and win a prize.”
    “Well,” she
said, “if you really want to know, I suppose I’ll tell you.” “I wish you
would.”
    “My name is
Anna Modena. I am what they call a consultant in exported antiquities.”
    I shook a
cigarette out of my crumpled pack and lit it “That sounds about as legitimate
as
    ‘ clairvoyant ’ What exactly does a consultant in exported
antiquities do?”
    Anna opened the
box file and laid it on the desk. She leafed through the stale old papers
inside and pointed again and again to lists of Arabian antiquities that Max had
brought back from the Middle East
    “Max Greaves
took away from Persia and Saudi Arabia and Egypt some of the most valuable and
interesting ceramics, figurines, brasses, and pots that you can imagine. He
collected most of them in the 1930s and 1940s, when the prices of such things
were comparatively low. At that time many black-market traders could be
persuaded to acquire them from museums, from ancient tombs, and even from the
private homes of Arabian collectors. Most of the antiquities that Max Greaves
brought back to the United States-in fact, most of the