Dead Hunt

for finding their lost artifacts. Vanessa and the board were happy with that. Diane, not looking a gift horse in the mouth, didn’t question their good luck, though she thought perhaps Jacobs and maybe Kingsley had something to do with it.
    Jacobs found some of the artifacts they had ordered—the twelfth-dynasty artifacts. They were in the fire at Golden Antiquities. The stone artifacts survived. The sphinx of Senwosret III was broken in half. The stone face and bust, like the sphinx, were covered in soot. The canopic jar had burst into small pieces. The gold artifacts were lumps of melted metal. Gone to history.
    There are two main philosophies of conservation— preservation and restoration. Years ago restoration was the most popular. These days it’s preservation— keeping artifacts at the state they are in currently, but not making them look like they once did before they were worn by time. Restoration often means adding modern material to the artifact, in fact, changing it from what it was.
    Korey Jordan, her head conservator, was a preservationist. But he decided to try to restore these burned artifacts because they were so recently damaged and because the entire museum was grieving over their loss.
    The phone rang. It was Andie.
    ‘‘I’ve got a transfer from the crime lab. You have a phone call from a Sheriff Maddox in Ohio,’’ she said.
‘‘Put him through,’’ said Diane.
‘‘Sheriff Maddox. Did you get the drawings of your little Angel Doe?’’ she said.
‘‘That’s what I called to tell you about, Dr. Fallon. When we got those pictures, in particular the one with her standing in that little dress, my deputy, who’s six four and weighs two hundred and eighty pounds, just bawled. Putting a face to her is really going to make a difference. People are going to respond. We are going to find out who this little girl is.’’
‘‘Neva Hurley, one of my crime scene crew, is an artist. She did the drawings,’’ said Diane.
‘‘Aging the face for the other drawing the way you did was a great idea. What I’m going to do is put it in the paper with the others and say we’re looking for someone who looks like this as a witness.’’
‘‘That’s a good idea. I think someone probably will respond,’’ said Diane.
‘‘I just wanted to thank you. This other information you sent, that analysis of her bone that said she grew up in central Ohio ...well, uh, we’re a small county with a small budget and...’’
‘‘That is paid for by a grant my osteology lab has,’’ said Diane. ‘‘I located a man’s son for him, and out of gratitude he funded the lab for the museum and he set up a trust fund for extras like this, so we can go the distance to identify someone else’s lost child.’’
‘‘Poor fellow. He must have loved his kid. That was mighty generous of him.’’
‘‘Drop me a line if you identify her,’’ said Diane.
‘‘I surely will, and thanks again.’’
Andie brought the mail in to Diane and Diane gave her the signed thank-you letter to send out.
‘‘Kendel is still upset,’’ said Andie. ‘‘She thinks this still makes her look guilty and everyone is helping cover it up.’’
‘‘I know. I don’t know what to do about it either,’’ said Diane. ‘‘It’s going to take a while to get her reputation back. I think the fact that we aren’t going to quietly fire her will help.’’
Andie went back to her office and Diane took out the mail and looked through it.
Andie called again.
‘‘Ross Kingsley wants to speak with you,’’ she said.
‘‘Put him through,’’ Diane told her.
She got the copy of Museum World and took off the brown paper wrapper. There was a picture on the cover of the Bickford Museum along with its acquisition of a piece of moon rock. Diane had heard about it and she was jealous. So was Mike. He was ready to go search for extremophiles on the moon. She picked up the phone.
‘‘Kingsley,’’ she said. ‘‘How are you? Recovered, I hope. If you’re calling to go on a road trip again, you can forget it.’’
He laughed out loud. ‘‘I’m doing great. I’m back at work. Joey’s little mouse gun didn’t do much damage. I thought you might want to hear about Clymene and her family. I still can’t think of her as Iris.’’
‘‘Go ahead,’’ said Diane. She flipped through the pages of the magazine, looking at the pictures. She heard him sigh.
‘‘Where do I start? Ma and Pa are being evaluated. We