“Gentlemen,” Haddon said ardently, “you have my sincere apologies for wasting so much of your time.”

“I assure you, it was no trouble,” Saleh said formally. “I am only happy that it was not a more serious matter requiring continued police attention.”

“No, no, I take full responsibility for the actions and oversights of my staff.”

TJ silently ground her teeth again. What an unfailingly petty sonofabitch the man was. In his spiteful, self-centered way he managed to see all this as some kind of personal loss of face, which meant, from his point of view, that somebody- anybody but him-had to be blamed.

“Please, please,” said Gabra, who seemed like a nice guy. “It was a most interesting morning with no apologies being necessary.”

This elicited a few curt, unintelligible syllables in Arabic from Saleh, and a moment later the policemen had gone, leaving Haddon, Jerry, and TJ staring at one another over the empty box.

“I hope you understand,” Haddon said, “how deeply displeased I am, and that I am forced to consider the two of you responsible for the lapse in proper procedure that allowed this ludicrous incident to take place. As the major said, we’re fortunate it wasn’t more serious. This entire collection might well have been walked off with.”

“Dr. Haddon, let’s look at this reasonably for a minute,” TJ said. She didn’t feel like being reasonable, she felt like bashing him with the Seventeenth Dynasty stone jug on the rack behind him. Seven years she’d been there, and never once until now had she heard him express the slightest interest in the skeletal collection. If he’d ever been in this room before, it was news to her. So why all this goddamn fuss now? He was blowing a trivial, silly incident all out of proportion. It was odd, yes, but hardly earth-shattering.

“Only one set of bones was missing,” she said calmly, doing her best to emulate Jerry. “Whoever threw it out, and whatever reason he did it, we now have it back. In very short order, 4360 will be back in his snug little box again, as good as new.”