We proceeded on our way, following the line of the cultivation as far as was possible before striking out into the desert. Buddle was nowhere in sight, but when we neared the site where Morgenstern’s crew was working, I saw von Raubritter watching our approach with a certain air of apprehension. To give the absent Morgenstern his due, he had been working with almost the same degree of expertise Emerson and I would have demonstrated. Having identified what must have been one of the main streets of the city, he was methodically excavating the structures that had lined and thus defined it. They were an interesting mixture, stately villas interspersed with lowly houses and miscellaneous buildings. The men had not yet reached ground level in a debris-riddled courtyard. They stopped at once at a sharp word from von Raubritter.

But the order came too late; only a few inches of sand remained and even I could see a shape too regular to be a natural formation. With a loud exclamation, Emerson dropped to his knees next to the excavated area and took a brush to clear the object of the remaing vestiges of sand. My cry of “Emerson!” mingled with von Raubritter’s “No, Professor!” was to no avail. Only physical restraint can stop Emerson when he is on the trail of an important find.

“It is the head of a queen or princess,” Emerson pronounced as he stood up. “Part of a composite statue. The crown would have been a separate piece, attached by means of this protuberance. As you see, Peabody, it was not finished. The surface is unpolished, and the faint vertical line from brow to chin indicates that the sculptor intended to continue working on it.”

Von Raubritter could not constrain himself from displaying superior knowledge. “This is part of the workroom of a sculptor named Thutmose. I was told that Herr Borchardt was euphoric when he came across an ivory horse blinker amidst the rubbish. It was inscribed with Thutmose’s name and job title as official court sculptor of Akhenaton. Since Herr Morgenstern has taken over, we have uncovered more than a dozen plaster casts of faces and full heads, along with tools and jars of pigments.”

Emerson raised his eyebrows. “It is a woman. Do you suppose it could be Queen Nefertiti?”

I repressed a strong urge to poke Emerson with something sharp, but since I was loath to wield my parasol for a second time in less than an hour, I had to content myself with a whispered reprimand. “That was not a wise move, Emerson. Look at them.”