The Illumination by Karen Tintori Read Free Book Online Page B

ceiling.
    The museum feels different at night,
she thought, catching a glimpse of her reflection as she swept past the window just beyond the reception desk and turned down the low-lit corridor leading to the offices. The building was hushed and sleepy now. By daylight there was a pulse of energy in the museum, athrumming in the air as visitors and staff shared a breath of the ancient world.
    The offices were all on the top floor. In the carpeted halls and galleries below, a wealth of culture glimmered beneath discreet spotlights. Golden bowls and jeweled goblets from third-century Sicily. Thirteenth-century flasks from Mameluke, Egypt. Persian candlesticks forged of bronze. Ancient Phoenician and Roman glass. A three-thousand-year-old mosaic from the Galilee in Israel. All were among the most prestigious centerpieces of the permanent exhibits, as were extensive examples of fine Islamic pottery, pre-Christian talismans, and Babylonian jewelry.
    Natalie’s footsteps hastened as she neared her office, thinking about Lita’s description of the pouch Dana had sent. It was decorated with a
mati,
Lita had told her, using the Greek name for the amulet designed to ward off the evil eye.
    She wondered if Rusty was home by now. According to Lita, his wife had sounded almost in tears when she called at five o’clock. Rusty had phoned her from JFK before noon, while waiting for his baggage, to say he only had to make one quick stop at the Devereaux to drop off a package for Natalie, and then he’d be on the train.
    But he’d never called back to tell her which train to meet, and he wasn’t answering his cell phone. His wife hadn’t heard a word from him since midday.
    He must be home by now,
Natalie told herself, as she switched on her office light and hurried around the desk.
    The pouch was exactly where Lita had said it would be. Natalie scooped it up, moved that her sister had reached out to her in this way. With practiced fingers she tested the texture of the cracked leather. Switching on the desk lamp, she peered at the hand-rendered image of the large bold eye with its blue iris and thick black outline. Her instant impression was that the pouch was old, worn with sand and time.
    Where did Dana get this?
she wondered, intrigued. The leather and the knots on the black drawstrings reminded her, in feel and in workmanship, of ancient Sumerian money pouches she’d studied from Lebanon.
    She carefully loosened the fastenings. The brief note from Dana—
A tiny treasure from the Middle East
—brought a wry smile, but it faded as she spilled the “treasure” into her palm.
    It was a pendant. Heavy. Striking. It gleamed up at her like a small golden egg, encrusted with jewels of lapis lazuli, carnelian, and jasper.
The classic eye, one of the most ancient symbols of protection.
Carried or worn by people across the earth nearly since the dawn of time, it was among the oldest, most pervasive talismans in the world.
    For nearly five thousand years the image of the eye had been written about, drawn, carved, and displayed. If eyes truly were the windows of the soul, as stated by Lao-tzu, the ancient Chinese philosopher who had written the greatest treatise on Taoism, it was no wonder that humans had always feared the envious glance, the evil intention glinting from one pair of eyes to another.
    From the beginning, Natalie knew well, people have always found a prolonged stare unnerving. That’s why, throughout history, most cultures have replicated the open eye as a protective amulet—like the one in her hand—to reflect back the evil effects of a suspect gaze.
    She’d always found it fascinating that people in the Middle East, since the days of early Sumeria, believed that light was generated in the heart and projected outward through the eyes, and that an evil heart cast an evil eye capable of harming whatever it looked upon.
    It seemed that humans had always worried that a covetous