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Fahd Yousef was a handsome man in his early fifties. His beard was shot with gray, and he looked the perfect example of the Middle Eastern professor of archaeology. He’d been married for thirty-plus years and had six children, who ranged in age from twenty-eight to twelve years old.
He smiled when she entered his office and the tension she’d felt that he might be suspicious of her again receded. “Have a seat, Diana.”
Fahd spoke English, as was his custom with her. He was more fluent in English than she was in Arabic and was quite comfortable with the language.
She settled in the visitor’s chair that faced his desk. “I’m surprised you’re here so late this evening.”
“I had a Zoom meeting with our American benefactor that kept me here after office hours.”
She cocked her head, surprised she hadn’t been invited to the meeting given that she’d been back from the field since early afternoon.
“I hope all is well with Gardner Holdings?”
Fahd didn’t smile or frown. His expression was carefully blank, reminding her again of those first weeks. “What is your take on Dennis Gardner?”
She weighed her options. The Jordanian archaeologist’s trust mattered more to her than Gardner’s. On a purely mercenary level, while Gardner’s grant was paying the bills now, Fahd could open doors for more research for her in this part of the world even after Gardner’s funding dried up.
But would honesty serve her if she expressed distrust of the man who financed her position? Was Fahd now the spy for Gardner?
She cleared her throat and went for it. “He’s vain and not the intellectual he wants the world to believe he is. He’s no champion for knowledge or history. He’s driven by profit and doesn’t give a damn about science.”
Fahd was Muslim and a scientist. He wasn’t a man to let his religious beliefs dictate his interpretation of the sites he excavated, which was particularly important in this part of the world where archaeology and three major world religions were deeply intertwined. But archaeology was never without controversy, starting from the days when it was pioneered by white men with their white supremacist and paternalistic views.
There was a huge push by archaeologists to decolonize the profession, and Diana, a white American woman who specialized in the Middle East, believed in that agenda and always sought to tread carefully. She wouldn’t have taken this position if it pushed a Jordanian man or woman out. But Gardner wouldn’t have funded the dig without her presence, and the fact that she was teamed with and answered to Fahd was what made this particular job work for her. She had no intention of eclipsing Middle Eastern voices in the field. She was a worker bee, bringing knowledge to the table and, in this instance, funding.
Without Salim by her side, that was all she aspired to in this part of the world.
Fahd gave a short nod. “He and his group of financiers are putting together a funding package for next summer.” He said this like it wasn’t good news.
“Is he planning to replace you?” she asked. “Or me?”
“We did not discuss your role, but I have no doubt he will again insist on an American field director. I will request your return.”
She felt a spark of gratitude along with a flare of pride. She’d worked hard to win this man over. His words meant more than she could say.
“Thank you.”
“I am concerned because he wants a list of potential sites. Not just sites, but pertinent details including location, date range, artifacts that have been recovered to determine it is a site. He wants to choose—or rather dictate—where we excavate. I have a feeling he will submit research questions to be addressed as a condition of funding.”
She understood his unease. The donor didn’t get to decide the direction of the research. And only the government could issue the permit—which would be evaluated based on Fahd’s research questions.
“How do you want to respond?”
“I’m not sure. The funding—it’s a lot. Enough to pay for a full crew for the entire summer, instead of filling out the team with student volunteers. At least a year of lab analysis for five people. Money for all the scientific tests. Plus ground penetrating radar, lidar, multispectral and RGB drone imaging, photogrammetry, and 3D modeling. But I don’t want to let him cherry-pick my research based on his goals for tourist destinations and a desire for new artifacts to replicate in his stores.” He paused and held her gaze. “Given your knowledge of the man, what would you do?”
She frowned. She didn’t really know Gardner and didn’t particularly like what she did know. He was the money guy, and in research archaeology, money guys were a necessary evil.
She had specialized in Middle Eastern archaeology and learned Arabic because she was in love. Plain and simple. The shift had been gradual. She’d been interested in Egyptology, with its deep history in the same region, but slowly, her focus changed as Salim wooed her with his ancestral culture and history.
And she loved the history and culture she’d studied as much as she loved the man. But now she was here, in Jordan, working on the dig of his—and her—dreams, and Salim was gone.
What would her dead fiancé do?
Of course she knew. He’d laugh at the billionaire and find a way to take his money and use it for the good of Middle Eastern archaeology. She took a slow breath as she imagined Salim’s glee. He’d have loved this job, and the students would have loved him.
“Give him a list of two or three sites—no locational data, we don’t want him to try to investigate on his own—that you believe the government would give you a permit for.”
She then sat down beside him to go over his maps with recorded sites and cross-referenced the known data. Included on his list were sites in Syria that were in jeopardy and had been since the rise of the Islamic State.
