Asprin, Robert Lynn – Catwoman – Tiger Hunt (With Lynn Abbey)

Bruce Wayne, of the Wayne Foundation, patron of a hundred useful causes, summoned the appropriate curator from Gotham’s finest art museum to his office. Saying he’d found the object in an old chest in the mansion’s attic—where wonders and trash had been found many times before—Bruce flicked the box open as if it were just another flea-market curio.

The woman dropped to her knees in awe and for a closer examination. She was speechless for several moments. She mentioned a name that meant nothing to Wayne and showed him where the artist had concealed it in the goldwork. She hoped the Wayne Foundation wouldn’t consider selling it for less than three million dollars or before her museum had an opportunity to make an offer.

Another piece of the puzzle fell into place.

When Bruce Wayne was alone again he studied the delicate, melancholy saint with her hooded eyes and glistening gold headcloth.

Put it back beneath the veneer? Allow it to flow from hand to hand, until the weapons were moving toward Bessarabia and Harry Mattheson disposed of the priceless artwork? If Harry Mattheson were the Connection . . .

In the end Bruce Wayne locked the icon in the Foundation vault and reinstalled the flexible veneer over another, equally worthless, plank of lacquered wood. This way, no matter what happened, when it was over, the Foundation would make certain that an object of reverence and beauty could not be perverted again. He thought about injecting a short-range transmitter into the frame, but did not. He’d follow the icon in person, until it reached the Connection’s hands.