The embroidered panel is just 14-by-20 inches. But the director of the tiny Italian museum never forgot it. Just before World War II, he spotted it in a drawer of a church in Trent, a town in Northern Italy. Then, mysteriously, it was gone, whisked overseas, sold by a New York gallery, and finally tucked away in storage here at the Museum of Fine Arts. It has not been seen by the public for at least two decades until today. That 620-year-old piece, "The Entombment of Saint Vigilius," will get a hero's homecoming in a museum in Trent. The MFA, after determining the work it had purchased back in 1946 for 3,000 had been stolen, quietly sent the piece back to Italy in October. "It's a beautiful textile, very fragile, and precious with silver and gold," said Alessandra Galizzi, a professor of museum studies at the University of Trent, who helped broker the return. "It is especially meaningful to this city. It belongs here." A show that includes "The Entombment," which features an image crafted with colored silk, is set to open in a renovated castle that houses the Diocesan Museum of Trent or Museo Diocesano. There will be music and Italian cakes, local politicians and a display case finally complete. The centerpiece will be the returned panel and four others. Together, they are part of a set of at least six the final one has not been found dating back to 1390, depicting the story of the third bishop and patron saint of Trent. So often in the museum world, restitution claims are met with skepticism and lengthy legal battles. In recent years, the MFA successfully fought off a claim by an Austrian woman who had demanded the museum give her a 1913 painting by Oskar Kokoschka that she contended had been sold under duress during World War I I This case was different, MFA officials say. The museum was first contacted two years ago by Evelin Wetter, an art historian in Switzerland. She had known about the missing piece but had no idea where it was until she inherited the papers of an Austrian art historian. Inside, Wetter found a photograph of the embroidery and, on the back, saw the stamp of the MFA. Wetter contacted officials at the Boston museum and told them she suspected the work in their possession had been taken during World War II. The MFA knew it had a panel, but just not that particular panel. The museum had even highlighted the work in a 2006 catalog of textiles. But in that catalog, the piece was simply listed as an "embroidered panel" possibly showing the Second Council of Lyons. It was not until Wetter reached out that the MFA realized the panel, in fact, represented St. Vigilius and came from Trent.