‘Try them.’
Calque aimed the keys at the Hummer. There was an answering click-click. ‘We’re in business, Sabir. I hate to restate the obvious, but you’d better drive.’
Sabir threw the guns and the rucksack containing the skull and the codex onto the back seat. Then he helped Calque into his seat, and belted him in.
‘Wait. Let me out again.’
‘Are you crazy? We haven’t got much time left.’
‘Let me out, I say.’
Sabir unbuckled Calque from his seat and helped him from the vehicle.
‘Find me something flammable.’
‘For Christ’s sake. You don’t mean to burn this place down?’
‘I’m a policeman, Sabir. Have been all my life. I can’t let this filth get out onto the streets. If you don’t want to help me, leave. But I’ve got to do it. I’ve just got to.’
Sabir sighed long-sufferingly. ‘You’re right. I should have thought of it myself, of course. But I was too busy thinking about my own skin and yours to give much of a damn about ten thousand complete strangers.’
Both men began ferreting through the detritus surrounding the industrial vats.
Then Calque straightened up. ‘I saw hand grenades, didn’t I?’
‘Gold-plated ones. Yeah. They’re probably fakes. You can’t persuade me that anyone in their right mind gold-plates a live hand grenade. But we should be able to tell if they’re real by the weight.’
‘Worth a try, then. Crystal meth produces a highly flammable vapour. The slightest spark can ignite it. Chuck a grenade into one of those vats and the whole place would go up.’
‘The death grip. How opposite. Yes. With us in it.’
‘We’d have eight seconds. Isn’t that right? Particularly if you back the Hummer right up to the vats, Sabir.’
‘Five seconds, not eight. Just how long ago did you do your military service, Calque? The Franco-Prussian war? You like to live dangerously, don’t you?’
‘You’re the one to talk. Shall we do it?’
‘You take one vat and I’ll do a second. But I won’t have time to strap you back in. You’ll have to take your chances leaning out of the window. If you fall out, I leave you. Okay?’
‘Who did they torture, Sabir? You or me?’
‘You, I’m glad to say.’
‘Did you leave me then?’
‘Stupidly, no.’
‘Then you’re not going to leave me now.’
Sabir backed the Hummer up to the nearest of the industrial vats.
Both men removed the safety pins from their grenades, keeping their fingers tight down on the spoons.
‘You on the death grip, Calque?’
‘The death grip. How apposite. Yes. I’m ready.’
‘I’ll call it. Okay? To a count of three.’
‘Okay.’
Calque was half-in half-out of the Hummer’s front window. He had a six-foot throw to the nearest vat. Sabir’s throw was about eight foot. The Hummer’s engine was throbbing quietly beneath them.
‘One. Two. Three. Fire in the hole!’
Both men threw their grenades.
Sabir launched himself back onto the front seat, grabbing Calque by the shirt as he did so.
He engaged the Hummer’s automatic gearshift and aimed it up the ramp.
Then he began to pray.
105
Emiliano Graciano Mateos-Corrientes stood down his snipers. He had the entire eighteen-hectare warehouse site ringed with his men. No one could escape. The ones that had run, shooting, from the warehouse, were all being herded towards the cenote – that was the obvious place for them to go. The rest were dead.
It was still somehow inconceivable to Emiliano that a bunch of gringos should come all the way down to the Yucatan simply to take over his crystal meth factory. Were they insane? Didn’t they know he had fifty foot-soldiers under his command, all armed with the latest weapons? That he had snipers equipped with the most up-to-date ‘light fifty’ Barrett M107 rifles, complete with Leupold 4.5 x 14 Mark-iv scopes and AN/PVS-10 day/ night optics? And that these snipers knew how to shoot the nipples off a three-year-old?
Crazy. Crazy.
He spoke briefly into his walkie-talkie.
What annoyed him the most was that the gringos had managed to time their incursion exactly right. Normally, there would have been a minimum of fifteen men guarding the factory. But someone – that fucker Pepito, probably – must have tipped the gringos off that with the consignment now ready, Emiliano was treating his foot-soldiers to the best whores and liquor his brothel in Merida could provide. It was the Day of the Dead, man. His men expected to let their hair down once in a while. And he had the local police and most of the local politicians in his pocket. What did he have to fear? A bunch of gringos invading his territory? Jesus.
The Hummer burst out from the basement area of Emiliano’s warehouse and up the escape ramp. The Hummer appeared to hesitate, and then made straight for his command vehicle. Emiliano could see two men in the front seats.
His mouth fell open.
As he watched, he heard two explosions deep in the bowels of his warehouse. Then there was a brief silence. It was followed by the equivalent of a vast intake of breath, as the meth vats caught fire. Then the warehouse literally burst from its moorings, its corrugated iron roof rising on a crest of over-heated air. When the roof was about thirty feet up, it flipped over onto its side, as if a sudden gust of wind had caught it.
Emiliano instinctively ducked down beside his Toyota Roraima. As he did so he noticed the rear of the approaching Hummer rising on a tide of hot air, and then smashing down again.
The Hummer was coming straight for his Toyota.
He threw himself to one side, shrieking.
The Hummer clipped his foot as it passed, pulverizing the bone, and twisting the foot three times around on the remaining skin and gristle. Emiliano hit the ground and rolled himself into a ball. He knew something terrible had happened to him, but not quite what.
When he tried to stand up, his leg collapsed beneath him, and he caught his first glimpse of the disaster that had been his foot.
He began shrieking in earnest, now, and calling for his mother.
106
Abi, Dakini, Nawal, and Rudra lay fanned out in the gravel at the cenote’s edge, listening for any pursuit. Their guns covered a 180-degree radius, with the cenote behind them forming the remainder of the circle.
‘Did you see what happened to Oni?’
‘No. He just disappeared. I think he went in the opposite direction to us.’
‘That figures.’
They all laughed. Their faces were streaked with dust and sweat, and Rudra had Berith’s blood all over him.
‘I’m going to take a look around the corner of the cenote. See if there’s any way out. Come running if I whistle.’
Abi got to his feet and began a hunched zigzag run towards the far corner of the cenote. There was a burst of machine gun fire, and he threw himself down flat. Then he wriggled back into cover.
‘Thought so. They’ve got us surrounded. They can’t bring their guns to bear on our backs, thanks to the cliff face, so they’ll have to come at us from the front.’
‘Is there any way out down there?’
Abi crawled to the edge of the cenote and looked down. ‘No. No caves. No walkway. Nothing. It just goes straight down like a chimney. But at least we won’t go thirsty. I hope to heck they don’t bring in mortars. I wouldn’t put anything past these guys.’
‘How many do you think there are?’
‘Too many.’
There was an explosion from over by the warehouse. The corrugated iron roof flashed briefly in its slow-motion trajectory over the trees, and then flipped over onto its side and vanished.
‘What the heck was that?’
‘Five million dollars’ worth of crystal meth going up in smoke. Not to mention half a million dollars’ worth of narco-bling. If they were angry
before, think what they’re feeling now.’
Rudra began to laugh. ‘Are you telling me they succeeded in blowing up their own factory? What was that you said about mortars?’
Abi shook his head. ‘It wasn’t mortars. We left Sabir and Calque inside, didn’t we?’
‘Yeah, but they’d never have freed themselves in time. They’ll have gone up with the building.’
‘Are you sure?’
Rudra thought about it a little. ‘No. You’re right. I didn’t tie that bastard Sabir’s legs up, did I? Didn’t think I needed to. What a fool. I should have hamstrung him while I had the chance. I thought we had all the time in the world.’
‘All water under the bridge now.’
‘What do you think is going to happen to us, Abi?’ It was Dakini.
‘We’re going to die. That’s what’s going to happen to us. How, is up to us.’ Abi turned over onto his back and eased his cell phone out of his pocket – then he began to crawl. ‘If you see anybody, shoot. I’m going to see if I can raise the dead. Then I’m going to talk to Alastor and Athame. Then I’m going to talk to Madame, our mother. Any of you girls needs a powder break, this may be the moment to take it.’
107
‘So what do we do now, Sabir?’
‘We assume they’re going to follow us and we keep on moving. We’re not exactly inconspicuous in this beast. I feel like the Terminator.’
‘The who?’
‘Forget it, Calque.’
‘And keep on moving where?’
‘First off, to Ek Balam. I want to deliver the skull and the codex back to the Halach Uinic. Tell him what’s gone down. I don’t want him and Ixtab thinking that we lied to them. They must be going spare back there.’
‘Such wonderfully descriptive language. No wonder you’re a writer. And then what?’
‘We drive to the airport.’
‘To the airport? Without our passports? Mexican Customs will laugh in our faces. And then they will probably arrest us. Plus, you may not have noticed it, but I haven’t got a shirt on.’
‘We can soon rectify that when we get back to Ek Balam.’
‘But what about the passports? They’re in the Grand Cherokee. And Lamia took that. And she’s got the two harpies from hell on her trail. How much chance do you think we have of ever catching up with her again?’
‘I don’t give a damn about Lamia and the harpies. But I do have to protect Yola.’
‘Then telephone her, why don’t you? Warn her to get away from Samois. Tell her and Alexi to go to a location you all know about and wait for us there. That we’ll meet them later.’
‘They don’t have a telephone. They live in a caravan.’
Calque threw his hands up into the air – it was his usual way of expressing despair. Then he grabbed his left bicep and screwed up his face in agony. He began to keen gently to himself.
Sabir glanced quickly away to prevent himself from laughing.
Calque regained his poise after a moment or two and began ferreting about in the Hummer’s nooks and crannies for a cigarette. ‘What are you trying to tell me? That Gypsies who live in caravans don’t use cell phones?’
‘Not these Gypsies, anyway. And I seem to remember that you aren’t that keen on cell phones yourself.’
Calque let out a cry of triumph. He speared a cigarette out of a crumpled pack and fixed it in his mouth. ‘That’s beside the point. It’s the height of irresponsibility for Yola not to be contactable. You’re her blood brother, Sabir – or whatever the hell it was you told me they nominated you. You knew the risks. Why didn’t you insist?’
Sabir’s expression darkened. He lit Calque’s cigarette with a gold Dunhill lighter he’d found sliding about on the dashboard. ‘Don’t you think I know that? Don’t you think I curse myself for my stupidity every damned minute of the day? Don’t you think I’m feeling sick to my soul with every mile that Lamia gains on us? I fell in love with her, man. I was even thinking about asking her to marry me.’ Sabir glowered at the sudden build-up of traffic ahead of them, as if the cars and their drivers were in some way responsible for his predicament. ‘This may come as a surprise to you, Calque, but people like me don’t fall in love that often. In fact, pathetic as this may sound, I can’t honestly remember ever falling in love before. This was a major first for me. I’d pretty much reckoned I was immune. Steamrollering my way downhill towards a lonely middle age. That sort of malarkey. How right I was.’
Calque shook his head. His eyes were troubled. ‘I’m sorry, Sabir. I know how you felt about Lamia. I didn’t mean to make a joke of it. I hold myself personally responsible for bringing her into your life.’
‘Ah, forget it. It wasn’t your fault, Calque. I’m grateful to you, actually. I’ve felt alive again these past few weeks – which makes a welcome change from the stumbling zombie I was before.’ He looked up from his driving. ‘But can’t you do anything for Yola and Alexi? Surely you’ve still got connections in the Police Nationale? Can’t you get someone to go out to Samois and warn them?’
Calque flicked his cigarette awkwardly out of the window. ‘You must be joking. What would I tell them? They’d think I’d contracted post-retirement syndrome. That I’d started to go out of my head. “Someone’s out to get the Second Coming, comrades. You must intervene before it happens. It’s a bunch of Gypsies you have to save. Only they never use cell phones. The woman’s pregnant, just like the Virgin Mary. Except this time around it wasn’t the Holy Ghost who impregnated her, it was her husband.” “Oh, where are you speaking from, Captain Calque? Pierrefeu? Belleville? Broadmoor? Or some other insane asylum we don’t know about?” “I’m out in Mexico, actually. Blowing up crystal meth factories. I’ll be with you shortly.”’
‘I see your point.’
‘How refreshing.’ Calque reached back with his good hand and fetched the rucksack over onto his lap. He fished out the Mayan codex and began to leaf through its bark-paper pages.
‘Staring at that isn’t going to help us.’
‘Indirectly, it might.’
‘How do you figure that?’
‘Because something’s still bothering me, Sabir. I don’t see how the Chilan and the Halach Uinic connected this man, Akbal Coatl, with Nostradamus. It’s simply too much of a stretch.’
‘That’s the least of our worries.’
‘No. It’s important. There are still too many unanswered questions for my liking. I don’t believe in magic, Sabir. There must be a logical connection.’
‘Ah. Logic. That’s the old Calque speaking.’
Calque fell silent for a while.
Sabir was silent too. After about five minutes of thinly disguised tension he began unconsciously drumming on the steering wheel. Every now and then he would jerk his head forwards as if responding to an abrupt change in his internal rhythm. He cast a speculative glance at Calque. ‘Don’t tell me you can read Maya glyphs? And Old Spanish?’
Calque shook his head without looking up. ‘No. But I can read Latin. And the last part of this book is written in demotic.’
‘Demotic? I thought that was Greek?’
Calque gave a long sigh and continued with his reading.
Sabir nodded sagely. He gave it another ten minutes. ‘What does it say?’
Calque glanced up. He flared his eyes. ‘I’ll tell you if you promise to stop that damned drumming and light me another cigarette.’
‘Okay. Okay.’ Sabir raised both his hands off the wheel.
‘You can still drive. I don’t object to that.’
‘Come on. What does it say, Calque?’
Calque waited for Sabir to light his cigarette. He took a long drag and allowed the smoke to drift out through his nostrils. ‘It says that when Friar de Landa was called back to Spain in 1563 to answer for his crimes before the Inquisition, Akbal Coatl – or Salvador Emmanuel as he was known to the Spanish – did indeed accompany him.’
‘Jesus. Talk about swimming with the sharks.’
&
nbsp; ‘Akbal Coatl then went on to assist the Friar in his writing of the Relacion de las Cosas de Yucatan, which was published three years later as part of a successful effort to disarm the critics of de Landa’s scorched-earth policy.’ Calque shook his head. ‘Incredible. On the surface it makes no sense at all. Can you imagine how assisting de Landa to wriggle out from underneath the Inquisition must have felt to Akbal Coatl? After what de Landa had done to his people and their artefacts? And after what de Landa had made him do?’
‘So why did he do it?’
‘Because otherwise the history of the Maya people would have died with him.’
‘Are you serious?’
‘Deadly serious. The fact still remains that Bishop de Landa’s book is the single most important document regarding Maya customs and practices we have left. It formed the backbone to the decoding of the Maya glyphs, Sabir. Even today, anthropologists and historians are forced to rely on it, in the absence of anything else.’
‘So de Landa created a gap in the market by burning all the Maya codices? And then he filled it with his own book? That’s cute.’
‘Which Akbal Coatl probably co-wrote, and which de Landa then claimed as his own work.’
‘You’re fishing, Calque. You can’t prove that.’
‘You’re right. Whoever really wrote it is irrelevant. The key words are “three years later”, Sabir. The book was finished “three years” after Akbal Coatl and Friar de Landa arrived in Spain. Don’t you see what that means?’
‘Not offhand. No.’
‘Nostradamus only died in 1566. It means that Akbal Coatl would have had three years, between 1563 and 1566, in which to hear about, and maybe even meet, the seer.’
‘What? Are you trying to tell me that the Franciscans let Akbal Coatl travel wherever he liked? Gave him carte blanche to journey through Europe? That’s one heck of a stretch.’
‘No it’s not. He was Friar de Landa’s private secretary, man. He stayed in Europe with de Landa until 1572, when de Landa returned to the Yucatan as the province’s first bishop, taking Akbal Coatl back with him. The man was de Landa’s major apologist amongst the disenfranchised Maya. His amanuensis, almost. One of the key elements in de Landa’s fight-back from the ignominy of his former position. During the three-year writing and researching of de Landa’s book, Coatl would have been sent from monastery to monastery, and from abbey to abbey, to conduct research on de Landa’s part, and to garner testimonials from his contemporaries to back up de Landa’s claims in the ecclesiastical court.’
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