The Mayan Codex as-2

by Mario Reading

  ‘Are you making all this up, Calque? How can you be so sure?’

  ‘Because it’s all here, Sabir, in black and white.’ Calque tapped the book with the heel of his hand. ‘There’s a complete list of Akbal Coatl’s journeys around Spain and southern France during the ten or so years he spent in Europe. With dates and locations. Look. Listen to this. In May 1566 – that’s two months before Nostradamus’s death, Sabir – Salvador Emmanuel, aka Akbal Coatl, travelled down from Avignon to the Franciscan seminary at Salon-de-Provence.’

  ‘You’re kidding.’

  ‘Are you beginning to get the picture?’

  ‘Look, Calque. I know for a fact that Nostradamus was buried in the Franciscan Chapel at Salon. He was tight in with the Franciscans by that time. He would have thought of it as an insurance policy against the Inquisition for his wife and children. That much I remember from the book I wrote. It was only later, during the French Revolution, that they dug him up and re-interred him in the Collegiale St-Laurent.’

  ‘Well that makes even more sense then, doesn’t it? The two men simply must have met. Nostradamus’s reputation as a prophet was Europe-wide by that time. He was at the very height of his fame. Even the French Royal Family stopped off at Salon to visit him. For all practical purposes he was a member of the Establishment.’

  ‘So you think they hatched this whole thing up together? A member of the Establishment, deep in with the Franciscans, and a Maya renegade? Sorry to play Devil’s Advocate, Calque, but somebody has to.’

  ‘I think Akbal Coatl asked Nostradamus for help as one member of an endangered species – the Maya – to another member of an endangered species – the Jews. This would have appealed to Nostradamus, whose sympathies were always with the underdog. I’m guessing that Nostradamus then told Akbal Coatl that he’d just had a vision of another member of an endangered species – the Gypsies – one day becoming the mother of the Second Coming. And, hey presto, the dates he’d been given might very well tie in with the Maya dates surrounding the ending of the Cycle of the Nine Hells.’

  ‘Go on, Calque. Your capacity for lateral thought is enthralling.’

  ‘So my guess is that the two of them would have pooled their knowledge. Wouldn’t you? And that after Akbal Coatl left, Nostradamus would have taken the precautions we already know he took in protecting his 58 so-called ‘lost prophecies’. Which weren’t lost at all, needless to say – they were merely very well hidden. Then Akbal Coatl decides to fulfil his part of the bargain by backing the whole thing up in his secret book. Only two hundred years later the War of the Castes comes along, and the book is lost. But both of them – Akbal Coatl and Nostradamus – have factored in a failsafe mechanism.’

  ‘The eruption of the Pico de orizaba.’

  ‘And two potential catalysts…’

  ‘Me and the guardian.’

  ‘Yes. You – or whoever else lucked onto the prophecies’ trail – and the guardian. It’s incredible, isn’t it? But it makes the most perfect sense. Prophet meets protector of the sacred books. The possibilities are limitless. But, as you say, Sabir, in our present situation they take us nowhere. Talking about possibilities, though, is anyone following us yet?’

  ‘Not so far as I can see.’

  ‘I thought so. They have other things on their mind, no doubt.’

  ‘What do you mean “no doubt”?’

  ‘I think you hit their Big Boss.’

  ‘What are you talking about, Calque? What Big Boss? And why haven’t you mentioned this before?’

  ‘I had more important things on my mind.’

  ‘I didn’t hit anybody.’

  ‘Yes you did. When you nearly rammed the Toyota. Back there at the warehouse. Didn’t you feel a crunch?’

  ‘I missed the Toyota by a mile, Calque. I’m not that bad a driver.’

  ‘Yes. But you hit a very large Mexican holding a walkie-talkie. He had a shiny suit on. The sort of suit only drug lords dare to wear – and believe me, Sabir, I know what I’m talking about. You smashed this man’s foot. Surely you saw him?’

  ‘I was too busy trying to get us out of there in one piece. And anyway, this thing has a snout the size of a condor’s. Of course I didn’t see him.’

  ‘Well I think that’s why we’re not being followed. I think you inadvertently took out the enemy’s commander-in-chief. I was going to tell you at the time, but then I got caught up in Akbal Coatl’s book.’ Calque steadied his left arm as they went over a speed bump. ‘It might afford us just enough of an edge to stay in the clear.’

  ‘I destroyed this man’s foot, you say?’

  Calque nodded, still grimacing from the pain in his arm. ‘I love people like you, Sabir. You plough through life leaving a trail of wrecked bodies behind you. Only you never notice them. It must be a sublime knack to have. I only wish I could emulate it.’

  ‘What about your associate, Macron? Have you forgotten about him so quickly? And who brought me back into this? It was you. And who brought Lamia into this? You again. Calque, sometimes when I listen to you bullshitting away at me, I get this curious image coming into my brain.’

  ‘Oh? And what image is that?’

  ‘Of the pot calling the kettle black.’

  108

  The intravenous morphine was beginning to work. Emiliano Graciano Mateos-Corrientes lay across the rear seat of the Toyota Roraima, and watched as his personal physician bandaged his foot.

  ‘You’ve got a compound fracture. Every hour you don’t get to hospital makes you that much more likely to lose your foot. If you’re lucky, only septicaemia will set in. If you’re unlucky, gangrene will follow. There’s filth in there. And bits of sock. And dust you picked up from the track. And polluted bone fragments.’

  ‘Hand me that pistol.’

  One of his lieutenants handed his pistol over to Emiliano.

  Emiliano pointed it at the doctor. ‘If I lose my foot, you lose your life. Do you get me? I have business here first. Before the hospital. You will accompany me.’

  ‘But the police. They will see the smoke of the fire and they will come.’

  ‘The police will not come. It has been explained to them and to the fire brigade that we are simply burning scrubland.’

  ‘But it’s the wrong time of year for the milpa slash and burn.’

  ‘It’s never the wrong time of year for the milpa slash and burn. Do you understand me, doctor?’ ‘I understand you.’ ‘Now get into the car. We are going to a baptism.’

  109

  ‘What did Madame, our mother, say?’

  Abi shook his head.

  ‘What is it, Abi?’

  Abi sat up on his haunches and stared at his feet.

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘What’s wrong? We’ve been played for suckers, that’s what’s wrong.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘She used us. That saint, our mother, used us as expendable camouflage.’

  There was a shocked silence. Then Nawal shook her head. ‘I don’t believe you.’

  Abi eased himself onto his side. He crawled closer to Rudra, Nawal and Dakini. ‘Listen to me. First off, Lamia – our so-called “wayward sister”. Well it turns out she wasn’t so wayward after all. She was on the same side as us right from the start.’

  ‘No.’ Nawal shook her head. ‘That’s just not possible. I know Lamia. She might have passed back information to our mother, but she wouldn’t have given herself to that man Sabir on anyone’s say-so but her own. She was far too pudique. Far too conscious of her face.’ She avoided meeting Dakini’s tortured gaze – both she and Dakini had a great deal to cope with in that department themselves. ‘And anyway, she would have confided in Athame. Those two were like this.’ Nawal made a knot out of her hands.

  ‘It’s true, nonetheless. I’ve just had it from the horse’s mouth. Madame, my ever loyal mother, thought that by coming clean she might provide me with a titbit of comfort at my moment of death.’

  �
�You’re not going to die, Abi. None of us is going to die.’

  Abi laughed. ‘The whole thing was an elaborate honey-trap to sucker Sabir into giving out the names she wanted. The Countess set it up so that Calque and Sabir would reckon they’d saved Lamia from a fate worse than death. It’s a trick as old as the hills. They fell for it. And I fell for it, too. Hook, line, and sinker.’

  ‘It can’t be true. Our mother would have told us.’

  ‘And give the game away? No. She wanted us outraged, angry, and alert. And she got what she wanted, as she always does. Lamia is heading back to France to kill the pregnant Gypsy. And we’re the sacrificial lambs that helped get her there.’

  ‘You must tell Aldinach and Athame immediately.’

  ‘No I mustn’t. After Madame made us destroy all our personal cell phones and replace them with pay-as-you-go, I made damned sure that I never gave out Aldinach and Athame’s numbers to anyone. Just like I didn’t give out yours. I didn’t want people calling up at potentially sensitive times for a cosy fireside chat. So if those two don’t decide to call our mother – and I somehow suspect they won’t – that’s it. She’ll have no way of warning them off from killing Lamia. And they’re just about to board a charter flight to London. So they’ll have their cell phones switched off anyway while they’re in the air.’

  ‘To London?’

  ‘First flight they could get. Lamia got out on a marginally earlier fight via Madrid. They found out that much, at least. So the three of them should all arrive in Paris at just about the same time. There are only so many connecting flights available. All Aldinach and Athame have to do is wait. They’ll probably catch Lamia straight out of Arrivals. They might even kill her right there in the concourse. Aldinach can sting like a bee with that scalpel of his. He’s twenty metres gone before the person even knows they’ve been stabbed.’

  The others shook their heads uncertainly.

  Abi grinned. ‘Look around you. We’re probably surrounded by fifty invisible men, intent upon our deaths. And whose fault is that? Lamia’s, Sabir’s, and our mother’s. In the absence of a deus ex machina reaching down and plucking us up into the sky, we’re doomed.’ Abi gave a resigned shrug. ‘We can’t touch our mother, but we can touch Lamia. And through her, Sabir. What have we got to lose?’

  110

  ‘There’s my Cherokee.’

  ‘I figured as much.’ Calque glanced around the roof lot of Cancun International Airport’s long-term parking. ‘We’re going to have to break into it, you realize that? And they’ve probably got banks of CCTV cameras here.’

  ‘No we aren’t.’ Sabir felt in his pocket. ‘I have the spare keys. I remembered them back at Ek Balam after we handed back the skull and the codex. While Ixtab was busy strapping up your arm and measuring you for a new shirt. They were in my overnight bag.’ He dangled the keys in front of Calque’s face as if they were cherries.

  Calque rolled his eyes. ‘Let’s dump this white elephant of a Hummer then. We’re going to have to scrub it clean of fingerprints. I don’t want the maniacs we stole it from, and whose crystal meth laboratory we blew up, coming after us in France. I wouldn’t put it past them to have a cosy in with Interpol.’

  Sabir nodded. He tucked the Hummer away in a remote corner of the parking lot. With Calque’s left arm out of action, it was Sabir who ended up valeting the cab.

  When they were finished, Calque grinned. ‘When we get back home you can pay someone to come and pick up the Cherokee for you and store it somewhere. That way no one will associate it with the Hummer. You simply mail them your keys, the parking ticket, a false name and address, and some cash. Then, in a month or two, you can come back here and pick it up, with no one any the wiser.’

  ‘You’ve got to be kidding.’

  ‘I am kidding.’ Calque sighed. ‘I think maybe neither one of us should ever set foot in Mexico again. In a few months’ time, when you haven’t reclaimed the car, the storage people will simply auction it off. That’s the way these things play.’

  ‘I liked that car. It held happy memories.’ The expression on Sabir’s face didn’t match his words.

  ‘Get over it, Sabir. She’s not worth it. She played us both for fools.’

  ‘I still don’t understand how she could have pretended to that extent. She was a virgin, man. I’m certain of it. Not some Mata Hari type, used to seduction. Not some courtesan. And her face. How could the Countess be sure I would go for her? It stretches the bounds of credulity.’

  Calque shook his head. ‘Because the Countess understands men and what drives them. She made a study of us without our knowledge. She realized that you were a bleeding heart from the word go. And that I suffer from absent daughter syndrome. Then she launched her perfectly primed cruise missile at us.’

  ‘Lamia told me she loved me. You can’t fake that.’

  ‘Oh yes you can. My ex-wife did it for years.’ Calque leaned inside the Cherokee and felt around in the lockbox. ‘We’re in business, my boy. Both passports are still here.’

  ‘So. And that’s another thing. Why would Lamia leave us our passports? Her passport was in with them. All she needed to do was dump the two of ours in the nearest garbage can.’

  ‘Why would she bother to do that, Sabir? She knew Abiger de Bale would kill us as certainly as night follows day. Leaving the passports would just facilitate the work of the Mexican police when they found our abandoned vehicle. That way they would have known for sure we hadn’t left the country.’

  Sabir slammed the Cherokee door and clicked the automatic lock. The expression on his face was bleak. ‘Come on, Calque. Let’s go and find ourselves a damned flight out of here.’

  111

  It started with the stun grenades. Emiliano’s foot soldiers had brought up bullet-proof riot shields, and they were launching the grenades from behind them.

  Abi, Rudra, Nawal and Dakini laid down as much blanket fire as they could, but it was clearly ineffective. Their ammunition was running out. The grenades were getting nearer by the minute.

  Then Emiliano’s men started in with the tear gas.

  Dakini was the first one to jump into the cenote.

  Snot and tears were streaming down Abi, Nawal, and Rudra’s faces.

  Nawal was the next to go. She felt semi-hysterical. She couldn’t breathe. All she could think about was how the feel of cool water on her eyes would be.

  Rudra watched both of the women leap into the pool. He dragged himself to the edge of the basin. It was a fifty-foot drop. The girls had both survived it. He could see them bobbing around in the centre of the pool, violently rinsing their faces.

  He glanced back at Abi, shrugged, and then eased himself over the side. He dangled for a moment and then let himself fall. The feel of the water was an exquisite blessing. He let himself sink as deep as he was able, before scissoring his legs and making for the surface.

  Abi plunged in beside him.

  Both men scrubbed at their faces, desperate to see again. Desperate to get their weapons clear of the water before they became useless.

  Fifty feet above them, Emiliano’s foot soldiers were carrying their boss out of the Toyota on an improvised bier. The morphine had already started to give him hallucinations.

  Emiliano grabbed his physician’s arm. ‘Give me more.’

  ‘I can’t give you any more. It would be too dangerous. Intravenous morphine is an unstable drug. There is only so much the body can take. You will already be hallucinating. Later, you will be constipated also.’

  ‘To hell with the constipation. And I can stomach the hallucinations. Give me more morphine. I’m in pain, I tell you. My foot is burning up.’ Emiliano screwed up his face, as if he were trying to clear his head through the drug-induced mist. ‘But not so much that I become unconscious. Do you understand what I am saying?’

  ‘I can’t give you any more, I tell you. It might prove fatal.’

  Emiliano pulled a pistol out from underneath his blanket and shot the doctor.
A single bullet, direct to the head. The doctor crumpled next to the bier like an empty suit of clothes. ‘Fatal? That’s what I call fatal, pendejo. Kick him into the cenote one of you.’

  Emiliano’s men were gathered in a ragged line just shy of the lip of the cenote. One of the men nudged the doctor’s body with the toe of his boot until it toppled over the side. He made very sure that he was not outlined against the sky while he was doing it.

  ‘Now pick up that syringe.’

  ‘Yes, Jefe.’

  ‘Do you see this vein in my arm?’

  ‘Yes, Jefe.’

  ‘Inject the morphine into it.’

  The man aimed the syringe at Emiliano’s vein.

  ‘Squeeze out a bit first, man. You don’t want air in there. When you think you’ve found the vein, draw a little back to check if there’s blood. Then shoot me up.’

  The man was sweating uncontrollably by this time. He dabbed at his forehead with his sleeve. He found the vein, drew up a little blood, then forced the plunger home.

  Emiliano sighed. He laid down his pistol and pressed his finger firmly onto the spot. ‘You got the other bodies?’

  ‘Yes, Jefe.’

  ‘Throw them in there too. The good doctor deserves some company.’

  The bodies of Vau, Alastor, Berith and Asson were dragged to the lip of the cenote and kicked in.

  ‘Anyone else still to come?’

  ‘None of our own. You were the only one of us injured, Jefe. And none of their people escaped, bar the two in the Hummer.’