The Mayan Codex

by Mario Reading

  ‘Okay, Abi. Okay. You don’t have to rub it in.’

  ‘What do you think they were talking about? Maybe you’ve got a view on that too, Vau?’

  ‘How do I know? What do you think?’

  Abi closed his eyes. He scrubbed at his face, then let his head fall back against the built-in headrest. He motioned to Vau to pull the car over. ‘Us, probably.’

  ‘How do you figure that, Abi? They don’t even know we’re following them.’

  ‘What? You think they’ve just relaxed down and forgotten about us, maybe? Put us out of their minds completely?’

  ‘No, Abi. I don’t think that.’

  ‘Why ever not?’

  Vau’s face lit up. ‘Because they’re too smart. Lamia knows we’ll never give up. And she’ll have told them that. They’ll be shit scared we’ll spring out from nowhere and get them.’

  Abi hunched down even further in the passenger seat in case the Cherokee overtook them again. ‘You know something, Vau? I think you’re right.’ He nodded his head a few times, thinking. ‘I think we need to rush things a little. I think we need to put the fear of God into them, and get them to make a few unforced errors. I’m fed up to my back teeth with all this pussy-footing around.’

  ‘But Madame, our mother, told you to hang back, Abi. I heard her say so. She told you to let them lead us to wherever they are going, and not to interfere with them until she tells you to do so.’

  Abi glanced across at his brother. ‘Well we know that wherever they are going is in Mexico. And probably in either Veracruz or the Yucatan.’

  ‘How do we know that, Abi?’

  ‘Because they are taking the coastal route, dummy. If they were transiting through to Guatemala, for instance, or Honduras, or Panama, they’d go the fuck down the centre, wouldn’t they? Past Mexico City.’

  ‘I suppose so. But you don’t have to swear at me all the time to get your point across.’

  ‘You suppose right. And yes I do.’ Abi yawned. He was beginning to lose interest in winding Vau up. ‘So we’re getting near to where we need to be. And they don’t know we’ve got a tracker planted on them. So I say we scare the living bejasus out of them, and set them to running at double speed. Because if we carry on the way we are going, Aldinach’s going to get ants in her pants again, and trigger another riot. Or that stupid bastard Oni is going to fall foul of the Mexican cops. I mean, have you seen him recently? He’s taken to wearing floral shorts. The idiot stands out like a cockroach on a teacake.’

  Vau slapped at the steering wheel. ‘Hey, that’s funny. I like that. A cockroach on a teacake.’

  Abi gave Vau a pitying look. ‘It’s not original, Vau. I stole the idea from Raymond Chandler. Only he said “a tarantula on a slice of angel food”.’

  ‘Angel food? What’s that?’

  ‘Fairy cake.’

  ‘Fairy cake? And Raymond who, did you say?’

  ‘Forget it, Vau. It’s really not that important.’

  43

  Sabir pulled off the Veracruz cuota road and into the village of La Antigua for lunch. The trio had approximately two days’ driving left before they reached Kabáh, and Sabir figured that a treat was called for.

  ‘What is this place?’ said Lamia.

  ‘It’s where stout Cortés scuttled his ships so that his men wouldn’t dare back out on him and return to Cuba.’

  ‘Stout Cortés?’ Calque stretched both hands above his head, like a man trying to reach for a light bulb. He stared down towards the river, which curled like a dirty brown ribbon towards the nearby Gulf. ‘The man was a barbarian. He almost single-handedly destroyed two great empires.’

  Sabir threw back his head. ‘I’m not giving him a testimonial, Calque. I’m quoting Keats’s “On First Looking Into Chapman’s Homer”.’

  Calque acknowledged Sabir’s point with a hitch of his shoulders. ‘And how do you happen to know about this place? It’s not exactly on the beaten track, is it?’

  ‘A holiday. With my mother and father. The only one we ever took together as a family.’

  ‘Why here?’

  A dead look came into Sabir’s eyes. ‘I was seventeen. My mom was going through a stable period for once. Semi-sane, anyway. My dad paid for us to take a trip to Mexico because he thought it would be good for her. We came down here via Oaxaca and Monte Alban, to see the ruins at Zempoala. It was a disaster. My mom had to be airlifted back to the US under sedation. But La Antigua was the very last place we had something approaching a good time. We ate langostinos al mojo de ajo just up the road there, and drank mojitos, and my father told us all about what happened when Cortés landed here with his men. We even took a boat up to the mouth of the river, and walked around on the headland.’

  ‘So you speak a little Spanish?’

  ‘Not a word. How about you, Calque?’

  ‘My Spanish is a fraction better than my English. And you know how good my English is.’

  ‘I wondered why you let Lamia do all the talking when we checked into our posada.’

  ‘I couldn’t help noticing you didn’t say much either.’

  Lamia had already started down towards the restaurant. ‘Well, I shall just have to do your translating for you, shan’t I? It will give me a role to play. Fortunately I speak Spanish fluently. As well as Italian, English, Portuguese, German, and a little Greek. Not to mention French.’

  ‘Show off.’

  She turned around and flashed them her most captivating smile.

  44

  Calque and Sabir chose a table overlooking the river, while Lamia went to visit the powder room. It was the first time the two men had been alone together since they’d crossed the Mexican border two days before.

  ‘Do you really think we can trust her, Calque? After what she said about the Corpus back there in Tampico? About still respecting the Countess?’

  ‘If she was trying to outwit us, Sabir, do you think she would have been quite so painfully honest?’

  ‘She might be trying a double bluff?’

  ‘Yes, and God is an Englishman. Come on, man. One has only to look at her to see that she is a decent person. I feel privileged to be travelling with her. Just think what it would be like if there were only the two of us here. What a state we would be in by now. At least she is keeping us focused. Not to mention up-to-date with our laundry.’

  ‘Yeah, well, it’s clear that you’ve got an almighty crush on her, Calque. You fuss around her like an old mother hen.’

  Calque straightened in his chair. ‘And what about you? Haven’t you noticed yourself recently? Your own behaviour?’

  Sabir pretended to watch some fishermen jump-starting their boat. ‘That’s bullshit.’

  ‘It’s not bullshit. I know you both hold secret assignations together. I woke up one night and heard you.’

  Sabir shrugged. He was still pretending to watch the fishermen. ‘It’s because we both can’t sleep. I have nightmares, and you snore. So between us it’s no wonder Lamia needs a break now and again. If we meet outside the room, it’s only by accident – not by intent.’

  ‘I do not snore.’

  ‘Oh, really? When did you last share a room with anybody, Calque? The early 1950s? Of course you snore. Like a steam locomotive winding up before its first big run of the day.’

  Calque threw both hands out as though he was trying to snatch at a runaway loop of knitting yarn. ‘I object to your example, Sabir. You are purposely exaggerating. I may snuffle a bit, but that is only when I inadvertently lie on my back. It is a common enough ailment.’

  ‘Snuffle. Snore. Have it your own way.’

  ‘You are still artfully avoiding my question.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘You and Lamia.’

  ‘Are you her daddy?’

  Calque bridled. ‘I feel I am somewhat in loco paternis, yes. I inadvertently brought her into this, therefore she is my responsibility.’

  ‘Admit it. You’d like her to be your daughter, wou
ldn’t you?’

  ‘See? You are changing the subject again? Perhaps you are simply too stupid to acknowledge your feelings for her?’

  Sabir gave up all pretence of staring at the fishing boat. ‘Who the heck are you calling stupid? And this from a man who doesn’t even realize he’s got an Oedipus complex.’

  Calque slapped the table. ‘I do not have an Oedipus complex. You’ve completely mixed up your Freudian terms. An Oedipus complex is when a boy competes with his father for his mother’s attentions. So you are certainly wrong there. My mother paid no attention either to me or to my father, so there was nothing even to play for. And don’t tell me I have the opposite of an Oedipus complex, because that is an Electra complex, and Lamia certainly does not have that about me.’

  ‘I’m not talking about her. And I’m not talking about your mother. I’m talking about you. Who’s changing the subject now?’

  ‘I do not deny that I still feel very damaged about the loss of my own daughter’s affections. Although I’m surprised and a little disappointed that you should choose to bring the matter up again. I told you about it in confidence, in a weak moment, Sabir, and I foolishly supposed that the subject would end there. However neither do I deny that I feel a quasi-paternal interest in Lamia. It would be strange, in the circumstances, if I did not.’

  Sabir snapped his fingers together. ‘I’ve got it. I’ve remembered it. It’s called a Lear complex. When a father has a libidinous fixation on his daughter.’

  Calque’s voice rose effortlessly above the hubbub surrounding them – a hubbub which was further aggravated by the restaurant’s resident trio attempting their own unique version of Besame Mucho on matching marimbas. ‘I most emphatically do not have a Lear complex, Sabir. And I would like to point out that Lamia is not, in fact, my daughter. And that therefore if I did happen to feel any sexual desire for her, it would not, in and of itself, be incestuous. Nor even inappropriate in terms of age difference. For you may not have noticed it, Sabir, but I am not quite in my dotage yet. I am still only fifty-five years old.’ Calque fumbled around in his pockets for a cigarette. He found one and lit it, flicking the extinguished match through the open window beside him. ‘However it is not predominantly sexual desire that I feel for Lamia, but rather admiration and liking. I also feel a curious protective urge to shield her from the attentions of younger men such as you.’

  ‘Younger men such as me? And what are younger men such as me, when they are at home?’

  ‘Younger men who have taken immaturity to an entirely new level. Younger men who mistake bravado for experience. Younger men who have no earthly sense of self-preservation. I remember you in France, Sabir, blundering from one disaster to the next without the faintest effort at self-control. It was an absolute miracle that you and your two Gypsy friends survived the eye-man’s attentions. In a rational world, you would all three be dead by now.’

  ‘And then you would have Lamia for yourself? Is that it?’

  Calque thrust himself up from the table. Sabir did the same. One of the waiters had been just about to ask them for their drinks order, but, sensing their lack of attention to the menu, he veered towards another table like a liner changing tack mid-ocean.

  ‘I don’t believe this.’ Lamia was heading towards them from the direction of the restrooms. ‘Are you two arguing again? I could hear you all the way across the restaurant. Must this happen every time I go away? It is impossible. I know you like each other. Why can’t you simply acknowledge it, and stop competing all the time? What were you arguing about this time?’

  Calque made a sheepish face, and sat back down to finish his cigarette. Sabir shrugged, and pretended to watch the marimba trio.

  ‘Were you arguing about me? Is that it?’

  ‘Of course not. Why should we do that?’

  Lamia sat down beside them and signalled to the elusive waiter. ‘Why indeed?’

  45

  Abi left it until well after Veracruz to put his plan into action. The trio were approaching Lake Catemaco on the coast road when he told Dakini to dish the baseball cap and sunglasses, and make her presence felt. Athame, Nawal, and Aldinach – who had chosen to join the other de Bale women as a female for the duration – were hunched down out of sight in the well of the people carrier.

  Lamia was driving the Cherokee, with Sabir asleep on the back seat. Calque was reading a book.

  Lamia lurched upright. Then she poked Calque in the ribs with her elbow. ‘I knew it. It was Dakini I saw back in Houston. I’ve just seen her again. With a different car this time.’

  Calque threw the book aside. ‘Where?’

  ‘She was pulled over in the Pemex station getting fuel. That one. Back there.’

  ‘Was she alone?’

  ‘Looked like it. But it was a very big car for just one person.’

  ‘Are you sure it was her?’

  ‘Don’t you think I know my own sister?’

  ‘Step on the gas then. We’ve still got a chance of losing her. She can’t leave without paying and giving the guy his tip.’

  Lamia threw the Cherokee into the first serious curve she’d encountered since the service station. ‘I knew we should have taken the cuota road out of Veracruz. There’s only one way out of here. They’ll simply be waiting for us at the junction at Acayucán.’

  ‘Give me the map.’

  ‘Sabir’s got it.’

  Calque stretched over to the rear seat and prodded Sabir’s leg.

  Sabir cracked open an eye. ‘What is it? Why are you waking me up? And why is Lamia driving like a maniac?’

  ‘We have company.’

  Sabir jack-knifed into a sitting position. ‘Where?’

  ‘Back at the Pemex station. They were still tanking up. With a bit of luck, we’ll have a couple of kilometres head start on them.’

  ‘Forget it. They’ll simply wait for us at Acayucán.’

  ‘That’s just what Lamia said. But I remember a smaller road on the map. A dirt road that runs through the mountains towards Jaltipan. If we get to the turn-off before they see us, we’ll have a fair chance of giving them the slip. They’ll never expect us to do such a stupid thing as that.’

  ‘Stupid. Yes. You said it, Calque, not me.’ Sabir blitzed a look at the map and then passed it across the seats. ‘You’re right about the dirt road, though. But I don’t like it. It’s no more than a farm track, really – they even show it as a fractured orange line on the map, and that’s never a good thing.’ He glanced at the empty road behind them. ‘If the Corpus see us taking it, man, we’ll be sitting ducks.’

  ‘So what’s the difference? We’re sitting ducks already.’

  46

  ‘That’s it. They took the dirt road, just as you expected.’

  Abi clapped his hands together. ‘They’ll have tremendous fun going over the Cerro Santa Marta. From sea level to 1879 metres in just under twenty kilometres. On a road that isn’t paved. With drops either side you wouldn’t even want to throw your grandmother over.’

  ‘Shall we follow them?’

  ‘What’s the point? They’ll pop out again in three or four hours’ time in Jaltipan. Gasping for breath, probably. We can pick them up with the tracker there, no problem. That’s if they don’t break their necks thinking we’re following them. I love doing things like this.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Unexpected things. What the Americans call coming in from left base.’

  ‘Like what you did with the railway inspector and his wife? Downloading the child pornography?’

  ‘Exactly. It makes me sick coming at things straight on. There’s always another way – a roundabout way – to achieve the same end.’

  ‘Tell me another one you did, Abi.’

  Abi relaxed back onto the passenger seat. ‘Okay. Seeing as we unexpectedly have a few extra hours to waste.’ He pretended to be thinking. In fact he’d been rehearsing the story he was going to tell Vau for the past fifteen minutes. Telling stories was the
only way you could ever teach Vau anything – he was like a child that way. ‘You remember that bastard de la Maigrerit de Gavillane?’

  ‘The one who insulted Madame, our mother, over the table placement while I was in hospital with a torn meniscus?’

  ‘Yes. Him. Because she was a widow, and because she had come without an escort to a formal dinner, he placed her below those upstarts with the Napoleonic title. The Prince and Princesse de …’ Abi shrugged. ‘They’re so insignificant, I can’t even remember their names.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter, Abi. Tell me about de Gavillane.’

  ‘He knew exactly what he was doing, the bastard – his father, and Monsieur, our father, had fallen out during the war over the Nazi question. You know how the Count felt about Hitler. Well, the de Gavillanes were enthusiastic fellow travellers to the Third Reich. After the war they hushed it all up, of course, and made out that they were Resistance heroes, but nobody believed them. The de Gavillane name even appeared on denouncements secretly given to high-up Nazi Party members and to the Milice – all the denouncements concerned people who just happened to own land abutting the de Gavillane’s country estate. By the end of the war, they had a 10,000-hectare park around their chateau. People don’t forget that sort of thing.’

  ‘What do you mean “people”?’

  ‘I mean we weren’t the only ones who wanted de Gavillane punished.’

  ‘You mean these other people paid you?’

  ‘Why would I need paying, Vau? I have more than enough money as it is. No. They simply made it easier for me to do what I had to do. Told me de Gavillane’s habits. What clubs he belonged to. Where he hung out. I finally narrowed it down to his health club, or the Turf. But the Turf is too public. His health club was better. I watched de Gavillane without his noticing it. People have habits, you see. And de Gavillane had one particular habit that amused me no end. He hated people leaving their plastic cups of water in the sauna. Whenever he went in he would throw the water onto the stone furnace, and then dispose of the plastic cups in the bin outside. Made no end of a song and a dance about it to the staff.’