codex and the thirteenth crystal skull with no difficulty whatsoever. The priests, and the three Maya who the Halach Uinic had clearly detailed for guard duty, had all been fast asleep, with the two objects wrapped in calico situated plumb in the centre of their sleepover. Like presents left by Father Christmas.
Now both Sabir and Calque, looking very much the worse for wear, were shambling towards him, flanked by Athame and Aldinach.
Abi chucked his chin at Aldinach. ‘Where’s Lamia? You didn’t kill her, did you?’
Athame approached him and began to whisper in his ear. Abi hunched down, nodding.
‘Right. I want you and Aldinach to take the fastest car we have. There’s only one possible direction she can have gone in, and that’s back towards the Cancun toll road. If she’s got any sense at all she’ll be heading out of the country. Fast. If you push it, you should be able to pick up her transponder signal after maybe fifteen or twenty miles. This whole country is as flat as a damned graveyard.’
‘But I thought you wanted me to question Sabir?’ Aldinach looked crestfallen, like a child who has unexpectedly been deprived of her fair share of the birthday cake.
‘We can manage all that. You and Athame are by far the best shadowers amongst us. I want you to follow Lamia wherever she is going. If she leaves the country, go with her. If you lose her, go straight to the Gypsy camp at Samois. My guess is that you’ll encounter her again there. There’s something more to this than meets the eye. But first things first. Calque and Sabir are going to come on a little trip with us. Put them both in the trunk of the Hyundai.’
‘So you did have a tracker in our car?’ Calque muscled his way a little nearer to Abi. By temperament he was unwilling to engage any further than was strictly necessary with those he thought of as the enemy, but, this time at least, his curiosity had got the better of him. ‘Where did you put it? We turned that vehicle inside out. I’m willing to guarantee that there was nothing concealed inside it.’
‘My brother Vau here is an electronic genius. You hear that Vau? I’m giving you a compliment.’ He turned to Calque. ‘He stuck it underneath the chassis.’
‘Underneath the chassis?’ Calque looked crestfallen. ‘But that’s the best way to ensure it gets knocked off over the first speed bump. Or in heavy rain. Or going through a field. We travelled thousands of miles in that vehicle. You people just struck lucky, that’s all.’
Abi laughed. ‘I said Vau was an electronic genius. I never said he was smart.’
Still shaking his head, Calque allowed himself to be manhandled into the narrow trunk. Sabir was unceremoniously tipped in beside him.
‘What? No conniptions, Mr Sabir? Rocha told my mother that you were terminally claustrophobic. That he’d seen you locked inside a wood box at the camp in Samois, and that you were half raving when they took you out of it. I understand that a similar event occurred around the time you murdered him. In a cesspit, wasn’t it?’ Abi’s words were lightly inflected, but his eyes were dead.
‘I’m not claustrophobic any more. Something happened in the touj. You can lock me in here as long as you want. I won’t care.’ Sabir put as much conviction as he could into the words. The truth was that he was scared witless they’d lock him up in an even tighter space than before. Give him the water treatment, maybe.
‘Oh, never fear. We’ll think of something else for you. We have time to spare for all of that.’ Abi slammed down the Hyundai lid.
98
Abi stepped out of the Hyundai sixty metres short of the warehouse. He programmed Oni’s number into his cell phone. Then he raised both hands above his head. The dawn was well up now, and visibility was improving by the minute. After ten seconds he cut the connection with a movement of his thumb.
He knew all about Oni’s itchy trigger finger. And he also knew that two heavy-duty machine guns – the Stoner M63 and the notoriously unreliable AAT – were covering the approach road. He didn’t want Oni and Berith to think the Mexican owners of the arms dump had returned early from their border run, and commence firing. And neither did he want to walk into a trap.
The cell phone cheeped. Abi put it to his ear. ‘Can you see us?’
‘I’ve got you.’
‘Any trouble?’
‘Nah.’
‘We’ll come in then.’
‘Yeah. Come on in. You’re a tempting target out there. I nearly let loose on you just for the hell of it.’
Abi got back in the car and signalled to Alastor behind him. The convoy moved forwards. ‘We’ll go straight to the warehouse and get this over and done with. We don’t want to stay here any longer than we need to.’
‘You think the Mexicans are on their way back?’
‘Wouldn’t you be?’
Abi backed the Hyundai up to the warehouse and got out. He slung the rucksack containing the codex and the crystal skull over his shoulder. ‘Get the two of them out of the trunk. Be as rough as you like. They’re both for the cenote, whatever happens. Doesn’t matter what shape they’re in. Nobody will ever find them. I doubt the guys that own this place are sub-aqua enthusiasts.’
Rudra and Asson manhandled Sabir and Calque out of the trunk of the car.
‘Vau. You and Alastor take over from Oni and Berith at the machine guns. They’ll be jaded and resentful by now. I’ll let them loose on our prisoners in compensation. Give them a little entertainment to take their minds off things.’
‘Okay. But do you really think we might have trouble?’
‘Unlikely for another few hours. Unless they’ve got access to a helicopter, that is. The guys that own this joint might not even have called in yet. Why should they? Who in their right minds would attack an arsenal? But at some point they will. And then they’re going to be very, very angry. Nobody likes cuckoos in their nest.’
Abi joined the others inside the warehouse. He dumped the rucksack unceremoniously onto a nearby counter, as if its contents meant nothing to him at all. ‘It’s a shame we don’t have Lamia – that could have been really amusing. I love a quorum. We’d soon have found out whether Mr Sabir is the gentleman he likes to think he is.’ He stood for a while, weighing up his two prisoners. ‘String the policeman up first. Strappado style. Arms stretched behind his back. I don’t care if you dislocate the hell out of him. We’ll see if Mr Sabir enjoys watching his friends whimpering in pain.’
Oni was beckoning to him from the corner of the warehouse. ‘Abi, have you got a minute?’
‘Can’t you see I’m busy?’
‘Seriously. I think you ought to come over here and take a look at this.’ Oni was pointing to a trapdoor, now only partially covered by some of the packing cases they’d plundered earlier. ‘I noticed this an hour or so ago when I came in for coffee. Didn’t have time to check it out then, because there were only the two of us here. Don’t you think we ought to take a look? Might be something of interest down there.’
Abi glanced over at Calque. Rudra had just finished roping him to one of the packing hoists. Sabir was seated between Calque’s legs – his arms were tied behind his back at the wrist and the bicep.
Asson grinned when he saw the direction of Abi’s gaze. ‘This way the policeman can piss on Sabir’s head when the pain gets too bad.’
‘Hold off a moment. I want to check what’s beneath this trapdoor first. You can boil me a kettle while you’re waiting. And scissor off the policeman’s shirt. We haven’t got time for any finesse. We’ll see if Mr Sabir likes eating parboiled copper.’
Oni pushed the packing cases aside. He wrenched at the trapdoor. It groaned a little, but didn’t give. ‘Hand me the Mini-Uzi. Now stand away, all of you, unless you want your teeth blown out.’
Abi clapped his hands over his ears. He had an inordinate fear of losing his hearing.
Oni let rip with the Uzi. Chunks of wood and metal shavings sprayed off the trapdoor. Oni tentatively kicked at it with the heel of his shoe. ‘Once more.’ This time the 9mm Parabellum slugs knocked a hole the size of a man’s head in the woodwork. ‘Okay. We’re through.’
Abi let his hands flutter down from his face. He watched as Oni manhandled what remained of the trapdoor
