Gavril’s nostrils and the massive dent in his temple. Talk about being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Alexi unhooked Gavril’s foot from the stirrup. He attached the horse to the hitching post and glanced around, searching for something capable of inflicting such a crippling wound. The gelding couldn’t have strayed far, weighed down with Gavril’s body.
He hobbled over to the stone. Yes. It was covered in blood and hair. He lifted it up in his arms, using only his sleeves – he knew enough not to smear any fingerprints. He returned and placed the stone near Gavril’s head. He was briefly tempted to feel inside Gavril’s pocket for any spare cash, but decided not to. He didn’t want to provide the police with a possible false motive for the murder.
When he was satisfied with his scene-setting, Alexi levered himself up on to the gelding. He swayed in the saddle, the blood pulsing round his head like a ballbearing in a pinball machine.
Two-to-one the eye-man was responsible for the killing – it was too much of a coincidence otherwise. He’d obviously run into Gavril on his way back. Questioned him. Killed him. In which case there was an outside chance that he now knew of the Maset, for Gavril, like any other gypsy his age who regularly visited the Camargue, would have known of the famous card game between Dadul Gavriloff and Aristeo Samana, Yola’s father. He might not know exactly where the house was, but he’d sure as Hell have known of its existence.
For one brief instant of uncertainty Alexi had been tempted to head back to the tree and retrieve the bamboo tube. But caution finally won out over vainglory. Now, setting the gelding’s reins, he allowed it to follow its head back towards the house.
46
Yola had devised a novel way of hitchhiking. She waited until she saw a likely gypsyowned vehicle approaching, made a snake-like sign with her left hand – followed immediately by the sign of the cross – and then walked out into the middle of the road to where the driver’s window would be. The vehicles nearly always stopped.
Yola would then lean in and discuss where she wanted to go. If the driver was travelling in a different direction – or not far enough – she would wave him impatiently on. The fourth vehicle she flagged down fitted her parameters perfectly.
Feeling like Clark Gable to Yola’s Claudette Colbert, Sabir followed her into the straw-littered rear of the betaillere. He had to admit that even a stinking Citroen H van was marginally better than walking. He had originally tried persuading Yola that they ought to cut corners and take a taxi back to the Maset, but she had insisted that, this way, no one would have a record of where they had gone. She had been ahead of him, as usual.
Sabir leaned against the lath-framed interior of the H van and toyed with the Spanish-made Aitor lock-bladed knife that he was hiding in his pocket. He had bought the knife off Bouboul, twenty minutes earlier, for fifty euros. It had a four-and-a-half inch razor-sharp cutting edge, which latched into place with a comforting click when you swung it open. It was clearly a fighting knife, for it had an indentation for the thumb about half an inch behind the blade – which Sabir presumed was to allow the knife to be stuck into one’s enemy without the disadvantage of cutting off one’s own finger in the process.
Bouboul had been reluctant to part with the knife, but greed – he had probably bought it for the equivalent of about five euros thirty years before – and being on the receiving end of one of Yola’s tongue-lashings, had been enough to force him into capitulate. She had claimed to hold him personally responsible for the loss of the horses – and, anyway, in her opinion, he was far too old to carry a knife. Did he want to end up like Stefan, with his eye hanging out on a string? Best get rid of the thing.
It was late afternoon by the time Yola and Sabir made it back to the Maset de la Marais. Predictably, the place was empty.
‘What do we do now, Damo?’
‘We wait.’
‘But how will we know if the eye-man catches Alexi? Once the eye-man has the prophecies, he will leave. We will never know what happened.’
‘What do you expect me to do, Yola? Wander out into the Marais and yell out Alexi’s name? I’d lose myself in no time. There’s three hundred square kilometres of absolutely nothing beyond that treeline.’
‘You could steal another horse. That’s what Alexi would do.’
Sabir felt himself reddening. Yola appeared to understand how men ought to behave, in extremis, somewhat better than he did. ‘Would you wait here? Would you be prepared to do that? Not go gallivanting off so that I’ve got two people to find?’
‘No. I would stay here. Alexi might come back. He might need me. I shall make some soup.’
‘Soup?’
Yola stood and watched him, a disbelieving expression on her face. ‘Men always forget that people need to eat. Alexi has been on the run since this morning. If he manages to get back here alive, he will be hungry. We must have something for him to eat.’
Sabir hurried around to the outhouse to see if he could find another saddle, a rope and some more tack. With Yola in this sort of mood, he understood exactly how Alexi felt about marriage.
Within fifteen minutes of starting his horse hunt, Sabir realised that he was not going to get anywhere fast. He wasn’t trained in the use of the lariat, like Alexi and the horses were becoming more skittish the closer dusk approached. Each time he lined one up it would watch him trustingly until he came to within about ten feet, upon which it would twist around on its hind legs and disappear, farting and kicking, into the undergrowth.
Sabir dumped the saddle and bridle at the edge of the Clos and started back along the trail in disgust. When he came to the junction that led towards the house he hesitated, then struck out to the left, down the track they had all three taken that morning to get to Les Saintes-Maries.
He was deeply worried about Alexi. But there was also something about the man which inspired confidence, especially when it came to managing out in the wild. True – according to Bouboul’s version of the story, the eye- man had been a bare minute’s ride behind Alexi when they had left town at the gallop. But a minute was a long time on horseback and Sabir had seen Alexi dealing with the ponies that morning and the way that he rode… well, suffice it to say that he was a natural. Plus he knew the marshes like the back of his hand. If his horse held up, Sabir would bet good money on Alexi giving the eye-man the slip.
In Sabir’s view, therefore, it was only a matter of time before Alexi came riding down the track, the prophecies raised triumphantly in one hand. Sabir would then retire to some quiet spot – preferably near to a good restaurant – to translate them, while the police did what the police were paid to do and dealt with the eye- man.
In due course he would contact his publishers. They would put the prophecies out to tender. Money would come flooding in – money he would share with Yola and Alexi.
And then, fi nally, the nightmare would be over.
47
Achor Bale decided that he would approach the house from the east, via an old drainage ditch that ran the length of one untended field. With Alexi away, Sabir and the girl would be on the lookout – on the qui vive. Perhaps there was even a shotgun in the house? Or an old rifle? Wouldn’t do to take unnecessary risks.
He was fleetingly tempted to return for the horse, which he had left tethered in a clump of trees a hundred metres or so behind the property. The horse would follow him perfectly easily along the ditch and the sound of its hoofes might even mask his approach. Perhaps the pair of them might emerge from the house, thinking Alexi had returned? But no. Why complicate matters unnecessarily?
