The Mayan Codex

27

Calque reached Lamia in three strides. He held up a placatory hand to the taxi driver, and drew her to one side.

‘We have a problem. The man who got you out of the house has just telephoned me. He ran into one of your mother’s people on the way back from the beach. The man came at him with a shotgun, and he was forced to kill him. As a result, we were almost certainly followed here.’

‘But that’s impossible…’

‘We don’t have time for this, Lamia. I’ll explain later. You know your mother better than I do. You know what she and her people are capable of. Will you do as I ask?’

Lamia allowed her eyes to search across Calque’s face. She nodded.

‘Get into the taxi. Now. I’m going to give the driver the address of my hotel in Cogolin. You must go there. I shall follow along behind in my car. At some point you’ll see me turn off the road. Don’t change the driver’s instructions. I must know where to find you. My hunch is that we are dealing with only one man. He will follow me, because I present the greatest threat to him. And if he doesn’t follow me and follows you instead, I will know where to come to find him. Do you understand what I am saying?’

‘Yes.’

Calque leaned across and gave the driver his instructions. He handed Lamia some Euros.

‘I’ll catch you up. Don’t worry. Take a room at my hotel under the name of Mercier. Then lock your door until I come. Have you got that?’

He backed off before she could change her mind. Without looking around, Calque made for his car. He got in, started the engine, and pulled into the traffic fifty metres or so behind the taxi. There were three cars between him and Lamia. None of them was a blue Renault. Calque glanced into his rear-view mirror.

The Renault was five cars behind him.

Calque’s belly tightened with fear. He wasn’t an action man. Never had been. He had always left that to the young – to people like Paul Macron. Which is why Macron was dead, and he was still alive. The thought ate into him like acid.

Now his only priority was to protect the woman. It was clearly his fault that she was in this situation, and he must do his very best to extricate her. He mustn’t fail her the way he’d failed his assistant.

Five kilometres down the road, at the Cogolin Plage roundabout, Calque veered off to the left, onto the La Croix Valmer road. The blue Renault followed him.

Calque made the sign of the cross. He knew that his only chance now was to use his intelligence. Outflank his opponent. Think laterally. If he couldn’t achieve that, the man would simply force him off the road at a suitable spot and do away with him.

He must keep the man guessing. Force him to hold back.

Calque hung a left towards Gassin. That would make the man think. Was Calque heading back towards Pampelonne? Or to the Countess’s house?

Calque accelerated up the steep hill towards the village. The road beyond Gassin was a winding one, and little used at this time of year. If the man was to make his move, he would doubtless make it there.

Calque was counting on the man’s innate curiosity to stay his hand. It was a thin edge to trust your life to, and Calque could feel the anxiety eating away at him. He had no weapon in the car. No possible means of self-defence. His heart was weak, and a lifetime of heavy smoking had ensured that his lungs would be of little use in a crisis.

The blue Renault closed in on him. They were well out of Gassin, now, and heading into the hills towards Ramatuelle. They couldn’t be more than five or six kilometres from the Countess’s house. Surely the man would hold his fire for a little longer?

Calque saw a car ahead of him, and speeded up. There was safety in numbers. People instinctively tried not to shit on their own doorsteps if they could possibly avoid it. And certainly not with witnesses present. The man behind him had already had one body to deal with – two would prove something of a crowd, surely?

The extra company appeared to have put the blue Renault man off his stride. Calque saw the car behind him drop back again. Perhaps he still thought that Calque was unaware of his presence?

Now they were approaching Ramatuelle. Calque sent up a brief prayer that the motorist in front of him was not intending to stop off for a newspaper or for his morning cup of coffee. He felt an overwhelming affection for the anonymous little man he was following – curious how it was possible to love a complete stranger.

The man continued on out through the village with Calque clinging to his tail like a pilot fish. They were barely three kilometres from the Countess’s house now, and Calque began to feel an upwelling of confidence in his own judgement. He had called the thing correctly. The man driving the blue Renault had obviously been in touch with the Countess, and she had told him to hold off and see what Calque intended.

Now it only remained for Calque to keep his head – before inserting it directly inside the tiger’s mouth.