The Mayan Codex

14

Lamia sat down beside the men. During her absence, Sabir had ordered coffee, and now she busied herself ‘being mother’, an elusive smile hovering about her face.

‘Well who’s going to be the first to ask, then?’ Sabir was still feeling slightly sick that he might, at this very moment, have been jetting off towards Saudi Arabia, if Calque and Lamia hadn’t happened by.

There was silence. Calque and Lamia sipped their coffee.

‘Okay. I’ll admit it. I ballsed-up. I was on the total wrong track. But I still don’t get the “Inchal” bit. Or why “Kabah” doesn’t apply to the Kaaba.’

Lamia glanced up. ‘I’ve just been using the hotel’s internet connection. I typed in “Kabah”. With an h. Just as you tell us it’s written in Nostradamus’s prophecy. Number two on the list of Google hits, after the Kaaba, takes you straight to Kabah, a Maya site down in the Yucatan. Kabah means “strong hand”, or, in its original form, Kabahaucan, a “royal snake in the hand”. The place is famous for the Codz Poop – the Palace of the Masks – in which hundreds of stone masks dedicated to the long-nosed rain god, Chaac, stretch along a massive stone facade. Chaac, if you don’t know it, is also the god of thunder, lightning, and rain, and he is considered capable of causing volcanic eruptions with his lightning axe.’

‘Jesus.’ Sabir had always known he possessed a single-track mind. But his recent inability to think laterally constituted something of a record, even for him.

‘The word “Inchal” was harder. At first, I only came up with a place in India, with no link at all to the Maya. In the end I decided to play around with it a little, and came up with “Chilan”.’

‘And what the heck is a Chilan when it’s at home?’

‘It’s a Maya priest. The word actually means an “interpreter”, a “mouthpiece”, or a “soothsayer”. The Chilans were responsible for teaching the sciences, appointing holy days, treating the sick, offering sacrifices, and acting as the oracles of the gods.’

‘Holy shit.’

‘And Chilans traditionally wore the “Ahau”, which is the Maya sun belt. The word also means “Lord” in Maya. So Nostradamus’s phrase “Ahau Inchal Kabah”, and his insistence that this person, blessed with the ultimate gift of prophecy, lives in the land of the “Great Volcano”, is so far from implying a place in Saudi Arabia, that it almost beggars belief how you could ever have allowed yourself to be so disastrously sidetracked, Mr Sabir.’

Sabir leaned forward and placed his head in his hands.

Calque squirmed deliriously in his seat. ‘Don’t tell me, Sabir. You haven’t been sleeping recently. Your brain is not functioning to quite its usual standard.’ The ex-policeman was enjoying himself. He was behaving as if he had somehow magicked Lamia out of his jacket pocket and presented her, in triumph, to a wildly applauding gallery.

‘Don’t rub it in, Calque. You’re beginning to sound like Svengali.’

Calque glanced towards Lamia. ‘What do you think? Shall we let him travel with us? Or shall we go it alone? We have all the material we need.’

‘Oh really?’ Sabir sat up straighter. ‘You’ve got everything you need?’

Calque hesitated for a moment. ‘Yes. I think we have.’

Lamia rolled her eyes.

‘You’ve got the full text of Nostradamus’s quatrain, have you? Including the key indicator of where to look for this man once you get to Kabah?’

Calque fiddled with his unlit cigarette.

‘Well you don’t need me any more, then, do you?’ Sabir stood up. ‘But if you should happen to change your minds, you can probably catch me any time within the next half hour. My house. A silver Grand Cherokee. After that I’m gone. Out of here. Capeesh, wiseasses?’