The Mayan Codex

61

‘Your turn to stick your hand in, Calque. Are there any particular bequests you wish to make? I’ll see to it that your posthumous instructions are carried out to the letter.’

Calque ignored him. He felt around in the first of their new series of holes. Then he closed his eyes. ‘There’s something in here. Something smooth. And cold.’

‘You’re kidding me?’

‘No. I can feel it quite clearly. It’s got teeth. And a nose. I can even feel the indentations of the eyes.’

‘Jesus Christ. What is it? I’ll kill you if you’re bullshitting me.’

‘I’m not bullshitting.’ Calque withdrew his hand from the hole. ‘We’re going to have to take the whole sconce out. There’s no way I can lever this thing through the size of hole I have here.’

Sabir stuck his hand into the hole and felt around. ‘You’re right. But we can’t risk taking the whole mask out of its niche. It’ll be too heavy. We’ll never get it back inside again.’

‘Then we’ll just have to leave it here on the ground. Maybe they’ll think it fell out due to condensation?’

‘Yes. That’s likely. Good call, Calque. I can just see the curator now. “Hey, guys! We just lost another of these 1,200-year-old masks. Bastard thing must have fallen out due to condensation.”’

Both men stepped back and stared at the sconce.

‘We’ll just have to tug like hell and then get out of the way. Thing’ll probably lose its nose when it hits the ground. That’ll really buff up our grave robber credentials. One thing I can tell you, Calque. When we get hold of whatever it is that’s tucked in behind this mask, I’m not sticking around.’

‘Neither am I. Come on. Let’s do it.’

The two men levered with their tyre irons until the mask was teetering at the very edge of its sconce.

‘It’s going to tip. Watch your feet.’ Sabir pulled at the mask, and then stepped quickly back as the entire structure overset towards him.

The mask hit the ground and bounced.

‘Christ. It’s still going.’ The two men turned around to watch the mask pounding its way down the steps behind them, stone-chips skittering in every direction.

Only then did they see the eight Maya standing in the moonlit courtyard. Each man held a rifle in his hands. Lamia was standing beside one of the Maya. Her mouth was bound with a cloth.

Sabir glanced at Calque. He spoke out of the corner of his mouth. ‘Any more funny jokes to share?’

Calque sucked at his teeth. ‘Not offhand.’ He gave a sudden Burt Lancaster grin. ‘No. Wait. Maybe these gunmen aren’t interested in us after all? Maybe they’re on a night training exercise for the Mexican army?’

‘Yeah. Right on, Calque. That’s a good one. Glad I fucking asked.’