The Nostradamus prophecies

68

Sabir rubbed his face with his hands, just as though he were smoothing in a squirt or two of suntan lotion. ‘There’s just one snag to all this.’

‘And what’s that?’

‘Not only will the French police not know exactly where we are going, thanks to my partially holding out on Calque, but they will still be out to get me – with everything they have in their arsenal – for Babel and the nightwatchman’s murder. With you both along as accessories after the fact.’

‘You can’t be serious?’

‘Oh yes I can. Deadly serious. Captain Calque told me that he is doing this entirely off his own initiative.’

‘And you believe him?’

‘Yes I do. He could have taken me into custody this morning and thrown away the key. Claimed all the kudos for himself. I was perfectly prepared to surrender to him without a struggle. I’m no cop killer. I told him so myself. He even held the Remington in his hand and then gave it back to me.’

Alexi whistled.

‘The authorities could have spent months pinning that maniac’s actions on to me, by which time the man they call the eye-man would have been long gone – probably with the verses in tow and ready for sale on the open market. And who could prove where he found them? Nobody. Because they’ve got no DNA evidence – the death of an unknown gypsy doesn’t rate a full police procedural over here, apparently. And anyway, they would already have had me in custody, so why bother with the rest? The ideal suspect. Whose blood is conveniently splattered all over the crime scene. Open and shut, no?’

‘Then why is Calque doing this? They will send him to the guillotine, surely – or exile him to Elba, like Napoleon – if things go wrong.’

‘Hardly that. He’s simply doing it because he wants the eye-man and he wants him badly. It was his fault his assistant got nailed. And he holds himself responsible for the nightwatchman’s death, too. He reckons he should have figured that the eye-man would come back to sort over unfinished business. But he says he got so carried away with his own and his assistant’s brilliance in working out the Montserrat code, that he couldn’t see the light for the trees. A bit like me, really.’

‘Are you sure it’s not a trap? So they can get both of you? I mean, perhaps they think you are working together?’

Sabir groaned. ‘What the Hell. I don’t know. All I know is that he could have taken me in this morning and he didn’t. That’s one heck of a bonafide in my book.’

‘So what do we do?’

Sabir lurched backwards in mock surprise. ‘What do we do? We head for the Camargues, that’s what we do. Via Millau. That much I have agreed with Calque. Then we lose ourselves for a few days amongst ten thousand of your closest relatives. Always bearing in mind, of course, that the eye-man can track our car wherever and whenever he wants to – and that we are still murder suspects, with the French police hot on our trail, handcuffs and machine guns at the ready.’

‘ Jesu Cristu! And then?’

‘And then, in six days’ time, at the absolute height of the festival of the Three Maries, we steal out of hiding and fi lch the statue of Sainte Sara from in front of a church crammed to the rafters with frantically worshipping acolytes. Without tangling with the eye-man. And without getting ourselves strung up, or hacked to pieces, by a crazed mob of vengeful zealots in the process.’ Sabir grinned. ‘How do you like them apples, Alexi?’