The Templar Heresy

8

When the convoy was about twenty miles from the camp, Khaled pressed the transmit button on his driver’s walkie-talkie and ordered Farooq to stop the lorries. If the woman had been hiding somewhere in the camp, the last thing he wanted to do was make a direct approach, and then end up chasing her over the harsh desert terrain.

And it was also possible, he reasoned, that she hadn’t been at the camp at all, but had been away obtaining supplies, in which case their best plan would be to lie in wait among the tents until she came back. He realized that neither he nor anybody else in the group had bothered counting the number of people in the camp or the vehicles parked there, which was a mistake. If they had, they would have known immediately whether or not anyone was missing.

Wherever the woman had been at the time of the attack, Khaled knew that they would have to proceed cautiously to ensure that they managed to locate her and then kill her. They could not afford to allow her to escape with the knowledge of what was in the temple. And that meant a circuitous approach to the camp.

‘Meet me at the jeep,’ he ordered. ‘And bring your map.’

Two minutes later, Farooq spread out his map on the bonnet of the 4x4, and for a few moments the two men just stared at the largely featureless terrain marked on it, the whole sheet a uniform sandy brown. Then Khaled glanced at the coordinates on his GPS unit, took a pencil from his pocket and drew a rough circle on the map. He changed the image on the navigation unit until it showed the location of the archaeological camp, and marked that spot on the map with a cross.

‘We can’t just drive there with the lorries,’ he said, ‘because if she’s in a vehicle heading to the camp she could easily see us and just turn around and head the other way. And then we might never find her. If she’s already at the camp, there are several 4x4 vehicles there she could use to get away.’

‘The lorries will kick up a lot of dust and sand,’ Farooq pointed out reasonably, ‘even if I tell the drivers to go slowly, so we won’t be able to approach without being seen.’

‘Exactly.’ Khaled pointed at the map. ‘We will not drive to the camp at all. There’s a track here that cuts down to the south between the camp and the border with Kuwait. Send one of the lorries down there and tell them to hold position near the route over the dunes that the archaeologists have been using when they drive to Kuwait City. They are just to watch, and to take no action until I give the order.’

Farooq estimated distances on the map by eye.

‘If they stay on that track,’ he said, ‘then they’ll be about ten miles to the east of the camp, and a lot further from where we are now. The walkie-talkies only have a reliable range of about five miles, so how will we remain in contact? We only have your satellite telephone.’

Khaled shook his head irritably. He hadn’t foreseen that particular practical difficulty.

‘But you told me that there is a satellite phone at the archaeological encampment,’ Farooq added. ‘I suppose that if the woman is there when we arrive, we can kill her immediately. If she runs for the border, we can use that phone to call the crew of the lorry and tell them to stop her before she gets there. That would work.’

‘Yes,’ Khaled replied slowly, ‘it would. That’s a good idea. Give my telephone to the crew and tell them what we want them to do.’

‘What about the other lorry?’

‘The men in the first lorry will cover the area to the east of the encampment, and if she does run, that will be the way I would expect her to go. But just in case she does something unexpected, I want you to send the second lorry along this other track to the west. I doubt if she would head that way, because there’s almost nothing out there but desert, but we should still take precautions.’

‘And where will you be?’

‘I want you to ride with me in the jeep, and we’ll go ahead of the second lorry on the westerly track. If she is in the camp, she will have found the mess we left and I’ve no doubt she’d be spooked by any vehicle approaching directly, but hopefully she would ignore a vehicle passing about a mile away. And that’s how I plan to approach her.’