She was familiar enough with the first marker to notice that its pattern was different from the one before her. When fitted back to back with the other disc, some of the holes would be blocked. However it pointed the way to the spearheads, only a subset of the pattern was important, not the whole thing.
‘As you can see, it has not been stolen,’ Merlo said smugly. ‘And the security here at the museum will keep it safe.’
‘A handful of unarmed doughy guys and some locked doors won’t keep these men out,’ Nina insisted. ‘You need proper security, professionals – armed professionals. And this needs to be kept in a vault, not a glorified filing cabinet.’
Merlo’s lips tightened at the criticism. ‘The night guards have guns.’
‘Then let’s hope the place isn’t robbed in the daytime.’
‘Do you think we are all peasants here in Spain, Dr Wilde?’ he snapped, starting to re-wrap the marker. ‘The marcador is completely secure! And,’ he went on, a mocking tone entering his voice, ‘even if the marcadores really do point the way to the Atlantean spearheads, nobody knows how to use them. Not even you have solved their secret.’ The last was said with considerable sarcasm.
‘You can’t take that risk!’ Nina protested, growing angry at his refusal to take her seriously. ‘If they have both pieces, all they need is someone who can translate Atlantean text. Once they know what it says, they will eventually find the spearheads – and they’ll have a weapon that makes a nuke look like a firecracker!’
Merlo tucked the last corner of the marker’s wrapping back into place. ‘If that is what the spearheads are. Which I do not believe. Antimatter bombs, pah – this is not a Dan Brown book! You have spent too much time making television shows – you have lost touch with real archaeology.’
‘So you’re not going to do anything to protect it?’ Nina demanded.
‘I have done more than enough.’ He stepped back, preparing to return the treasure to the drawer.
A mad idea flashed through Nina’s mind. If Merlo wouldn’t do what was necessary to keep the Atlantean relic safe, someone else would have to do it for him . . .
Almost before finishing the thought, she snatched the marker from him.
The Spaniard gawped at her in disbelief. She imagined her own expression was much the same. ‘What are—’ he began, before realisation struck. ‘No!’
But Nina had already kicked off her high heels and bolted for the door.
14
Nina raced through the lab, clutching the marker. Merlo yelled in Spanish behind her.
The door ahead opened. The portly security guard jumped back in surprise as she ducked around him and ran for the exit. He hurriedly shouted into a walkie-talkie before starting after her.
She reached the elevator, but couldn’t risk taking it. Instead she ran up a narrow staircase behind it, emerging on the museum’s main floor. Going right would take her back to the entrance and the park—
She reached the terrace – and saw a guard pounding towards her. Bare feet skidding on the smooth marble, she hurriedly reversed and ran into the museum proper.
Carrying both her bag and the marker was awkward. She almost dumped the former, but remembered that literally everything she currently possessed was in it – including money, passport and shoes. Instead she stuffed the Atlantean treasure inside and held the bag shut as she ran.
Startled visitors jumped out of her way. The guard was gaining. Through more doorways, into a hallway with rows of Roman busts on plinths at the far end.
He was right behind her. A hand clutched at her ponytail—
Nina swung the bag at him. The heavy marker clonked against his head. She jinked aside, squeaking to a halt as he stumbled past.
The guard crashed against the front row of plinths. The carved heads wobbled, an early-first-century bust of a woman toppling over. Nina shrieked and lunged to catch it before it burst apart on the floor, then laid it gently down.
The guard looked in confusion between her and the rescued bust, then pushed himself upright as Nina ran again.
Beyond the next room was the museum’s central hall, a large oval chamber with a glazed ceiling. Its centrepiece was a perfectly restored Roman fresco on the floor, a rope cordon keeping tourists’ feet off the ancient tiles.
The fastest route to the exit was straight across the fresco. She offered a silent apology to the archaeologists who had carried out the restoration, then hurdled the rope, racing through more rooms in a blur of pottery and Roman coins. Ahead was the room where she had first met Merlo. She was almost out!
She ran on to the terrace leading to the main entrance—
Merlo himself rounded the corner ahead, face filled with fury. ‘Stop!’ he yelled, holding out his arms to make a tackle.
Without stopping to think, she jumped on to the terrace’s balustrade – and leapt off it.
She sailed over a wheelchair access to land on the plaza beyond. Pain flared in one ankle as her heel hit the stone slabs hard. Wincing, she looked back – to see Merlo and the others making a slower but safer descent to the zigzag ramp.
That gave her a head start, but not much. She ran into the broad space of the Plaza de América between the archaeological edifice and the Museum of Arts.
Where to go – and how? She couldn’t run for ever; some of the guards were faster than her. She needed something quicker than her two feet . . .
A teenage boy slouched with a mountain bike, boredom clear on his face as he waited for his parents to take a selfie. ‘Sorry, kid,’ Nina said, yanking the bike from him. ‘I need your wheels!’
She made a hasty rolling start. The bag’s weight in one hand unbalanced her, the bike wobbling and almost pitching her off before she straightened out. The boy ran after her, screaming Spanish abuse as his startled parents looked around.
The guards were still chasing her. Nina pumped the pedals harder. She pulled clear of the bike’s yelling owner, clicking up through the gears to gain speed. Her pursuers fell away behind.
She swung on to one of the boulevards, hooking the bag over the handlebars. Ahead was a crescent; she shot into it, making a wide turn to bring herself on to a tree-lined avenue. It was a busy route, horse-drawn carriages and bicycle rickshaws overtaking the ambling tourists.
But there was a motor vehicle on it too – a police car, lights and siren sending people scattering. Merlo hadn’t been kidding about the cops’ rapid response time.
Footpaths led into the trees on both sides. Nina swung down one to her right, bushes swatting at her as she whisked along the track. As long as she continued roughly north, she would head back towards Seville’s centre, where she would have a chance of escaping the cops in the Holy Week crowds.
If she could get out of the park . . .
She burst out from bushes, making a quick swerve around a line of people at an ice cream stall to bring the bike back on to asphalt. She was almost at the Plaza de España. An exit from the park beyond it would bring her out near the University of Seville, where she had once given a lecture.
She reached another wide avenue and turned towards the Plaza. Behind, the police car peeled through an intersection after her. She clutched the bag more tightly and snicked up through the gears.
More cops ahead joined the hunt, officers patrolling the Plaza de España running in her direction. None was crazy enough to take a shot, the sheer number of tourists acting as a deterrent. But the crowds made matters harder for Nina too, forcing her to weave through them.
She swung on to an avenue leading north-west out of the Plaza. Its end was fenced off, horse-drawn carriages lined up on the far side. She jumped the bike on to the pavement with a jarring thud and whizzed through the pedestrian entrance. Her ride immediately became several times more dangerous; she was now on a public road, badly parked cars on both sides and more drivers filing between them. She went with the flow of traffic, following a car circulating around the one-way loop to the park’s gates before cutting alongside a li
ne of vehicles at a stop light.
Ahead was a large traffic circle. The university was directly opposite. The road was clear, so she zoomed past the waiting cars – and instantly regretted her decision.
Traffic lights on another road turned green, and Spanish drivers did not take their time pulling away. Dozens of cars suddenly rushed at her. Horns blared, the oncoming vehicles weaving to avoid her. Metal and plastic crunched just behind. She glanced back. The two collided vehicles were blocking anyone else from coming up on that side. She turned and yanked up the handlebars to wheelie on to the grassy central circle.
That gave her a brief respite as she pedalled across it, but despite the fender-bender, drivers were still orbiting the roundabout, squeezing past the two stationary cars and even putting their wheels on the sidewalk. ‘And I thought they were impatient in New York!’ Nina gasped as she continued at full pelt towards the exit ahead. A man who had narrowly missed her the first time seemed determined to finish the job, blasting angrily on his horn. She was able to spare just enough concentration to flip him the bird before sweeping on to the wide sidewalk outside the university.
She was safe—
Or not. Vehicles rounding another traffic circle further down the road parted to let a police car through. ‘Oh, crap!’
More cops were approaching from behind. She swung the bike through a gate into the university’s grounds. The oncoming police car screeched to a stop outside, stymied by a barrier.
Nina cut across a lawn and rounded the corner of the main building. A gate led back out on to the streets. No cars beyond; it was a pedestrianised zone. Dodging startled students, she sped through the opening.
Twin tramlines ran along the street’s centreline, but while normal traffic was prohibited, the road was not inaccessible. Another police car was coming down it from the traffic circle, siren squalling. She followed the tramlines into a spacious square, where the Holy Week crowd became a crush. Music filled the air, a brass band blaring out a tune.
The parade itself gave her a moment of shock – at least until her knowledge of history overcame instinctual revulsion. Those marching were Nazarenos, members of a Catholic order following tradition by wearing long robes and tall pointed hoods that covered their faces. The same design had been adopted by the loathsome bigots of the Ku Klux Klan, only their concealment was out of cowardice rather than an exhibition of shame before God.
The music was surprisingly jaunty, the onlookers treating the parade more as spectacle than a sombre exhibition of penance. Amongst the hooded Nazarenos were pasos, elaborate floats bearing religious imagery, which at first glance appeared to be motorised but were actually carried on the shoulders of dozens of men hidden beneath their decorative skirts. They were being borne on to the street leading to the Cathedral of Seville.
Nina rode towards the parade until the thickening crowd forced her to stop. Gripping the bag, she jumped off the bike and ran. The wailing police car had already come to a halt.
The cops hadn’t given up, though. She glanced back to see two baseball-hatted men in sunglasses running after her. She was easy to spot; the vast majority of the visitors were Spanish, almost uniformly dark-haired, while her red tresses stood out like a beacon.
She ducked lower, shoving through the throng before emerging on the parade route itself. Robed figures surrounded her, eyes widening in surprise behind the holes in the pointed capirote hoods as she scurried past. ‘Oye! Oye!’ someone shouted, a foot catching her painfully on her calf. Penitence clearly did not rule out anger, especially on a day that people had likely been anticipating for months. She gasped, but pressed on, more cries in her wake.
Keeping her head down, she pushed through the Nazarenos to scuttle alongside a lumbering float. A larger-than-life statue of Jesus on the cross regarded her disapprovingly from atop the paso. She spotted a small gap in the front row of onlookers and ducked into it.
A glance back as the crowd closed behind her. The closest cop was being hampered by his own religious upbringing – he was reluctant to disrespect the devout by barging through the Nazarenos. She took advantage of his hesitation and hurried onwards, forcing her way through the crush.
The parade turned into a plaza in front of the cathedral. Nina instead kept going down its side, the crowds gradually easing. A narrow street on her left; a quick check for police, then she took it. There were far fewer people here. A long line of parked mopeds led her to another junction. No cops there either. She rounded the corner and hurried along the new alley, then stopped, suddenly breathless.
The bag was heavy in her hand. She rummaged for her sea-damaged shoes and put them on her dirty, aching feet, then glanced back at her cargo.
The second spear marker was hers. The irony that she was now actually guilty of what she had been accused of aboard the Atlantia did not escape her. A small disbelieving laugh. What the hell had she been thinking? For all Merlo’s arrogance, he did have a point: there was no proof that the spearheads really were some kind of ancient superweapon, merely her supposition. She might have just committed grand larceny and set every cop in Spain after her for nothing.
But another part of her insisted she had made the right decision; the only decision. The raiders had specifically taken the first marker, and nothing else. They wanted it for a reason. And she was the only person with any explanation, however out-there, of what the spearheads might be . . .
It was something she could consider more once she was safe. She closed the bag, then headed off into the city.
15
Tangier, Morocco
‘You know,’ Eddie said to Karim as the Moroccan opened the Citroën’s rear door, ‘I never thought running around a major city with an unconscious woman over my shoulder would draw so much attention.’
Karim’s usual ebullience was conspicuously absent. ‘Get her inside,’ he said. ‘Quickly!’
The Englishman knew why he was so fraught. After getting clear of the restaurant, he had phoned his friend to learn that Maysa and the children were still being held hostage. Karim hadn’t dared call the police out of fear for their lives. ‘Thanks for coming, by the way,’ he said as they put the limp Ana on the back seat. ‘After I fucked up your restaurant, I wasn’t sure you’d even pick up the phone for me.’
Karim shook his head. ‘I should have warned you sooner. But I was afraid. They have my family, Eddie!’
‘Not for long,’ Eddie promised him. He made sure Ana was secure, then closed the door. ‘Let’s go.’
Karim’s home was not far. He pulled up a few hundred feet away. ‘I do not want to get closer, in case they are watching for me. What are we going to do?’
‘You are going to stay here and look after Ana,’ Eddie said firmly. ‘I’ll sort this out.’ He regarded the building, looking for points of entrance. Like most houses in the city, the windows on the ground floor – and even some higher – were barred, to deter opportunistic burglars. But those around the inner courtyard, he remembered, were not. ‘Maysa told me your kids keep jumping across to the roof of another house. Which one?’
His companion gave him an uncomprehending look. ‘Why do you—’
‘Because if they can do it, so can I. Where’s this other house?’
‘Behind mine,’ Karim said, pointing. ‘The one with the red walls.’
Karim’s home stood on a hillside; the other house was lower down the slope. ‘I see it.’
‘They jump across from a ledge. I keep telling them not to, but . . . in a way I am impressed.’ His expression slowly changed from reluctant parental pride to despair. He murmured an Arabic prayer, then: ‘Oh Eddie! What if they are hurt, what if they are – if they are dead? I do not know what—’
‘You cooperated, they don’t have any reason to hurt them.’ Eddie could actually think of one very good reason why the bad guys would harm their hostages – to ensure their silence – but knew better than to tell his friend. ‘Okay, wait here.’
He got out and crossed the street
. He was sure one of the kidnappers would be on guard at the front door, so instead went down a narrow alley, then cut across the hillside until he was behind Karim’s home.
There was the ledge, a protruding cornice three storeys up. He turned to examine the red house. An old cast-metal drainpipe wound down from the roof. That all the upper-floor windows near it were barred suggested it was climbable.
He made sure nobody was watching, then started his ascent. Plaster flaked beneath his feet as he hauled himself upwards, but the pipe held. He soon reached the top and stood on the sloping roof. The gap to the ledge was less than ten feet, so the jump would pose little difficulty. It was the landing that concerned him. The cornice was perhaps eight inches deep, the wall behind it lacking any handholds . . .
He took a step back, then jumped across the alley.
His raised hands took the impact against the wall. Even so, the touchdown was precarious. The twenty-five-foot drop rolled beneath him before he caught his balance. Once steady, he sidestepped along the ledge to a corner.
He gripped the flaking edge to ease himself around, then continued on to a point where he could pull himself up to the roof. Proof that Karim’s kids had been here came in the form of chalk graffiti on the tiles. A small smile, then he carefully made his way across.
The courtyard opened out below, the radio blaring from the kitchen’s open window. How had Maysa’s son reached it? He must have climbed on to the sill of a closed window below, then lowered himself to swing in.
Hoping the hostage-takers weren’t in the top-floor room, Eddie descended and perched on the sill. Karim and Maysa’s bedroom: empty. But he couldn’t take the chance of making noise by forcing the window open.
Instead he lowered himself down, hanging from the sill before dropping to the courtyard. It was a risk – he might be heard or seen if there was a bad guy in the kitchen – but it was also his best chance to get into the house undetected. He pressed his back against the wall and listened intently.
The Spear of Atlantis (Wilde/Chase 14) Page 16