THE NOSTRADAMUS PROPHECIES

Home > Other > THE NOSTRADAMUS PROPHECIES > Page 3
THE NOSTRADAMUS PROPHECIES Page 3

by Mario Reading


  ‘With what?’

  ‘Well… My bil­li­ard cue.’

  ‘Whe­re do you ke­ep this of­fen­si­ve we­apon?’

  ‘Whe­re do I ke­ep it? Whe­re do you think I ke­ep it? Be­hind the bar, of co­ur­se. This is St-De­nis, not the Sacré-Co­e­ur.’

  ‘Show me.’

  ‘Lo­ok. I didn’t hit any­body with it. I only wa­ved it at the gypsy.’

  ‘Did the gypsy wa­ve back?’

  ‘Ah. Mer­de.’ The bar­man slit open a pack of Gi­ta­nes with the bar ice-pick. ‘I sup­po­se you’ll ha­ve me up for smo­king in a pub­lic pla­ce next? You pe­op­le.’ He blew a clo­ud of smo­ke ac­ross the co­un­ter.

  Cal­que re­li­eved the bar­man of one of his ci­ga­ret­tes. He tap­ped the ci­ga­ret­te on the back of the pac­ket and ran it lan­gu­oro­usly be­ne­ath his no­se.

  ‘Aren’t you go­ing to light that?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Pu­ta­in. Don’t tell me you’ve gi­ven up?’

  ‘I ha­ve a he­art con­di­ti­on. Each ci­ga­ret­te ta­kes a day off my li­fe.’

  ‘Worth it tho­ugh.’

  Cal­que sig­hed. ‘You’re right. Gi­ve me a light.’

  The bar­man of­fe­red Cal­que the tip of his ci­ga­ret­te. ‘Lo­ok. I’ve re­mem­be­red now. Abo­ut yo­ur of­fi­cer.’

  ‘What ha­ve you re­mem­be­red?’

  ‘The­re was so­met­hing stran­ge abo­ut him. Very stran­ge.’

  ‘And what was that?’

  ‘Well. You won’t be­li­eve me if I tell you.’

  Cal­que ra­ised an eyeb­row. ‘Try me.’

  The bar­man shrug­ged. ‘He had no whi­tes to his eyes.’

  9

  ‘The man’s na­me is Sa­bir. S.A.B.I.R. Adam Sa­bir. An Ame­ri­can. No. I ha­ve no mo­re in­for­ma­ti­on for you at this ti­me. Lo­ok him up on yo­ur com­pu­ter. That sho­uld be qu­ite eno­ugh. Be­li­eve me.’

  Achor Ba­le put down the te­lep­ho­ne. He al­lo­wed him­self a bri­ef smi­le. That wo­uld sort Sa­bir. By the ti­me the French po­li­ce we­re thro­ugh with qu­es­ti­oning him, he wo­uld be long go­ne. Cha­os was al­ways a go­od idea. Cha­os and anarchy. Fo­ment tho­se and you for­ced the es­tab­lis­hed for­ces of law and or­der on to the back fo­ot.

  Po­li­ce and pub­lic ad­mi­nist­ra­tors we­re tra­ined to think in a li­ne­ar fas­hi­on - in terms, of ru­les and re­gu­la­ti­ons. In com­pu­ter terms hyper was the op­po­si­te of li­ne­ar. Well then. Ba­le pri­ded him­self on his abi­lity to think in a hyper fas­hi­on - skip­ping and jum­ping aro­und whe­re­ver he fan­ci­ed. He wo­uld do wha­te­ver he wan­ted to do, whe­ne­ver he wan­ted to do it.

  He re­ac­hed ac­ross for a map of Fran­ce and spre­ad it ne­atly out on to the tab­le in front of him.

  10

  The first Adam Sa­bir knew of the Su­re­te’s in­te­rest in him was when he switc­hed on the te­le­vi­si­on set in his ren­ted fl at on the Ile St-Lo­u­is and saw his own fa­ce, full-si­ze, sta­ring back at him from the plas­ma scre­en.

  As a wri­ter and oc­ca­si­onal jo­ur­na­list, Sa­bir ne­eded to ke­ep up with the news. Sto­ri­es lur­ked the­re. Ide­as sim­me­red. The sta­te of the world was ref­lec­ted in the sta­te of his po­ten­ti­al mar­ket and this con­cer­ned him.

  In re­cent ye­ars he had got in­to the ha­bit of li­ving to a very com­for­tab­le stan­dard in­de­ed, thanks to a fre­ak one-off best­sel­ler cal­led The Pri­va­te Li­fe of Nos­t­ra­da­mus. The ori­gi­nal con­tent had be­en just abo­ut nil - the tit­le a stro­ke of ge­ni­us. Now he des­pe­ra­tely ne­eded a fol­low-up or the mo­ney tap wo­uld turn off, the lu­xury li­festy­le dry up and his pub­lic melt away.

  Sa­ma­na’s ad­ver­ti­se­ment in that lu­dic­ro­us free rag of a news­pa­per, two days be­fo­re, had cap­tu­red his at­ten­ti­on, the­re­fo­re, be­ca­use it was so in­cong­ru­o­us and so en­ti­rely unex­pec­ted:

  Mo­ney ne­eded. I ha­ve so­met­hing to sell. Not­re Da­me’s [sic] lost ver­ses. All writ­ten down. Cash sa­le to first bu­yer. Ge­nu­ine.

  Sa­bir had la­ug­hed out lo­ud when he first saw the ad - it had so ob­vi­o­usly be­en dic­ta­ted by an il­li­te­ra­te. But how wo­uld an il­li­te­ra­te know abo­ut Nost­ra­da­mus’s lost qu­at­ra­ins?

  It was com­mon know­led­ge that the six­te­enth-cen­tury se­er had writ­ten 1,000 in­de­xed fo­ur-li­ne ver­ses, pub­lis­hed du­ring his li­fe­ti­me and an­ti­ci­pa­ting, with an al­most pre­ter­na­tu­ral ac­cu­racy, the fu­tu­re co­ur­se of world events. Less well known, ho­we­ver, was the fact that fifty-eight of the qu­at­ra­ins had be­en held back at the very last mo­ment, ne­ver to see the light of day. If an in­di­vi­du­al co­uld find the lo­ca­ti­on of tho­se ver­ses, they wo­uld be­co­me an ins­tant mil­li­ona­ire - the po­ten­ti­al sa­les we­re stra­tosp­he­ric.

  Sa­bir knew that his pub­lis­her wo­uld ha­ve no com­punc­ti­on in an­te­ing up wha­te­ver sum was ne­eded to ce­ment such a sa­le. The story of the find alo­ne wo­uld bring in hund­reds of tho­usands of dol­lars in news­pa­per re­ve­nue and wo­uld gu­aran­tee front-pa­ge co­ve­ra­ge all over the world. And what wo­uldn’t pe­op­le gi­ve, in this un­cer­ta­in age, to re­ad the ver­ses and un­ders­tand the­ir re­ve­la­ti­ons? The mind bog­gled.

  Until the events of to­day, Sa­bir had hap­pily fan­ta­si­sed a sce­na­rio in which his ori­gi­nal ma­nusc­ript, li­ke the Harry Pot­ter bo­oks be­fo­re him, wo­uld be loc­ked up in the li­te­rary equ­iva­lent of a Fort Knox, only to be re­ve­aled to the im­pa­ti­ently sla­ve­ring hor­des on pub­li­ca­ti­on day. He was al­re­ady in Pa­ris. What wo­uld it cost him to check the story out? What did he ha­ve to lo­se?

  Fol­lo­wing the bru­tal tor­tu­re and mur­der of an unk­nown ma­le, po­li­ce are se­eking the Ame­ri­can wri­ter Adam Sa­bir, who is wan­ted for qu­es­ti­oning in con­nec­ti­on with the cri­me. Sa­bir is be­li­eved to be vi­si­ting Pa­ris, but sho­uld un­der no cir­cums­tan­ces be ap­pro­ac­hed by mem­bers of the pub­lic, as he may be dan­ge­ro­us. The qu­ality of the cri­me is of so se­ri­o­us a na­tu­re that the Po­li­ce Na­ti­ona­le are ma­king it the­ir pri­ority to iden­tify the mur­de­rer, who, it is strongly be­li­eved, may be pre­pa­ring to stri­ke aga­in.

  ‘Oh Jesus.’ Sa­bir sto­od in the cent­re of his li­ving ro­om and sta­red at the te­le­vi­si­on set as if it might sud­denly de­ci­de to bre­ak free from its mo­orings and crawl ac­ross the flo­or to­wards him. An old pub­li­city pho­to of him­self was ta­king up the full ex­tent of the scre­en, exag­ge­ra­ting every fe­atu­re of his fa­ce un­til he, too, co­uld al­most be­li­eve that it de­pic­ted a wan­ted cri­mi­nal.

  A de­ath-mask ‘Do You Know this Man?’ pho­tog­raph of Sa­ma­na fol­lo­wed, its che­ek and ear la­ce­ra­ted, its eyes dully ope­ned, as if its ow­ner we­re sit­ting in jud­ge­ment on the mil­li­ons of co­uch-po­ta­to vo­ye­urs ta­king fle­eting com­fort from the fact that it was so­me­one el­se and not they, de­pic­ted over the­re on the scre­en.

  ‘It’s not pos­sib­le. My blo­od’s all over him.’ Sa­bir sat down in an armc­ha­ir, his mo­uth han­ging open, the throb­bing in his hand un­can­nily ec­ho­ing the throb­bing of the lin­king elect­ro­nic mu­sic that was even now ac­com­pan­ying the clo­sing he­ad­li­nes of the eve­ning news.

  11

  It to­ok him ten fre­ne­tic mi­nu­tes to gat­her all his be­lon­gings to­get­her - pas­sport, mo­ney, maps, clot­hes and cre­dit cards. At the very last mo­ment he rif­led thro­ugh the desk in ca­se the­re was anyt­hing in the­re he might use.

  He was bor­ro­wing the fl at from his Eng­lish agent, John To­ne, who was on ho­li­day in the Ca­rib­be­an. The car was his agent’s, too and the­re­fo­
re uni­den­ti­fi­ab­le - its very anony­mity might at le­ast suf­fi­ce to get him out of Pa­ris. To buy him ti­me to think.

  He has­tily poc­ke­ted an old Bri­tish dri­ving li­cen­ce in To­ne’s na­me and so­me spa­re euros he fo­und in an empty film ca­nis­ter. No pho­tog­raph on the dri­ving li­cen­ce. Might be use­ful. He to­ok an elect­ri­city bill and the car pa­pers, too.

  If the po­li­ce ap­pre­hen­ded him he wo­uld simply ple­ad ig­no­ran­ce - he was star­ting on a re­se­arch trip to St-Remy-de-Pro­ven­ce, Nost­ra­da­mus’s birthp­la­ce. He hadn’t lis­te­ned to the ra­dio or watc­hed the TV - didn’t know the po­li­ce we­re hun­ting for him.

  With luck he co­uld ma­ke it as far as the Swiss bor­der - blus­ter his way thro­ugh. They didn’t al­ways check pas­sports the­re. And Swit­zer­land was still out­si­de the Euro­pe­an Uni­on. If he co­uld ma­ke it as far as the US Em­bas­sy in Bern he wo­uld be sa­fe. If the Swiss ext­ra­di­ted him to anyw­he­re, it wo­uld be to the US, not to Pa­ris.

  For Sa­bir had he­ard ta­les abo­ut the French po­li­ce from so­me of his jo­ur­na­list col­le­agu­es. On­ce you got in­to the­ir hands, yo­ur num­ber was up. It co­uld ta­ke months or even ye­ars for yo­ur ca­se to ma­ke its way thro­ugh the bu­re­a­uc­ra­tic night­ma­re of the French juris­dic­ti­onal system.

  He stop­ped at the first ho­le-in-the-wall he co­uld find and left the car en­gi­ne run­ning. He’d simply ha­ve to ta­ke the chan­ce and get so­me cash. He stuf­fed the first card thro­ugh the slit and be­gan to pray. So far so go­od. He’d try for a tho­usand euros. Then, if the se­cond card fa­iled him, he co­uld at le­ast pay the mo­tor­way tolls in unt­ra­ce­ab­le cash and get him­self so­met­hing to eat.

  Across the stre­et, a yo­uth in a ho­odie was watc­hing him. Christ Jesus. This was hardly the ti­me to get mug­ged. And with the keys left in a brand-new Audi sta­ti­on wa­gon, with the en­gi­ne run­ning.

  He poc­ke­ted the cash and tri­ed the se­cond card. The yo­uth was mo­ving to­wards him now, lo­oking abo­ut him in that par­ti­cu­lar way yo­ung cri­mi­nals had. Fifty met­res. Thirty. Sa­bir punc­hed in the num­bers.

  The mac­hi­ne ate the card. They we­re clo­sing him down.

  Sa­bir dar­ted back to­wards the car. The yo­uth had star­ted run­ning and was abo­ut fi­ve met­res off.

  Sa­bir threw him­self in­si­de the car and only then re­mem­be­red that it was Bri­tish ma­de, with the ste­ering whe­el pla­ced on the right. He plun­ged ac­ross the cent­ral di­vi­der and was­ted three pre­ci­o­us se­conds se­arc­hing aro­und for the un­fa­mi­li­ar cent­ral loc­king system.

  The yo­uth had his hand on the do­or.

  Sa­bir crunc­hed the auto­ma­tic shift in­to re­ver­se and the car lurc­hed back­wards, thro­wing the te­ena­ger tem­po­ra­rily off ba­lan­ce. Sa­bir con­ti­nu­ed back­wards up the stre­et, one fo­ot twis­ted be­hind him on to the pas­sen­ger se­at, his free hand clutc­hing the ste­ering whe­el.

  Iro­ni­cal­ly he fo­und him­self thin­king not abo­ut the mug­ger - a de­fi­ni­te first, in his ex­pe­ri­en­ce - but abo­ut the fact that, thanks to his for­cibly aban­do­ned bank card, the po­li­ce wo­uld now ha­ve his fin­gerp­rints and a pre­ci­se lo­ca­ti­on of his whe­re­abo­uts, at exactly 10.42 p.m., on a cle­ar and star­lit Sa­tur­day night, in cent­ral Pa­ris.

  12

  Twenty mi­nu­tes out of Pa­ris and fi­ve mi­nu­tes shy of the Evry auto­ro­ute junc­ti­on, Sa­bir’s at­ten­ti­on was ca­ught by a ro­ad sign - thirty ki­lo­met­res to Fon­ta­ineb­le­au. And Fon­ta­ineb­le­au was only ten short ki­lo­met­res down­ri­ver from Sa­mo­is. The phar­ma­cist had told him so. They’d even had a bri­ef, mildly flir­ta­ti­o­us dis­cus­si­on abo­ut Hen­ri II, Cat­he­ri­ne de Me­di­ci and Na­po­le­on who had ap­pa­rently used the pla­ce to bid fa­re­well to his Old Gu­ard be­fo­re le­aving for exi­le on El­ba.

  Bet­ter to for­get the auto­ro­ute and he­ad for Sa­mo­is.

  Didn’t they ha­ve num­ber-pla­te re­cog­ni­ti­on on the auto­ro­utes? Hadn’t he he­ard that so­mew­he­re? What if they had al­re­ady tra­ced him to To­ne’s fl at? It wo­uldn’t be long be­fo­re they con­nec­ted him with To­ne’s Audi, too. And then they’d ha­ve him cold. They’d simply sta­ti­on a few mo­re cop cars at the toll bo­oth exit and re­el him in li­ke a fin­nock.

  If he co­uld only get the qu­at­ra­ins from this Chris per­son, he might at le­ast be ab­le to per­su­ade the po­li­ce that he was, in­de­ed, a bo­na fi­de wri­ter and not a psycho on the prowl. And why sho­uld the gypsy’s de­ath ha­ve had anyt­hing to do with the ver­ses any­way? Such pe­op­le we­re al­ways en­ga­ging in fe­uds, we­ren’t they? It was pro­bably only an ar­gu­ment over mo­ney or a wo­man and he, Sa­bir, had simply got in the way of it. When you lo­oked at it li­ke that, the who­le thing to­ok on a far mo­re be­ne­vo­lent as­pect.

  Anyway, he had an ali­bi. The phar­ma­cist wo­uld re­mem­ber him, su­rely? He’d told her all abo­ut the gypsy’s be­ha­vi­o­ur. It simply didn’t ma­ke sen­se for him to ha­ve tor­tu­red and kil­led the gypsy with his hand torn to shreds li­ke that. The po­li­ce wo­uld see that, wo­uldn’t they? Or wo­uld they think he’d fol­lo­wed the gypsy and ta­ken re­ven­ge on him af­ter the bar fight?

  Sa­bir sho­ok his he­ad. One thing was for cer­ta­in. He ne­eded rest. If he car­ri­ed on li­ke this he wo­uld be­gin to hal­lu­ci­na­te.

  For­cing him­self to stop thin­king and to start ac­ting, Sa­bir sle­wed the car ac­ross the ro­ad and down a wo­od­land track, just two ki­lo­met­res short of the vil­la­ge of Sa­mo­is it­self.

  13

  ‘He’s slip­ped the net.’

  ‘What do you me­an? How do you know that?’

  Cal­que ra­ised an eyeb­row. Mac­ron was cer­ta­inly co­ming on - no do­ubt abo­ut that. But ima­gi­na­ti­on? Still, what co­uld one ex­pect from a two-met­re-tall Mar­se­il­la­is? ‘We’ve chec­ked all the ho­tels, gu­est ho­uses and let­ting agen­ci­es. When he ar­ri­ved he­re he had no re­ason to con­ce­al his na­me. He didn’t know he was go­ing to kill the gypsy. This is an Ame­ri­can with a French mot­her, re­mem­ber. He spe­aks our lan­gu­age per­fectly. Or at le­ast that’s what the fo­ol cla­ims on his web­si­te. Eit­her he’s go­ne to gro­und in a fri­end’s ho­use, or he’s bol­ted. My gu­ess is that he’s bol­ted. In my ex­pe­ri­en­ce it’s a ra­re fri­end who’s pre­pa­red to har­bo­ur a tor­tu­rer.’

  ‘And the man who te­lep­ho­ned in his na­me?’

  ‘Find Sa­bir and we’ll find him.’

  ‘So we sta­ke out Sa­mo­is? Lo­ok for this Chris per­son?’

  Cal­que smi­led. ‘Gi­ve the gir­lie a doll.’

  14

  The first thing Sa­bir saw was a so­li­tary de­er­ho­und cros­sing the ri­de in front of him, lost from the pre­vi­o­us day’s exer­ci­se. Be­low him, dis­sec­ted by tre­es, the Ri­ver Se­ine spark­led in the early-mor­ning sun.

  He clim­bed out of the car and stretc­hed his legs. Fi­ve ho­urs’ sle­ep. Not bad in the cir­cums­tan­ces. Last night he’d felt ner­vo­us and on ed­ge. Now he felt cal­mer - less pa­nic-stric­ken abo­ut his pre­di­ca­ment. It had be­en a wi­se mo­ve to ta­ke the tur­ning to Sa­mo­is and even wi­ser to pull over in­to the fo­rest to sle­ep. Per­haps the French po­li­ce wo­uldn’t run him to gro­und so easily af­ter all? Still. Wo­uldn’t do to ta­ke un­ne­ces­sary risks.

  Fifty met­res down the track, with the car win­dows open, he pic­ked up wo­ods­mo­ke and the un­mis­ta­kab­le odo­ur of fri­ed pork fat. At first he was temp­ted to ig­no­re it and con­ti­nue on his way, but hun­ger pre­va­iled. Wha­te­ver hap­pe­ned, he had to eat. And why not he­re? No ca­me­ras. No cops.

  He ins­tant
ly con­vin­ced him­self that it wo­uld ma­ke per­fect sen­se to of­fer to buy his bre­ak­fast di­rect from who­ever hap­pe­ned to be do­ing the co­oking. The mystery cam­pers might even be ab­le to po­int him to­wards Chris.

  Aban­do­ning the car, Sa­bir cut thro­ugh the wo­ods on fo­ot, fol­lo­wing his no­se. He co­uld fe­el his sto­mach ex­pan­ding to­wards the smell of the ba­con. Crazy to think that he was on the run from the po­li­ce. Per­haps, be­ing cam­pers, the­se pe­op­le wo­uldn’t ha­ve had ac­cess to a te­le­vi­si­on or a news­pa­per?

  Sa­bir sto­od for so­me ti­me on the ed­ge of the cle­aring, watc­hing. It was a gypsy camp. Well. He’d luc­ked in­to it, re­al­ly. He sho­uld ha­ve re­ali­sed that no one in the­ir right mind wo­uld ha­ve be­en cam­ping out in a nort­hern ma­no­ri­al fo­rest in early May. August was the ti­me for cam­ping - ot­her­wi­se, if you we­re French, you sta­yed in a ho­tel with yo­ur fa­mily and di­ned in com­fort.

  One of the wo­men saw him and cal­led out to her hus­band. A bunch of child­ren ca­me run­ning to­wards him and then stop­ped, in a gag­gle. Two ot­her men bro­ke off from what they we­re do­ing and star­ted in his di­rec­ti­on. Sa­bir ra­ised a hand in gre­eting.

  The hand was pul­led vi­olently from be­hind him and for­ced to the re­ar of his neck. He felt him­self be­ing dri­ven down to his kne­es.

  Just be­fo­re he lost cons­ci­o­us­ness he no­ti­ced the te­le­vi­si­on mast on one of the ca­ra­vans.

  15

  ‘You do it, Yo­la. It’s yo­ur right.’

  The wo­man was stan­ding in front of him. An ol­der man pla­ced a kni­fe in her hand and sho­o­ed her for­ward. Sa­bir tri­ed to say so­met­hing but he fo­und that his mo­uth was ta­ped shut.

 

‹ Prev