Alexi grabbed for the ring and slid it over his head.
‘Turn around! Turn around in the water and let it drag you!’
Alexi turned around and let the ferry drag him along behind it. He was scared of swallowing water and maybe drowning like that. So he curved his neck forwards, until his chin lay fl at on his chest and allowed the water to wash over his shoulders like a bow-wake. As he did so, it belatedly occurred to him to feel around in his shirt for the bamboo tube. It was gone.
He glanced back at the slipway. Had he lost it there, while falling? Or in the water? Would the eye-man see it and realise what it was?
The eye-man sat astride his horse at the barrier. As Alexi watched, the eye-man took out his pistol and shot the mare. Then he turned back towards the Pont de Gau and the Marais and disappeared into the underbrush.
39
Perhaps it was a mistake to instil so much fear in your enemies that they had nothing left to lose? What other motive could possibly have prompted the gypsy into taking such a ridiculous risk as leaping across a single-pole barrier on an exhausted horse? Everybody knew that horses hated seeing daylight between whatever they were jumping over and the ground. And the horse had known it was headed for deep water. You had to train horses specially for that sort of thing. It was madness. Sheer madness.
Still. Bale had to admire the man for attempting it. The gypsy had known, after all, just what awaited him at Bale’s hands. Shame about the horse, though. But it had shattered its leg in the fall and Bale hated to see an animal suffer.
Bale gave the worn-out gelding its head. Instinctively, the gelding started back along the trail by which they had come. First stop on the return trip would be the gypsy who had been looking after the horses. Get some information there. Then a cast around town for the blond Viking. Failing that, his girlfriend.
Either way, Bale would pick up Sabir’s trail somewhere - somehow. He knew it. He always did.
40
Gavril slowed his horse to a walk. The animal was on its last legs. He didn’t want to risk killing it and then find himself stuck, kilometres from nowhere, in the middle of the Marais.
Unlike Alexi, Gavril wasn’t really a country boy. He was happiest lurking on the outskirts of town, where the action was. Until now, Gavril’s idea of a good time had involved the active trading of stolen cellphones. Gavril didn’t steal them himself, of course - his face and hair were far too memorable for that. He simply acted as the middleman, moving from café to café and from bar to bar, selling them on for a few euros profit per pop. It kept him in beer and clothes and there was the added attraction of knocking off the occasional payo girl, when he struck lucky. His hair always provided the guaranteed first topic of conversation. How can you be a gypsy with hair that colour? So his blondness wasn’t all bad.
Almost without realising it, Gavril drifted to a halt. Did he really want to chase after Alexi and the gadje? And what would he do when he came up with them? Frighten them into submission? Perhaps he shoul simply view the stealing of the horse as a clever way out of an impossible situation. It had at least guaranteed that Badu and Stefan couldn’t pursue him and wreak whatever vengeance their perverted minds could conjure up. He would be happy never to see them or Bazena again in his life.
And what of Yola? Did he really want her that much? There were other fish in the sea. It might be best to leave the whole thing alone. Make himself scarce for a while. He could rest the horse and then make his way slowly north. Abandon it somewhere near a train depot. Hitch a ride on a freight car to Toulouse. He had family there. They would put him up.
Secure in his new plan, Gavril turned away from the river and towards the Panperdu.
41
Bale chose to wait for Gavril behind an abandoned gardien’s cabane. He and the gelding blended in perfectly beside the deep-shelved thatching of the roof, which was capped in white, like the keel of an upturned rowing boat.
Bale had been standing in the lee of the cabane for the past ten minutes, watching Gavril approach. Once or twice he had even shaken his head, bemused by the man’s persistent blindness to whatever was going on around him. Had the gypsy fallen asleep? Was that why he had so arbitrarily decided to abandon a trail which had been clearly blazed through the marsgrass for everyone to see? It had been absurd good luck that Bale had caught sight of Gavril mere moments before the latter had had time to disappear for ever beyond the treeline.
At the last possible moment Bale stepped out from behind the cabane, leading his horse. He untied the handkerchief from around the horse’s mouth and replaced it in his pocket - it was a trick he’d learned with Berber pack camels in the Legion. He hadn’t wanted the horse to whinny when it heard its companion approaching and give away the game.
‘Get down.’ Bale waved his pistol encouragingly.
Gavril glanced over Bale’s head towards the edge of the nearby woodland.
‘Don’t even think about it. I’ve just shot one horse. Another will make no difference to me. But I’ve got nothing against the animal. Shooting it unnecessarily would be guaranteed to make me very angry indeed.’
Gavril cocked his leg over the saddle and slid down the horse’s flank. He automatically stood with the reins held in his hands, as if he had merely come to pay Bale a courtesy call, rather than to find himself the victim of an ambush. He looked bewildered - as if he were seven years old again - and his father had just landed him a clout for something he hadn’t done. ‘Did you shoot Alexi?’
‘Why would I do that?’
Bale approached Gavril and took the horse from him. He tethered it at the hitching post outside the cabane. Then he unknotted the lariat from around the pommel of the saddle. ‘Lie down.’
‘What do you want? What are you going to do?’
‘I’m going to tie you up. Lie down.’
Gavril lay on his back, looking up at the sky.
‘No. Turn over.’
‘You’re not going to knife me again?’
‘No. Not that.’ Bale stretched both of Gavril’s arms out beyond his head and guided them through the loop of the lariat. Then he fastened the other end in a temporary slip knot to the hitching post. He walked across to the gelding and unknotted the lariat from around the gelding’s pommel. Then he walked back and knotted Gavril’s feet together, leaving the trailing rope-end on the ground. ‘We’re alone here. You’ve probably realised that by now. Nothing but horses, bulls and bloody pink flamingos in any direction.’
‘I’m no threat to you. I just now decided to head north. To steer clear of you and Sabir and Yola for good.’
‘Ah. She’s called Yola, is she? I did wonder. What’s the other gypsy called? The one whose horse I shot?’
‘Alexi. Alexi Dufontaine.’
‘And your name?’
‘Gavril. La Roupie
.’ Gavril cleared his throat. He was having difficulty in concentrating. His mind kept moving on to irrelevant details. Like the time of day. Or the consistency of the scrubgrass a few inches in front of his eyes. ‘What did you do to him? To Alexi?’
Bale was walking the gelding around to where Gavril was lying. ‘Do to him? I didn’t do anything to him. He fell off his horse. Managed to scramble into the river and hitch a lift on a ferry. It’s a misfortune for you that he got away.’
Gavril started to weep. He hadn’t consciously wept since childhood and now it was as if all the misery and hurt that he had stored up in himself since that time had finally overflowed its borders. ‘Please let me go. Please.’
Bale hitched the gelding to the rope-end tied around Gavril’s feet. ‘I can’t do that. You’ve seen me. You’ve had a chance to mark me down. And you’ve got a grudge. I never let men go who hold grudges against me.’
‘But I don’t have any grudge.’
‘Your leg. I gouged your leg with my knife. Back in Gourdon.’
‘I’ve already forgotten that.’
‘So you forgive me? That’s kind. Why did you come after me then?’ Bale had untied Gavril’s horse from the hitching post and was leading it around in front of him. Now he unhitched the lose rope-end attaching Gavril’s hands and knotted it to the pommel of Gavril’s saddle.
‘What are you doing?’
Bale tested both knots. Gavril was arching his neck backwards to see what was happening behind him. Bale walked to the edge of the nearby marsh and cut himself a handful of dried reeds, about three feet in length. He cut another, single reed and looped it into a noose. Then he knotted the ends of the reeds together, until they took on the shape of a besom head. One of the horses began to snort.
‘Did you say something just then?’
‘I asked what you are doing?’ The words came out as a sob.
‘I’m making myself a whip. Out of these reeds. Do-it-yourself.’
‘My God. Are you going to whip me?’
‘Whip you? No. I’m going to whip the horses.’
Gavril started to howl. It was not a noise he had ever made before in his life. But it was a noise Bale was familiar with. He had heard it time and again when people felt themselves to be in extremis. It was as if they were trying to block off reality with sound.
‘An ancestor of mine was hung, drawn and quartered once. Way back in medieval times. Do you know what that involves, Gavril?’
Gavril was shrieking now.
‘It involves being put on a gibbet and having a noose placed around your neck. Then you are pulled up, sometimes as high as fifty feet and displayed to the crowd. Surprisingly, this rarely kills you.’
Gavril was hammering his head against the earth. The horses were becoming restless with the unexpected noise and one of them even walked a few paces, tightening the tension on Gavril’s rope.
‘Then you are let down and the noose is loosened. You are revived. The executioner now takes a hooked implement - a little like a corkscrew - and makes an incision in your stomach. Here.’ He bent down, turned Gavril partially over and prodded him just above the appendix. ‘By this time you are half strangled, but still able to appreciate what is happening. The hooked implement is then inserted in your stomach sack and your intestines are pulled out like a steaming string of sausages. The crowd is cheering by this time, grateful, no doubt, that it is not all happening to them.’
Gavril had fallen silent. His breath was coming in tubercular gulps, as if he had the whooping cough.
‘Then, just before you are dead, they attach you to four horses, placed in each quarter of the square like compass points. North, south, east and west. This is a symbolical punishment, as I’m sure you’ll understand.’
‘What do you want?’ Gavril’s voice came out unexpectedly clearly, as if he had come to a formal decision and intended to fulfil its contractual requirements in as serious a manner as possible.
‘Excellent. I knew you’d see reason. I’ll tell you what. I won’t hang you. And I won’t draw out your intestines. I’ve got nothing against you personally. You’ve doubtless led a hard life. A bit of a struggle. I don’t want to make your death an unnecessarily painful or a lingering one. And I won’t quarter you. I’m two horses short for that sort of flourish.’ Bale patted Gavril on the head. ‘So I shall halve you instead. Unless you talk, of course. I should tell you that these horses are tired. The halving may prove a bit of a strain for them. But it’s extraordinary what a little whipping can do to galvanise a weary animal.’
‘What is it? What do you want to know?’
‘Well, I’ll tell you. I want to know where Sabir and… Yola was it? Was that the name you said? I want to know where they are hiding.’
‘But I don’t know.’
‘Yes you do. They’ll be in a place Yola knows. A place she and her family may have used before, while they were visiting here. A place known to you gypsies but which no one else will think of. To encourage your creative juices, I am going to stir these horses up a little. Give them a taste of the lash.’
‘No. No. I do know of such a place.’
‘Really? That was quick.’
‘Yes. Yes it was. Yola’s father won it in a card game. They always used to stay there. But I forgot about it. I didn’t need to think about it.’
‘Where is this place?’
‘Will you let me go if I tell you?’
Bale gave the gelding a taste of the switch. The gelding jerked forward, tightening the rope. The second horse was tempted to follow in the same direction but Bale shushed it away.
‘Aiee. Stop it! Stop it!’
‘Where is this place?
‘It’s called the Maset de la Marais.’
‘What Marais?’
‘The Marais de la Sigoulette.’
‘Where’s that?’
‘Please. Make them stop.’
Bale gentled the horses. ‘You were saying?’
‘Just off the D85. The one that runs beside the Departmental Park. I can’t remember what it’s called. It’s the small park, though. Before you get to the salt workings.’
‘Can you read a map?’
‘Yes. Yes.’
‘Then point it out for me.’ Bale crouched down beside Gavril. He opened a local map. ‘The scale on this is one centimetre for every 500 metres. That means that the house should be marked on it. It better be, for your sake.’
‘Can you untie me?’
‘No.’
Gavril started sobbing again.
‘Just a moment. I’ll fire up the horses.’
‘No. Please. I can see it. It’s marked. There.’ He indicated with his elbow.
‘Any other houses nearby?’
‘I’ve never been there. I only heard about it. Everybody heard about it. They say Yola’s father must have cheated to have won the right to use it off Dadul Gavriloff.’
Bale stood up. ‘I’m not interested in folk ta
les. Have you anything else to tell me?’
Gavril turned his head back towards the ground.
Bale strolled a few yards until he found a twenty-pound rock. He hefted it under his arm and returned to Gavril’s side. ‘This is how you died. You fell off your horse, with your foot twisted inside your stirrup and you smashed your face against this rock.’
Gavril half turned his head to see what Bale was doing.
Bale brought the rock down on Gavril’s face. He hesitated, wondering whether to do it a second time, but the cerebrospinal fluid was already leaking out through Gavril’s nose - if he wasn’t dead, he was certainly dying.
Pointless spoiling the set-up. He placed the rock carefully at the side of the track.
He unlooped the lariat and dragged Gavril by one foot towards his horse. Taking Gavril’s left foot in his hand, he twisted it around in the stirrup, until the foot was inextricably caught, leaving Gavril half trailing along the ground. Then he retied the lariat to the pommel.
The horse had begun grazing again by this time, calmed by the methodical pace with which Bale had conducted his chores. Bale rubbed its ears.
Then he mounted his own horse and rode away.
42
Calque looked around the Place de l’Eglise. He checked out the cafés and the shopfronts and the scattered benches. ‘So this is where it happened?’
‘Yes, Sir.’ The auxiliary motorcycle gendarme had just been made aware that he was being asked these questions as part of an ongoing murder inquiry. His face had instantly taken on a more serious cast, as though he were being quizzed about the likely shortcomings of his family’s health insurance cover.
THE NOSTRADAMUS PROPHECIES Page 27