Throughout, Kassim concentrated on Jay’s body. The man with her did not interest him, except as a remote agent who was manipulating a woman’s body. Only when Jay lay with her head in the crook of Merlin’s arm trying to get back her breath, did Kassim look at Merlin’s face for the first time. He dropped the binoculars, pushed back the edge of the blanket covering him and raised his face for one incautious moment to the sky.
‘Allah is merciful,’ he said to the rocks around his hide. ‘To the believer, He gives all things.’
He grabbed the glasses and looked again to make sure. There was no doubt: he was looking at the man who had been his prisoner during the siege of Beirut. Aware suddenly that he lay in shadow, that it was late, with the sun not far to go before it vanished below the horizon, Kassim wriggled back from the skyline and dismantled the hide, carefully concealing all traces of his all-day vigil in the broiling sun. He ran crouching until it was safe to stand and then hurried across the broken ground, hoping to reach the dog-proof boundary fence in time.
Merlin stared up at the sky, his mind empty. The cloudless blue had turned mauve with dusk and was darkening rapidly. Jay made a little noise in her sleep. Some water had slopped over the edge of the air bed. It was cold and the air was chilling rapidly, now that the sun had gone. Merlin liked the way she went to sleep on his shoulder after making love. He liked everything about her. He had never known with anyone else the heights of joy that he attained with her, the sweet, quiet calm they shared at moments together, nor the fiercely protective instinct she aroused in him. On the negative side, on his brief trip to New York he had missed Jay more strongly than any other person in his life. He was not a hundred percent certain that he wanted to belong to anyone that much, but there didn’t seem to be a choice.
Beside him, Jay dozed until he nudged her gently awake with: ‘Time to get dressed for dinner with Count Dracula.’
Jay protested, ‘Do I have to wear a wimple, Merlin? I’ll be too hot. A velvet dress is bad enough.’
‘Think of all the Arab women in the world, wearing veils all their lives.’
‘They’re welcome.’
Inside the guest house, Merlin unplugged the charging unit and inserted the battery into his flash gun. ‘Carry the wimple and put it on just for the pix, if you like. But this place is nearly a desert. You’ll be surprised how swiftly it’ll cool down, once the sun’s gone. And I doubt if a fitness fanatic like Kreuz has central heating in his house.’
There were three of Jay’s medieval dresses spread on the bed.
‘The brown one,’ Merlin decided. ‘That’ll look good in flash pictures. Nice and sombre as a background for whatever these relics are.’
‘But we could photograph them tomorrow by daylight,’ she objected. ‘So why do it over dinner? Wearing one of these dresses is a real bore, Merlin. I can’t even move around without holding the train up off the ground.’
Merlin was slipping on a crushproof white tropical dinner jacket over a dress shirt and black trousers. He straightened his bow tie. ‘With a guy like Kreuz, I do everything the first time. He may change his mind by tomorrow morning.’
Jay let him help her into the dress. There was a light knock on the door of the guest house. The guard called Dieter entered and began discreetly tidying away the loungers around the pool. When Merlin picked up his camera case, he asked quietly, ‘Do you mind if I have a look inside, sir?’
‘You’re scared I’m packing a gun?’
Dieter smiled. ‘I’m quite a keen photographer myself, sir. I’d love to see your cameras.’
Merlin opened the case. The manservant lifted the cameras and lenses out, examined them one by one and replaced them. ‘Beautiful equipment,’ he said softly.
They followed him outside. The clear sky was velvet black and full of stars. As Merlin had said, the air was already cold. Halfway along the path to the main house, Jay sensed something in the darkness behind her. She turned and saw two of the Dobermans following them, a couple of paces behind. The two large black bodies were dimly outlined against the light pebbles. The dogs’ eyes glowed in the starlight. In her shock, she nearly dropped the wimple.
‘You’re quite safe,’ said Dieter, sensing her unease. ‘The dogs are a hundred percent obedient.’
‘You could have tied them up,’ she said. ‘Just while we walked across.’
The guard sighed. ‘I’m afraid Dr Kreuz is very strict about his rules and one of them is that the dogs must be loose after nightfall.’
As they approached the main house, an infrared beam was tripped and floodlights sprang on all around the building. As though this had been a signal, a distant but horrible noise broke out at the western end of the valley. It sounded like several of the dogs snarling and barking.
Dieter stopped with his head on one side, listening. ‘The dogs are terrible killers.’ He smiled, holding the main door open for them. ‘I’m surprised there’s any wildlife left on the estate, but occasionally a rabbit strays in from outside. The dogs tear it to pieces.’
Chapter 5
Kassim was within sight of the boundary fence when he heard the dogs. They were running silently on his scent, only the scuffle of stones giving them away. It was dark in the valley below, but up on the hills the last faint glow of dusk revealed at first two, then three, and finally four dark shapes gaining on him fast. He was tempted to throw down the bundle wrapped in the old blanket in order to go faster, but to do that meant putting all his trust in speed.
His heart pounding with fear and exertion, he raced the last fifty metres to the boundary in the certain knowledge that he was not going to make it. He stopped just short of the fence and turned to face the dogs. They fanned out and kept coming. Only then did he open the bundle and throw the rabbit towards them; it was an old trick used a thousand times by fellahin slipping over the border between Lebanon and Israel. Whether or not it worked, depended on having the nerve to stand completely still, without moving so much as a hair whilst the dogs instinctively went for the decoy.
After a day spent in the dark, hot, airless sack, the rabbit moved in what seemed like slow motion to Kassim. Run, you little bastard! he prayed. He wanted to shoo it away or kick it from him, but he knew that a single movement could cost his life. Despite every muscle in his body screaming for oxygen, he held his breath and stayed motionless. Scenting the Dobermans, the terrified rabbit shot sideways, hoping to escape between the man and the oncoming dogs. In panic, it scooted this way and that, seeking shelter in the unknown landscape. The dogs skidded round on a new course, following its desperate zigzags.
Kassim waited until he was sure their attention was locked on the moving prey; he had at most twenty seconds. He threw the old blanket over the barbed wire strands that topped the fence. Behind him in the dusk, three of the dogs tore the rabbit literally limb from limb in a growling, snarling frenzy of blood lust. The high-pitched death scream of the rabbit was clearly audible over the noise the dogs were making until it ceased abruptly. The fourth Doberman was too late to be able to grab a mouthful of fur and flesh before the game was over. Frustrated, it turned back to the larger prey just escaping over the fence, leaped ten feet into the air and clamped its teeth firmly into the calf muscle of Kassim’s left leg.
He screamed with pain. Fuelled by terror, his muscles found the reserve of energy for one last desperate effort and heaved both his weight and the dog’s upwards until most of Kassim’s body was on the outside of the fence. Flesh tore and the dog fell. Released from its weight, Kassim overbalanced and fell. He would have dropped all the way to the ground and rolled clear of the fence, except that his clothing was tangled in the barbs, so that he ended upside down on the far side of the fence, his head halfway to the ground and his injured leg trapped behind him, still on the inside.
With a furious snarl, the dog scrambled to its feet, scented the blood dripping from the torn leg and leaped to crunch bone and muscle between its powerful jaws. This time, the pain was almost paralysing. Des
perately Kassim tried to twist his body round before the other dogs arrived at the fence and tore his face to pieces through the wide mesh. One hand scrabbled at his pockets for the canister of CS gas he carried. For one nightmare moment, he thought it had fallen out, then his fingers closed on the smooth metal and he wrenched it free, aiming for where the dog’s eyes must be. There was no effect. The Doberman was shaking his leg, the whole weight of its body swinging in the air as it tried to pull him back over the fence. Its violently scrabbling claws raked Kassim’s skin through his clothing. The pendulum movement made it difficult to be sure where the canister was pointing.
Hearing the other Dobermans coming, Kassim screamed from mingled pain and fear, nearly dropping the canister. His free hand felt through the wire and found the dog’s neck, slippery with saliva dribbling down the narrow chin, mixed with Kassim’s own blood. With a superhuman effort, he wrenched himself round and delivered a generous squirt of gas directly in the animal’s eyes. The grip of the savage teeth loosened and the Doberman fell to the stony ground with a thud, blinded and howling with pain.
The counter-balance gone, Kassim’s body weight tore flesh and clothing loose from the barbs. He fell to the ground clutching his injured leg and moaning with pain as the other three dogs hurled themselves in fury at the far side of the fence, their fangs only inches away from his flesh as they clamoured for his blood.
*
The heavy metal lined door thudded shut behind Merlin as he followed Jay inside the main house. He noticed bolt sockets on both sides of the door jamb as well as in the lintel and threshold; entering Kreuz’s home was like walking into a bank vault. The distant noise of the dogs was replaced by the muted strains of a Bach cello concerto that issued from small speakers discreetly hidden in the dark oak wall panelling. At the top of a flight of wide stone stairs stood Hermann Kreuz, dressed in a black dinner jacket with a black shirt. One hand was fondling the head of another Doberman sitting beside him. With a command for the dog to sit still, Kreuz bounded lithely down the stairs to greet his guests.
When Jay moved forward into the light, Kreuz smiled his appreciation of the brown velvet dress with the high bodice and the long train sweeping the floor.
‘Kuss die Hand,’ he murmured, his lips brushing the back of her hand. He stood back, the better to appreciate her. ‘If I may say so, that is a very beautiful dress. It’s a style that suits you well.’
Jay turned completely round to show the dress off, one hand holding the train clear of the floor. ‘I’m glad you like it. It’s a stage costume I’m wearing at Merlin’s request, so that he can take some pictures of me holding these relics of yours.’
The idea of photographs filled Kreuz with horror. ‘It’s out of the question,’ he said. ‘I am merely the custodian of all the precious things kept here. For any photography, I should have to obtain the owners’ permission. They may have objections.’
Jay explained about the magazine article. Kreuz said nothing, but he kept his eyes on her even when Merlin was trying to reassure him: ‘We won’t say where we took the photographs, Dr Kreuz. "A private collection" is the usual euphemism.’
‘And you expect me to rely on your discretion?’ Kreuz queried.
‘As a journalist, I’d be stupid to betray a confidence and risk losing a source.’
‘Very well.’ The surrender came with surprising swiftness. After seeing Jay in her costume, Kreuz’s mind was on something else. He excused himself with, ‘I’ll be with you in a moment.’
He left them in the hallway decorated with medieval Spanish armour and weapons. At the head of a broad flight of stairs leading up to the upper floor, the dog lay with its head on its paws, watching the visitors. A couple of minutes after Kreuz had gone, the lights went out.
‘What’s going on?’ Jay asked. She felt Merlin’s arm go round her waist.
‘Don’t scream,’ he said. ‘Or you’ll alarm our four-footed friend up there.’
‘Can it see in the dark, d’you think?’
‘No, but it’s got a good sense of smell.’
She shuddered. ‘I hate the way dogs sniff at me.’
They heard voices talking in German. A light appeared at the end of a long corridor.
It was Dieter holding a camping gas lamp. The valley was at the end of a power line, he explained, and cuts were frequent. He led them down a long corridor. The house was bigger than it looked from outside. Jay was having trouble with the train of her dress, so Merlin helped her to free both hands by putting on her wimple for her by the light of Dieter’s lamp. They continued along corridors, up steps and down and then across a courtyard garden, open to the sky.
Inside the chapel, another gas lamp showed Kreuz standing by a huge round table. On it were two objects covered by cloths like a conjuror’s props on stage. He dismissed Dieter who withdrew, taking his lamp with him and leaving Merlin and Jay to pick their way through the semi-darkness of the chapel, aware of ancient, bulky furniture and statues all around.
The air they were breathing had that distinctive church smell of old wood, almost like camphor. It was frustrating for them to see only what was on the table and the dim outlines of carved screens, a statue and some gleaming metal here and there in the darkness outside the pool of light. When Kreuz saw Jay’s face framed in the severe lines of the wimple, his hand holding the lamp trembled with excitement so much that he had to put it down on the table. Merlin was surprised to see that he had changed out of the dinner jacket he had been wearing only a few minutes before; Kreuz now wore a dark hooded cape of some coarse fabric that came down to the ground. Only his tanned, unlined face caught the light against the shadowy background.
Kreuz licked his lips. His voice took on the same sibilant quality it had had in the little chapel near St Denis where he had showed them the fresco. ‘I have two very precious objects for your delectation,’ he said to Jay. ‘The first is a mirror of polished bronze. Roman, second century.’ He lifted the cloth off it and passed it to her.
‘Roman?’ Merlin queried.
Kreuz chuckled. ‘Remember that in Eleanor’s time, Mr Freeman, Europe was still waist-deep in the mud of the Dark Ages. What technology existed was very primitive. For that reason many Roman and Greek artefacts, although hundreds of years old, were still in use by those lucky enough and rich enough to possess them, as Queen Eleanor once possessed this mirror.’
Jay took it from him. The back was engraved with an intricate picture of satyrs and nymphs. The front had been repolished and gave a soft and flattering reflection of her face, lit by the gas lamp.
Merlin was busy with his photographic equipment. ‘Is this the best light we can have?’ he asked.
‘Can you manage?’ asked Kreuz. ‘The power might not come on again until the morning. We can leave the photography until tomorrow, if you like.’
In the mirror Jay saw Kreuz’s pale blue eyes watching her intently. She pushed a stray hair back behind the veil of the wimple. Her reflection in the mirror mocked her. It was the face carved in stone, the face painted on the wall of the mysterious chapel in the woods, but it was also her own face.
Merlin took several pictures, some by direct light and some using flash bounced off the whitewashed walls while Kreuz kept well away from the lens. When Merlin had finished, he took the mirror back from Jay and wrapped it carefully in the cloth again.
‘The other relic,’ he said in his strange sibilant voice, ‘I won’t describe to you.’
Jay lifted the cover off. On the table was a pear-shaped vase, wider at the bottom than the top and made of crudely blown glass mounted in gold encrusted with large red gem stones. The medieval style of craftsmanship was crude and lumpen beside the finesse of the Roman mirror.
‘A wedding gift?’ Her eyes met those of Kreuz. There was a silence. Merlin was busy loading a fresh cassette of film into his camera by the light of the gas lamp.
‘But whose wedding?’ teased Kreuz.
Jay ran her finger round the gold rim at the b
ottom of the vase. Without taking her eyes off Kreuz, she announced, ‘It’s inscribed: Hoc vas dedit rex Ludovicus sponsae suae Alianorae. This vase was given by King Louis to his wife Eleanor.’
‘You can read such a faint inscription in this poor light?’ asked Kreuz.
‘I made it up.’ Jay felt pleased at the joke she had played on him. ‘There’s an identical vase in a museum in Paris. It was Eleanor’s wedding gift to Louis. And that’s inscribed, Hoc vas sponsa dedit Alianor rege Ludovico.’
‘Correct,’ said Kreuz approvingly. ‘This is the missing one of the pair.’
‘How much would a thing like that be worth?’ asked Merlin.
Kreuz took the vase from Jay and caressed it as a mother might a child. ‘To a collector,’ he smiled, ‘this thing, as you call it, is priceless.’
*
Salem was nervously chain-smoking, throwing the cigarette ends out of the window of the rusty and battered pickup van. By the dashboard clock he had been waiting at the rendezvous for half an hour when the dishevelled figure of his brother lurched out of the darkness and wrenched open the passenger door.
His hand about to turn the ignition key, Salem heard Kassim’s ragged breathing. ‘What is it, little brother?’ he asked. ‘What has happened to you?’
He switched on the courtesy light and saw Kassim’s injured leg, bandaged by a strip from the torn trousers. Dark red blood was seeping through. Kassim’s face was white from shock and contorted with pain.
‘Turn off the light and drive to the coast,’ he gasped. ‘I need a doctor.’
‘I’ll take you to a hospital.’
‘No!’ Kassim grabbed the wheel. ‘I’ll give you directions. My friends will take care of me. Just get me to Malaga airport. I know the way from there.’
Salem drove carefully on the narrow, winding country road, heading north at first to pick up the main road to the town of Antequera, from where a dual carriageway led south through the mountains to Malaga.
The Spirit and the Flesh Page 22