Evil Star (18 page)

Pedro said something in Spanish. Sebastian went over to him and spoke at length. When he had finished talking, he reached out and tousled the boy's hair. Suddenly he was looking sad.

"I had a son once," he said. He shook his head. “You know how to find me."

He turned and walked away.

Matt glanced at Pedro, who nodded. They still couldn't talk to each other, but they seemed to understand each other more and more.

Together they set off.

The track that Sebastian had showed them ran through agricultural land. Some of the fields were planted with maize, beetroot, and asparagus while others held cattle, chewing at the rough, spiky grass. Following Sebastian's advice, the two boys kept to the very Horowitz, Anthony - [Gatekeepers 02] - Evil Star edge of the track, ready to drop out of sight if any cars appeared.

Once, an open-backed truck came rattling past and they threw themselves under a low shrub and waited until it had disappeared, kicking up clouds of dust. The afternoon was swelteringly hot. Pedro had fished two plastic bottles out of a bin and filled them with water from a tap, but Matt doubted it would be enough. He could feel his bottle leaking in his pants pocket. He was tempted to drink it all now.

As soon as the truck was out of sight, they stood up and trudged on in silence. Matt would have liked to talk — there was still so much he didn't understand — and it seemed crazy to him that they would be able to communicate only when they were asleep. They were two of the five. He won-dered what languages the others spoke. The two boys and the girl that he had seen on the beach had been white and fair-haired but they could be Russian, Scandinavian — or even Martian, for all he knew. And what happened when they did finally meet? Was that the end of the adventure or the beginning of something worse?

So many questions, but Matt could only walk on in silence, feeling the sun as it beat down on his shoulders. He still hadn't gotten used to his own smell, to the unfamiliar shape of his hair, and the dye, dark and sticky all over his skin. His clothes no longer disgusted him but they felt strange, like some sort of unpleasant fancy dress. And he kept on stumbling over his rubber sandals. Worst of all, he was worried about Richard. He had to admit that Sebas-tian was right —

the chances of the journalist turning up at this hacienda were probably one in a million. But he had nowhere else to go, no other clues to follow. He had to start somewhere, and it might as well be here.

Pedro stopped and took a quick drink. Matt did the same, wondering Horowitz, Anthony - [Gatekeepers 02] - Evil Star if the Peruvian tap water would make him sick. The other boy was doubtless used to it. He had been drinking it all his life. The water was warm and tasted metal-lic but Matt didn't care. He had to stop himself from drinking it all.

After that, Matt's thoughts wandered. Five miles might not seem much to Pedro, but it was a long way for him, particularly in the heat and in sandals that tried to trip him up every few paces. A car passed, coming the other way, and once again the two of them had to dive for cover. I low much security would there be at the hacienda? Sebastian hadn't said anything but it occurred to Matt that anyone as rich and powerful as Salamanda would be sure to have guards.

The sun began to set and a cool breeze crept into the air. Matt's legs were beginning to ache and he only had an inch of water left when they turned a corner and Pedro raised a hand in warning and they ducked back into the undergrowth, crouching low. There was a house directly ahead . . . not just a house but an entire complex complete with barns, storerooms, stables, and even, incredibly, a sixteenth-century church carved out of white stone, with its own soaring bell tower. This was where the lane had brought them — all five miles of it. There was nothing more beyond. Two stone pillars and a twisting metal gate marked the entrance. The gate was open, but somehow Matt didn't feel it was inviting him in.

Carefully he peered round, searching for any sign of life. All the buildings were grouped around a flower-filled courtyard with an elaborate ornamental fountain in the middle. A huge acacia tree grew next to it. The tree had four separate trunks and leaves that spread out to provide a natural shade from the sun. There was a tractor parked outside one of the barns. A man, dressed in white, Horowitz, Anthony - [Gatekeepers 02] - Evil Star came out, pushing a wheelbarrow. Apart from the soothing tin-kle of water in the fountain, everything was silent.

"Matteo . . ." Pedro tapped Matt's arm and pointed.

Matt looked into the distance and saw a guard tower constructed at the edge of the complex. At the same time, a man appeared with a rifle strapped across his back. He stopped and lit a cigarette, then kept on walking. So Matt had been right. This hacienda might be in the middle of nowhere but Salamanda left nothing to chance. The place was guarded, and Matt was sure that there would be plenty of other security around, too.

"Que hacemos ahora?"
Pedro asked.

"We wait." The meaning of Pedro's question was obvi-ous. He wanted to know what they were going to do. Matt looked up. The sun was already setting behind the palm trees that grew tall behind the house. The night might still be an hour away, but the shadows were spreading out. They would help. Two dark-skinned boys in dark clothes in the dark. It wouldn't be too hard to slip inside.

The house itself was completely open. Three wide, wooden stairs ran up to a veranda that ran its full length. There was nobody in the courtyard, no sign of movement in the guard tower. Security cameras? Matt hadn't seen any, and there was always a chance that they wouldn't oper-ate in this low light. He would just have to risk it.

The thought that Richard might be here, perhaps only a few meters away, spurred him on. He nudged Pedro and then, keeping low, ran through the gate across one corner of the courtyard, making for the side of the house.

Nobody saw them. Nobody cried out. Matt stopped, breathless, his back against the wall just below the veranda. Pedro was next to him, Horowitz, Anthony - [Gatekeepers 02] - Evil Star looking unhappy. He shook his head as if to say
This is a crazy idea

and I don't want any part of it.
But at the same time, he was still sticking by him, and right now Matt was grateful that he wasn't alone.

Where would Richard be and how could they possibly find him in a house crawling with guards? There was no obvious prison complex, no windows covered with bars. A basement or cellar, perhaps. That would be the most likely place. But first they had to get in.

At least that wasn't going to be too difficult. Now that he was closer, Matt could see that the veranda continued all the way around the back. On one side, there was a hand-rail, separating the house from the garden and the courtyard. The main body of the house made up the other side with tall, elegant windows standing at intervals about five meters apart. The windows reached down almost to the floor and all of them were open. Matt glanced at Pedro, giving him one last chance to back out. Pedro nodded.
I'm with you.
Matt reached up and used the handrail to pull himself onto the veranda. Now he was as good as inside the house. The roof with its heavy red tiles stretched out over him. Matt waited until Pedro had joined him, then crept round the side.

Almost at once, he heard voices. There was a meeting going on in one of the rooms, but in the stillness of the evening the sounds were carrying out. Matt gestured and the two of them crept along the veranda past more sofas and some terra-cotta pots. They came to an open French window. A man was speaking on the other side.

Carefully, an inch at a time, Matt peered round the corner and looked in.

It was a dining room with a vast wooden table that seemed to have been cut from a single tree. The floor was also made of polished Horowitz, Anthony - [Gatekeepers 02] - Evil Star wood, and there were wooden pan-els set into the walls. An iron chandelier — it must have weighed a ton — hung down, illuminating the room not with electric bulbs but with about a hundred candles, each one in its own holder. Matt wondered when they had been lit. A servant or someone must have come in while the meeting was in progress.

There were three men and a woman sitting around the table. Matt recognized one of them instantly and stopped dead, feeling as if the ground was opening up beneath him. It was Rodriguez, the police captain who had beaten him up at the hotel in Miraflores. He was in uniform. The other two men wore suits. The woman had a simple black dress. All of them were listening attentively as they were given their instructions.

The man who was talking to them was sitting in a tall wicker chair with his back to the window. Matt could see nothing of him apart from one arm and a hand, resting on one of the arms. He had long fingers and seemed to be wearing a linen suit. He was speaking quickly, in good English, only occasionally stumbling over some of the words. Matt whistled very softly at Pedro and swung his head over toward the room. Why were they using his own language? If he listened long enough, he might find out.

"I do not care what is a possibility and what is not," the man was saying. "I give you the instructions and you will obey. The swan must be ...
en la position
... in position, five days from now. At midnight exactly. You understand, Miss Klein?"

The woman nodded. "It will all be done," she said. Her English was worse than his, and heavily accented. "But I am needed soon the ..."

It took her a minute to find the word. "I must have the coordinates,"

she said.

Horowitz, Anthony - [Gatekeepers 02] - Evil Star Now Matt understood. The woman was German and spoke no Spanish. The man was Spanish and spoke no German. They were using English as a common language.

“You will have the coordinates as soon as I have them myself," the man went on. "My agents have been into the Nazca desert but they have still failed to find the platform."

"The diary did not give you the position?"

"It gave me the approximate position, and it is possible that we now know enough to place the swan exactly where , it is meant to be. But I prefer to leave nothing to chance. We have to be careful, but the search continues. Just so long as everything is ready at your end."

"Of course, Herr Salamanda. Everything will be as you ask. ..."

That was the end of it. Matt was listening in with his head pressed against the wall, right next to the window. Pedro was slightly behind him. So he was the one who heard the clunk of boots on wood and realized that at least two guards were making their way toward them, patrolling the full length of the veranda. They were still out of sight, around the front of the house, but in a few seconds they would turn the cor-ner and the two boys would be discovered.

There was only one thing to do. Matt pushed Pedro, and the two of them flitted past the open window, past the dining room. Matt hoped that they wouldn't be seen in the growing darkness — or, if they were, that none of the peo-ple in the room would realize they weren't meant to be there. He heard the woman talking as he went past, and wished he could have stayed longer to hear more. But he and Pedro had only just moved in time. A second later, the
guards appeared, both of them dressed in loose-fitting khaki overalls and armed with rifles hanging from their shoulders. The veranda they saw was Horowitz, Anthony - [Gatekeepers 02] - Evil Star empty.

Matt and Pedro didn't stop moving until they had reached the back of the house, where they came upon an inner courtyard, immaculately laid out with antique benches surrounding a well and a single, dark green
molle
tree in the very center. There were two more wings to the house, one on each side. Matt noticed that here some of the windows on the upper floor
were
barred. Perhaps these were the cells he had been imagining. Could Richard be sitting in one of them even now?

He needed a way up — and saw one, on the opposite side of the yard. An open staircase with a series of arches over a wooden banister, running up to a gallery. But before he could move, a third guard appeared, coming through a doorway on the first floor and making as if to come down. Matt cursed himself. Had he really thought he could just walk in here, find his friend, and. walk out with him? Was it likely that one of the richest and most powerful men in Peru wouldn't make sure he had plenty of protection?

Sebastian had been right. This was stupid. Worse than that, it was suicide. He and Pedro were going to get caught. They would be handed back to Captain Rodriguez. And neither of them would ever be seen — in Ayacucho or anywhere else — again.

Pedro had obviously had the same thought. He glanced at Matt, who nodded. They would get out of the house and wait. Maybe later, in the middle of the night, it would be safer to take a look around.

Together, they crept round the side of the courtyard, keeping well into the shadows. There were lights on inside the rooms and they could see moths dancing in the door-ways, but fortunately no lamps had yet been turned on outside. There was a door leading into the study that they had already seen from the front. They could pass Horowitz, Anthony - [Gatekeepers 02] - Evil Star through here and out the other side.

They entered the study.

Matt quickly took in his surroundings. This had to be where Diego Salamanda worked. There was a grandness about the room, the rich tapestries on the walls, the expen-sive rugs on the floor. A sudden thought occurred to Matt: If this was Salamanda's private office, perhaps the diary of St. Joseph of Cordoba might be here. He hadn't thought about the diary since Richard had disappeared. His entire mind had been focused on finding his friend. But suppose he stumbled across it? If he could get his hands on it, per-haps he could use it as a bargaining chip. The diary for Richard. The Nexus would hate that — but he didn't care. Salamanda and the Old Ones could do what they liked. All he wanted was to get out of Peru.

Pedro was already halfway across the room.

"Wait!" Matt whispered.

Pedro stopped and watched in dismay as Matt began to search the desk. It was an ugly piece of furniture, heavier and bigger than it had any right to be, with a leather square built into the surface and gold rings on the drawers. Matt tried one of them. It wasn't locked but made so much noise as it was opened, wood creaking against wood, that it could surely be heard throughout the house.