Adam stared into the dead, black, pitiless eyes on the far side of the desk. His knowledge of Alberuque, as the High Priest Itzechuatl in the past, told him that this was not bluff. The tale about the dummy might be true, but Adam doubted that. It was probably no more than a concession to the canons of the present day thought up by the modern Alberuque to gloss over lightly the fact that he was still at heart Itzechuatl, the blood-lusting savage who was determined to take again this opportunity to enjoy tearing out the heart of a living human being. Dummy or no dummy, for the past four days Adam had not been able to rid himself of the awful conviction that, somehow or other, at the end of the ceremony, Alberuque would so contrive matters that he, Quetzalcoatl, should supply the heart to be offered to the gods.
After a silence that could be felt had lasted for some thirty seconds, Alberuque went on, ‘Please do not suppose that my companions would seek to prevent me from sacrificing the Señorita Chela on the lap of Chac-Mool. As a woman her presence at such a ceremony is a gross sacrilege. High Priests, as you may know, have the power to “smell out”, as it is termed, evil-doers and the guilty. I have only suddenly to declare myself to be perturbed, fix upon the Señorita as the cause of my fears that some influence is obstructing the objective of the ceremony, then accuse her of being a spy who has recently entered my service under false pretences. Others will seize her, strip her of her clothes and reveal her sex. I will not have to say another word. Everyone will be howling for her death, and I shall simply accept their verdict.’
This was so exactly what Chela had feared when Adam had threatened to expose her imposture that he could not doubt that was the course matters would take. To allow her to be slaughtered in front of his eyes was unthinkable. Glancing at a small clock on a bureau, he saw that it was now ten past eleven. Hunterscombe and the police might get there by a quarter to twelve. But not before. All he could do was to pray that God would speed them on their way, and continue to play for time. Taking the piece of paper, he said:
‘All right, I’ll learn it.’
Five minutes ticked by, then Alberuque said, ‘You have had long enough. Recite it to me.’
Adam laid down the paper and did so, but deliberately muffed the words.
‘Enough of this mulishness,’ Alberuque snarled, his dark face now set in anger. ‘You are an educated man, Gordon. An author, used to words and phrases. These are easy ones to memorise and I have no more time to waste. Either you will now recite them properly or we will proceed to the pyramid. The sight of the Señorita Chela about to be thrown into into the lap of Chac-Mool may loosen your stubborn tongue.’
Seeing that he had no option, Adam spoke his piece. Still holding his pistol, Alberuque went to the door, opened it and said to Father Lopéz, who was waiting outside, ‘He has come to heel. Call an escort, then take him over to the museum.’
Two minutes later, Adam was marched between two guards, with Father Lopéz following, across a corner of the open space. The museum was divided into a number of bays by walls, upon which there were photographs of excavated ruins and big glass showcases containing pottery, weapons and other items from the long-dead civilisations of Mexico. In several of the bays, attendants were robing Alberuque’s principal lieutenants.
Occupied as Adam’s mind was with the danger in which he stood, the significance of the fact that several of the leading conspirators were changing into the barbaric vestments of a pagan priesthood did not escape him. Even the parody of Christianity combined with worship of the old gods, with which so many of the Indian and Mestizo priests had satisfied their parishioners for four centuries, was evidently now to be abandoned. Tonight there would be no mockery of the Mass to precede the ceremony of his ‘Elevation’, and he had counted on that to gain him a good twenty minutes. It brought home to him more sharply than ever how time was running out, and he began to fear that Hunterscombe might not now come on the scene before the dreaded pagan ceremony was well under way.
In a bay reserved for him, Adam found four men waiting. Laid out nearby was the gorgeous costume of featherwork and embroidery that he had worn at Uxmal. During his wild career down the Pyramid of the Magician and subsequent arrest by the police he had lost his great feathered head-dress, his shield and the wand crowned with his jewelled symbol of power. But he saw that replacements, probably stolen from one of the museums, had been procured for him.
To delay matters a little, he again demanded to be taken to the lavatory. Father Lopéz showed annoyance, but could hardly refuse his request; so he was led away to one just inside the entrance to the museum. Getting out the cigarette case, he repeatedly gave Hunterscombe’s call sign. As he had hoped, there was no reply. That cheered him a little, as it showed that the Wing Commander was not still in his apartment telephoning various authorities; the police could now definitely be assumed to be on their way.
Knowing that Alberuque would be extremely loath to proceed with the ceremony without him, Adam sat down and lit a cigarette. After a few minutes Lopéz rattled the door and called on him to come out. He ignored the shouts and went on smoking. But he was not allowed to do so for long. The door was kicked in and Alberuque stood outside. He was now dressed in the flamboyant robes of a High Priest, his face was painted with stripes and circles and he presented the same terrifying appearance as he had when in his incarnation as Itzechuatl. Glaring at Adam, he snarled:
‘We leave in five minutes. If you are not ready to accompany us, stay here and I will send you a pair of human ears that you may recognise.’
At this threat, Adam quailed and surrendered. Hurrying now, he returned with Lopéz to the bay where his vestments were laid out. As he passed the other bays, he saw that they were all empty. The men who had been changing in them had disappeared.
Suddenly seized with panic at the thought that Alberuque might carry out his threat to leave without him, and Chela pay the penalty, he refused to take off his suit and insisted that the men who were attending him should arrange the princely robes over it. Neither would he allow them to remove his shoes so that they could put on his feet the gilt leather sandals. In less than three minutes he was again feeling the weight of the solid gold breastplate, leg gyves and arm bucklers as he strode towards the entrance to the museum.
Alberuque was waiting there. Beside him stood another, slenderer figure, also berobed in splendour and with fans of gorgeous Quetzal plumes appearing to sprout from every limb. Only the blue eyes in the lavishly painted face enabled Adam to recognise Chela.
As they walked out on to the open space, Adam thought of trying to warn her that the evil priest to whom she had given such devotion would kill her without the slightest scruple. But he decided that there was no point in doing so at the moment, since, as long as he obeyed Alberuque’s orders, she would be in no danger.
Adam had expected to have to walk the quarter-mile to the base of the pyramid, then make the long, tiring climb to the summit; or, as had been the case in the vision he had had of himself some weeks earlier, be carried up it in a sedan-chair. He had counted on that to take not less than a quarter of an hour, and there would at least have been a chance that Hunterscombe, with the forces of law and order, would have arrived by then. But Alberuque had thought of a much more impressive way for the Man-God to make his appearance. Instead of turning right, in the direction of the pyramid, he walked straight ahead towards the helicopter.
As Adam realised that they were to fly up, his heart gave a sickening lurch. He had assumed that the ceremony would not start until midnight. Now it was evident that by midnight it might be over. In four minutes or less they would be on the top of the pyramid and the last chance of Hunterscombe’s arriving in time be gone.
This was the second time that Adam’s hopes of a delay had been unexpectedly disappointed. Now he could no longer hope to be rescued. When help did come, he would be marooned on the summit of the pyramid, at the mercy of men who would certainly murder him in their fury at seeing their followers down below being dispersed by police and troops.
Chela was leading the way, Adam walked just behind her, and Alberuque, his automatic again in his hand, brought up the rear. Realising that death stared him in the face, Adam was sorely tempted to break away and run for it. But the double threat of Alberuque’s pistol and what would happen to Chela if he did, kept him walking towards the helicopter. When they reached it, Adam saw that the pilot was now robed as a priest and his scarred face painted. They took their places as before: Adam beside him and Chela and Alberuque in the two rear seats. There was a whirr of blades and the ’copter lifted.
As it rose in the air, the bright moonlight revealed the scene below. In three open spaces scores of cars and small vans were parked. The men who had arrived in them were assembled on the pyramid and round its base. Its three terraces were packed with people and those who had arrived too late to get a place on them were grouped on the mounds and uneven ground where, weeks before, Adam had had his fall and knocked himself out. It was possible to arrive only at an approximate estimate of their numbers, but he guessed that the assembly could not be fewer than one thousand.
The helicopter went up high, made a wide circle so that the car parks and crowds temporarily passed from view, then it returned, hovered and landed with a slight jolt that made it lurch sideways on the great square of tumbled stone blocks which had once formed the temple, and now rose in a tangled mass a few feet above the level of the flat summit of the pyramid.
When they alighted, Adam saw that only six of Alberuque’s lieutenants, including the pilot, had been granted the honour of donning priestly robes to assist him in the ceremony. With him that made seven, and it passed through Adam’s mind that seven was the magic number common to all ancient religions. Five of them had climbed the pyramid in advance and were standing on the broad, flat terrace that had once had the temple as its background. They now formed a line there and as Alberuque, followed by Adam and Chela, picked his way across the big, uneven stones towards them, they genuflected.
Alberuque halted for a moment to adjust his robe. The pilot quickly passed him and joined the group. It then divided, three on each side, and Adam saw that, while standing in a row, the bodies of the five had concealed the stone image of Chac-Mool. It reposed there, silent but infinitely menacing, the head turned sideways, the knees and shoulders raised, waiting as of old to receive a sacrificial victim in its lap.
But there was no cleverly constructed dummy to be seen. The absence of one confirmed Adam’s grim supposition that it had been only a figment of Alberuque’s imagination, invented to disguise temporarily his intention to sacrifice a human victim.
Walking past the sinister stone image, Adam advanced to the edge of the broad terrace and for some moments gazed down at the silent, expectant crowd gathered below. He recalled his dream, in which he had stood there before to be received and acclaimed as a Man-God. In the moonlight the clothes of the people down there could not be distinguished, so they might just as well have been wearing the cloaks with gaudy patterns that their ancestors had worn a thousand years earlier. The blur of upturned faces was the same.
He decided that he must be dreaming again. It was absurd, fantastic, unbelievable, that there could really be a plot in this day and age to destroy modern Mexico, with its booming industries, skyscrapers, achievements in science and art, magnificent motorways and broad-minded government which was slowly, but surely, turning it into a Welfare State; to turn the clock back hundreds of years, leaving the country at the mercy of hordes of primitive Indians led by a handful of fanatics. The whole conception of such a revolution was hopeless: utterly impractical. It could be no more than an idea conjured up in a nightmare. He must soon wake up in his bed at the El Presidente, or perhaps in London.
Like receiving a bucket of cold water in the face, he was brought back to earth by one of the priests handing him a microphone, a spotlight that completely blinded him being switched on from somewhere, and Alberuque’s voice coming from within a few feet of his ear with the harshly whispered ultimatum, ‘Now say your piece, and clearly; otherwise I’ll smell out your woman, have her stripped naked and give her to Chac-Mool.’
Although it was cold up there, beads of perspiration started out on Adam’s forehead. He had played for time, had done his utmost to enable Hunterscombe to arrive before the assembly below dispersed, carrying his message, and the codeword was sent out that would inflame the whole country. How could he possibly send them away inspired to commit themselves to a ruthless civil war in which thousands of their kind and thousands of other entirely innocent people must be killed.
But if he refused, what of Chela? Strong as he was he could not hope to overcome the seven priests, and Alberuque was armed. The thought of her being murdered before his eyes was positively horrifying. He must continue to play for time. Even while he was speaking Hunterscombe might arrive.
Fearing that half-measures would probably drive Alberuque into such a fury that to revenge himself he would carry out his threat and sacrifice Chela, Adam resisted the temptation to mumble and declaimed his speech in a loud voice. It was received by the crowds below with an awed murmur of appreciation.
The wave of sound had hardly subsided when Alberuque took the hand microphone from him and shouted into it:
‘Sons of Mexico! Rightful owners of its soil and silver. You have heard the Man-God delegate temporal authority over you to me. There is one way only in which we can hope to triumph. It is by swift and ruthless action. The masters must be destroyed root and branch before they have time to organise against us. When you go forth from here, kill! kill! kill! Death to the descendants of the gachupines.’
As he paused, there came a thunderous burst of applause. The cheering lasted a good minute and it was only as it began to fade that Adam caught Chela’s voice coming through it from behind him. She was shouting:
‘No! What are you saying? No! No! No!’
Drowning her cries, Alberuque resumed his speech. ‘I call upon you now to witness the ancient ceremony of Elevation. The Man-God has made his will known. As in the past he again ascends to rejoin his Divine Brothers. The shedding of his blood will rejuvenate our nation.’
It had come—the dread decree that Adam had been fearing ever since he had recognised Alberuque to be Itzechuatl. Yet still he could hardly believe it possible that in this modern age such a thing could really happen. Even now, at the eleventh hour, he thought again that he must be suffering from a ghastly dream and, as is the way with nightmares, would wake at the critical moment to find himself in bed, sweating but safe.
Fear for Chela had kept him obedient up to the moment of Alberuque’s final sentence. The actual announcement that he was to be the victim of the ritual murder put her out of danger. Suddenly he woke to the reality of his own peril. Alberuque was standing on his right and within a yard of him. Had his hands been free, he could easily have seized him and thrown him down the pyramid. But they were not. In his right hand he held the long staff of authority tipped with his cypher in jewels; in his left the big shield from which dangled his plumed head-dress.
Letting fall his impedimenta, he thrust out his right hand to grab Alberuque. But the evil priest had anticipated that he would make a fight for his life, and had taken precautionary measures. Unseen by Adam five of the other priests had closed in behind him. The second he moved, they flung themselves upon him, grabbing him round the neck and waist and by both arms.
His only assets in a fight against such odds were his towering height and the powerful muscles in his big limbs; but although small men, the priests were muscular and, except for one, they were in the prime of life.
Exerting all his strength, he wrestled with them, striving to throw them off. As he did so, he caught a glimpse of Chela. The seventh priest was holding her back from coming to his assistance. Through the almost deafening shouts of excitement that rose from the crowd, he could hear her screaming at Alberuque:
‘You cannot do this! You cannot! Oh, what have I done that this should happen? Holy Virgin, have pity. Save him! Save him!’
Adam got an arm free and brought his clenched fist down on the head of one of the priests. The man fell like a pole-axed ox. But another of them seized his arm again. With both arms held, his body was vulnerable. One of the priests, lowering his head, ran in and butted him in the stomach. The blow winded him. The breath driven from his body, he doubled up. His limbs went slack. Seizing their advantage, the priests dragged him towards the Chac-Mool.
Again he caught a glimpse of Chela. The priest was holding her with her arms behind her back. She was struggling violently with him and still screaming, ‘Oh, Lord, have mercy! Holy Mary intercede for me! Save him! Save him and I’ll become your handmaiden. I have sinned; I know it! But I repent! I repent!’
It was then that Adam subconsciously became aware that new sounds were vibrating in the air. From overhead there came the roar of aircraft while the shouting of the crowd no longer held a note of fanatical elation; it had changed to pandemonium. Out of the night sky above the massed people, row after row of flares descended, dropped from fighter aircraft. Help had come, but too late; for aircraft could not rescue him.
Yet the thought that succour was so near lent him new strength, and he had got back his wind. Desperately he turned and twisted like Laocoon among the serpents. Snarling with fury, the four priests strove to force him down on to the Chac-Mool. For a moment he let himself go limp, gave a terrific heave and broke free. But, as he jumped clear, the older priest tripped him. He went down heavily, hitting his head on the raised knees of the hideous idol. The blow did not knock him out, but he was momentarily blinded. Stars and whirling circles flashed before his eyes. Involuntarily his muscles slackened, and he was rendered temporarily helpless.
Panting from their exertions, the priests got him down. One of them tore off his gold breastplate, another ripped away his shirt; the two others were using their full weight to pin down his arms. As his vision cleared, he saw Alberuque standing over him. The High Priest’s painted face was demoniac. Grasped firmly in his hand he held the obsidian sacrificial knife. He raised it to strike.
Adam knew then that his hour had come. As the government forces had arrived before the completion of the ceremony, the codeword that was to rouse the mobs all over the country would not yet have been sent out from the museum telephone exchange. He had saved Mexico from a terrible Civil War. But he must pay for it with his life. Fate had decreed that Itzechuatl should, after all, wreak his hate and vengeance on the victim who had escaped him a thousand years before.
At that very moment there came a piercing yell. A second later, two shots rang out. With a wail of agony, Alberuque dropped the knife and clutched his side. For a moment he swayed, then heeled over and fell. Another shot followed. The priest who had torn off Adam’s breastplate gave a sudden grunt and went over backwards. The other three hastily let go of Adam and took cover as well as they could behind the Chac-Mool.
Gasping for breath, Adam heaved himself to his feet and looked towards the place where Chela had been standing. The spotlight was still on. In its glare he saw that the priest who had held her was dabbing at his face, from which blood was dripping. She now lay sprawled at his feet.
Instantly Adam grasped what must have happened. She had somehow managed to get her head round and fix her teeth in the man’s chin. Then, as he released her, she had drawn the little automatic she often carried strapped to her thigh and shot Alberuque. The infuriated priest who had been holding her must then have knocked her down.
Adam took a stride in her direction. Having no longer anything to fear from Chela, the priests behind him sprang to their feet and came at him again. The man with the bitten chin ran to their assistance. Once more Adam found himself fighting for his life against four of them.
Like a pack of wolves attacking a big reindeer, they fastened on to his limbs and strove to pull him down. Staggering from side to side, the group reached the very edge of the terrace. One more step in that direction and all five of them, with arms and legs whirling, would have pitched down the steep steps.
Adam was facing that way. Over the heads of his shorter assailants he had a swift view of what was taking place below. The road to the pyramid was made as bright as day by the glare of the headlights on a long line of vehicles. The leading ones had already drawn up and police or troops were tumbling out of them. The mob had dispersed and was running in all directions. But there were scores of people still on the pyramid terraces, and some of those on the nearest were making for the top.
Again he was near despair. Even if he could succeed in fighting off the priests who clung to him, help would soon reach them. Assailed by greater numbers, he must succumb. He was fearful, too, that now they would all go over the edge. Splaying his feet, he made a violent effort to heave himself backward. It took the others by surprise. All but one of them lost their hold on him. Jerking up his elbow, he struck the man under the chin with it. His teeth snapped together, his head fell back and he dropped to the ground.
Chela had been left unguarded. For a few moments she had been knocked out. Now she had come round and again came into action. Raising her pistol, she shot in the back the priest whose chin she had bitten. With a hideous scream, he sank to the ground.
There remained two unwounded priests, and the one Adam had hit on the head, who had now staggered to his feet. All three of them had to be dealt with if he was to stand any chance at all of escaping with Chela down the rear side of the pyramid before the mass of shouting Indians coming up its front was upon them.
The nearest priest was the one who had piloted the helicopter. Rushing at him, Adam seized him round the body. The other two ran at him. With sudden dismay he saw that they had drawn their knives. It was clear that, realising they could no longer hope to overcome him and get him down on the Chac-Mool, they meant, if they could, to kill him where he stood.
Desperately he looked round for a weapon. His glance fell on the long staff of authority. It would not be as effective as a spear, but the jewelled serpent-head at the top could inflict an ugly wound on a man’s face. Snatching it up, he fended off the attack. Backing away, he jabbed with it first at one priest, then at the other, while hoping that Chela would use the rest of the bullets in her pistol to shoot them before one of them could stab him. Ten seconds later he realised that hope to be vain. To escape their first rush he had leapt aside and turned; so now he had his back to her. She would not dare shoot at them for fear of hitting him.
The two priests had their backs to the edge of the terrace. Adam was sparring with them at a distance of only four feet, so he could see beyond them down the steep slope. Howling like dervishes, the thirty or forty Indians and Mestizos who were pounding up the steps from the lower terrace were now within twenty feet. A few flourished knives and sabres, but most of them were armed with pistols.
He dared not turn his head and so take his eyes off his two assailants, but with all the strength left in his lungs he shouted to Chela, ‘Run! Run for your life!’
As he urged her to flee, he knew that within the next two minutes he must be overwhelmed and hacked to pieces by the ferocious mob that was surging up towards him.