“I’m responsible for you people. But I won’t say the thought didn’t cross my mind.”
Rivas took the wheel and they pulled away in silence. He took them along the airport boulevard, past unbelievable slums, and on to the Avenue Fray Servando Teresa de Mier, heading downtown.
The car swept them silently along broad streets. Away from the airport there was something like normality apart from the occasional machine gun poking over sandbags at strategic corners; and for all Webb knew, that too was normality in Mexico City.
Judy, a child in a magic garden, kept looking back at him, enthusiastically pointing out street markets and mosaic-covered buildings designed by architects from Mars.
“You’re looking a bit strung up, Oliver,” said Noordhof. “Why don’t you relax?”
Webb put a hand to his brow. “Relax? By this time tomorrow we could be little stars twinkling in the sky.”
The colonel put his hands together in an attitude of prayer.
The Mexican whisked them along the broad Avenue Insurgentes. Apart from a lot of broken glass, there were still few signs that things were crumbling. All the same Rivas was visibly tense, looking up and down roads as they passed and generally wasting no time.
“University City straight ahead,” said Noordhof. “Once we’re through that we’re in the clear.”
“In the clear?”
There was a queue of traffic ahead, and flashing lights in the distance. An army truck raced past, overtaking them on their right. Noordhof said, “Yeah. Mexico City is being sealed off. Something to do with the roads north being jammed.”
“But we’re going south.”
Ahead, soldiers were jumping out of the back of a truck. Barbed wire was being stretched across the street. An officer looked up sharply and then jumped as the big car squeezed through the gap, but then the Lincoln was round a corner and the cameo had vanished. A sign showed a little yacht on waves; below the yacht were the words “Acapulco 400 km.”
The road was starting to climb; soon they were winding through a countryside of tall mountains, rearing out of stubbled fields yellow with corn. Noordhof looked at his watch. “Step on it, Rivas. You’re racing an asteroid.”
Rivas stepped on it. Unfortunately it turned out that, while he had a great deal of speed, he had very little skill. Taking one corner too wide, the car had a hairsbreadth miss with a red bus, stacked to the roof with straw-hatted Mexicans. Rivas shouted something colourful; there was an exchange of hooting, and then the bus had vanished in a trail of blue smoke.
They roared through a dusty little village. A wedding procession scattered. Angry shouts and the barking of a dog receded into the distance.
An hour on, Rivas slowed down. They came to a turning, an open parking area, and a lodge house. The car braked to a halt. Rivas and Noordhof held out identity cards. Judy and Webb produced passports, which were closely scrutinized by an American GI. The soldier checked their names against a list and waved them in.
“Oaxtepec,” Rivas said. “I get you here in time, yes? This is a government recreation centre. The American soldiers and yourselves are our guests until the asteroid flies past. At least I hope she flies past.” Rivas was driving them, now at a leisurely pace, along a well-surfaced road. Acres of lawn were randomly broken up by swimming pools and colourful flower beds. The road climbed, and finally stopped at what seemed to be a big ranch house.
Noordhof excused himself, explaining that he had a chalet bungalow down the hill. Rivas was escorted towards a room in the main building. A man of Indian extraction, wearing a white jacket and dark flannels, led Judy and Webb along a cloister to adjacent rooms.
Webb’s room was spacious and the furniture was ornate and solid. One wall was a French window leading out to a lawn dotted with palm trees and sub-tropical bushes. A fan took up half the ceiling. He threw his backpack and jacket on a chair, walked over to the window and looked out at the swaying trees.
The phone rang. Noordhof said, “They’ve picked it up at Gran Sasso, Nice and Tenerife, and the HST are locked on. Goldstone have it on radar.”
“Orbit?”
“The Harvard-Smithsonian, JPL, Finland and Palomar all agree on perigee. It’s somewhere in an east — west narrow arc about ninety miles wide. A fair drive south of here.”
“Collision probability?”
“Still fifty-fifty.”
Webb put the receiver down and looked at his watch. It was just past three o’clock. Nemesis, alias Karibisha, would come in at 06:15, in just over fifteen hours.
If it existed.
Webb wiped sweat from his eyelids. He took a few deep breaths, and tried to keep his voice steady. The sweat on his palms made the receiver slippery.
Judge Dredd answered with a tired “Yeah.”
“How did it go?” Webb asked.
“Ollie! It’s a bummer. I just could not get root access to the Teraflop. It’s no often I’m beat but there you are.”
Webb groaned.
“I’m awfie sorry about that, Ollie.”
“You tried. Thanks, Jimmy.”
“Real sorry. Mind you, I got your answer.”
“What?”
“Oh aye, it was easy. I just gave the Tenerife telescope instructions through Eagle Peak and the Oxford terminal at one and the same time. I got different pictures from both. Either yon telescope points in two directions at once or the Eagle Peak pictures are a barefaced fraud.”
Webb felt himself going light-headed. “Jimmy, you’ll never know how grateful I am. I’ll see you next week. Meantime remember the second half of our deal.”
“Which is?”
“Keep quiet about this or I’m in trouble.”
The reply was pained. “You’re in trouble! What about me? If the Social found out I was earning on the side…”
Webb put the receiver down. The light-headedness was worse; a feeling of detachment began to wash over him, as if his soul was outside, looking down on his tormented mind from a point just below the ceiling. He went to the toilet and sat on the lid with his eyes closed and his head in his hands.
Xochicalco
Judy was tapping at the French window. She had a bright yellow towel under her arm and was wearing a crocheted, cream-coloured bikini with a matching shawl draped round her shoulders. Webb hauled himself from his exhausted sleep into the conscious world.
She put her arm in his. Webb let himself be led down a long hill, past swimming pools and through acres of landscaped garden. Her arm was trembling slightly. The touch of her skin, the inflexion of her voice, the intimacy of her presence, even the hint of perspiration from her body, all these he found both delicious and disturbing.
He sensed that she had something to tell him.
A jellyfish on stilts, as they approached, turned out to be an enormous geodesic umbrella underneath which was a small sub-tropical jungle of orchids and palm trees. They stood on a little hump-backed bridge under the umbrella and watched the volcanic spring water bubbling below. The air was acrid and sulphurous, and the woman led him along a narrow path through the tropicana. Away from the hot spring the air was heavy with scent. Butterflies the size of handkerchiefs were flitting around the palm trees and the orchids. Judy looked around conspiratorially, and they sat down on a bench. “I’ve something to tell you.”
She paused. A jeep was approaching down the hill at speed.
“Yes?”
The vehicle braked to a halt outside the dome, a little American flag fluttering on its bonnet.
“Spill it, woman!” Webb swallowed a lump in his throat.
She put a protective hand on Webb’s. “Oliver, we’re both in great danger here.”
A squat GI with a head like a bullet was clambering out. Judy leaned forward. “Later. We mustn’t speak of this in the hacienda.”