‘Surprised he kept you around after you fucked up and let me capture him.’
Luaba’s face twitched at the reminder of his failure. ‘Shut up!’ he repeated, giving Eddie a harder jab with the rifle.
Mukobo finished his address. ‘Dr Wilde! It is time. Lead the way inside.’
‘You’re not going first? I thought you wanted the world to see your great discovery,’ she said with sarcastic emphasis.
‘Your cameraman was wounded. If anyone else is hurt, it will not be me!’
The denuded expedition, now outnumbered more than two-to-one by the Insekt Posse, headed up the tower and clambered down the stone shaft to the first chamber. The documentary crew’s equipment was where they had left it. Nina switched on a tripod-mounted lamp. Luaba seemingly lacked the imagination to be impressed by what it revealed, but Mukobo’s reaction was more awed. ‘Ah!’ he exclaimed. ‘Most magnificent.’ He spotted the blood on the floor. ‘Where your man was hurt, yes?’
‘In there.’ She indicated the passage beneath the Hebrew inscription. Mukobo looked, but with the lamp being angled away from the opening saw only darkness within.
More of the group entered, Eddie and Howie amongst them. ‘You all right?’ her husband asked.
‘So far,’ she assured him. Fortune and Lydia arrived behind them. ‘How about you two?’
‘Oh, absolutely fine,’ Lydia said shakily. Her eyes were still red-rimmed from crying. ‘Surrounded by drug-crazed psychopaths who want to — to chop our f-fucking arms off! Just fine, yeah.’
Fortune picked up her audio gear and gave it to her. ‘Here.’
‘W-what am I supposed to do with this?’ she demanded.
‘Your job, of course.’
‘He’s right,’ Nina told her. ‘Focus on what you do best. It’ll take your mind off the… other stuff. Trust me,’ she went on as Lydia was about to object. ‘It helps. It really does.’ The New Zealander still looked anything except happy, but donned her mixing box and headphones.
Brice was one of the last to arrive. ‘Must admit, I expected something a little more spectacular.’
‘This is only the first room,’ said Nina as she switched on a lantern. With more people now in the chamber, the first light was partially obscured. ‘There are probably more down there—’
She broke off as she saw one of the militia making his way down the dark passage towards the glint of silver at its far end. She was about to warn him to come back — but then held her tongue. ‘If we get more lights working,’ she quickly said instead, ‘we’ll be able to see what we’re dealing with.’
‘I’ll help you,’ said Howie. He lowered the camera — then saw the man in the passage. ‘Whoa, whoa, that won’t end well!’
His cry alerted Mukobo and Brice that something was wrong. Both men whirled, the warlord shouting a warning—
Too late.
The militia man reached the large floor block farther down the passage — and staggered as it dropped under his weight. The rasp of stone against stone echoed down the hallway as the walls began to close in.
Mukobo rushed to the opening. ‘Sortez!’ he yelled. ‘Sortez d’ici!’ Behind him, Howie whipped the Sony back up to capture events.
The man regained his footing and looked around in shock. Unlike Rivero, rather than retreat he ran for the chamber containing the silver idol.
The slab continued to descend until it halted with a thud about a foot below floor level — then started to slide towards the next room. The jolt made him stumble again, but he recovered, racing down the rapidly narrowing passageway—
One arm banged against an approaching wall. He reeled, unbalanced — and hit the other. By the time he straightened, both sides were upon him. He turned sideways, but now couldn’t move fast enough to get clear. A shriek of fear suddenly became a strangled croak as the passageway relentlessly closed in. A hideous crack as his ribcage was crushed — then the two walls met with a harsh and final bang.
Mukobo yelled for a flashlight. One was hurriedly found and shone down the hallway. He stared in horror as the trap completed its cycle and reset, the mashed remains of the young man splattering messily down as the walls pulled apart. The viscera-covered slab rolled back towards the first chamber, then returned to floor level.
The stunned silence was broken by Eddie. ‘I’ve heard of runners hitting the wall, but not the other way around…’
Mukobo whirled, jabbing a finger. ‘Another word! Say another word, Chase, and I will kill you!’ He rounded on Nina. ‘You knew that would happen! You knew — and you said nothing!’
‘I told you our cameraman was hurt in here!’ Nina replied. ‘There was blood all over the floor — that should have been a goddamn clue not to go in!’
‘You should still have warned him,’ snapped Brice.
‘I didn’t see him,’ she lied. The former MI6 agent’s icy gaze didn’t flicker, as probing as a polygraph. ‘There were too many people in here!’ She looked back at Mukobo. Her split-second decision to keep silent had been, she was forced to admit to herself, both in the hope of causing a distraction that Eddie or Fortune might use — and a desire to obtain more data on the trap’s workings. She was proud of neither, and was afraid Brice would realise that…
Mukobo glared at her — then turned away, shouting in French at his men. All hurriedly retreated from the passage. ‘So what do we do now?’ Brice asked.
‘If there is a trap, it is to protect something valuable,’ said Mukobo. ‘So we will find a way through it.’ He addressed Nina again. ‘You will find a way through it.’
‘The trap worked differently this time,’ she said, ‘but I saw more of how it operates. Hopefully I’ll be able to figure out how to get someone through safely.’
‘I don’t think that’s quite what he meant,’ said Brice, with a serpentine smile.
‘No?’
‘No,’ Mukobo told her firmly. ‘You will go through the trap!’
‘No she fucking won’t,’ Eddie growled. He was about to step towards the warlord when Luaba raised his gun to deter him.
‘Because of your negligence, one of my men is dead,’ Mukobo went on. ‘You are responsible — so you must make things right.’
‘She’s an archaeologist,’ protested the Yorkshireman. ‘If there are any more traps after this one, you’ll need her to work out how to beat ’em. If she gets killed, then you’re fucked!’
‘But she isn’t the only archaeologist, is she?’ said Brice, indicating Ziff. ‘Sorry, but we haven’t been formally introduced. You are?’
‘Uh — Ziff,’ the older scientist replied. ‘Dr David Solomon Ziff.’
‘And what’s your area of archaeological expertise, Dr David Solomon Ziff?’
Ziff gave Nina a worried glance before answering. ‘The, ah, the life and works of King Solomon.’
Brice’s voice became patronising. ‘And who built the palace in which we’re standing, Dr Ziff?’
‘That would be… King Solomon.’ The name emerged with resignation.
‘You see?’ Brice said to Eddie. ‘We have an expert in the subject. Having a generalist as well feels somewhat redundant.’
Fortune stood beside Eddie. ‘No, please. I shall do it. I am their guide — I should lead the way.’
‘She will go!’ barked Mukobo, stabbing a finger at Nina. ‘That is an end to it. I will shoot the next one who argues with me!’
‘Yeah, let her go,’ muttered Lydia bitterly. ‘She got us into all this, let her do it.’
‘You can fucking shut up,’ Eddie growled at her.
Mukobo started to draw his weapon. ‘Okay, I’ll do it,’ Nina hurriedly said. ‘I’ll find a way through.’
‘How?’ asked Ziff. ‘It really is a death trap!’