The thought crossed his mind that, if the car pulled up, he might perhaps make his escape; but he quickly abandoned that hope. A policeman was sitting on either side of him. They would almost certainly be armed and, although they were both small men, he was handcuffed; so any attempt to overcome them must prove hopeless. Miserably, he resigned himself to spending the rest of the night in a cell, being taken ignominiously back to Mexico City, then spending several days in prison before Ramon and Chela could procure his release.
The car had just passed through a large village and was entering the flat lands when it slowed down. The driver sounded his horn urgently, ran on another fifty yards, then pulled up. Peering forward through the windscreen, by the light of the headlamps Adam saw the reason. Lying down across the road and completely blocking it was a huddle of a dozen or more Indians.
He and the policeman sitting with him had hardly taken in the
fact when a tremendous shouting broke out and two other much larger groups of Indians emerged from the jungle on both sides of he road. In a human wave they threw themselves at the car and wrenched open the doors.
The two policemen had drawn their pistols. Before they had time to raise them, rough hands seized them, the driver and an officer who was sitting in front, by the arms and legs and dragged them out on to the road.
For a moment Adam remained where he was, dazed by the suddenness of the attack. Quickly recovering his wits, he shuffled his way out. Two other police cars had been following. They, too, were almost submerged under mobs of Indians. A single shot was fired, but no cry of pain came to tell that a bullet had found its mark. A solitary policeman succeeded in getting away into the jungle, then it was all over. As an ambush it had been a complete success.
Feeling slightly ridiculous, Adam stood in the middle of the road arrayed in his finery. The fighting had ceased, the Indians were binding the police hand and foot, then lifting them into the back of a lorry that had just driven up. A voice said behind, Adam
`Exalted One, permit me to introduce myself. I am Father Suarez, and your humble servant.'
Turning, Adam saw that he had been addressed by a man who did not look at all like a priest. He was a big, burly, red faced Mestizo with broken teeth. Adam began to stammer his thanks for having been rescued; but Father Suarez waved them aside, led him some way down the road, then along a cart track off it that ended after a hundred yards at a small, square, one roomed house.
It was empty except for a chair and a small table on which there were a candle, a bottle of tequila, a glass and a platter of
fruit. The priest apologised for not taking him to his own dwelling, on the grounds that even the glimpse his people had caught of, Adam would have made them tremendously excited, and he was anxious to avoid a demonstration in the village which might rouse from their sleep a few untrustworthy people who lived there. He then said that he must despatch a messenger to let. Adam's friends know that he had been rescued, but would return soon as was possible, with a file, so that Adam could be freed
from his handcuffs.
Left on his own, Adam clasped the bottle of tequila with both hands and awkwardly poured some into the glass. He did not much care for its flavour, but he badly needed a drink. Taken neat it was fiery stuff and, as it went down, he gasped and spluttered; but it warmed his stomach and soon afterwards he felt the better for it.
Sitting down, he began to speculate on what was likely to happen as a result of the new turn events had taken. Wryly he recalled his nickname of `Lucky' Gordon, and supposed that he was lucky to be sitting there a free man, instead of being still on his way to a cell in a police station. But for how long could he count on his luck holding?
It seemed obvious that his rescue could have been ordered only by Don Alberuque or Father Lopez, so either or both of them must have escaped arrest; although how they had managed to arrange so quickly for the ambush was puzzling. Anyway, it could be assumed that they would soon be on their way to pick him up.
What would they have planned to do with him? It was hardly likely that they would take him back to the Hacienda. There must still be police at Uxmal trying to find out all they could about the ceremony, and some of them might be questioning the staff at the hotel. The most likely alternative was a return to Mexico City, via Merida. But that, too, could be dangerous. It might be hours before the policeman who had escaped into the jungle could reach a telephone or find some motor vehicle to take him in to Merida; on the other hand, he might already have done so and be on his way there.
Once news of the ambush reached police headquarters, they would establish road blocks in the hope of recapturing the man who had played the part of Quetzalcoatl, and Adam's height, features and hair would make him easily identifiable to anyone who had his description. To keep him where he was would be even more risky as, by morning, it was certain that the village and its neighborhood would be swarming with police trying to find out where he had got to. At length he decided the most likely possibility was that they would spirit him away to some other hideout deep in the jungles of Yucatan.
The prospect was anything but pleasant, as he might have to remain there for weeks before it was safe for him to emerge. Almost it seemed better to give himself up and rely on Ramon to get him out of trouble. But to do that would also entail a nasty risk. The authorities might prove indifferent to anything Ramon had to say and, as a matter of policy, put Quetzalcoatl on trial, then award him a long prison sentence. In what better way could they knock the bottom out of the conspiracy? It was possible that if he turned `King's Evidence' they might let him off. But in that case what about Chela? If he gave her Monsignor away and utterly wrecked her hopes of bettering the lot of her beloved Indians, would she ever forgive him?
It occurred to him then that perhaps her hopes were already wrecked. Ramon had said that the authorities would not pounce until they knew who the leaders of the conspiracy were; yet they had struck that night. Possibly Don Alberuque was only one of the leaders and there were bigger fish in Mexico City who were not prepared to show themselves until the revolt actually started. If the government was now on to them the whole project was already a busted flush.
Adam sincerely hoped it was. If so, and the police could pull in and put on trial a number of prominent Mexican churchmen and Indian caciques, they might not greatly exert themselves to catch he unknown man who had been used to play Quetzalcoatl simply Because he had the right figure and colouring. Then, if he lay low for a while, once Chela had recovered from her disappointment they might go again to her little villa at Acapulco and resume their wonderful honeymoon, with this nightmare business no longer looming over them.
By the time Father Suarez returned Adam, although still greatly worried, was in a slightly happier frame of mind. The priest brought a file with him and set to work on the handcuffs. While he filed away, Adam asked him how it had been possible to prepare the ambush so quickly, and learned that he owed his liberty to the Father.
Suarez had been present at the ceremony. When the police had come on the scene he had not panicked but kept his wits about him. There had not been many police only three car loads of them although it was possible that others whom he had not seen had arrived simultaneously at the back of the pyramid. In any case, it had at once been obvious that the police were not sufficiently numerous to attempt anything against the congregation, but had come to arrest the principal participants in the ceremony. Having taken cover among the only group of stones n the immediate vicinity which, Adam recalled, were a dozen or so waist high phalli, the Father had seen him come plunging down he pyramid and realised that his capture was inevitable. Without losing a moment, under cover of darkness he had run the quarter of a mile to the place where he had left his motor cycle, jumped on it and driven, all out, back to his own village. There, feeling certain that if Adam survived his perilous descent the police would take him in to Merida, he had aroused his congregation and only just in time, prepared the ambush.