Ice Shock(25)

“Honestly, Josh.” Mom makes an irritated clucking sound. “I don’t have time to change things. I’m really not sure about you staying with a girl …”

“Couldn’t you please just tell Tyler’s mom for me?”

She pauses. “What about Emmy’s mom?”

“I’ll sort that out.”

I’m not sure whether mom is going to agree, and I’m starting to get pretty worried. I can’t just fly off to Ek Naab if mothers all over Oxford are waiting for me with soup. Luckily, Mom seems in too much of a hurry to argue.

“Okay, fine,” she says reluctantly. “I’ll take my cell phone, but it’s better if you send me a text before you call. That way I can arrange a place to talk where I won’t disturb anyone else.”

“Will do.”

“I’ll be back for Christmas Eve. And we’ll go to that hotel you like.”

I manage a weak smile. “Great!”

With a last regretful look, Mom hugs me tightly, whispering, “I love you, Josh” into my ear. She marks a cross on my forehead and kisses me. For a couple of seconds, I feel a gaping hole open up somewhere deep inside me, and it fills with fear and guilt. I hug her back, trying to ignore it.

“You won’t do anything stupid?”

I can’t speak, so just shake my head and swallow. I watch her get into her car and drive away.

And then I’m alone.

I go upstairs, take a few deep breaths; then on my Ek Naab phone, I call Montoyo.

“Josh! It’s great to hear from you!”

Montoyo’s voice sounds warm and confident. He tells me that the transcription and translation of the Ix Codex is all finished. Blanco Vigores has worked solidly for months. “He’s been looking very old lately,” Montoyo admits. “And he seems lonely, like never before. Can’t remember seeing so much of him.”

“I have a bit of a confession to make,” I begin. Then I explain about discovering that Dad might have been in Saffron Walden on June 16, and about our escapade to the archaeologist’s house the other night. When I come to the part where Simon Madison saw us, I sense Montoyo growing wary. When I admit that the pages of the Ix Codex were taken from my bedroom (I don’t mention the kissing), there’s a long silence that crackles with tension.

Finally, in a dry whisper, he says, “You’re telling me that you let Madison get his hands on pages from the Ix Codex?”

I can’t help cringing. “I tried to stop it …”

His voice sounds hollow with dismay. “Josh—how do you think he came to be at the Thompson house the same night as you? He must be having you observed. He could only know about it because of you.”

Miserably, I tell Montoyo my theory about Ollie. He doesn’t seem all that surprised. Instead, he breathes a long sigh.

“Dios mio. I was afraid of something like this.”

“You knew someone was watching me?”

Montoyo practically growls. “Of course not, Josh! What I mean is this: it was perhaps inevitable that you’d try to get involved on your own account. As I suggested, we would have been wise to keep you in Ek Naab. The plans for the 2012 problem are well under way. This is the safest place for you. With what you know, you should not be in the outside world, meddling.”

“I wasn’t ‘meddling.’ I was trying to find out what happened to my dad!”

Montoyo lets rip with an impatient yell. “We don’t know what happened to him! It’s possible we never will! And look what you’ve done in the process!”

Now I’m angry. After all I did to help them, Montoyo has done nothing to help me find the one truth I really care about.

“I’m going to send someone to pick you up,” he snaps. “Where is a good place?”

“I’m not going to live in Ek Naab.”

“Josh, listen to me. Do you realize what’s in those first three pages? Enough information for Madison’s group to control part of the 2012 technology.”

My heart sinks. It’s true, then; Madison’s stolen artifact is one of the things written about in the Ix Codex.

“They have the Adapter,” Montoyo continues, exasperated. “They can make the Key.”

“The Adapter is what he stole from that guy in Lebanon?”

Montoyo sighs. “We think so. We were negotiating with a private collector—Abdul-Quddus. He bought it from the Baghdad National Museum after the start of the Iraq War. But as you know from that news story, Madison took it.”

“Damn … ,” I say. “That is not ideal.”

“Not ideal?” Montoyo repeats, annoyed again. “Of course it’s not! Listen, Josh. I’m looking at a map of Oxford. There’s a big meadow near your home. Port Meadow. A river runs through it. Be by the river at four tomorrow morning. Okay?”