He was still smiling when the arm locked around his neck like a steel clamp.
Shock and fear slowed his reactions, but he knew the first few seconds of a situation like this were crucial. He managed to stab his elbow into the ribs of the man behind him with enough force to make him grunt and his right leg twisted round the other’s in an attempt to unbalance him. At the same time, he reached both hands over his left shoulder to get a grip of his unseen opponent’s collar and threw his weight forward, bending his left knee and trying for a hip throw that would use the attacker’s bulk against him. He might as well have tried to shift a block of concrete. In desperation he smashed his head backward, anything to loosen the grip that was choking him, but he only managed a glancing blow that made the other man laugh. His stockinged heels scraped on the concrete as he was dragged helplessly towards a darkened alcove off the main car park.
‘Twice you have missed our appointment. There will not be a third time.’
The voice sounded familiar, but before he could place it Jamie’s legs were kicked from under him and massive hands slammed him to the ground so the back of his skull bounced off the floor. While his head still spun, some kind of filthy rag was stuffed into his mouth. He was positioned head first towards the garage with his feet into the alcove. An enormous weight settled on his chest, pinning his arms at his side and he found himself looking up into a grinning face that was too small for the head it inhabited. He searched for a name and his heart stopped as he found it. Gustav.
‘I took this from a Taliban who was trying to cut my balls off outside Farkar, up in Kunduz,’ the squat German said conversationally, producing a long curved knife from inside his zipped jacket. ‘Guess who still has their balls?’
He brought the knife down close to Jamie’s face, so he could see every shade of blue on the shimmering blade, and drew the razor edge across the Englishman’s cheek. Very slowly. First the left side, then the right; the blade rasping effortlessly through two days of stubble.
‘You didn’t have time to shave? No need now, eh? Frederick, he thinks you’re planning to auction the Sun Stone, but that will not happen, OK?’ He slapped Jamie’s cheek for emphasis. Now the wicked twinkle of the knife point hovered directly over Jamie’s right eyeball. ‘It won’t happen because you are going to tell Gustav exactly where it is or you end up like your friend. The stone belongs to us, the keepers of the truth; the successors of the ancients. Only we have the knowledge to use it for the purpose it was intended.’ The words came out stilted and mechanical, as if they’d been learned by constant repetition in a school room. Jamie shook his head to try to dislodge the gag, but the German interpreted the movement as rebellion or defiance. ‘No? That’s good, because now we’re going to have some fun, you and me.’ Gustav studied him impassively, like a butcher contemplating a cut of meat. ‘The eyes, the ears or the nose? Not the tongue. You will need the tongue later.’ His free hand reached down to caress the side of Jamie’s head. ‘The ears then.’
Desperately, Jamie used all his strength in an attempt to shift the German.
‘Shhh,’ Gustav said gently. ‘The more you struggle, the worse it is for you.’
Rough fingers closed on the lobe of Jamie’s right ear and pulled it taut. He tried to scream behind the gag that filled his mouth, but he knew no one would ever hear him. He thought he was losing his mind when a red spot appeared like a cancerous mole beside Gustav’s left lip. The spot wavered and Jamie’s eyes followed it. The German must have read something in his captive’s face, because he hesitated before making the cut. Another bright spot appeared over his left breast, and a third almost exactly in the centre of his forehead. Gustav frowned and his eye drifted down to the spot on his chest. It took him a split second to recognize it for what it was.
‘No!’
The knife rose high before the blade descended in a deadly two-handed arc towards Jamie’s exposed throat. Three sharp cracks split the silence.
Sarah saw Jamie emerge from the car park lift and went to meet him. The Englishman’s face was pale, almost grey, and at first he seemed to look right through her. When she took his arm, he blinked and forced a smile.
‘Hey, you’re shaking,’ she said.
‘I had a bit of a run-in with the car park attendant. I’ll be fine in a minute.’
They walked in the general direction of the river. It was busy now, the offices and banks were emptying and the streets filled with shoppers. At the intersection of two streets they found a tourist sign that pointed them towards the Frauenkirche and, when they crossed, there it was, on the far side of a small park in the centre of the square.