The Nostradamus Prophecies Read Online Free PDF

right.’
    The woman was standing in front of him. An older man placed a knife in her hand and shooed her forward. Sabir tried to say something but he found that his mouth was taped shut.
    ‘That’s it. Cut off his balls.’ ‘No. Do his eyes first.’ A chorus of elderly women were encouraging her from their position outside the caravan doorway. Sabir looked around. Apart from the woman with the knife, he was surrounded entirely by men. He tried to move his arms but they were bound tightly behind his back. His ankles were knotted together and a decorated pillow had been placed between his knees.
    One of the men upended him and manhandled his trousers over his hips. ‘There. Now you can see the target.’
    ‘Stick it up his arse while you’re at it.’ The old women were pushing forward to get a better view.
    Sabir began shaking his head in a futile effort to free the tape from his mouth.
    The woman began inching forward, the knife held out in front of her.
    ‘Go on. Do it. Remember what he did to Babel.’
    Sabir began a sort of ululation from inside his taped mouth. He fixed his eyes on the woman in fiendish concentration, as if he could somehow will her not to follow through with what she intended.
    Another man grabbed Sabir’s scrotum and stretched it away from his body, leaving only a thin membrane of skin to be cut. A single blow of the knife would be enough.
    Sabir watched the woman. Instinct told him that she was his only chance. If his concentration broke and he looked away, he knew that he was done for. Without fully understanding his own motivation, he winked at her.
    The wink hit her like a slap. She reached forward and ripped the tape off Sabir’s mouth. ‘Why did you do that? Why did you mutilate my brother? What had he done to you?’
    Sabir dragged a great gulp of air through his swollen lips. ‘Chris. Chris. He told me to ask for Chris.’
    The woman stepped backwards. The man holding Sabir’s testicles let go of them and leaned across him, his head cocked to one side like a bird dog. ‘What’s that you say?’
    ‘Your brother smashed a glass. He pressed his hand into it. Then mine. Then he ground our two hands together and placed the imprint of mine on his forehead. He then told me to go to Samois and ask for Chris. I wasn’t the one that killed him. But I realise now that he was being followed. Please believe me. Why should I come here otherwise?’
    ‘But the police. They are looking for you. We saw on the television. We recognised your face.’
    ‘My blood was on his hand.’
    The man threw Sabir to one side. For a moment Sabir was convinced that they were going to slit his throat. Then he could feel them unbandaging his hand – inspecting the cuts. Hear them talking to each other in a language he could not understand.
    ‘Stand up. Put your trousers on.’
    They were cutting the ropes behind his back.
    One of the men prodded him. ‘Tell me. Who is Chris?’
    Sabir shrugged. ‘One of you, I suppose.’
    Some of the older men laughed.
    The man with the knife winked at him, in unconscious echo of the wink that had saved Sabir’s testicles two short minutes before. ‘Don’t worry. You’ll meet him soon. With or without your balls. The choice is yours.’

16
    At least they’re feeding me, thought Sabir. It’s harder to kill a man you’ve broken bread with. Surely.
    He spooned up the last of the stew, then reached down with his manacled hands for his coffee. ‘The meat. It was good.’
    The old woman nodded. She wiped her hands on her voluminous skirts but Sabir noticed that she did not eat. ‘Clean. Yes. Very clean.’
    ‘Clean?’
    ‘The spines. Hedgehogs are the cleanest beasts. They are not mahrime. Not like…’ She spat over her shoulder. ‘Dogs.’
    ‘Ah. You eat dogs?’ Sabir was already having problems with the thought of hedgehogs. He could feel the onset of nausea threatening.
    ‘No. No.’ The woman burst into uproarious laughter. ‘Dogs. Hah hah.’ She