Evil Star

Micos sent them here? There didn't seem to be any reason, and Matt wasn't prepared to waste any of their money paying to get in.
    Even so, he lingered around the entrance and listened as the tour organizers delivered the same lecture to each group of tourists.
    Coricancha was the ancient word for "golden courtyard." There had once been a great temple with four thousand priests living here.
    Every wall had been lined with solid plates of gold, and the rooms had been filled with statues and altars .. . also gold. It had been used by the Incas as a religious center and a celestial observatory. Then the conquistadors had come and taken everything. They had melted down the gold, ripped out the altars, and built their own church on the ruins that remained.
    Would Fabian bring them here on Friday night? Matt wondered.
    Was there a chance that Richard might turn up? A guard walked out of the entrance and gestured at Matt and Pedro to move away. Pedro muttered something ugly and guttural in Spanish and tugged at Matt's sleeve. Matt understood. The guard thought they were trying to beg from the tourists. They had no place here. Poor people in Cuzco really had no place anywhere.
    As the evening drew in, they walked back to the square and sat on the long step between the cathedral and the fountain. Matt wondered what Pedro was thinking about. He had tried to explain that Fabian was coming, but he wasn't sure how much the other boy had Horowitz, Anthony - [Gatekeepers 02] - Evil Star understood. Pedro didn't look happy to him — but then, he hardly ever did. Matt knew how he felt. He had never asked for any of this.
    He was completely out of his depth. Pedro probably wished he was back in Lima and that the two of them had never met.
    At last, the darkness came, and with it Cuzco was trans-formed into something almost magical. Matt had noticed how strange the light was by day. At night, the sky became a luminous blue with the mountains stretching out, deep black, below. Thousands of orange lights sparkled in the outlying suburbs, and streetlamps glowed all around in the square. After the heat of the day, the evening was cool.
    The restaurants were filling up, the pavements packed with peo-ple in no hurry to go anywhere, like extras on some huge open-air stage.
    The police car entered the square just after nine o'clock. Matt noticed it first — a low, white vehicle with a yellow-and-blue stripe and a strip light mounted on the roof. There were two men inside.
    He watched the car as it cruised slowly along the far side and parked in front of one of the money change shops. The two men didn't get out.
    He thought nothing of it. There were police everywhere in Cuzco, just as there had been in Lima. It seemed that their main job was to keep the tourists happy. Tourists were worth millions to the Peruvian economy. They had to feel safe.
    But then a second police car joined the first, and Matt began to grow uneasy. They couldn't be looking for him! Apart from Fabian, nobody knew he and Pedro were there. Pedro nudged him, glancing in the direction of the second car. The expression on his face was clear: The police in this country were bad news. The two of them had been moved on plenty of times throughout the day and Matt had no doubt that he and Pedro could be arrested just for sitting here.

    Horowitz, Anthony - [Gatekeepers 02] - Evil Star What was the time? Surely it must be getting close to ten o'clock?
    He wished Pedro hadn't stolen his watch.
    The two police cars and more policemen on foot were entering the square from all sides, moving slowly, seem-ingly with no particular purpose. What was going on? Pedro was becoming more and more agitated. There was some-thing animal about him now. His eyes were wide and alert. Every muscle in his body seemed to be locked.
    He was sens-ing danger, even if he hadn't seen it yet.
    "I think we should move," Matt said. "Vamos!"
    He didn't want to go. Fabian would arrive any minute now. If he could wait just a few minutes longer, the whole ordeal might be over. Getting up, walking, might draw attention to himself. Every fiber of his being screamed at him to stay where he was. While he was sitting down, unno-ticed, he was safe. But at the same time, there were more than a dozen policemen in the square now, fanning out, all of them armed. Had the police come by coincidence or did they know Matt was here? Was this just another raid, or were they looking for him?
    The question was answered in an instant