The Lord of Opium(120)
The African soldiers kept glancing outside as though expecting trouble. Boris and Samson had, Matt noticed, armed themselves with stun guns. A breeze laden with smoke from burning cholera, smallpox, and plague germs stirred the curtains of the windows. It was another beautiful day in the drug neighborhood.
“You’re one of the lucky ones, Listen,” said Dr. Rivas. “Glass Eye likes you. He wants you to grow up to become his hundred and fiftieth or two hundredth wife. I forget how many there are.”
The little girl refused to look at him. “I’m putting you into my freezer,” she hissed.
Matt longed to lunge at the doctor and silence him forever, but the soldiers would stop him. “Glass Eye won’t live that long,” he said, lifting Listen onto one of the beds.
The doctor laughed bitterly. “Oh, yes he will. He isn’t in as good a shape as El Patrón was, but we can do wonderful things with machines. I can build a mechanical heart that will keep him going. Just think, Listen. In ten years you’ll be seventeen. You always wanted to be a drug queen, and here’s your chance.”
To Matt’s surprise, Listen didn’t look grief-stricken, as he’d expected. The expression on her face was rage. It made her seem a lot older than seven.
“I think it’s time for lunch,” said Dr. Rivas, getting up and brushing the wrinkles from his lab coat. He sent the eejit caretakers to the nursery kitchen, and they soon returned with cheese sandwiches and chocolate milk. Matt didn’t think he could eat, but he’d grown so tired of stew and polenta that the new food was welcome. Listen spat on her sandwich and threw it on the floor. The soldiers and Russian bodyguards stood by the door and watched.
Matt picked up Mbongeni’s stuffed toys and put them into a cupboard, where Listen couldn’t see them. He rolled the crib into the kitchen, but the eejits, when they tidied up, put everything back. They’d been programmed to keep things in order, and it was useless to argue with them.
“Happy Man has been going on hunting parties,” Dr. Rivas said suddenly. “He and a few friends have been flying around in those little stirabouts.”
“I suppose they want to turn this place into a wasteland like the rest of the Dope Confederacy,” said Matt.
“They’ve been extremely successful.” The doctor smiled, pleased that he’d gotten a reaction. “The animals here have never been hunted, and they didn’t know they were in danger. Happy Man bagged a dozen pronghorn antelope, even more white-tailed deer, two bears, a jaguar—they’re very rare—and a puma. It won’t take him long to clean this place out.”
For the first time Matt realized that the doctor was not only evil, he was insane.
“The machine guns were so powerful, they blew the animals to bits. One of the antelopes was standing in front of a window at Malverde’s chapel. I suppose the beast thought it was under the saint’s protection, but it soon learned its mistake. When the buzzards came down to feed, the soldiers blasted them, too.”
“Why tell me?” said Matt. He carefully kept his face blank at the mention of the chapel.
“Because I want you to see your country in ruins. I want you to watch your friends die and know that you yourself have fallen into the hands of your worst enemy.”
“What do you have against me? I didn’t do anything to you.”
“You destroyed my son and drove my wife to suicide,” said the doctor, as though he hadn’t heard Matt. “You burnt up my life’s work, but it’s all worth it if you suffer.”
“El Patrón did those things, not me.” Matt despaired of getting through to the man. He was locked into a mental bubble.
More soldiers came to the door. They talked excitedly in some African language. Boris and Samson jumped from one foot to the other, trying to make themselves understood.
“I’m not El Patrón,” Matt repeated.
“Oh, but you are,” Dr. Rivas said softly. “You have the same gestures, the same body, and the same voice. You’re the most perfect copy of him I ever made.”
The soldiers beckoned to the doctor, and they conferred in low voices. “Glass Eye had a slight relapse this morning,” Dr. Rivas said when he returned. “That’s why he didn’t call for you. It seems that Happy Man took advantage of the situation to go hunting again. He didn’t come back.”
“Tough toenails,” said Matt. With any luck, the fake general was in the stomach of a jaguar (very rare).
“It means that your time has run out. Dabengwa wants the border opened, and he wants it now.”
Matt grabbed a fork from a table and stabbed at his right hand, but he wasn’t fast enough. The African soldiers were as well trained as the Farm Patrol, and one of them twisted his arm behind his back while another kicked him in the stomach. Matt collapsed, gasping for breath.