The Lord of Opium

by Nancy Farmer

  “African. It may sound odd, but all names have meanings in their original languages. Matteo means ‘gift of God,’ and Mirasol means ‘look at the sun.’ ”

  “ ‘Look at the sun.’ Yes, that suits her,” said Matt, thinking of Waitress’s habit of following him around like a small planet. “Do you listen a lot?” he asked the little girl. She hung her head.

  “She does. That’s why I’m glad we didn’t have to blunt her intelligence when she was harvested,” the doctor said.

  Harvested, thought Matt. Listen had been grown inside a cow just as he had, and that meant she was a clone. Then the rest of Dr. Rivas’s statement sank in. “What do you mean, blunt?”

  “All such infants are injected with a drug that destroys part of the frontal lobes—all, that is, except El Patrón’s clones. He wanted them to experience the kind of childhood he never had.”

  “So that’s what’s wrong with Mbongeni,” said Matt, looking with horror and pity at the little boy who had finished the milk and was banging his head rhythmically with the bottle. He realized that the bite on Listen’s arm came from this poor, damaged child.

  “Take his bottle, Listen,” said the doctor. The girl fled from Matt and leaned over Mbongeni’s cage. She yanked the bottle away from the boy and, before he could complain, popped a pacifier into his mouth.

  “Isn’t it better that he live as a happy infant, unaware of the hatred people have for clones? When you speak of destroying tissue samples, by the way, he’s one of them,” said Dr. Rivas.

  “He’s a child,” Matt said.

  “Not according to the law. He exists for one purpose only, to prolong the life of his original.”

  “I make the laws here,” said Matt, “and I say Mbongeni is a child.”

  Dr. Rivas sighed and ran his fingers through thinning hair. “Would you like lunch in the garden, mi patrón? The eejits can set out a table under the grape arbor.”

  “I want Listen and Mbongeni to come.”

  “I’m afraid the boy would be frightened. Clones like that get very attached to routine and start screaming if anything is changed.” The doctor pressed a buzzer, and a pair of eejit women came into the nursery. One of them upended Mbongeni and changed his diaper. The boy howled with rage, but when he was laid back down, fresh and sweet-smelling, the other eejit began to play peek-a-boo with him. Mbongeni gurgled with delight, not tiring of the game. Eejits, of course, never tired of anything.

  “They’ll do that until he falls asleep,” said Dr. Rivas.

  * * *

  Listen wasn’t eager to go with Matt, but Dr. Rivas explained that it was her duty. Matt was the new patrón, and they had to obey him. She seemed to accept this, although she folded her arms to keep from taking his hand. The doctor must have relayed a message, because the eejits had already put up a table under the arbor by the time they arrived. A fine spray of water cooled the air, and birds flew back and forth through the mist. A mockingbird sat at the top of the arbor and sang.

  Lunch was a large pizza and a salad. Listen wriggled in anticipation as the doctor served Matt first, then himself, and last of all her. She inhaled the odor of hot cheese and pepperoni, but she didn’t eat until Dr. Rivas had given her permission.

  “What do you like to do?” Matt asked her.

  “Don’t know,” said Listen. She ate with surprising delicacy, or perhaps Matt was only used to Mirasol’s wholehearted gobbling.

  “Do you like dolls or coloring books?” Matt tried to remember what he did at her age. “Do you watch TV?”

  “Don’t know.”

  “That’s very rude, Listen,” said Dr. Rivas. “Answer the patrón.”

  “I like all of them,” the girl said sullenly.

  “Did you ever see El Látigo Negro?” Matt said, naming his favorite show.

  “I might have,” Listen said.

  “I liked the battles El Látigo had with the Queen of Skulls. She was always playing dirty tricks on him.”

  “She turned into a snake once and he picked it up, thinking it was his whip,” said Listen.

  “I remember that! It bit him and he almost died.” Little by little Matt drew her out until she was almost relaxed, but she kept her distance.

  For dessert they had watermelon. It was brought to them by Mirasol, who was followed by a chef in a long white apron. “I had to let her come,” he said apologetically. “She kept jittering, and I didn’t know what to do.”

  “That’s all right,” said Dr. Rivas. Mirasol took up her post by Matt’s chair. She was in her waitress uniform again. “Listen, you may take slices of watermelon for yourself and Mbongeni, but pick out the seeds before you give him any.” The girl slid out of her chair and made a speedy exit.

  The doctor turned toward Matt. “Aren’t you going to ask me who Mbongeni’s original is?”

  “It doesn’t matter. I’m not going to allow the boy to be operated on,” Matt said.

  “He’s Glass Eye Dabengwa’s clone.”

  A vague feeling of dread came over Matt. He found it difficult to connect the happy child with the sinister adult, but someday—if Mbongeni survived—he would turn into an elephant-gray monster with yellow eyes. “Why is he here?”

  “This hospital was the finest of its kind in the world. It was a safe place for the drug lords to raise their clones, and in those days El Patrón was Glass Eye’s ally. That was when he was still president of Nigeria. Now he’s retired. El Patrón’s great-great-grandson Benito married Dabengwa’s daughter.”

  “Her name was Fani,” said Matt. “I remember she had to be drugged into doing it.”

  “Drug lords marry for power, not love,” said Dr. Rivas. “Tissue samples for Mbongeni and Listen were sent here eight years ago. The original Listen was Glass Eye’s favorite wife, but the original died before our Listen was harvested.”

  Matt flinched inside. He would never get used to the word harvested.

  “Normally, such embryos are terminated, but Glass Eye wanted her spared. She was, legally, no longer a clone. She was human and would grow into an intelligent, beautiful woman. He wanted her raised to be his wife.”

  “That’s disgusting!” said Matt, pushing his chair away from the table. “He’s horrible. He’s a sadist. He’s ninety-nine years old, and he never blinks.”

  “Drug lords live a long time.” Dr. Rivas signaled to Mirasol, and she began gathering up plates. “When Glass Eye is a robust hundred and ten, Listen will be eighteen.”

  “He’s not getting anywhere near her!” Matt could feel rage rising within him and desperately tried to force it down. But Dr. Rivas’s next statement took him by surprise.

  “I agree, mi patrón. She’s too good for him. But consider this: As long as we have Listen and Mbongeni—especially Mbongeni—Glass Eye won’t dare to attack Opium. He needs the boy for spare parts.” The doctor smiled a friendly, all-encompassing smile. You could almost believe that he wouldn’t say boo to a baby, let alone harvest it. “They’re our insurance policy.”

  And they were, Matt realized. They would give him breathing space to renovate the hospital, cure the eejits, and replace the opium with real crops. Later he could deal with the problem of Dabengwa, but for now he felt an enormous burden roll off his shoulders.

  He noticed that Mirasol was dawdling over the leftover watermelon slices. “Eat,” he commanded, and she, with her usual speed, obeyed.

  19

  DR. RIVAS’S SECRET

  What a huge difference the removal of Dabengwa made! Matt had taken on so many problems that he had felt paralyzed, and now he could relax. He could take his time with the other tasks. He accessed the holoport that afternoon—over Dr. Rivas’s strong objections—and contacted banks in Switzerland, South Africa, and Japan to move money into the accounts of the new doctors. He sent a message to Esperanza to find qualified nurses and lab technicians. The hospital had to be built up before they could start work on the eejits.

  Matt had never handled actual money—it wasn’t
used in Opium—but he understood the concept of buying and selling. He had studied the ebb and flow of currency and knew that so many US dollars equaled so many pesos, rubles, or rands. Banking was merely a set of numbers to Matt. It was good to have high ones, and if they fell below a certain point, you moved a few tons of opium around and magically the numbers went up again.

  Drugs were the real money. Drugs and gold. El Patrón had a lot of that, too.

  For the first time Matt appreciated the power he had. He could buy anything he wanted—a castle in Spain, a spaceship, an Egyptian pyramid—and have it shipped to him. When the boys visited, he would throw them a party that would outdo El Patrón’s birthdays, and it wouldn’t include boring speeches or stiff, formal dinners.

  What did Ton-Ton like? Soccer. Matt would have the top soccer teams from Argentina and Brazil flown in. Chacho liked music. Matt would invite the best guitarists in the world. Fidelito liked wrestlers. Or rather, Fidelito’s grandmother had liked wrestlers and told him stories about them. The little boy’s eyes lit up when he talked about El Pretzel, so called because he tied his opponents into knots. Another favorite was El Salero, the Saltshaker, who threw salt into people’s eyes when the referee wasn’t looking, but El Muñeco was the best. He was so noble he never played dirty tricks and so good-looking that girls fainted when he stepped into the ring.

  Planning the party made Matt feel feverish, and, in fact, he did have a fever. Dr. Rivas ordered him to bed, and Matt thought, I don’t have to go to bed. I’m a drug lord. I can do anything I want. But he was too tired to argue.

  He awoke refreshed and full of confidence. It was time to return to Ajo. The doctors would arrive in a few days, and he had to prepare for the party. And he missed Celia, Daft Donald, and Mr. Ortega. With his newly found power he wanted to give them all presents, but he realized that he couldn’t give them the things they really wanted. Daft Donald would want his voice back and Mr. Ortega his hearing. As for Celia, what reward was good enough for her complete devotion?

  He was feeding Mirasol breakfast in his hospital bedroom when Cienfuegos slunk in. The jefe closed the door carefully and ran a kind of wand over the walls, ceiling, and floor.

  “Expecting trouble?” Matt said, picking fragments of toast from the front of the girl’s uniform.

  “Avoiding it,” Cienfuegos said. “I declare this room free of listening devices and spy cameras.”

  “That’s good,” said Matt absently.

  “A drug lord should never be this relaxed,” the jefe said. “You act as though you haven’t a care in the world, brushing crumbs off your pet eejit, while who knows what plots are being hatched behind your back.”

  “Even El Patrón took holidays,” retorted Matt.

  “He did when he was old and had a system of bodyguards and sicarios in place. When he was young, he slept with his eyes open.”

  Matt sighed. “Should I send for Dr. Rivas?”

  “No!” Cienfuegos barked. “No,” he repeated more softly. “Dr. Rivas is the problem.”

  “How can I believe you? He saved my life.”

  The jefe pulled up a chair and leaned close, as though he expected someone to be eavesdropping. “He’s a brilliant scientist, but he has a family to protect, and that compromises him.”

  Matt took a second look at Cienfuegos as an idea began to surface in the back of his mind. “I know Dr. Rivas came here with his father, wife, and three children.”

  “The father died of a heart attack, and the wife killed herself when El Patrón turned one of their sons into an eejit. The eejit is still alive, which is amazing for someone so profoundly chipped, but the doctor has devoted his life to protecting him. I believe you saw the young man removing leaves from a pond.”

  Matt remembered. Dr. Rivas must have chosen the veranda so he could watch his son. “The other two?”

  “They work in the large observatory you saw when we flew in. What you must remember is that the doctor would do anything to protect them.” Cienfuegos leaned back, watching Matt expectantly. After a moment he said, “Waitress, go to the kitchen.” She rose at once but paused to look at Matt.

  “It’s all right. Please go to the kitchen,” the boy said.

  “Did you see that?” exclaimed the jefe after she left. “She waited to get your permission.”

  “Maybe she likes me.”

  “She was trained to obey everyone, not make choices about who to obey,” Cienfuegos said. “The cooks say she jitters when she’s away from you. That’s a danger sign. Eejits break down if they’re under too much stress, and they can die.”

  Matt was appalled. He hadn’t meant to put her in danger. “What should I do?”

  “Stop trying to awaken her, mi patrón. Let the doctors do it. Right now we have a much more important problem on our hands. Dr. Rivas has been lying to you.”

  More trouble, thought Matt. You crawl out from under one rock and another rolls into its place. He was ready to start jittering himself. “What about?”

  “It’s better if I show you. Follow my lead,” said Cienfuegos.

  Following his lead meant wandering through the gardens as the jefe explained which plants he planned to collect for Esperanza. He’d already trapped several kinds of squirrels. There were so many around all you had to do was hold out a peanut and they jumped into your arms. He was digging up wildflowers and collecting seeds. “You have to collect them as complete communities,” he explained. “You can’t mix the ones growing in alkaline soil at a thousand feet with those in acid soil at five thousand feet. You also have to collect the bacteria and fungi living with them.”

  Matt wasn’t interested in soil samples, but he guessed that the conversation was a cover for their real purpose. He knew that hidden microphones and cameras were scattered all over Paradise. El Patrón had been addicted to spying. Dr. Rivas could keep track of their movements, but what difference did that make?

  The doctor had a family, and now the idea that had begun to surface in Matt’s mind became clearer. He knew little about the outside world except what he’d seen on television. On TV people had brothers, sisters, sons, and daughters. Ton-Ton had parents. So did Chacho. Fidelito had a dearly loved grandmother.

  No one in Opium had a family except the Alacráns and their visitors. No one else got married. Until Matt had met the boys at the plankton factory, he hadn’t realized how abnormal life in Opium was.

  They came to an outdoor shrine dedicated to Jesús Malverde, and Matt was embarrassed to see a small plaster statue of the young El Patrón draped with silver charms. Cienfuegos bowed his head and crossed himself. “That’s not a real saint,” Matt said.

  “I am directing my prayer to God,” the jefe replied. “It doesn’t matter who delivers the message.”

  Directly behind the shrine was a building almost completely hidden in vines, and Matt heard a girl yell, “Don’t touch me!” It was Listen! He started to run, but Cienfuegos held him back.

  “Let me handle this,” he said. Matt saw that standing in the shadows on either side of the door were bodyguards in the distinctive black suits El Patrón had favored. So they had not all died at the funeral. Some had been kept here, and Matt wondered why. Cienfuegos casually walked toward the men and said, “I’ve come to fix the electrical problem.”

  “What electrical problem?” growled one of the guards.

  “The current is leaking into the wall, and anyone touching it gets a shock,” said the jefe.

  “Nobody told me about it,” said the other guard.

  “Dr. Rivas just contacted me. He’s afraid one of the children will get electrocuted.”

  That woke the guards up. “Crap! I didn’t know wires could leak. Have you got a pass?” the first man asked.

  “Right here.” Cienfuegos started unfolding a piece of paper, and the two men bent over to read it. Suddenly, with a speed that made Matt’s heart leap into his mouth, the jefe flicked a stun gun from a shoulder holster and shot both of them. Twice.

  “You
killed them!” the boy cried.

  “Not quite,” said Cienfuegos, prodding one of them with his foot. “You need two shots for some of these gorillas.” He bent down and relieved the men of their weapons.

  “But why? They were no danger to me. I’m the patrón.”

  “Only if they think you are,” said the jefe.

  “They’re microchipped. They can’t attack me any more than you—” The minute Matt said it, he realized his mistake. The Farm Patrolmen were chipped, and they didn’t want to be reminded of it. A look of pure fury crossed Cienfuegos’s face. He leaned against the door frame, breathing heavily.

  “Celia told you, didn’t she?” he said, shivering with repressed emotion.

  “Don’t blame her. I’m the patrón. I’m supposed to know everything,” said Matt. “She said everyone was”—he searched for a word—“controlled.”

  “You could call it that.”

  “But your intelligence isn’t harmed,” Matt said, trying to preserve the jefe’s honor.

  “Too bad they didn’t leave my soul alone.” Cienfuegos laughed shakily. “Dr. Rivas is probably wetting his pants right now if he’s watching the monitors. Come on. You have to know what he’s hiding.”

  20

  THE BUG

  Matt looked back, expecting to see more bodyguards running through the garden, but the paths were empty. Inside the building was a large room with swings and a jungle gym and beds. Eejit caretakers were stationed around the walls. One table was set up with art supplies. Another had pitchers of lemonade and sandwiches. It was an ordinary playground for children, or what Matt supposed was ordinary. He’d only seen such things on TV.

  Mbongeni was sucking on the bars of a large cage, the floor of which was littered with stuffed toys. He seemed happy enough. Listen’s legs were poking out from under a bed, and Matt ran over and dragged her out. “Give her back, you stupid ca-ca face!” a boy roared from the shadows.