Iris Johansen - Dark Summer

"In spite of what you told me about not listening to him, you seem to be willing to follow his advice." She followed him out into the sunlight. "I can understand wanting to follow a dying man's wishes about the disposal of his remains. But you could have gotten into trouble."

He shrugged. "I was in trouble all the time anyway." He dropped down on a flat, smooth rock outside the cave entrance. "Sit down. The heat radiates and comes up out of this rock and eases every muscle in your body."

"Not scientific." But he was right, the heat was wonderfully soothing. "But good."

"Paco used to sit here in the afternoons." He took a drink of water and closed his eyes. He looked lazy and totally sensual, half-naked, with the sun stroking the bronze smoothness of his bare skin. "Sometimes I'd sit with him. He wouldn't let me talk. He said those were the moments to repair the soul. Usually I was too restless to worry about my soul and took off after a few minutes. Later, I wished I'd spent more time with him."

"We always want to get those moments back after we lose someone." She lifted the bottle to her lips. "Marrok doesn't sound Apache. Did you take your mother's name?"

"Why would I do that?" He opened his lids and took another drink. "She cared nothing about me."

"You don't know that. Sometimes circumstances get in the way."

"And sometimes a baby gets in the way if a woman wants to be free. My father used to talk about her sometimes when he was stoned. Pale ivory skin, fine Castilian features and eyes dark as night. He wanted her back. Not me. I didn't need her. I didn't want her either."

"Your name?" she prompted.

"Now what would be a good name for a half-breed? Joseph Running Deer?"

"It's a beautiful name."

"But not mine." He took another drink. "Though I was once called Joseph. I changed it when I came to live with Paco."

"A new start to a new life?"

"Maybe. Something like that. Paco didn't care what I called myself."

"How did Paco die?"

He looked out at the horizon. "Danner killed him."

Her gaze flew to his face.

"Not personally. He hires people for that kind of job. He had him beaten to death."

Shock jagged through her. "Good God."

"I didn't think there was much good about God that night. I found Paco down on the plateau, where they'd dumped him like a heap of garbage."

"How did you know it was Danner?"

"Paco wrote about it in his book of spells. He was expecting it to happen. He'd made preparations."

"Against Danner? Dammit, I want to know about this Danner. Details, not vague bullshit."

"From the beginning?" He took another drink of water. "Danner grew up poor and never got enough power or money. He was the son of a missionary who dragged him all over the world into jungles and third-world villages to preach the gospel. He hated the life, but he was exposed to all varieties of primitive herbal medicines and cures. From voodoo priests to jungle witch doctors. Some of the cures and potions seemed to work, and he thought he'd found a way to get away from a life he hated and onto the gravy train. He became a chemist and went back into the wilds and began to 'appropriate' the secrets of those primitive tribes. Two years later he sold an arthritis painkiller to a pharmaceutical company for a staggering amount of money. After that he was on his way. In the next twenty years several homeopathic cures and little-known herbal breakthroughs paved his way to billions."

"If he's so rich, why would he be doing this?"

"I told you, for Danner there's never enough." He paused. "And all his life he's been searching for the big bonanza. The drug that would make him king of all he surveyed."

"And what is that?"

"The panacea."

She frowned. "What?"

"In every culture there are tales of a mythical drug or potion that can cure any illness."

"Mythical is right."

"But what power would a man possess if he could be the one in control of a drug like that? He could control life or death. Danner has always had a God complex. He wants to be worshipped and feared. The panacea would give him what he's been searching for all his life. To what lengths do you think he'd go to gain that power?"

"You're saying that's what's at the bottom of all this? Danner thinks he's found this panacea? Why?"

"Paco."

"That's crazy. You mean because he was a shaman, Danner thought he'd discovered a way to create this cure-all?"

"Not at first. I think word of Paco's supposed magic was probably like the rustle of the wind in a cornfield in the beginning. But Danner and his people were keeping their ears to the ground and asking questions. He believed in the potential for native healing. Why not? It had made him rich. He had feelers out all over the world for any sign of an authentic breakthrough of any sort. Our reservation was no exception. Danner began to hear stories about Paco and started to pay attention."

"What kind of stories?"

"There were occasions when Paco would visit someone terminally ill, give him an elixir, and he would get well."

"Then they obviously weren't as ill as everyone thought."

Marrok shook his head. "Oh, they were that sick. I used to go with him and sit there on the floor with Ned and watch Paco do his thing. He always insisted that I had to trail along and learn."

"You said occasions. It didn't happen all the time?"

"No. But enough times that he began to get a reputation. And that made him important enough to attract the big man to the reservation. Danner rented a house in town and began to come up here himself to talk to Paco. It was all done with great respect and courtesy." His lips twisted. "I even grew to like Danner. He treated me with the same respect as he did Paco. I was obviously not important to him, but he still spent a long time getting to know me. I didn't realize he was trying to pave the way to getting information about Paco's panacea if Paco couldn't be persuaded. Even after he found out how little Paco confided in me, he was still friendly, even fatherly toward me. Hell, he was a rich, important man who thought two no-account Indians were worth his time. I wasn't used to that."

"Did he find out anything from Paco?"

"Not then. But he was a patient man. He was willing to watch and wait and make sure all the talk about Paco wasn't bogus. He invested six years doing that."

She shook her head. "That's a long time. You must have seen through him by then."

"I wasn't there. I couldn't take the reservation life any longer and took off. I kicked around the world for a while and joined the SEALs. I came back occasionally to visit the old man, but he seemed the same and as contented as ever. I'd run into Danner now and then, and he'd greet me like a long-lost son." His lips tightened. "Now it's easy for me to read strangers. But Danner had worked himself into my good graces at a time when I was wild and needy and reaching out for any kind of understanding. He was very clever. He fooled Paco, too, until right before he died. But he must have gotten impatient and tipped his hand. One night I got a call from Paco, and he told me to come home. He said he thought Danner was going to kill him." He drew a deep breath. "He told me that even if he died, I wasn't to try to fight Danner. It would be useless. He said that I had to leave right away and protect the dogs. He said I had to promise. I thought he was out of his head."

She frowned. "What dogs? Ned?"

"Ned and three other dogs that Paco owned." He grimaced. "He didn't actually believe that he owned them. They were his friends. He didn't like people much. Dogs were a part of his life ever since I can remember. He said Danner would be after the dogs, and I had to make sure they were safe."

"Why would Danner be a threat to them?"

He ignored the question. "Paco was talking fast and hard by that time. I couldn't get a word in to find out anything. He said Danner was coming, and he couldn't talk much longer. He told me to look in his book of spells. He kept saying over and over that he'd had to do it, and there wasn't any other way to keep the truth safe. He'd already told Danner that he'd destroyed the formula when he'd realized the danger it would bring him. But he couldn't destroy the dogs, and he didn't know if he'd be able to hold out and keep from telling him. He might have to tell Danner about the dogs, that it was always the dogs…" His lips tightened. "He hung up, and he didn't answer when I tried to call him back. I took off and arrived here within six hours. It was too late. He was already dead. When I came up here to the cave, I found that it had been ransacked, his medicine chest stolen, and everything else in shambles."