Gary Braver - Elixir

It had begun thirteen days ago. They had trekked out from the Tifalmin village gathering flora samples to take back to the States. Chris was a medicinal chemist working for Darby Pharmaceuticals, a Boston laboratory pioneering the synthesis of folk medicines. With the discovery that alkaloids from Catharantus roseus shrunk tumors from Hodgkin's disease, Darby had entered a race with other commercial labs, convinced that miracle drugs grew on trees. Specifically, Chris was testing for plant steroids capable of conversion to animal steroids for contraceptive purposes. Darby's goal was to produce the world's first male birth-control pill-a goal that, once realized, would rocket company stock to high heaven.

Chris Bacon was the Darby point man because he was their premier researcher and because he knew the Papuan bush. The son of the American ambassador to Australia in the late 1950s, Chris had attended Boys' Royal Academy in Port Moresby where at age fourteen he met Iwati, one of the few highland youths to attend the Academy. In 1943, Iwati's village had helped Australian-American forces build the airstrip near Tifalmin village, giving the Allies an interior foothold and access to the chincona tree whose bark was used to produce quinine, the most effective treatment for malaria. It was the Tifalmin's first contact with men with white skin and steel-a contact that resulted in Iwati growing up speaking English. And because he was bright, an Australian missionary group sponsored his education. Both diabetics, they met at the school's infirmary to have their blood sugar monitored and to receive insulin. Over the four years Chris and Iwati became friends-a relationship cemented forever during their last summer when Chris saved Iwati's life. Ironically, the boy was raised on the banks of the Sepik River but had never learned to swim-a fact Chris discovered when another boy pushed him into the deep end of a pool. Iwati went down like a rock and would have drowned had it not been for Chris.

Like his father before him, Iwati was the Tifalmin medicine man. In spite of the juju trinkets and mumbo-jumbo, he was thoroughly westernized, wearing Bermuda shorts, a Harvard T-shirt, and a new Bulova watch Chris had brought, while his men trudged through the bush naked but for penis gourds. Like his father, Iwati had a genius for telling which plants healed and which killed-a genius that brought Chris halfway around the globe. Iwati had a plant for every ailment-fevers, toothaches, ulcers, snakebites, lesions, malaria, and syphilis. And they pointed to the future of western world medicine.

For the third time in two years, Darby had sent Chris packing. But this time he managed to bring company money to build a school in the Tifalmin village. A long-term investment in shaman magic. And now it was to end in spears and arrows.

Chris cocked the gun and held his breath.

No trick of the light. No paranoid delusion. A figure took form out of the clotted shadows in the vines.

"Come out, you son-of-a-bitch!" Chris said.

The figure stopped, and for a moment the jungle turned to still life.

Suddenly the silence shattered in shrieks from all directions as the figure came rushing down on Chris. On reflex he shot and didn't stop until all six chambers of the Colt were empty and he was clicking at a naked body tied at the feet by vines and twisting in the air.

From the shoulder scarification marks, he recognized Maku, one of the porters. His chest had been shot open by the bullets, but he was already dead. His head was missing.

In horror Chris watched the body swing until it came to rest just feet away. He tore bullets off his belt to reload when a dozen Okamolu warriors materialized from the shadows, forming a circle around him, and jabbing the air with spears. Before Chris could reload, a little wrinkled man came up to him. He was naked like the rest but for a long white plume through his nose, a neckband crescent, and a headdress of feathers. His face was striped with white paint. The juju man.

In his hand was a spear with Maku's head still dripping blood. He approached Chris, jabbering in a tongue he didn't recognize. Chris tried to concentrate on slipping rounds into the chambers, but the juju man pushed Maku's head into his face. Black flies swarmed around it. He could smell the blood. Dark warm fluids dripped onto his shoes, making his gorge rise.

The juju man's eyes were wild and his mouth was bright red from chewing betel nuts. Every few seconds he would spit thick wads of red, as if he'd removed the head with his teeth. With his free hand he touched Chris's face and arms as if testing for paint. He yelled something, and his men mumbled back like a chorus. One of them shouted something angry, and the others agreed. It sounded like a death warrant. At once they began to chant and jab the air with their weapons again. As the old man backed away for clear shots, a ululating howl stunned the spears in place.

From the bush stepped a large man wearing a skirt of laplap grass and an elaborate bird-of-paradise headdress. What gave him a particularly fearsome appearance was the bright yellow face paint and red circled eyes. Instead of the shaman necklace of shells he wore a cord studded with crocodile teeth and weighted by a shrunken human head.

In perfect English he said, "They won't harm you."

Iwati.

He walked past Chris to the juju man and said something in a clear, even voice. Chris didn't understand a word, but the effect was immediate. The old man mumbled something, and the warriors lowered their weapons. Then, incredibly, they bobbed their heads in supplication.

Chris quickly loaded his gun. "You won't need that," Iwati said.

"Christ, man, look what they did." Maku's carcass dangled just feet away, blood still pouring from the neck hole.

Iwati nodded. "They won't harm you."

It wasn't just his appearance that held Chris. It was the Okamolu's reaction. They looked more like frightened schoolboys than notorious flesh-eaters.

"How come they're so scared? They've seen white men before."

Iwati did not answer.

"What do they want?"

"Just curious." Then Iwati said something in bush tongue.

The juju man muttered something to his men. He was dismissing them, and they looked grateful to leave. They turned around, then filed back into the black tangle the way they came. Before disappearing, each one looked back. And Chris could swear that what he saw in their faces was raw fear.

They buried the remains of Maku in a clearing and built a fire on the site to keep away scavengers. While the porters were back at camp, Iwati led Chris to the lake. The water looked like black glass. Silhouetted against the afterglow of the sun was the ancient Omafeki cone. A refreshing breeze had picked up, relieving the air of the nauseating sweetness. From under some mats of palms Iwati pushed out a small log canoe.

"Where're we going?"

Iwati pointed over the water. In the dim light, Chris could see a small island, maybe a quarter mile off shore. "What's out there?" he asked. Iwati didn't answer.

Chris squatted in front while Iwati paddled toward the island, guided by the moonlight. The closer they got, the more intense the sickening odor became. They pulled up at a small clearing surrounded by trees festooned with long vines. Chris made a move to get out when Iwati stopped him. From his sack he removed the carcass of a small tree kangaroo and hurled it high toward shore. In the moonlight Chris watched it arch to where the flowers hung. A split second before it splashed down, something huge exploded from the depths and caught it. Some violent thrashing and the rolling flash of underbelly; then it disappeared into the black. A massive crocodile.

"He waits for birds," Iwati said.

The animal surfaced in the distance, its tail etching a sinuous wake in the moonlight as it glided away like some ancient sentinel having collected his fee.