Paul Theroux - Blinding Light

His eyes were always working; his fingers, too — always flexing. He had a scavenger’s restlessness. And now, while Steadman and Ava were listening to the objections of the others, who were shocked at the prospect of spending another night in the Secoya village, Manfred was making a circuit of the settlement, looking hungry and moving swiftly, his greedy eyes twitching busily in his jerking head.

On his return he nodded to Steadman. He gestured to him, indicating that he wanted to speak to him alone.

“You want to try something else?”

Ava said, “What did you find?”

But Manfred, who had shown no interest in Ava, did not turn to her. He kept his attention on Steadman, in the confiding and familiar way that unsettled him, as though Manfred assumed that Steadman was a friend, or if not an ally, then at least pliable. He walked a little distance, where a torn web dangled like a rag, and beckoned to Steadman.

“This is not yimsonweed,” he said when Steadman wandered over to him. Manfred was pinching a twig still bearing leaves and thin ragged flowers. He sniffed it and held it close to Steadman’s face. “Is a clone of Brugmansia. You see the leaves so shredded? The flowers — just strings? Its name is Methysticodendron. This is so rare, no one sees this but just a few lucky botanists. And maybe it did not exist before.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means datura — highly atrophied.”

“What happens with it?”

“I know a man, one German from Koblenz, who came through here. He was a chemist. He wanted to synthesize the alkaloids in this clone. They said, ‘Try it first.’ It was a scopolamine crystal. It blitzed him.”

“Ayahuasca blitzed me,” Steadman. “I’ve had all the visions I can handle.”

“No visions,” Manfred said. “I know a little about this one. They make tea from the leaves and stems. I read it in my book. Take the scrapings in an aqueous maceration.” Steadman suppressed the urge to smile at the way Manfred sucked at his saliva as he said this. “It is great. It change your head, it give you experiences. Only the question of money, but you have money.”

Steadman glanced at Nestor, who was implacable, picking his teeth. “So what’s the point?”

Manfred said to Nestor, “He wants to know,” but Nestor just shrugged — knowing yet noncommittal.

Steadman said, “Why are you telling me this, Manfred?”

“Don’t you see?” Ava said. She had walked over to listen with Nestor. “It’s something that costs money. He doesn’t want to pay.”

Even then, Manfred did not look at her. Instead, he shortened his neck and clenched his jaw, making it as compact as a clutch of mandibles. All his teeth bunched in his mouth, bulging against his lips.

Nestor smiled at Steadman, but his smile meant nothing except a challenge or a contradiction. He said, “In the Oriente you find out about these drinks after you drink them.”

“Experience,” Manfred said. “He knows.”

“Knowledge,” Nestor said. “Some people call that borrachero. Or toé. Ask Señor Perito. Mr. Hexpert.”

“What about the others?” Steadman asked.

He indicated the two couples, who, a little distance away, just out of earshot, were squatting on logs near the covered platform, looking disconsolate, wanting to leave, hating the smoke and the smells, dreading the night they would have to endure in the village.

“Rich tourists,” Manfred said.

The same casual belittling thought was in Steadman’s mind, and it so annoyed him to hear this irritating man put it in words, he told himself that the description might be wrong. One of them appeared to be enjoying his book. And, after all, these people were doing the same thing he was. Like them, hoping for an adventure, he had hooked up with Nestor for the ayahuasca. The truth was that they were all on the same drug tour.

“You are not like them. You are an intelligent man — a wise man. Also brave.” He tapped the side of his nose. “I know this. If you want to try it, we must do it now.”

Steadman said, “Nestor, who else has done this?”

“Not many people. No one lately. It doesn’t work on everyone, and it costs more. Five hundred each.”

Without saying yes, Steadman said, “Five is doable.”

“The Secoya don’t take credit cards,” Nestor said.

“Maybe you can loan me some money,” Manfred said.

Ava jarred him with a laugh. She said, “‘Loan’ never means loan.”

“I researched the information,” Manfred said, nagging again. “What about the time factor? I negotiated with the Indian. I am facilitating.”

Nestor said, “I’ll just let you guys argue it out.”

“See? I told you,” Ava said. “He doesn’t want to pay.”

As though to put an end to the argument, she walked away with Nestor, back to where the others were standing, looking futile.

“I know who you are,” Manfred said, putting his face into Steadman’s. “Ever since Lago Agrio.”

“You saw a passport at the hotel.”

“Yes, but even if I never see it, I know,” Manfred said. “You are different from those people. In the van I think, There is something about this man. And I see you writing notes.”

“What do you want?”

“I want your story for my book.”

“I’m not who you think I am, and I don’t have a story,” Steadman said, defying him and at the same time impressed that all this time Manfred knew who he was. “But even if I was and I had a story, why should I give it to you?”

He was not amazed by Manfred’s presumption — writers he regarded as headhunters. This was typical, the arrogant conceit of the writer who took everything and used what he wanted; the same presumption was often in his own mind. And Steadman was annoyed again, because the German was giving voice to one of his own ideas, an ambition that was still unfulfilled, and his saying it aloud — like “rich tourists”—made it seem oversimple but valid. Steadman did not know what he wanted to write, but whatever it was, he wanted it to be his own, original, unexpected story, not something a stranger could guess at. And that was precisely what Manfred had guessed.

“I want your story” was the sort of thing a dwarf with an evil insect’s face might say, bargaining with the harassed hero of a folktale.

Manfred was still holding the unusual plant with the strange torn-looking leaves and the even stranger blossoms. He dangled it, his eyes blazing, and said, “I have made the arrangement. Without me you cannot do it.” He breathed harshly through his mouth. “And this is something incredible.”

Whenever it became obvious that someone was brazenly trying to fob something off on him, Steadman felt his attention slacken and he lost interest. The more forceful and creative the sales pitch, the more Steadman resisted, seeing the salesman as an obvious buffoon. A persuasive sales pitch was no pitch at all, but rather something like a tremor that caused a distinct throb of aversion. The odd thing was that, knowing all this, seeing Manfred’s motive as transparent, and even sensing resistance rising in himself as Manfred grew shriller, he still wanted to know more. And he was fascinated by his own reaction — that he was allowing this grubby wheedling man to tempt him with the misshapen blossom on the twisted twig.

Ava seemed to understand that Steadman was listening. She walked from where Nestor was crouching and said, “If you give this German any money, you're nuts.

Manfred said, “Yah, I am just a German,” but his accent so overwhelmed him, his protest was a Teutonic yawp, which almost gagged him on the word Chermin. “When you see me, you see a German. Do you see a Jew when you see the woman Sabra? Oh, we are bad people. We persecuted the Jews. So we made our fate. We are the Jews now. You can say anything about a German and no one will schrei at you.”