By this process of elimination she was able to cut the number of suspects by half. That still left nigh-on twenty possibles, however, and no amount of filtering or compare-and-contrasting could seem to get that total any lower. Each man was as much Conquistador material as the next. The business executive? The blueblood? The publishing tycoon? The tlachtli team manager? Which?
There was nothing else for it. Mal jotted down the remaining candidates’ names on a sheet of paper, then left the building. She went out into Campbell-Bannerman Street, the broad thoroughfare formerly known as Victoria Street, renamed after the prime minister who signed the peace accord with the Empire, embraced the faith and became Britain’s first ever High Priest — all on the same day. A few blocks down from the Yard, there was a twenty-four-hour pharmacy. Mal approached the counter and asked for a vision quest package. The pharmacist demanded to be shown ID. The sight of Mal’s Jaguar Warrior badge knocked some of the snootiness out of him.
“That seems to be in order, madam,” he said. “One has to be careful. One doesn’t sell vision quest packages to just anybody. The law prohibits… but then you already know what the law prohibits.” He was flustered.
“Don’t panic, I’m not here to bust you. Unless you’ve been selling drug tinctures to people who aren’t certified sane enough to use, which I’m sure you haven’t.”
“Indeed not! Never!”
“Then we’re fine. I really am here to buy a package, that’s all.”
“Then let me be of service. Any particular preference? What sort of vision are you hoping to achieve? Prognostication? Communion with the gods? Self-realisation? Recreation? We have tinctures to suit all sorts, all of them naturally sourced and prepared according to time-honoured recipes.”
“I’m looking for answers. I need to make a choice.”
“Any specific choice?”
“Between men.”
The pharmacist interpreted this in a certain way and raised an eyebrow. “You’re after a husband?”
“No, I’m not. And I hope you’re not volunteering.”
He wanted to snipe back at her, but couldn’t. It didn’t pay to get lippy with a Jaguar. “I misunderstood. I beg your pardon.”
“I’m just after… clarity, I suppose. Insight into a dilemma.”
“Ah. Might I recommend, then, a draught of psilocybin mixed with honey? It’s traditional, highly palatable, goes down a treat, and the effects are gentle but potent. I prepare it specially myself, from mushrooms grown by reputable wholesalers, and my customers report back that the results are always satisfactory and that — ahem — ‘bad trips’ are rare.”
“Okay. If that fits the bill. I’ll take one dose.”
“Might I enquire whether you’ve had experience with hallucinogens before, madam?”
“A little. I used to dabble. Nowadays, not so much.”
“Are you on any medication?”
“No.”
“Do you have any underlying chronic health problems?”
“No.”
“Any ailments or diseases you’re presently suffering from?”
“Only premature mortality syndrome,” Mal muttered under her breath.
“Excuse me?”
“Nothing. No diseases.”
“Splendid. I’ve just mixed up a fresh batch of ‘magic honey,’ as it happens. It’s in the cold store. Back in a jiffy.”
Mal took the psilocybin-honey draught home. The pharmacist recommended using it in a familiar, comfortable environment. That would help anchor her, in the event of “problems” occurring. He also suggested she void bladder and bowels beforehand, wear a loose-fitting garment, keep the telephone to hand just in case, and light a single candle but place it well out of reach where it couldn’t be accidentally knocked over. He wished her luck on her vision quest and handed her a receipt so that she could claim back the cost of the trip on expenses.
Mal set everything up as suggested. She sat herself cross-legged on the floor in a cotton kimono. The candle flickered on the mantelshelf. She held up the little phial of amber-yellow liquid, studying it by the dim flame light. At last she unstoppered it, raised it to her lips, took a deep breath, then swigged the tincture down in one gulp.
This was it. No going back now.
She placed the sheet of paper with the suspects’ names on it in front of her, propping it up against a cushion. She ran her gaze over the list countless times until she had memorised them all. Then she closed her eyes.
The sickly-sweet taste of the tincture clogged the back of her throat. She listened to the sounds in the flat — the whir of the air conditioning in the bedroom, the churn of the refrigerator in the kitchen, the occasional moth’s wingbeat of the candle as it guttered. She listened to the city noises outside too, and the floorboard-creaking footfalls of the young couple in the flat above as they prepared for bed. She hoped they weren’t about to indulge in one of their marathon sex sessions. That could definitely mess with her trip, hearing the accelerating thudding of bedstead against wall and the rising moans and groans that seemed to last forever.
The names, Mal told herself. Fix your focus on the names, nothing else.
She felt odd. She felt light-headed. It passed. Then it returned, and her consciousness seemed to narrow inside her brain, becoming attenuated, like a wisp of smoke. There was herself and another self. She was Mal Vaughn, the physical entity, and a separate Mal Vaughn, a traveller in her body, a driver, a woman at the wheel who was gradually taking her hands off the controls. The car was coasting to a halt. It was on a night road somewhere, at a clifftop, far above a crashing sea. The cliff was extraordinarily tall, so high she couldn’t hear the sea any more. There were only stars. She was up among constellations, where the gods flew. The stars were points of ice, not suns. They had no heat. If you touched them they could cut like diamonds. You could pluck them out of the earth, if you wished to, like a miner in a mine. With your rock hammer and chisel you could dig pure raw starstuff out of the ground, the elements of creation, brilliant glints in the darkness. Mal was down below and up above at once, at the same time, in a confined space and surrounded by infinite space. Two things simultaneously. Opposites. Oneness in duality.
Almost as if on instinct, she latched on to that. Oneness in duality. A basic tenet of faith. One of the fundamentals of the Aztec religion. But also the Conquistador. What was he but two people in one, one person acting as two? He was contradiction. He had his real face and his public face. He had the face he saw in the mirror every day and his other face, his masked face, his not-face, the one he was famed for. He was a known unknown. He was a presence who was an absence. He was a celebrity whose identity was a secret. His truth was a falsehood. His pretence was a fact. His existence was nonexistent.
Who are you?
The names cycled through Mal’s mind. The names had colours. No, the names were colours. Each came with its own particular shade, its own suite of emotions and resonances. Some were brighter, brasher than others. They flared and swirled. Some came to the fore, others retreated into the background. They were like a painting she could walk through. Some were hot to the touch, others cool. They formed arches, corridors, labyrinthine crystalline structures.
Who are you? Tell me.
The names blurred and sharpened as though a camera was pulling focus, trying to zoom in on distant objects, fathoming depth of field. They echoed, speaking themselves. They became a jumble of syllables, overlapping, fusing together in new and unintelligible amalgamations. She was losing hold. Her grip on the vision was slipping. The names were melting, growing meaningless, the blabbering idiolect of a pre-speech infant.
Come on!
One of them must be her man. One of them, she was sure, had to be the key to the Conquistador.
Remember them. Remember the names.
There was Charles Wooding. There was Christopher Martin. There was Christopher Wooding. No. Martin Christopher. Christin Martopher. Inopher Chrismart.
No. Try again. Try harder.
Will Wood. No. Will Wilson. No. Wilson Willing.
