“The secret of successful education,” the Mushroom Master said wisely as Ton-Ton moled around the fungus gardens with pipes, “is finding out how a particular person learns.”
* * *
Matt fulfilled his promise to take Listen to the oasis. He worried that she would destroy the quiet nature of the place, but she seemed awestruck by it. “We won’t tell the others,” she said. “They don’t need a secret world, but we do. Those sure are some funny-looking rocks.”
Matt looked up at the range he’d climbed to escape Opium. “That’s how I got to Aztlán. There’s a ridge of mountains where you can see all the opium farms at once.”
“I don’t mean those,” the little girl said impatiently. “I mean these.”
And Matt saw the rocks that surrounded the old miner’s cabin and collapsed grapevine. They were some distance away, on three sides with the fourth side opening onto the small lake. In the middle, next to the water, was the campsite where he and Tam Lin had toasted hot dogs.
Now he saw what Listen was talking about. The color and texture were strange. He walked to the nearest one and scratched it with his pocketknife. It was very hard, but a few brown flakes came loose. “This looks like some kind of metal ore,” he said.
“Dr. Rivas had a box that looked like that,” said Listen. “He put an eejit inside. He was trying to block out something, but he wouldn’t tell me what.”
Matt remembered asking Tam Lin why they could sleep so soundly at the oasis with mosquitoes whining in their ears and the hard earth underneath. ’Tis not bodily comfort we need, Tam Lin had replied, but the mind at ease. Something about the rocks holds back the cares of the world. This is the only place in Opium I’ve felt free.
Of course. The metal ore blocked the energy from the Scorpion Star. “What happened to the eejit?” he asked.
“He was okay as long as he was inside, but he went rogue the minute he got out. Dr. Rivas tried it about a hundred times.” Listen yawned and lay down on the sand next to the water.
* * *
That left only the Bug to deal with. If El Bicho had learned anything from being treated kindly—gratitude, for example—no one saw evidence of it. He was as vicious and demanding as ever. Finally, after consulting everyone, Matt asked permission to install the child in the Brat Enclosure. “My opinion, which you won’t listen to, is that we put him to sleep like the rabid coyote he is,” said Cienfuegos.
“I thought you didn’t have homicidal impulses anymore,” said Matt.
“A few may have been overlooked,” admitted the jefe.
“We’ve had bichos like him before,” said the Mushroom Master. “We treat them with love, and if that doesn’t work, we give them an extra-long Dormancy to be sure they don’t do harm when they wake up.”
As for El Bicho, he approached the Brat Enclosure with suspicion. He found the peaceful groups of children threatening, and he immediately destroyed a sand castle they had built. The children only looked at him and began building another. “Do you remember the Scorpion Star?” Matt asked him. “This is its original. When you grow up, you’ll join the scientists. You’ll be one of them and never be lonely again.”
The Bug looked at Matt as though he were a rat dropping. But he went willingly into the enclosure, and the last they saw of him, he was squatting by a pool with other children, feeding giant carp with rice balls. “Do you know,” said Matt, “his hand has started to grow back. It’s like he’s a frog or something.”
“Then he’ll fit right in here,” the Mushroom Master said tranquilly. “We admire frogs.”
* * *
One moonlit night Matt flew María over the sand dunes west of Yuma. They passed the ruins of the old city, a sketchwork of deserted houses and dry fields. To the south was the glow of San Luis on the border of Aztlán, and when they went close to the ground, María gasped. “Those are bones! There are skeletons down there!”
“Cienfuegos told me about this,” said Matt. “They’re only visible under the full moon, and sometimes they’re hidden by shifting sand. Those are the bones of Illegals who tried to cross over.”
“So many,” said María.
“They’ve had a hundred years to accumulate. It’s extremely hot and dry here. El Patrón didn’t bother to send out the Farm Patrol.”
“But why didn’t their own governments stop them?”
Matt looked out over the thousands and thousands of skeletons strewn like a ghost army over the earth. “These were surplus people. They had few skills that Aztlán and the United States wanted. The governments were glad to get rid of them.”
“This must never happen again,” said María, with a firmness that reminded Matt of her mother.
“I’ve been thinking about that,” he said. “I have to fix the border so that other people can open it in an emergency. Power has been in the hands of one man for too long. But there are problems with giving people freedom. Some of them will abuse it. Both Cienfuegos and Sor Artemesia say it’s inevitable. Cienfuegos says he can organize the Farm Patrol into a decent police force, and Sor Artemesia will try to look after people’s souls. Our old, predictable lives are going to change.” He idled the hovercraft over the dunes, and it bobbed gently on a cushion of antigravity.
“I’m thinking of not opening the border until people adjust to the new system. We’ll soon be self-sufficient, especially if we can persuade women to join us. I’m thinking of turning Opium into a larger biosphere, or as close to it as we can get.”
“The drug dealers won’t like it,” María pointed out.
“Crot the drug dealers,” said Matt. “It will be an adventure, and it may not work, but it’s worth trying. And one thing more, mi vida.”
She turned toward him.
“I want to marry you.”
She smiled mischievously, so like the lady in the Goya painting. “I’m only fifteen, you know. It’s illegal.”
“I’m fifteen too, and I’m the Lord of Opium. I say it’s legal.”
“Mother will be furious.”
“That’s one of the side benefits,” said Matt. They said nothing for a while.
María gazed out at the field of bones, and the moonlight painted the world with a pale blue light. “You sure picked a weird place to propose,” she said.
“I think it’s peaceful.”
“You’ll have to bring in a real priest. I’m not going to be a drug lord’s floozy.”
“You can have ten priests if you want them.”
“You’re crazy, but okay. I accept. After all, who’s going to say no to the Lord of Opium?”
“Only the Lady of Opium,” he said, putting his arms around her.
APPENDIX
JESÚS MALVERDE
Jesús Malverde is a Robin Hood figure known as the “generous bandit” and “angel of the poor” because he stole from the rich and gave to the poor. He was supposedly killed on May 3, 1909, a day that is celebrated at his shrines. He is an unofficial saint who isn’t recognized by the Catholic Church. People pray to him for many things—good health, money, family problems, and finding a job—but he is best known as the patron saint of drug dealers, especially those from Sinaloa. There is no evidence that he was involved with drugs during his life.