Forests of the Night Read Online Free PDF Page A

temples. It was sandy and coarse, and in the last year he’d let it grow till it touched his shoulders. Back when he was young and vain and wanted more than anything for a woman to fall in love with him, he’d kept his hair short and tried to style it in the modern way, but it was so thick it ruined combs and defied brushes. Now he simply used his fingers when it was snarled.
    â€œAnd those slick baby cheeks, yeah, I can picture how it happened. Some dark-eyed Pocahontas gets down and dirty with a square-jawed Irish stud. Quite a mix. I know a guy, a photographer down in South Beach, one look at you, he’d faint. He’s always searching for that one-of-a-kind primitive mojo. Of course, you probably wouldn’t want your picture in a fashion magazine, would you? Post-office walls, that’s more your style.”
    Jacob waited. Polite. He forced himself to smile.
    â€œTell me something, okay?”
    Jacob was silent.
    â€œYou’re an Indian, you live in the goddamn forest, commune with the birds and beasts. How come you don’t go milk a rattlesnake or something? You gotta buy your poison from people like me?”
    â€œThat’s not a skill I have, milking rattlesnakes.”
    â€œBut you know what I mean. Your ancestors, they didn’t have to buy venom. They got their own. Brewed it up, whatever the hell they did.”
    â€œI have my own ways,” Jacob said. “My own reasons.”
    â€œWhat happened to self-sufficient? That’s what Indians do, right? They live off the land, commune with the spirits, rub two sticks together.”
    â€œThose days are a long time gone.”
    â€œWell, you’re a disappointment,” she said. “You’re my first Indian and look at me, I’m standing here full of disillusionment.”
    â€œVenom from the forest would provide clues to those who pursue me.”
    She considered it for a moment.
    â€œYeah, okay,” she said. “That makes sense. Throw them off.”
    Jacob watched the fish circling the pool, rolling and diving.
    â€œYou know about cone snails?” Shirlee said. “ Conus purpurascens .”
    â€œI’m prepared to learn.”
    â€œI found this kid, he’s doing a postdoc down in Miami, studying neuropharmacology. They’re producing some shit-kicking hallucinogens these days, painkillers you wouldn’t believe. One taste, you’re gone for a week, flying wherever the hell in the universe you want to go, then you wake up, you’re fine, no hangover, nothing. Amazing shit. This kid, he’s hard up for cash, got some kind of habit, poor guy. So we worked out a deal, our mutual benefit. And yours, too.”
    â€œI don’t want to hallucinate,” Jacob said.
    â€œYeah, yeah, I know. You want to wax somebody, ship ’em to the embalmer. Sure. That’s what I’m talking about, cone-snail venom. Same stuff, different strength, that’s all. A tiny bit gets you high, a little more kills the pain, and a teensy bit more gets you dead. It’s all about portion control.”
    She drew on her pipe and blew out a stream near his face.
    â€œFirst phase hits like cobra toxin, second phase like puffer-fish venom. Different peptide fractions cause different nerve reactions. Paralysis, numbness, total shutdown of neurological receptors. One peptide targets skeletal muscle sodium, another does neuronal calcium channels. Bottom line, this is seriously bad shit. A little dab’ll do. Three seconds your guy is frozen, can’t breathe, three seconds later, you got yourself a corpse.”
    Jacob nodded again.
    â€œThat’s what you want, then? A cone-snail cocktail?”
    â€œHow much does five thousand dollars buy?”
    â€œWith or without the blow job?”
    â€œJust the venom.”
    She drew on the pipe again, but the weed had gone out, so she tapped out the remains into the flowering red plants that filled the beds behind