The Memory Artists - Jeffrey Moore [80]
“And his mother? What’s she like? Have you met her?”
“No. In Norval’s words, she’s a vulgar, nether-class banlieusarde, given to hysteria and lovers. Which he’s never forgiven her for—that and the fact that she spends most of her time at a nudist resort and votes for Le Pen.”
“But that’s not enough to hate her, surely?”
“She cheated on his father when Norval was a little boy. So he feels betrayed, neglected—especially when a parade of men, one after the other, began to fill up the house.”
Samira nodded, bit her lip, began to think of something else. Dissolute, pathologically violent? Is that what he said? Which may explain … She watched the beside clock blink greenly from 8:59 to 9:00. “Do you know what ‘K’ is?”
“K?”
“I found a vial of it … somewhere, and I want to know what it is. Could it be potassium? It’s a white powder.”
“Well, potassium is silver-white. But it’s explosively reactive—it oxidises when exposed to air and reacts violently with water, so it’s always stored under a liquid that it doesn’t … you know, react with. What kind of vial was it in?”
“Is there anything else it could be?”
“Well … lots of things. I don’t know. Where’d you find it?”
“Uh, well … in an alleyway.”
“In an alleyway? In that case, it could be ketamine, which is quite popular these days. It’s also known as Special K, Kit Kat …”
“Which is …?”
“An anaesthetic. Veterinary and medical.”
Samira looked puzzled. “Oh, maybe that’s what it is.”
“At lower doses it has dissociative and psychedelic effects—it’s used to produce the ‘near-death experience.’”
“Really?” Oh, I get it now. It’s one of Norval’s hallucinogens.
“It’s usually combined with rohypnol. It’s a date-rape drug.”
Samira’s jaw sagged. So I was right about that man. He’s worse than the populations of Sodom and Gomorrah combined. “Oh shit. You’re not serious. So Norval’s a date rapist.”
“Norval? What’s Norval got to do with—”
“And maybe I was next.”
“Next? Oh no, I think you’ve got the wrong—”
“I found it in a drawer beside his bed! Maybe that’s how he gets through his freaking alphabet! Hold on, I’ll be right back.”
“Look at this,” said Samira, minutes later. She set down the vial on Noel’s
bed table, hard.
“Really, Sam, I don’t think—”
“I knew there was something … satanic about him. The party I went to a few weeks ago ... somehow Norval is behind all that. It wasn’t just a coincidence he stepped into that elevator.”
“But … that doesn’t make any sense. It’s not his style. He doesn’t need drugs to seduce women.”
“And at JJ’s party, that line about ‘excess and the palace of wisdom’— I think I heard it as I was being drugged. Or when I came to. Maybe it was Norval who said it—it’s something he would say, isn’t it?”
“Well … possibly.” He has said it before, Norval recalled. More than once. He picked up the vial, which he recognised as one of Dr. Vorta’s, and held it up to the light. “And that’s all you remember? Was it Norval’s voice?”
“I … I’m not sure.”
Noel unscrewed the vial, inserted his baby finger. He looked closely at the colourless crystals before putting them lightly against his tongue.
“Special K?” Samira asked.
Coloured C’s and H’s and the numbers two and three began to bounce inside Noel’s head like lottery balls. “Chloral hydrate.”
“What does it do? Make women unconscious, comatose?”
“It’s a sedative. And hypnotic.”
“I knew it!”
“It’s being used in one of Dr. Vorta’s studies. He thinks that it may be the future for treating certain types of brain cancer.”
“Brain cancer? I don’t get it. Why would Norval keep a bottle of … He doesn’t have cancer, surely to God?”
“Not that I know of.”
Oh hell. She remembered his words about ending his days in water. After Z, I’m dead … She looked again at the Polaroid of him in the frame of the oval mirror. “But why was it … next to his bed? And why does it say ‘K’ on the label?”
“Klor ortanca. It comes from a lab in Istanbul. I’m pretty sure he just uses it for insomnia.”
Samira nodded slowly, her face strained.