Seductive Poison

by Deborah Layton

I rose up. Everyone was quiet … waiting. The silence reverberated in my ears. The corner of my upper lip began to twitch. I wished I hadn’t stood up. I began to talk, then sat back down on my leg to give me more height. My audience tilted their heads and scratched their temples in unison. I could tell from their puzzled looks and furrowed brows that they had not read my affidavit.

  I spoke of my continued unsuccessful efforts to get word to my mother and brother in Guyana. The American Embassy was unhelpful, I told them, and why, after I had signed my testimony in the consul’s office in Georgetown, hadn’t an official immediately visited Jonestown? They had told me they would. Why, when they finally did condescend to visit the helpless inhabitants three months later, in August, hadn’t I been apprised of my mother’s and brother’s condition? Had the visitors even been able to see them? Had they even tried?

  I described how my brother had been taken as a hostage to Guyana the day I’d arrived in America, in an effort to ensure my silence. I described the wild paranoia that Jim had infused into every fiber of each and every inhabitant. And, finally, I warned them of everyone’s mental instability. How I, too, had been crazed by misinformation, a lack of protein, a lack of sleep. I explained how I, like everyone else, had believed the American government was trying to invade the compound. We all believed we were the enemies of the United States Government.

  “I was convinced that you, each one of you in this room, was conspiring to annihilate us. I heard what I believed to be your gunfire in the jungle.”

  The genteel men smiled dismissively. When I finished, their questions were tame, docile, and shamefully ignorant.

  “Why did you join?”

  “Were your parents supportive?”

  “Why didn’t you leave if you were unhappy?”

  “Are you insinuating that the Reverend keeps the residents of Jonestown there against their will?”

  I could tell they hadn’t heard a single word I’d said. They looked impatient, as if their thoughts were already elsewhere. I imagined them contemplating their weekend plans—with whom they would have a round of golf, what movie they would see. They did not seem to be taking Congressman Ryan and me even the least bit seriously. How could I have failed to convey the gravity of this situation? Was it because most of the inhabitants were black that no one seemed to really care?

  “Ya’ done good!” Ryan smiled as we headed back down the maze of corridors. He patted his suit pocket. “I’ve got the letters your siblings wrote to your mom and brother right here. I promise I will read the letters to each of them individually, and let them know they have a prepaid ticket home. Are you sure you won’t accompany us?

  “I … I can’t … I’d be killed …” Or worse, I thought, drugged and imprisoned in Jonestown.

  “Well … not to worry, Deborah. Everything is going to be just fine.” He squeezed me with an enormous bear hug. “I’ll call you the day I return.”

  It was impossible for those who had never known fear or stared into the face of darkness and death to conceive of my dilemma. It was impossible for them to know what all of us had been through and to imagine the dangers still lying ahead in the jungle.

  Mama, I thought, I’m so sorry. I thought I would have had her home by now. I had tried to get messages to her. I was doing everything I could think of to get her back. Why wasn’t I getting anywhere?

  Ryan continued to hold my arm as he walked me to the rotunda. When I turned to hug him good-bye, I was startled by the sight of Teresa. She was entering the building with the Temple’s attorney. I stiffened. Her terrified eyes met mine. I wanted to run over to her and apologize, say that I had always cared for her, that I was forced to report on her. But instead, I looked away. I felt filthy, like a snitch going to the other side. Why did she look so frightened? Surely I had not scared her. She must have known I was going to be here. What was Jim up to? Was she here to discredit me or to kill me? Or had she defected? Never, I thought … never, not Teresa!

  As I drove off in the limousine, I felt unsure of what I had done, afraid of what would happen, and miserably aware that I had just upset the order of my new life, that the life I had run from was catching up with me again. I realized no one, not even Ryan, understood that lives were truly in danger. No one was capable of understanding how malevolent Jim Jones had become and what kind power he had over the inhabitants of Jonestown. Ryan seemed to view his forthcoming trip like any other business jaunt. No one took the time to seriously ponder and evaluate the disturbing story I had told. Not even Ryan recognized the true danger his investigation was creating for himself, his entourage, and for the people in Jonestown. I could not figure out what else I could say to make them see the potential for catastrophe.

  20

  Hope Extinguished

  November 18, 1978

  A chestnut-brown cockroach sneaked out from under the hallway carpeting as my keys jingled in the lock. I walked into the kitchen and set down my groceries. I wondered how Ryan and his entourage of aides and newspaper reporters were doing. They’d been in Guyana for five days. They’d probably seen the dances, the entertaining skits. I wondered if Jim had had flowers brought in from the capital and planted them around the radio room and the Pavilion to impress everyone. Since my defection Jim had probably allotted more money for the construction of new cottages, more wooden walkways, and maybe even a guest cabin with conveniences like a sink, water, and a mosquito net.

  And then the phone rang. A shrill voice shouted at me. I hardly recognized my sister.

  “Slow down, Annalis …” My heart was pounding. I caught only tidbits. What was she saying?

  “Ryan’s been shot, his aide’s been wounded, several cameramen have been hurt …”

  “Where, Annalis? In the capital? Where?”

  “News is skimpy … At an airstrip somewhere in the jungle….”

  “What? How?” My legs felt heavy and I slid down the wall to sit with my knees propped in front of me like a shield. “What about Mama?”

  “Debs, get the hell out of there. No one is sure what happened. Maybe Mama is in the hospital. The reports say some people are in Trinidad receiving medical care. Others are in the capital, but they don’t know who …”

  “Annalis.”

  “Leave! You’re probably on a hit list! The instigator of a congressional invasion. I will meet you in an hour in town at that little fruit stand you like. A friend’s offered her home. You’ll be safe there. The Temple won’t find you. Do not come here! They may have already started this way. I’ll call John at the conference. I’ll tell him not to go back to the house, but to come straight up here.”

  I grabbed my new flannel nightgown, toothbrush, pair of jeans, toilet bag, and rushed out to the car. Throwing my bundle into the backseat, I looked over my shoulder and locked the doors. With disbelief and fear pulsing through my veins, I drove over the Bay Bridge listening to the radio for more news.

  What was happening down there? Leo Ryan shot? Had Jim finally panicked? But why? Weren’t the mothers and children on a boat for Cuba? Hadn’t the Russians accepted the money and finally granted asylum to the encampment? Maybe nothing had worked and now Father had declared war against everyone. I chewed the inside of my cheek. Had I been listed as “fair game”? Had Jim assigned someone to find me and take me out?

  With one eye glued to the rearview mirror, I continued to switch radio stations. And then everything went silent. My hands trembled. My breathing was shallow and rapid. There was the thumping of feet, the smell of dirt scattering, the clouds of dust. Hushed, distraught voices whispered into my ear, an old, familiar voice rose above the vibrations, “White Night, White Night.” Sweat broke out on my forehead. I stopped the car in the emergency lane. Where was Mama? It was happening again. I saw it, felt it, smelled it. I was being pulled back into the fear, the dread, the insanity.

  I am here again.

  Oh my God, help me. Help them … Someone stop this! I run across the walkway, away from the Pavilion, past the kitche
n, down the footpath, looking for Mama. Up her stairs, onto her veranda, into her cottage. She is not here. Someone else’s belongings have replaced hers. The purple, red, and orange serape is gone. Mama’s sandals, her trunk, her clothes, gone. Mama?

  I can hear Father’s voice yelling over the loudspeakers, “Hurry, children, hurry to the Pavilion. The congressman has been killed. All is lost. We must die quickly. Die before they come in and kill us. Hurry, my darlings. Oh, how Father loves you …”

  The voice on the radio filters through again. “We have just received news … Yes … It has just been confirmed that the entire community of almost a thousand …” No! No!!!

  The words on the radio are telling me that my worst nightmare has come true. I can see it all in vivid detail in my mind. Father’s loud voice, his words slurred, drugged. “Come, mothers, my sweet children, come quickly, before they do it for us.” People standing close together, shivering uncontrollably, tears streaming down their brown cheeks, wondering why, why did it go so wrong? Babies in their arms, mothers with sons, daughters with fathers. Families forced apart by Father looking wildly for one another. Eyes searching the jungle for an escape route.

  I am suddenly aware of a young mother. I cannot see her face clearly, but I can hear her thoughts. Who is she? Her voice is clear, she sounds familiar. She is trying to think within the chaos. She is trying to devise a plan in the midst of madness, a way to survive …

  Should I run into the jungle with my baby? Could we survive in there? What if I am caught? Shot in the back? What if my baby is ripped from my arms as my wounded body writhes on the ground, as they drag him away from me, back into the death Pavilion? Could I stand hearing him scream for me, unable to comfort him as they hold him down and pour the pink poison down his throat? No! It’s better to stay. I’ll hold him, I’ll comfort him. “Mommy’s here, sweet-pea.” I’ll hum to him, tell him not to be afraid, “Mommy’s with you.” We’ll die together, simultaneously, in an everlasting embrace that the world will see. The world will know how much I loved my baby. The world will know that the United States Government killed us.

  Beth? Run! Run with Chioke …

  Some won’t swallow the poison, they’re holding it in their mouths, preparing to secretly spit it out. But the cyanide is so terribly strong, it’s being absorbed through the soft tissue in their mouths.

  Panic, contusion, pain! Oh, the pain! Vomiting, cramps, dizziness. I am fading away. I am dying. God help us. Where did it all go … wrong?

  I press my foot against the accelerator, rushing, aching, driving as fast as I can from a world where logic and reason no longer exist, where insanity has imploded upon itself.

  Annalisa was waiting at the fruit stand. I followed her as she drove a long and circuitous route to a friend’s house. Sick with fear and grief, I went into the bathroom and stared at my bedraggled reflection in the mirror. I did not look twenty-five. I did not look like my age. I was worn out and pale, too colorless to cast an image into the mirror. I leaned forward and stared into my lifeless eyes. I wondered when the tears would come, or if they ever would. In an attempt to create order, I unpacked my toilet bag, arranged my toothbrush and face cream neatly next to the salmon-hued sink, then rearranged them next to the rust-colored Indian vase. I shivered. I was cold. I could hear Annalisa in the kitchen. The news was murmuring from the television. The kettle reached a boil and suddenly went quiet as she removed it from the fire. I walked back into the bathroom and began to run a hot bath.

  “Annalis … How’s Papa?”

  She appeared in the doorway with two steaming mugs.

  “Tom’s with him.” She sat gloomily on the corner of the tub and handed me a cup.

  The reports from Guyana said at least fifteen members were in the capital and had survived. One report stated that a woman named Sharon had slit the throats of her three children and then her own, in a bathroom at the organization’s headquarters in Georgetown. Sharon’s former husband had come to the capital with Leo Ryan and a group of the Concerned Relatives to visit the children whom he had been forbidden to see since Sharon had left America.

  Jim had been right to trust Sharon. No one else in the capital had been allowed to have their family with them because it would make an escape more likely. But Sharon had been obedient to the very end.

  I was sure Jim had Beth brought back into Jonestown after I left. She was probably not among the lucky few in the capital who had survived. And what about Mama and Larry?

  My teeth began to chatter and I slid into the bath, the bubbles rushing up my back. What about Lee? Might he have fled into the forest when no one was watching? And what of Mary? Had she been in the kitchen when the sirens started? And where, oh where was Sweet Annie? Why couldn’t I remember her face?

  Annalisa and I sat in silence drinking Mama’s German tea. This was the way she’d made it for us when we didn’t feel good. The way Mutti had made it for her in Hamburg, sweetened with sugar and lightened with condensed milk. I thought how it must have been for Mama during the war, her parents hidden somewhere in Europe while she waited in America, praying and hoping for good news. She was twenty-five then. She had come here to start a new life, but she had been afraid. So many fears, so many secrets, so much shame. So many similarities between us.

  Was everyone really gone? Jim … perished? Could he still hurt me? Or would he haunt me forever as he had always warned me he would? Oh God. How could I … how dare I … feel relief … ?

  I heard the front door slam. John had made it.

  After my bath, we sat in front of the television, flipping channels to get new information. Suddenly, I was assaulted by the image of a man I did not recognize but knew intimately. Larry, my brother, was being led someplace, accompanied by a herd of angry faces. The voice on the TV proudly announced it knew something I didn’t. The voice was brimming with satisfaction…. “Larry Layton has just been arrested …”

  I remained in Davis for several days waiting for news of Mama and more about Larry. Tiny morsels of information filtered up from South America, but never enough. Why hadn’t they found Mama yet? Where could she be? I began to feel hopeful again. It seemed that no news was good news. Annalisa and I passed the time by taking walks in the orchards and biking to the fruit stand for hard, crisp, tangy apples.

  On the morning of November 28, 1978, the telephone rang, then stopped and started again. It was the family code.

  Tom was trying to steady his voice. “Debsy,” he paused, “we just got a phone call, about Mama…. She died in Jonestown, perhaps a week before the massacre. Larry never left her side, not even for meals. He was with her till the end. Sweetie …” He cleared his throat. “She had one of us with her …” Tom was trying hard to sound brave, for me.

  Two weeks after my useless visit to Washington, D.C., I packed my belongings again. I explained to Annalisa and Tom that I wanted to give Papa the news. It had to be me, the link between it all, the perpetrator, the deceiver. I had to be the one to tell him what had happened to his wife, to tell him his worst nightmares had come true.

  I stood before Papa. His eyes downcast and dull, he seated himself on the couch Mama had reupholstered for his birthday. He looked up at me and patted the space next to him, inviting me to sit with him. I moved toward him, this man I had lied to, bad-mouthed, and taken money from to give to Father. The man whom I hadn’t even called “Dad” since I joined the Temple.

  “Dearest, come sit with me. Tell me what I dread.” Then he sighed deeply, as if preparing for the coming onslaught of pain. His olive skin looked ashen and his soft blue eyes were turned away from mine. The evening wind had picked up and the fog was rolling in. The room grew chilly.

  “Papa, I have good news and bad news,” I began. “Mama did not die in the massacre.” His eyes flickered with hope. “She passed away several days before.” His face sank into deeper despair. I put my arms around his shoulders.

  Papa fell forward, grasping his head with both hands and gasped in horror.


  “Oh dear God, help us,” he groaned through tears. “Where did I go wrong? Dear God, where did I go wrong?”

  We sat for what seemed like forever. I held him and we cried. We grieved the loss of our innocence, our hopes and dreams. And as the enormity and magnitude of our reality dawned on us, we felt the weight of our regret.

  We were unprepared for the self-righteous scrutiny of the media that would turn us into specimens of feverish interest. In a flash our family would no longer be just citizens, neighbors, or friends. No longer inconspicuous faces in the grocery store. We would be the objects of fascination for a prurient American public. We would symbolize what others were afraid to acknowledge and observe in themselves, and so they would soon condemn us.

  During the next few days we continued to be inundated with more frightening news. Larry was alive and in a Guyanese dungeon. He hadn’t killed anybody, but he was charged with murder. We had to find and engage an attorney from 6,000 miles away. We needed to hire someone to prepare and bring food to him. Still no time to think, to reflect, to mourn Mama’s death.

  For weeks I was chauffeured by agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Secret Service to undisclosed locations for secret meetings. I was interrogated by Lawrence “Bonny” Mann, the Guyanese ambassador to the United States. I was deposed by U.S. Attorneys trying to recover the Temple’s money from the Bahamas, Panama, and Europe. I met for hours with the House Committee on Foreign Affairs. I was subpoenaed to give sworn testimony before a federal grand jury. I was followed by news cameras, constantly questioned about Larry. Weary and filled with shame, I tried to explain that if I had been there, even though I wanted to leave, I, too, would have considered Congressman Ryan a threat. I would have viewed him as one of the evil mercenaries Father had warned us about. Yes, I would have gone to the airstrip and tried to shoot Ryan in an attempt to defend my comrades. Yes, when I lived in Jonestown I believed that anyone on the outside was the enemy.