Sacrifice to the Emerald God Read Online Free Page A

was that the man was not casting his gaze upriver, but was staring down at her with dark, lustful eyes.
          Margie’s studies in South American anthropology had necessitated a more than working familiarity with Spanish so that she could read in the original some of the seminal, primary works of the priests and monks who had accompanied the conquistadores in their early 16th century depredations. And so she easily understood the fearsome, hulking man when he said to her, “ Buenos dias, signora . Have you had a nice sleep?”
          She could feel a dull ache where the man had punched her, right on the edge of her jaw, and she rubbed it almost unconsciously, feeling for swelling. She had never been punched before and had always wondered what it would feel like. It had been both worse and not as bad as she had imagined. The sensation of her jaw being met with a superior, intense force had made her see stars and was an insult that she could have lived without. But she had lived and it felt like nothing was broken, although she now knew what a glass jaw was.
          Marjorie was not in the mood to return the man’s pleasantry. Her initial reaction was to shout and scream, demanding to be released. But remembering what her earlier cries of protest had produced, she remained fearfully quiet. And then there was the knife that glinted so threateningly in the morning sun. And the hand that held the knife, it was covered in blood up to the elbow. The man watched Margie looking at it and smiled. “Some mess, eh?” he said.
          The droning of the engine reminded Margie that every second was taking her farther and farther away from rescue. Her heart was pumping wildly and she could feel her legs shaking. A feeling of emptiness ran throughout her body as the knowledge that this might be her last day on earth came home to her. These were the kinds of things that you read about in the newspaper or in some lurid mystery story. The fact that it happened to real people who desperately wanted, as much as Marjorie did, to continue to inhabit the physical realm of existence, had never occurred to her. It was incongruous to be confronted with a violent, painful death on such a bright, sunny, pleasant day, especially when she considered the fact that not more than an hour ago, she was writhing in passion with her new mate, oblivious to the problems of the world.
          Suppressing the urge to scream for help and fighting back the tears that threatened to gush from her worried, shaded eyes, Marjorie tried to take stock of her situation. She realized that she still gripped tightly in her hand her large, straw purse and was still adorned with her now silly, straw hat and sunglasses. Her skirt was pulled tightly around her thighs as a result of her struggles with her captor. Her orange tube top had slid down her chest and the top of her right breast protruded from it. At the ends of her legs, which were bent at the knees and pushing up against the feet of her blood soaked kidnapper, her low heeled, cork sandals seemed ridiculous with their broad, yellow, sateen straps that circled her ankles like decorations on a May pole.
          When she looked back up at the desperado, she saw that his eyes were fixated on her delicate, slender thighs and her pale, well trimmed calves. Her colorful, loose, peasant’s skirt had ridden up to her knees in her struggles. She shifted her body nervously so that she could yank it down to protect her modesty. When she was done, she tugged at her top and tucked her right breast away.
          One of the other men, the man in the back, saw her movements and the gang leader salivating at her delectable form like a dog at a pork chop. He laughed.
          “Hey, Jefe ,” he called out over the loud motor, “what’s with the pretty gringa ? I didn’t know that you had a date this morning.”
          The man laughed at his own joke, a scrofulous, high pitched squeal. Diego