Sacrifice to the Emerald God (14 page)

      The bandit got angrier and angrier as he watched his money pile up in front of the effeminate stranger. He didn’t help his cause by taking long swallows from his bottle of brandy. The blond
gringa
was supposed to bring him luck and now he was losing. Maybe he should have sold the bitch to Esquella after all. After a huge mound of his
dinero
slid over to the stranger he turned and gave the cunt a slap across the face. She stared back at him, tears in her eyes, wondering what she had done.

      It was about three a.m. and the crowd had thinned down a bit. The band had gone home and someone was playing scratchy records at the bar. Two men besides Diego and the stranger were left at the table. Diego had gone through all of his cash and most of Pepe’s too. His minion was sitting behind him to his right and had looked dismally at him when he demanded his money. He knew better than to deny
el Jefe
when he was in a mood like this.

      But Diego thought that his luck had finally changed. He had taken three cards after the first round and had been dealt two kings to match the one already in his hand and a nine to match the one he had held on to. The betting went on for three rounds before the other two men dropped out. It was just him and the stranger. The tall, thin man dropped a large wad of cash into the pile, raising the drunken bandit. Diego looked down at his pile and saw that he could not match it. He looked at the other man with undisguised hatred. And then he remembered the diamond ring. He had not told Pepe about it, but he didn’t give a fuck about that. Pepe could go shit himself for all he cared. He pulled out the ring and tossed it onto the pile, uttering in his low, gravelly voice, “I call.”

      Margie was surprised to see her wedding ring drop into the pile of money. She was drunk and tired and her knees and back hurt from kneeling on the hard, wooden floor all night. She had gotten used to the men peering lustfully at her naked breasts and her head was dizzy from the high octane brew that her captor had kept pouring down her throat. But when she saw the ring, her heart stopped. Tears formed in her eyes as she suddenly remembered what she had been only a few short days ago. She had hardly thought about it on the trip up the river and when she did, she had quickly pushed it out of her mind as harmful to her mental health. But here it was, her ring, the symbol of her love and troth to Tom. Was he looking for her? Was there hope still? She doubted it. Tears started to flow down her cheeks.

      No one paid the unhappy, blonde
gringa
any mind. Everyone’s attention was on the table and the two combatants. Pepe cursed his boss under his breath for hiding the ring from him, but knew that if the bandit lost, there would be hell to pay. His hand fingered the
machete
on his belt. Shit could break out here real soon and he wanted to be prepared.

      Diego stared at the dark haired man. He knew that he had him. He placed his full house down on the table slowly, a huge grin on his face. The man’s face seemed to shudder slightly. The bandit prepared himself to haul in his winnings. But then the thin man smiled and placed his cards on the table face up. To Diego’s dismay and surprise he revealed three aces: the ace of clubs, the ace of spades and the ace of diamonds. Next to them were two fives.

      The furious bandit clenched his fists and his teeth. “Why did this always happen to him!’ he thought angrily. He was going to kill this son of a bitch. He thought of the .45 on his hip. “Let the mother fucker eat one of these,” he thought as his right hand slowly and surreptitiously reached for it. But then the man surprised him. Rather than reach his hands out to draw in the cash and the sparkling jewel on the table, he pushed out the pile in front of him. He had hardly said anything all night, but now he spoke.

      “All you have lost and all I have on the table against the
gringa
. What do you say,
Signor
Badoya?”

      The man’s voice was icy cold. It was hard edged, but not deep, monotoned. Diego looked at the pile of cash. It was almost triple what he had gambled away. The gods were funny. They had made him lose all night so that he could have this chance to treble his money. Maybe the
gringa
was lucky after all. He broke into a wide grin. “Okay. Okay,” he said, amused.

      “One card,” the dark stranger said. “Let Esquella shuffle and you cut first.”

      News of the high stakes game had been brought to the aging whore some time ago and she was standing to the side watching. Diego was a notoriously poor loser and she wanted to be there if things went bad.

      The bandit, convinced of his luck, nodded. Esquella came over and picked up the deck of cards and shuffled it five times. When she was done, she plunked it back down on the table between the two contestants and retreated.

      Diego gave the deck of cards a hard look. He had been a gambler all of his life and lived for these moments. He looked at the unhappy
gringa
. He still had to bust her ass and he didn’t want to lose her. But he felt that whoever had been watching over him all of these years was there tonight. This was too good to be true.

      Margie was horrified at the development. She looked at the strange man who sat across from the bandit. He looked sadistic and cruel. What would life as his property be like? Where would he take her? Her mind revolted at the thought of being his possession. Better the devil that she knew than the one that she didn’t. Her throat was dry and the cloud that had been formed by the liquor left her brain. She had never experienced a moment of singular high tension such as this one. She was afraid, but excited too. It was almost like she had never lived until she had met the bandit who had kidnapped and befouled her. Her whole body was tingling with the energy sparked by the danger of the moment.

      The bandit took his time. He watched the other man’s face for signs of sweat and saw none. There was a small fortune on the table. The man had not only collected his losings, but that of several of the other men who had sat at the table. Finally, the room deadly quiet, Diego Badoya made his play. He reached out and, after placing his palm on the deck, ran his thumb along its side. He stopped about two thirds of the way up. He lifted his hand and turned his palm over. It was the jack of hearts.

      Diego looked up at the other man. He felt sure of himself now. Wasn’t he the jack of hearts himself, like the man in that
Americano
song? Wasn’t he destined to take all?”

      The other man calmly considered Diego’s card. He reached his hand out calmly to the remaining pile of cards. He quickly and deftly picked up a slender sliver of them and tossed them over. It was the queen of spades.

      Diego couldn’t believe what he was seeing. What trick of the gods was this? He had lost it all! And the
gringa
too! Fury erupted in him. “This bastard has to die!” he thought. His right hand reached for the pistol on his hip as he jumped to his feet. But before he had fully cleared the holster a shot rang out. The man was pointing a small, silver pistol at him. Its barrel was smoking and there was a pain in his chest. He looked at the man with amazement. How had the asshole done it?

      Diego sat down in his chair. His mashed up straw hat and the ridiculous sunglasses that he wore made him look, suddenly, like a clown. Pepe, panicked at the shooting of his boss, stood and drew his
machete
. He just had time to raise it over his head when the stranger’s small, shiny gun spoke again. A dot appeared in Pepe’s forehead and he staggered back on his heels. He crashed against the table behind him, spilling glasses and bottles all over the place and then slid to the floor.

      Margie was aghast at what had just happened. She whined and moaned behind her gag. “
Oh my God! Oh my God!
” she thought desperately.

      Diego sat in his chair dazed. There was a small hole in his chest just around his heart, or where his heart would have been if the devilish character had had one. He dropped the .45 to the floor. His mind went to his lucky sombrero that he had lost when he made his escape from
Cotabaya
. He should have known right then that he was doomed. And things had been going so well. After a moment, with a narrow but thick stream of blood slowly descending his shirt, the legendary bandit rose to his feet. He nodded at the onlooking, shocked crowd and then turned towards the door. A few drunken steps later, he pushed it open and disappeared.

      His body was never found. Some say that he fell in the river and was washed away. Some say he was buried up in the mountains by some of his former
compadre
s, his ghost preying on the peasants and miners who work up there. And some say that he was seen down in Ecuador where, after recovering from his wound, he renounced his life of crime, married a wealthy widow and now runs a dry goods store in the capital. Whatever happened to him, neither Margie nor
Porto Vaca
ever saw him again.

Chapter Seven

New Friends

There was absolute silence as the crowd of people watched the bandit disappear. Margie was beside herself. A wave of terror ran through her and she began to cry. She had never been a real crier, but over the last week she had done a lot of catching up. It was just that she needed some way to express her dismal unhappiness. She looked at the thin, pale, well dressed man. He had a definite look of cruelty to him, something more dangerous to her than the off handed, generalized callousness of her former captor. And, while she had been able to maintain the illusion that she had been the bandit’s temporary prisoner, she had passed into the realm of property now, gambled away like some trinket, just like her diamond ring that the man was now casually examining.

      The distraught woman wondered whether she should run after the wounded
bandido
, but the hole in his chest certainly looked mortal. And she knew that she would probably not get as far as the door.

     Esquella was looking at her with renewed interest. “Armando, what are you going to do with the
gringa
?” she asked, standing behind him, her arm on the back of his chair. The man was folding up the money that he had won.

      “I have some ideas,” he said noncommittally, in his low, toneless, cold voice. His hands were long and boney, soft, but with a certain cruelty to them. There was a large emerald ring on his right hand.

      “I’ll give you $10,000 dollars for her, American,” Esquella offered.

      “No, thank you,” the man answered politely.

      “$20,000 dollars,” the eager madam returned. “And of course, if you want to use her for a while first, I can wait. Just don’t mark her up too much.”

      “She’s not for sale, Esquella,” the man replied. This time there was a definite edge to his voice. He was standing now. He handed a fold of bills to the former whore. “This is for your trouble,” he stated with finality. He stepped over to the kneeling, half naked, blond haired woman and took hold of the rope that Diego had left around her neck dangling between her pretty breasts. He pulled her to her feet and then leaned over and loosened her skirt. Margie was horrified when it fell to the floor around her ankles. He lifted her feet out of it one by one. Margie shivered as he touched her legs. His hands were cold and strong. She was shaking and suddenly she had to pee.

      The man tossed the skirt to the tavern owner. “Here,” he said, “you can keep this. She won’t be needing it anymore.”

      Margie watched her last possession but for her muddy, ruined sandals pass from her life. What did the man mean by saying that she, “won’t be needing it anymore?” Was she going to have to remain naked for the rest of her days? A sudden, intense attack of despair ran through the frightened young woman. Even though she knew that it was fruitless, and certainly inadvisable based on the apparent cruelty and callousness of the man, not to mention her status as mere property that one might do with as one wished, she issued a violent, desperate protest from her gagged mouth.

      “…oooooooo! …eeeease!” she yelled. She shook her head and tried to pull away from the man. But he held the lead that confined her neck firmly in his grasp. It was about three feet long and he slowly pulled her within arms reach with his left hand and then swung his right brutally and cruelly across her face.

      The sound of the man’s large, flat hand colliding with the rebellious woman’s face echoed through the now nearly empty tavern. A couple that had been romancing in a chair in the corner, the woman draped across the man’s lap and their faces melded together, both looked up, startled. The bartender, used to nightly scenes of brutality in the place, stopped restocking the bar with bottles of the locally brewed beer and brandy and took note.

      Fire broke out across Margie’s right cheek as the blow sent her stumbling. She was only able to keep her balance due to the rope that led from her neck to the man’s left hand which, being taut, stabilized her. Margie let out a wail behind the soaked, balled up fabric in her mouth.

      He struck her again. This time, she lost her footing, her knees gave out and she fell to the floor at the man’s stylishly clad feet. With her hands bound behind her back, she had nothing to break her fall and she moaned as she landed hard on her shoulder and hip. The man was wearing shiny, pointed, hand sewn, black shoes. His black, cotton slacks had a crease that would slice butter. The floor was dirty and dusty and, here and there, there were puddles of spilled beer, spit and blood. Margie sobbed as the shock and pain from the second blow ran through her. She sensed the man leaning over her, felt his hand grab the knot to her leash under her neck and pull her face again towards him. A third, vicious blow crossed her face, causing her to see stars.