The Thing That Walked In The Rain Read Online Free PDF

sunlight shining in through a large, iron-barred window. The Indian came in, followed by three companions. Each carried a machete with which he cut the ropes from our ankles. Then we were helped to our feet.
    “Holy One send for you,” was the curt remark of the leader. They led us away through the sunny room, and along a narrow hallway which presently opened into another room lighted by sputtering candles set at intervals in holders in the wall, and giving off a heavy perfume of cloying sweetness.
    Seated on a glittering, jewel-encrusted golden throne on a dais at one end of the room, was Bahna, staring straight ahead of him, his features as inscrutable and expressionless as if they had been of graven bronze.
    Our four conductors stood us in a row before the throne. Then they departed noiselessly, leaving us alone with Bahna. lie addressed 11s collectively, his expression changeless.
    “Twice,” he said, “have you earned death, and twice has the great god, Nayana Idra, spared you. Nayana Idra seeks votaries, not corpses, therefore I, his mouthpiece, offer you a final opportunity to live. The Divine One can use all of you, alive and well—can bring happiness and greatness to all. Your scientific knowledge, Professor Mabrey, can be employed in his service. You might in time, become one of his adepts—help to spread his religion as it was spread before, and will be again, to the four corners of the earth. He could use your strong arm, Jimmie Brown, and yours, Pedro, to fight in his service. He requires a High Priestess Consort for his earthly vicar, such a one as Senorita de Orellana, with youth, culture and beauty. Make oath, all of you, that you will observe his commands as administered through me, that you will make no attempts to escape, and you will be admitted as honored members of our cult. I await your answers.”
    “You won’t have to wait long for mine,” replied Mabrey. “It's ‘No.’ ”
    “That goes for me, too,” I said.
    “And for me,” said Anita.
    “An’ for me,” said Pedro defiantly, “you can pliz go to hal.”
    “Perhaps,” said Bahna, apparently unperturbed, “you will all he glad to decide otherwise when you have seen what you shall shortly see. For I swear to you all, that your fate shall be as the fate of the one who is about to die. if you persist in your folly.”
    He clapped his hands, and four Indians came in to take us away.

CHAPTER V The Sacrifice
    WE were conducted from the throne room to another smaller one, where our hands were unbound and we were given breakfast, while a guard, armed with a machete, stood over each of us. After breakfast our hands were bound behind our backs once more, and we were all very effectually gagged. Then we were taken to the sunny room through which we had passed some time before, and led up to the barred window. Looking down from this I saw that we were just above the place of sacrifice which we had observed the day before. The window through which we were looking had been concealed from below by the jungle growth.
    Evidently a ceremony was about to take place, for the terraces were lined with what appeared to be four orders of priests, from neophites to acolytes. Bahna, the adept, was nowhere in sight. Just as the sun reached the meridian, the priests began chanting a somber, dirge-like melody in a minor key, to the weird accompaniment of drums and reed instruments. This chant kept up for perhaps five minutes. Looking around, I saw that the shores of the lake were lined with thousands of spectators, who must have been drawn from a large part of the surrounding territory.
    The chanting suddenly ceased, and eight acolytes stepped forward, blowing conch shells. The din was terrific. The other priests were shouting something in which I could catch, from time to time, the word “Nayana Idra.” I judged from their manner that they were crying a summons to their snakey god. Suddenly I saw, waving above the water, writhing and twisting in their