Free Mississippi Cotton by Paul H. Yarbrough Page B

and didn’t want to get any closer. I leaned forward and squinted at the dark colored snake. “He doesn’t look like he’s movin’. Y’all think he’s dead?”
    “Hand me a stick,” Taylor said.
    Casey started poking through the weeds, trying to find a tree limb. Finally he picked one up about three feet long. He pitched it to Taylor, who was closer to the snake.
    “I think he’s dead,” I said.
    Taylor poked the snake. It didn’t move. He poked it again. Finally he slipped the stick underneath it and lifted it. It didn’t move until Taylor lifted the stick high and the snake started sliding down toward his hand. He dropped the stick and jumped back. It just lay on the ground. Finally, satisfied it was dead, we closed in.
    “Cottonmouth,” Taylor said. “Sure death if you get attacked by one of those.”
    “My daddy said they’ll make you sicker than a dog with mange,” I said.
    “Shoot! They’ll kill you too, Jake. I’ve heard lotsa guys say so,” Taylor said.
    Casey had gathered courage at the discovery that it was dead and moved in a little. “I wonder how it died?” The three of us stood directly over it.
    “You think somebody came along here and killed it, Taylor?” Casey asked.
    “Beats me. Say! Look it’s kinda got a bloody spot on its head.” Taylor put his foot on it just below the head, and pointed with the stick. “Look at that. Looks like little holes in its head. Maybe somebody shot it. Hey, Jake, see if the fish are still on the stringer.”
    I looked at the stringer. I imagined a giant cottonmouth attached to the fish.
    I tugged the stringer then pulled it up. “Yep, looks like they’re all here.”
    “Hey, what’s this shiny thing?” Casey said. He was pushing something with his toe, just beyond the snake. “Look, Taylor,” he said, holding up the small object in the sunlight. Its reflection sparkled.
    “Look, another one,” I said.
    Before I picked it up Taylor took Casey’s, held it in the air and said, “That’s a bullet shell…you know, a casing. A .22.” He looked at Casey.
    “I’ll bet it’s Looty,” Casey said.
    I looked at both of them. “Who is Looty?’
    “He’s a guy we know,” Taylor said.
    “Yeah,” Casey said. “He lives across the cotton field over yonder.” He pointed toward the field. “All by his-self.”

 
     
    CHAPTER 7
    Sunday morning seemed to come earlier. Maybe it was because you knew you were going to have to get all dressed up, and you felt tired before you even got out of bed. We had bathed the night before, and after we ate breakfast we were instructed to get a move on. Get dressed so we could get to Sunday School by nine-thirty. I had my sport coat and necktie with a picture of the Lone Ranger and Silver. Even if it did scratch my throat, I liked the way it looked. My Sunday shoes had a nice shine, something I had done before I left home.
    “Now don’t get up there and play in them and scuff them up. You’ve worked hard to get a nice shine on them. Try and keep it for at least one day,” my mother had said. It seemed to me un-shined shoes could keep your feet covered as much as shined ones.
    Taylor and Casey had to make the same sacrifice, getting dressed in Sunday clothes. Cousin Trek had the same attitude my daddy did. Why would you dress like going to church was just anything else? You went to school casually, but you went to Sunday School like you were going to see God, dressed your best. Besides, if you went to see the governor would you go like you were going just anywhere?
    “Let’s go, boys,” Cousin Trek hollered up the stairway. We had already started before he called and almost ran into his voice as we flew down the stairs. We didn’t go in the pickup on Sunday, but instead all climbed into the ‘49 brown Ford sedan. No sitting in the bed of the truck and getting our Wildroot Cream Oil-combed and parted hair blown into an urchin look. No dust coating us from the gravel road. But nothing could stop us