Come on, do your stuff!â
Freddy crawled up carefully beside Jinx and whispered in his ear. âAlice doesnât talk like that, you dope. Quit using slang or heâll get on to you. She wouldnât say âBetcha,â and âdo your stuffâ!â
Jinx grinned. âSorry,â he murmured. âGuess I wasnât very ladylike. Howâs this?â And then he gave a silly giggle, and said: âOh, sister, I do believe the horrid creature winked at me! Why, Mr. Snake! Tee-hee! I bet youâre a terrible tease!â
âOh, my goodness!â said Freddy under his breath.
But the snake didnât seem to suspect anything. He perhaps had not had much experience with ducks, and may, like many other people, have thought them much sillier than they are. He raised his head higher and his forked tongue flickered out angrily. Then he just swayed there, staring at the duck.
Jinx managed to give a couple of little frightened quacks as he pushed the pole forward. âYou better not touch me!â he quavered. âIf you bother me, my Uncle Wesley will tear your scales off!â
The snake gave a mean little snicker. âWe donât want to bother your uncle, so we wonât tell him, will we? Not now. Maybe Iâll tell him later when I get hungry again.â And as Jinx pushed the pole closer, the snake opened his jaws and lunged at the duck.
A snakeâs jaws can stretch pretty wide. Half of the duck disappeared into the rattlerâs mouth. But as he closed his jaws and tried to swallow the rest of it, his long fangs stuck fast in the gum.
For a second or two he didnât move, then he lifted his head and shook the duck hard. A few feathers flew off, and the gum just stuck tighter than ever. And then he flew into a rage, and he whipped and twisted and wriggled and thrashed about until he was exhausted. âO.K.,â said Freddy, and he and Jinx came out and tied the rattler to their fishpole. They wound wire around him in a spiral and fastened it tight at the ends, and then they crossed the wall and got into their saddles and started home.
âO.K. rattler,â said Freddy .
When they got there, they untied the snake and dumped him into a wooden box, covered with a piece of heavy window glass that Freddy had found in the loft. Before they put the cover on, Jinx held him down, and Freddy worked most of the gum out with a stick. âTomorrow,â he said, âweâll take him down to Centerboro and see if we can sell him.â
âWhoâd buy a rattlesnake?â Jinx said.
âFred Whimper had two coons at his garage,â Freddy said. âHe said a lot of folks bought gas there just so they could look at the coons. I was thinking of Dixonâs Diner. Folks that came in to look at him would have to at least buy a cup of coffee.â
So next morning they hitched up Hank to the phaeton and loaded the box in and went down to Centerboro. But Mr. Dixon wasnât enthusiastic, even after Freddy offered to charge him only for the box, and throw the snake in free. âFolks donât want to look at snakes when theyâre eating,â he said. âMakes their stomachs feel funny.â Freddy tried a couple more places, and then drove home again.
He had to keep the snake in his studyâwhich was the room in the pig pen where he had his typewriter and his easy chair and his books and papers. For Hank wouldnât have him in the stable, and Mrs. Wiggins said she and her sisters wouldnât get a wink of sleep if she knew he was in the cow barn. Freddy didnât mind, for the snake had had an interesting life, and he seemed eager to pleaseâprobably in the hope of being let go. He told Freddy in his harsh whispering voice tales of his exploitsâsome of them pretty hair-raising, for he was really a tough customer. Freddy enjoyed having him as a guest.
So Theodore didnât have to go live in Hankâs watering
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