Freddy Rides Again by Walter R. Brooks Page B

Come on, do your stuff!”
    Freddy crawled up carefully beside Jinx and whispered in his ear. “Alice doesn’t talk like that, you dope. Quit using slang or he’ll get on to you. She wouldn’t say ‘Betcha,’ and ‘do your stuff’!”
    Jinx grinned. “Sorry,” he murmured. “Guess I wasn’t very ladylike. How’s this?” And then he gave a silly giggle, and said: “Oh, sister, I do believe the horrid creature winked at me! Why, Mr. Snake! Tee-hee! I bet you’re a terrible tease!”
    â€œOh, my goodness!” said Freddy under his breath.
    But the snake didn’t 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. “You better not touch me!” he quavered. “If you bother me, my Uncle Wesley will tear your scales off!”
    The snake gave a mean little snicker. “We don’t want to bother your uncle, so we won’t tell him, will we? Not now. Maybe I’ll tell him later when I get hungry again.” And as Jinx pushed the pole closer, the snake opened his jaws and lunged at the duck.
    A snake’s jaws can stretch pretty wide. Half of the duck disappeared into the rattler’s 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 didn’t 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. “O.K.,” 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.
    â€œO.K. rattler,” 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. “Tomorrow,” he said, “we’ll take him down to Centerboro and see if we can sell him.”
    â€œWho’d buy a rattlesnake?” Jinx said.
    â€œFred Whimper had two coons at his garage,” Freddy said. “He said a lot of folks bought gas there just so they could look at the coons. I was thinking of Dixon’s Diner. Folks that came in to look at him would have to at least buy a cup of coffee.”
    So next morning they hitched up Hank to the phaeton and loaded the box in and went down to Centerboro. But Mr. Dixon wasn’t enthusiastic, even after Freddy offered to charge him only for the box, and throw the snake in free. “Folks don’t want to look at snakes when they’re eating,” he said. “Makes their stomachs feel funny.” Freddy tried a couple more places, and then drove home again.
    He had to keep the snake in his study—which was the room in the pig pen where he had his typewriter and his easy chair and his books and papers. For Hank wouldn’t have him in the stable, and Mrs. Wiggins said she and her sisters wouldn’t get a wink of sleep if she knew he was in the cow barn. Freddy didn’t mind, for the snake had had an interesting life, and he seemed eager to please—probably in the hope of being let go. He told Freddy in his harsh whispering voice tales of his exploits—some of them pretty hair-raising, for he was really a tough customer. Freddy enjoyed having him as a guest.
    So Theodore didn’t have to go live in Hank’s watering