Read Online Mississippi Cotton by Paul H. Yarbrough - Free Book Online Page B

heard.”
    “It’s true. Humphrey Turnipseed told me.”
    “Aw squat! Humphrey Turnipseed is dumber than a baked cow pattie.”
    “He is not. You’re dumb.”
    “He failed the third grade twice.”
    “He did not. He failed it jus’ once. And that was because he had mumps and measles in the same year.”
    “Well, he’s still dumb,” Taylor said. “There ain’t no such thing as a roach hex.”
    “Well, jus’ the same, I’m not lettin’ ‘em wiggle in my hand.”
    “You’re jus’ chicken,” Taylor said. When he turned back to the water Casey distorted his face and stuck his tongue out at Taylor’s back, then cast his dead roach into the branch.
    We sat on the bank under the bridge and watched our corks. Fishing made me think about the dead guy, and about the colored men who found him while they were fishing. Last night while we whispered after bedtime the three of us wondered if it was BB who had been with his daddy and found the body. Taylor said it might have been since a lot of the time BB and his daddy did go fishing at the river bridge down at Greenville. It could have been anybody, but I think we wanted it to be somebody we knew so we could ask questions about the big crime.
    “Y’all think we can ask BB or Julius, or whatever his name is about that dead guy?” I asked. “I mean, when we see him.”
    “Sure,” Taylor said. “Might be the first thing I’m gonna ask him.”
    “He won’t mind?”
    “Naaa. BB’s a nice guy.” Taylor pulled his line up to check his bait, then flipped it back in. “I guess you’ve never met him, huh? In all the times you been here? You never have?”
    “Never have,” I said. “Guess he was never around, or something. How come he didn’t want to play football in college?”
    “Don’t know. I think he jus’ wanted to go fight Communists,” Taylor said.
    I held up my hand. “Shhh. I got a bite. Watch my cork.” My cork was moving around and bobbing just a little bit. Just enough to make some small ripples before it would stop. Then the whole thing would be repeated: bob—ripples—bob—ripples.
    “Ahhh, that’s a turtle after your bait,” Taylor said. “Better check it. Bait might be gone.”
    I pulled my line in and the worm had been mangled some—a pretty good sign of a turtle attack. Turtles would swim under the water and jus’ nibble around on your bait, never getting’ their mouths on the hook, just teasing you. I reset my worm and flipped the line upstream some.
    “He could have gone to college and then to war, it looks like to me,” I said.
    “I don’t know. Why don’t you ask him that? I’ll ask him if he saw the dead guy, too.”
    “I wonder who killed that guy?” I asked.
    “I wonder, why?” Taylor asked.
    “Will y’all shut up talkin’ about dead guys? You’ll scare the fish away. Hey! I got one,” Casey screeched.
    His cork darted below the brown water. His line pulled hard. His pole bowed and shimmied in his hands. He tugged, both hands on the pole. He yanked hard and up on the bank a big blue catfish sailed, landing in the grass in a flopping frenzy.
     
     
    We caught three more. Taylor caught a cat, a hand-sized bream, and I caught a cat almost as big as Casey’s. After about an hour or so they stopped biting under the bridge, and we decided to move up the branch. It was probably after ten we figured, but we had time to try a couple more spots before going home for dinner.
    We followed the branch, sometimes staying close to it, sometimes getting back a ways. There were some cattails close to the bank and some willow trees so close to the branch that you couldn’t get around without slipping into the water. Besides, we were more likely to step on a water moccasin walking through cattails and drooping willow branches. Casey said there was danger stalking us every step of the way.
    “There’s a good spot jus’ up here,” Taylor said. “We’ll try it for a few minutes. If they don’t bite we’ll try one