Salvation of Miss Lucretia Read online

  “That’s one you would have got for sure if we weren’t just practicing,” I told him. “Now let’s get the dogs calmed down so they can find a fresh scent.”

  We practiced bagging five more squirrels before we took a break. The dogs were tuckered out, too. They stretched out on the ground, breathing hard with their tongues hanging out.

  “Time to start looking for a campsite,” Poudlum said.

  “Uh huh,” I agreed. “It’ll be dark in a hour or two. We need to find some water. Only thing missing from this forest is a good creek.”

  “They’s some little branches in here though,” Poudlum said. “We ought to come up on one pretty soon. If not, I ’spect we’ll spot a spring.”

  I was just about to say if we didn’t find a creek or a spring we had full canteens, but before I could get it out of my mouth I suddenly picked up a scent that brought terror to my heart.

  “Freeze, Poudlum!” I whispered harshly as I put my hand out to stop his forward motion.

  “What is it?” he whispered back as he stopped dead still.

  “Don’t you smell it?” I asked.

  He inhaled deeply through his nose and then whispered, “Oh, Lord, it’s a timber rattler!”

  Those big rattlesnakes had a distinct odor about them, kind of like a goat. My nose told me something was nearby, and I didn’t see any goats. We searched the ground with our eyes as we eased the safeties off on our rifles.

  “I don’t see it nowhere!” Poudlum hissed.

  “Me neither, but it’s here. Keep looking.”

  The dogs had drifted off ahead of us and there was nothing to do except wait and look. That snake could blend in with the leaves and dead limbs and twigs on the ground, and one step in the wrong direction could bring disaster.

  Suddenly I saw what looked like a stick slithering a few feet directly in front of us.

  “There he is, Poudlum, dead ahead!”

  “Dead is right,” Poudlum said as he raised his rifle.

  I did the same, and our motion alerted the snake. His tail popped up and his rattles buzzed. He raised his head and struck with glistening bare fangs.

  We both fired at his diamond-shaped head and blew it clean off his body.

  The sound of the rifle shot brought Old Bill and Rip back from hunting a fresh trail, but they both kept a respectable distance from the remains of the snake, not sure if it had been rendered harmless.

  Poudlum poked at it with a stick, and except for a few twitches, it didn’t move.

  “Be careful,” I told him. “I’ve heard tell those things can still bite you after they’re dead.”

  “How could they do that?” he asked.

  “I don’t know, just from the reflex of his muscles maybe?”

  I put the end of a long stick on the snake’s head, just to make sure, while Poudlum took out his pocket knife, lifted the snake’s tail and sliced off the rattlers. “Twelve of ’em,” he counted. “That was an old snake, and he would’ve killed one of us if you hadn’t of smelled him.”

  The snake’s body was as big as my arm and it was about five feet long when we stretched it out.

  “You know, Poudlum, I’ve heard some people skin snakes, roast ’em, and eat ’em.”

  “They do,” he confirmed, “and I have eat some before.”

  “Was it good?”

  “No, it tasted snaky to me, and I won’t eat ’em again. The skin is worth something, but I just ain’t got the stomach to handle it, except for these rattlers, unless you want ’em.”

  “Naw, you take ’em. I’ll get the next set.”

  “Lord, have mercy, I hope they ain’t no next set.”

  Shortly after the rattlesnake encounter, we came upon a spring surrounded by giant hardwoods with hardly any undergrowth because the thick canopy overhead kept the sun from filtering through. We unfurled our tent and used the blunt side of our hatchets to drive the stakes for our tie ropes into the ground.

  Once the tent was erected we stood back to admire it. Poudlum said, “Now we can sleep real snug in there, and the dogs will be out here to keep any varmints away.”

  It was getting dark by the time we had gathered up a huge pile of dead limbs for our fire. After we fed the dogs we heated up a can of beans and had them with cheese and crackers, along with some of the sweet spring water.

  Afterwards we spent a while beside the fire teaching Rip to use his paw to shake hands and to roll over. First we would do the tricks with Old Bill while Rip watched, then we would manually put Rip through the motions until he got so he would respond to the spoken command.

  “He’s a smart dog, Poudlum, and he done everything Old Bill did today.”

  “You think maybe tomorrow we could hold Old Bill back and see if he’ll pick up a scent on his own?” Poudlum asked.

  “Yeah, I think he’s ready to try on his own. But right now, I think they’re tired,” I said as the two dogs curled up on the ground near the fire.

  “I feel like curling up myself,” Poudlum said.

  We crawled into our tent and stretched out on our blankets. Poudlum dug out the candles and the matches while I took the books out of my pack. Uncle Curvin had taken us by the library in Grove Hill before we went to Mister Autrey’s. I had checked out Robinson Crusoe and Poudlum got Treasure Island. We always got different books and after each of us had read the one we had selected, we would trade and read the other one. That saved us from an extra trip to the library.

  I had gotten to the part where Mister Crusoe had been captured by the Moors and made into a slave when my eyes got droopy.

  I looked over, and by the light of the flickering candle, it looked like Poudlum was already asleep. I blew out the candle and gathered the blanket about myself, expecting to go right on off to sleep, but sleep evaded me.

  My thoughts kept returning to what Mister Autrey had said before we left, about Miss Lucretia living back in these woods. It was strange enough that an old lady lived all alone way back in these woods, but it was the ominous and warning tone which he had used when speaking of her that bothered me.

  Finally, when sleep seemed impossible, I turned over and whispered, “Hey, Poudlum, are you awake?”

  When there was no response, I reached over and gently shook his shoulder and repeated my question.

  When he roused up, he said, “Well, I was asleep. What’s the matter?”

  “Ain’t nothing wrong,” I reassured him.

  “You always wake people up in the middle of the night when nothing’s wrong?”

  “No, not usually. I’m sorry, but I couldn’t sleep ’cause I got to ask you a question.”

  I could tell he sensed something was indeed wrong because he sat up and said, “What is it you want to ask me?”

  I realized then that I hadn’t even formed the question in my mind, and I hesitated while Poudlum waited patiently.

  When it came to me, I asked, “What was Mister Autrey talking about just before we left, when he told us Miss Lucretia lived way back in these woods?”

  There was another long silence before Poudlum finally said, “He was just telling us she lived in these woods so we would know.”

  “No, there was more to it than that. He said it like a warning and told us to stay away from her or any sign of her.”

  More silence, then Poudlum said, “You sure you really want to know?”

  “Yes! That’s why I woke you up. I can’t sleep just thinking about it.”

  “All right, then,” Poudlum said in a hushed tone, “she’s the last voodoo queen!”

  I thought maybe I had misunderstood him, so I asked him what he had said. He repeated it, adding, “She’s the last of her kind and most folks don’t want nothing to do with her. Mister Autrey’s kind enough to let her live back here so nobody won’t know about her and she won’t bother nobody.”
r />   “But you know about her?”

  “Lots of colored folks do, but most don’t want nothing to be known about her.”

  “How come?”

  “Cause voodoo is a kind of religion brought here from Africa by slaves. They used to have priests and priestesses, but it has just about died out, and like I said, Miss Lucretia is the last of the Snake People.”

  “Did you say Snake People?”

  “Uh huh.”

  “Why you call them that?”

  “Cause voodoo is always represented by some kind of snake. Most folks have come to realize snakes ain’t worth worshiping, and they ain’t even good to eat.”

  “You said most folks?”

  “A few still seek out what white folks would call a lucky piece or a lucky charm, you know, like a rabbit’s foot or something similar.”

  “What kind of luck charm can you get from a voodoo queen?”

  “They’s lots, but what they claim is the most powerful is a fire rock.”

  “What’s that?”

  “A piece from a rock that’s been shattered by lightning.”

  “Does your momma and ’em know about Miss Lucretia?”

  “Shore do, and I’d be in a mess of trouble if my momma knew where we are hunting. I just told her I was going with you, but I didn’t say where. She says folks who practice voodoo can’t do it without drinking whiskey and dancing all night.”

  I was intrigued with the subject and pressed on even though in the back of my mind I felt like Poudlum was uncomfortable about it. “What else do they do besides make lucky charms and drink and dance?”

  “Well, they claim they can heal people.”

  “Heal them from what?”

  “Anything from a broken neck to ailments of the heart, like love.”

  “Can they really do that?”

  “My momma says they can’t even cure they own headaches from drinking all night.”

  “What else do they claim to do?”

  “Lots of stuff.”

  “Please tell me some.”

  “Well, they claim to be able to tell how things in the future will turn out.”

  “How do they do that?”

  “They cut a rooster’s head off and say they can read it in the blood.”

  “What else?”

  “They claim they can walk barefoot over a bed of red-hot coals.”

  “Can they?”

  “Some say that’s true.”

  “I never heard of such stuff,” I said.

  “The trouble with voodoo,” Poudlum said, “is it makes you do what you might not do unless you believe in it.”

  Now I was really confused. Poudlum sensed my confusion, and said, “If you believe in it and have yourself a fire rock, then you’ll probably take chances you wouldn’t normally take, and if nothing bad happens, then you would give the credit to voodoo. If you don’t believe in it and don’t have yourself a fire rock and something bad happens to you, then they will claim it happened on account of that.”

  “What do they say if you have a fire rock and something bad happens to you anyway?”

  “They’ll claim yours had lost its power and it’s time to pay or trade the priestess for a new one.”

  “Sounds like a way to trick people out of things,” I said.

  “Uh huh, but they got lots of tricks, and scare some folks into believing in ’em.”

  “You don’t believe in it, do you?”

  “Shoot no!” Poudlum said, emphasizing the words. “But, like I said, they got lots of tricks, and I’m scared of ’em.”

  “Are there more of them around besides Miss Lucretia?”

  “She the only one I ever heared about around here. We’ll just do like Mister Autrey said, and we won’t have nothing to worry about. Now, let’s try to get us some shuteye.”

  When Poudlum said that I knew the conversation was over, but I wasn’t reassured at all. In fact, I was more concerned about Miss Lucretia than before.

  I finally fell into a fitful sleep and dreamed of hearing voodoo drums echoing through the forest.

  When morning came, I was the first to awaken, and when I poked my head out of the tent flaps, I knew something was wrong.

  The dogs were gone!

  Chapter 3

  Mojo

  “Maybe the dogs just off chasing a fox or some other varmint,” Poudlum said as we were having our breakfast of biscuits and ham. They were Poudlum’s momma’s biscuits, and one of them was a plenty for anybody. We had several more wrapped up in wax paper.

  “No, they would have been back by now and it ain’t like Old Bill to run off early in the morning, if that’s when they left. I think something other than a fox has enticed them away.”

  I had been calling and whistling for my dog since way before breakfast and he always came when I whistled for him.

  “What we gonna do?” Poudlum asked.

  “I don’t know, but we got to find our dogs. You don’t think that voodoo priestess took ’em, do you?”

  “I wouldn’t put nothing out of mind when it comes to voodoo.”

  “But how could she have got the dogs to go with her, Poudlum?”

  “A dog will go with ’bout anybody if they offer ’em a tasty bone. Who knows. She might have put a spell on ’em, or something.”

  “She can do that, Poudlum? You didn’t tell me she could do stuff like that!”

  “I don’t know that for a fact. I’ve just heard stuff like that about voodoo. Some folks say they can put a curse on you and make bad things happen to a person.”

  “What does your momma say about that?”

  “She say if you don’t believe in it, their mojo won’t have no affect on you.”

  “Their what?”

  “Mojo.”

  “What’s that?”

  “It’s voodoo for spells, curses and such.”

  We decided to leave our camp intact taking only our rifles with us, and search the forest for the dogs. After we had gone in ever-widening circles with no sign of them, we returned to our camp about noon, knowing we had to make some kind of decision.

  “Rip been right at my feet ever since he was a puppy,” Poudlum said.

  “The way I see it, we got two choices,” I told him.

  “What are they?”

  “We can strike camp and go back to Mister Autrey’s, or we can go straight through this forest to Miss Lucretia’s and see if she’s got our dogs.”

  “We can’t leave our dogs,” Poudlum said. “As much as I hate the thought of it, we got to see if she might have took ’em.”

  “You know how to get there?” I asked.

  “Lord, no! I ain’t never been back there!”

  “Well, let’s see, Mister Autrey said she lived at the back of his property just before you got to an old fence that was his property line. I figure if we head straight north eventually we’ll come to that fence and then we could just follow it one way or the other until we find her cabin.”

  “But when we get to the fence, which way do we go?”

  “We’ll figure that out when we get to the fence. How long you think it’ll take us?”

  “Your guess is as good as mine,” Poudlum said.

  “I guess we need to think about what to take with us. We need to be prepared if we can’t get back to our camp before nightfall.”

  “We need to think about hiding stuff on us, too,” Poudlum said.

  “Why’s that?” I asked.

  “You got a short memory. Don’t you remember how Dudley trapped us in that room on the back of Silas’s cabin on the Tombigbee River, and the only thing that saved us was that we had our pocket knives hid in our boots?”

  Once again, we both hid our pocket knives in our boots, and we stuffed extra .22 bullets in every
pocket, and, lucky for us, Poudlum dug a four-inch piece from a broken hacksaw blade out of the bottom of his of his pack and slid it into his back hip pocket. It was a thin blade and wouldn’t be detectable in his pocket.

  It was a little after noon when we departed our camp with only our rifles and canteens. About four hours later we realized we had made a mistake.

  The forest had grown thicker, choked with vines and rotting fallen trees and limbs, which made our progress a lot slower. We still hadn’t come to the fence line, and it was too late to get back to our camp before dark.

  “Should’ve packed up and brought everything with us,” Poudlum moaned. “Now it looks like we gonna be stuck way out here in the woods overnight.”

  “We could make us some torches and probably find our way back to camp,” I told him. “But then we would have to get up and start all over again.”

  “We didn’t even bring nothing to eat with us.”

  “Shssss,” I whispered. “There’s our supper sitting over next to that big cottonwood tree.”

  It was a big jackrabbit, sniffing around, but he hadn’t spotted us. I took careful aim on the rabbit with my rifle and squeezed the trigger. The stillness of the forest was shattered by the sound of the shot, but it was a true one that provided our supper.

  We set up camp right there, making do with what water we had in our canteens. We dressed out the rabbit and skewered him on a straight hickory stick. Then after we got a good fire going, we raked out some hot coals between two forked sticks we had driven into the ground and rested each end of the stick on one of them.

  After that we kept adding fresh hot coals and pretty soon that rabbit was golden brown. We knew it was ready to eat when we easily pulled off a back leg. It was hot and we had to wave it around some till it cooled down enough to eat.

  “Should’ve hid some salt on us along with the other stuff,” Poudlum said after he had taken a juicy bite.

  It was just after dark now, and we had full stomachs and a bright fire going with plenty of wood stacked up. We had also found a grove of pine trees nearby and raked us up enough straw to make ourselves a soft bed, well back from the fire.

  Poudlum’s sleepy voice came drifting across the fire through the smoke, saying, “Why you think she took our dogs?”