1. More Subtil than Any Beast of the Field More Subtil than Any Beast of the Field
I heard the snake before I saw it.
The rattle was light and crisp, a high-pitched buzz singing up from the tall grass. If I hadn’t known better, I might have thought it was an insect—a noisy jarfly, maybe, fallen from the trees. But I was born in Blackberry Holler, between Fox Mountain and Little Fox Mountain. And I knew a rattlesnake when I heard one.
The first thing I did was go still. That was important, since I didn’t know where the snake was, and stomping on him would mean getting bit. But it was also a problem, because I was mid-step when I froze, my right leg up high in the grass. Now I was stuck balancing on one foot, and I’d never been much good at that.
I didn’t panic right away. Instead I just tried to whistle, certain Freddy would come to my rescue. Raccoons are excellent snake hunters. Really, that was the only reason Mama let me keep him around. But I must have been more scared than I knew, because I couldn’t get my lips to work right. My whistle came out all wind and raspberries.
You’re supposed to stay calm around snakes. Daddy says they can tell if you’re scared, and that makes them scared too. Also, if you get bit, and your heart is racing, the venom will spread faster.
But all I could hear was the belltail’s rattle, as if it were the only sound in the world—as if the wind weren’t blowing and the jarflies weren’t screeching and the creek weren’t gushing nearby.
My heart started to pound. I was farther in the woods than I was supposed to be, and no one knew where I’d gone. They probably wouldn’t even start looking till Daddy came home. By then it might be too late. I wasn’t sure I could make it back home with a bite. Gunner Sutton, the old man who owned the machine shop where Daddy worked, had once been tagged on the hand by a copperhead. Within minutes he’d swollen up so bad that they’d had to cut off his watch. Eventually his skin near the bite had gone black. People said you could hear him moaning all the way to Knoxville.
I felt like I might be sick.
I tried whistling again for Freddy and managed a bit louder than before, but still he didn’t come. I tried remembering the words of a work that would help slow my pulse. I’d studied hill magic all my life and knew hundreds of works by heart. I should have been able to come up with something. But my left leg was getting tired and wobbly. I was breathing heavy and starting to sway. All I could think about was keeping my balance and that rattlesnake buzzing below me. It felt like time slowed. The midday sun beat down through a gap in the boughs. Sweat blossomed on my big forehead. It trickled down my cheeks. A droplet slid into my left eye.
That’s what did me in. I didn’t mean to move. It just happened. The sweat stung in my eye, and I turned my face toward my shoulder to wipe it away, and the rattlesnake’s triangle head darted out of the grass near my raised foot with a swish. I felt him strike my right ankle. Lightning zipped through me.
I cried out, falling backward to the ground, and even though I could still hear the rattle—even though I knew I should freeze again—I almost rolled over to crawl away.
“Don’t move, girl,” someone said, stern and deep.
I didn’t recognize the voice. I couldn’t see the person behind me. But I knew it was an adult, and that brought me to my senses. I stayed still.
The stranger walked slowly, with intention. He came into view as he rounded the snake, giving it a wide berth. He was wearing dress pants and a pressed, collared white shirt—the kind of nice clothes we didn’t see much in our holler, especially in the dog days of summer. His thick black hair was slicked back with grease. He was Daddy’s age, maybe a bit older, but his face was clean-shaven and his mouth quicker to smile. He had friendly blue eyes.
“You’re doing fine. You’re all right,” the man said. He had a jacket over one arm, which he carefully draped on a low-hanging tree limb before picking up a forked branch from the ground. “Just stay still now. I know you’re scared, but there’s no reason to be. Just stay still and keep faith. You won’t get bit.”
“I’m bit already,” I said, fear coursing through me as fast as the venom.
The rattling got louder. I tensed. The man took a step forward. My eyes darted through the tall grass, still blind to the serpent.
“You’re not bit,” said the stranger, and the buzzing sound seemed to quiet. “That was a bluff. A warning. You aren’t hurting, are you?”
I took a shaky breath and focused. He was right. My ankle didn’t hurt. I looked up, surprised, and the man grinned bright as the sun.
“See?” he said.
“But I felt something.”
He moved another step closer. “Shock, probably. Or the little beast bumped you with his stubby nose.”
He winked at me, now nearly close enough to touch. I knew that somewhere between us, coiled up and watching, was the snake, but the sound of his rattle was getting softer.
“Just keep faith,” the stranger said again, his voice deep and lilting. The words hummed in my head, lingering like a song.
And then, in one quick motion, the man took the branch in his hand and jabbed down. I flinched, closing my eyes. I didn’t want to see the snake killed.
The stranger shouted, “Glory be!”
When I looked again, I felt a jolt of surprise. He’d pinned the snake to the ground, not speared it. He bent, gently moving aside the tall grass with his free arm. I got up on my knees, wanting a better view.
The timber rattlesnake was tan. His eyes seemed to shine golden in the sunlight. He had a rust-colored stripe along his back and black, V-shaped crossbands all down his fat, scaled body. He was at least five feet long. I counted twelve pale segments on his rattle. That didn’t tell me how old he was, but I knew rattlesnakes could live a long time. Something about this one seemed ancient.
Something about him seemed familiar, too.
Suddenly I remembered a scary folktale about a girl who’d died on our mountain and a snake with bright eyes.
Suddenly I remembered my snake story—the one my mother retold every year on my birthday.
Mama had put me down for a nap in my bassinet by the window, but after she’d thought I was asleep, she heard me playing with my wooden rattle.
Maw-maw, her grandmother, went in to check on me. Seconds later, she let out a bloodcurdling scream.
Because I hadn’t been playing with my rattle. I was still fast asleep. The sound Mama had heard had come from a rattlesnake curled up in the bassinet right beside me. He was twisting around my little arm.
Now, as I stared at the man and the serpent, an anxious feeling sparked in my chest. The snake writhed, whipping his tail, fighting to free himself from the forked ends of the stick. And then the man whispered something I couldn’t hear. Without warning, the serpent went still.
“Mister,” I whispered, mesmerized. I was kneeling, like I was saying a prayer.
“The name’s Jasper Jones,” the man said.
In one fluid motion, he grabbed the belltail by its neck and stood up. The snake was so long that its rattle brushed the grass even when the man held its head high in the air. But the little pale segments didn’t vibrate in response. In fact, the snake was barely moving. The only reason I knew he was alive was because I saw his tongue tasting the breeze.
“I’d like to know what they call a girl as brave as yourself in these parts,” Jasper Jones said, still examining his catch. “You kept your wits about you better than a grown man.”
I rose slowly, dusting off my backside. It was only then that I saw the man had an old pillowcase stuffed into his belt.
“I’m Delilah,” I said.
The rattlesnake was inches from the stranger’s face, but he took his eyes off the serpent and looked at me.
“Pleasure to make your acquaintance, Delilah,” he said. “Can you find your way home? You aren’t lost?”
I nodded yes and then shook my head no and then said, “Mister, what do you want that snake for?”
Something inside nagged me to be careful—something warned me I wasn’t safe yet.
Jasper Jones grinned. “You tell your mama and daddy you met a preacher today,” he said. “And all y’all come on up to my church this Sunday.”
I frowned. We didn’t have any churches in Blackberry Holler. I started to say that, but then the man tugged the pillowcase from his belt, distracting me.
I realized it was already half full.
The reptiles inside slithered and roiled, pressing their long bodies against the worn cotton. Jasper Jones lowered the rattlesnake in to join them, tail first.
And against all my good sense—against the advice of all the old stories—the moment before he disappeared, I locked eyes with the serpent.
