Page 13 - Contrast1965Spring

Barking frenziedly, the little hound ran round
and round the snake. The copperhead, eyes
hard on the hound, flipped and turned in rage.
The .dog circled again and the snake, jerkily,
angnly turned with it, half striking, regaining
Control, turning again, eyes always on the
hound.
"Watch out, Budd y.I" came hiIS mot her ' s
anxious cry.
The boy gripped the hoe. The snake faced the
dog away from him. He brought the hoe down.
The snake tangled into tight coils. Again
Buddy brought the hoe down, breathing hard.
Both ends thrashed. He had hit roo far back.
"The head. Git his head!" Cap'n Jim's wife
called. The hound yapped in a frenzy.
Buddy lifted the hoe. The snake rolled and
writhed in the dust beating up small clouds.
~here was the head. Buddy hit hard. The long
ody rolled and coiled and rolled.
"Agai n," ye lled his mother.
~Uddy chopped and chopped again and leaned
reathlessly on the hoe. The body writhed
away. The head lay opening and closing,
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opening and closing.
Buddy looked at the hoe, its blade wet where
it had cut into the snake; dust stuck to the
wetness. The snake's writhing was not so
wild now, its convulsions growing more feeble.
The head opened and closed on dust.
"Yeah, it was a copperhead all right," Cap'n
Jim's wife observed. "Look at those marks,
and that head."
Buddy looked at the snake. The head was
still, the body barely moving except for slow
twitches of the tail tip. The snake would not
slide again into the hot lane for a sun bath,
or stroke rapidly away through the grass into
the bushes. His stomach tightened in a queer
way - as if he might be sick. He swallowed,
but it was, hard. The snake lay still.
Buddy bit his lip. The snake wasn't moving.
His hands ached. He still clutched the hoe
with a desperate grip. Its blade was drying
now. He dropped it behind him in the grass.
The snake was dead ....
He had never killed before.