Jinx became the greatest plaything that Org and Little Bit possessed. He
could not fatten, but under the care and treatment he received he
acquired a little more interest in life, and showed quite a fondness for
his youthful owner.
Gaitskill laughed, and decided that the mule would keep Org out of
mischief, which would justify the cost of its keep. Tickfall smiled at
the sight of a little boy sitting on a big saddle while a diminutive
black boy sat behind him, proud of his position and waving a greeting to
all his black friends as he passed. Org and Little Bit would not have
swapped Jinx for an automobile.
“A automobile gits out of fix,” Little Bit said as they discussed this
one day. “When she stops nothin’ kin make her go. Ef somepin gits de
matter wid it, nobody knows whut ails her.”
“But this mule is different,” Org said proudly. “I like something that
wags its tail.”
“Dis hay-burner suits me,” Little Bit agreed.
They found to their delight that Jinx was thoroughly familiar with that
great jungle called the Little Moccasin Swamp. The boys could ride out
to that swamp upon Jinx and turn into any path which led into the
jungle. The mule would carry them for miles along the winding animal
trails, and then to their surprise they would find themselves in the
highway again. They explored recesses in that swamp which they could
never have reached without the mule, and they were never uneasy about
losing their way.
They found great pools of water where large fish swam that were easily
visible to the eye, and apparently unafraid. They found great sinks of
vegetation where ugly snakes crawled, and they learned that Jinx could
smell a snake as far as the eye could see, and that he had no desire to
get near enough to be bitten. They saw immense turtles sunning
themselves upon the logs and stumps. They found droves of wild pigs,
extremely dangerous to man when he was standing upon his two feet, but
harmless when a four-footed animal carried them upon his back.
Hence arose this matter of debate between them: Can a wild hog count? If
he cannot, how does he know the difference between two legs and four
legs?
They found an eagle’s nest, came too near, and were followed for miles
by a screaming bird which swooped down upon them, fanned her immense
wings within an inch of their hats, and snapped her vicious beak in
their faces with a noise like the snip of immense shears. Once they saw
a panther crouched upon a live-oak limb, his eyes glowing in the jungle
shadows like living rubies; the animal screamed at them—the only thing
which ever extracted a burst of speed from Jinx. They were followed for
miles as they went out of that swamp by that screaming, snarling,
hissing, spitting cat.
Once Little Bit turned around and made a noise like an exploding
pop-bottle, a method which he had found efficacious in frightening
domestic cats away. The vocal answer to Little Bit’s elocutionary effort
was so terrifying that Jinx nearly jumped out of his skin.
Then one day, on the edge of a little clearing, they found a six-foot
alligator asleep in the sun.
They dismounted and walked closer. The alligator slept on.
“How close can we get to this thing before he wakes up, Little Bit?” Org
asked.
“He’s awake right now,” Little Bit told him. “He pretends like he’s so
sleepy he’s mighty nigh dead, but he knows we is here all right. But he
won’t move till you gits right on him, close enough to tech him wid yo’
hand.”
“What’ll he do then?” Org wanted to know.
“He’ll slap his tail aroun’ and knock yo’ foots out from under you an’
bite yo’ leg plum’ off,” Little Bit informed him. “He’s layin’ dar now
waitin’ fer a wild pig to come rootin’ aroun’ him like wild pigs does
aroun’ logs. Den he’ll slap ’em wid his tail an’ bite ’em in two.”
The boys backed away, climbed upon the trunk of a fallen tree, and
looked across the underbrush at the alligator. He was as still as an old
rusty stove-pipe, which he somewhat resembled.
“Less take that rope off our saddle and rope him,” Org suggested. “They
rope everything in California, cattle and everything.”
“Who’s gwine put dat rope aroun’ dat alligator?” Little Bit asked.
“You can do that,” Org replied as he untied the rope from the saddle.
“Mebbe I kin, but I ain’t gwine to,” Little Bit asserted, climbing up on
the back of the mule. “Little Bit don’t choose but a little bit of
alligator in his’n. Dis mule don’t hanker fer none.”
“All right, ’fraid-cat,” Org taunted. “You hold the mule, and I’ll throw
the rope.”
Like most boys who had lived in the West, Org had often played with a
rope, looping it and throwing it in imitation of the cowmen. He climbed
upon a trunk of a fallen tree about thirty feet from the quiescent
alligator, coiled the rope, and threw it with wonderful luck. The coil
straightened, and the open loop fell right in front of the alligator.
In the less remote sections the alligator is fearful, for it has learned
the menace of man. But this one had possibly never seen a human being
before. When the rope fell it moved forward a few feet and became quiet
again. Org gave the rope a quick jerk, and the loop caught under one of
the alligator’s front feet and over his head. Org was standing by a limb
upon the fallen tree, bracing himself to keep his balance. Quickly he
twisted his end of the rope around the limb and tied it.
The creature was still unaware that it was captive. Org threw a few
branches from the tree in its direction, and it crawled slowly forward a
few feet. At last it came to the end of the rope.
A hoarse, coughlike bark rang through the forest, and instantly that
six-foot alligator was a snarling fury as it entered into combat with
its bonds. For ten minutes the two frightened boys beheld the most
terrifying spectacle they had ever imagined. Org scuttled down from the
treetrunk and took refuge with Little Bit upon the back of the mule,
making ready for instant flight.
Within a radius of that rope the alligator beat down the marsh-grass as
flat as if a road-rolling machine had passed over it. He got into the
low underbrush and pounded it down, making a noise like an express train
with his powerful clawing feet and his slapping tail. He roared and
raised himself almost upright on his tail, and clawed at the rope with
his front feet as a man would fight with his hands, and snapped his
great jaws together like the slapping of two clapboards.
But he could never succeed in getting the rope between his teeth, for
the reason that he could not turn his head or lower his chin. Finally,
in an awful burst of fury, he threw himself backward, rolled over and
over, slapping, thrashing, clawing, snarling, uttering awful coughlike
barks to which a thousand echoes in the forest responded in kind. The
boys wondered at the creature’s catlike agility, shuddered at the
concentrated venomous fury of the battle, quivered with awe at the
agonizing, snarling vociferation emitted from between those terrible,
gnashing, snapping teeth.
Yet the very configuration of the woods fought for the boys. The rope
was constantly taut, for the reason that it could hardly be moved
without becoming entangled with roots and cypress knees and the tough
underbrush and the clinging, almost unbreakable vines called bamboo. The
struggle against these obstacles slowly exhausted the alligator’s
strength.
At last he sank down and remained quiet.
After a while the boys mustered their courage and crept forward to see.
They found their captive had twisted the rope around the cypress knees
and projecting roots until he was tied to the ground and helpless. His
eyes were not sleepy now. They glowed with baleful flames, ugly,
piglike, with glints of green in their fires of fury. The big mouth
gaped wide when he saw the boys, and the jaws snapped with frightful
force.
After a consultation, the two boys ran across the clearing to a
switch-cane jungle and cut two long cane poles. Returning with these,
they began to prod and torment the alligator, thrusting the poles into
his mouth when he opened it; and when he no longer would let them look
at his tongue, they still pursued their medical examination by punching
him in every place where they thought he might have a particularly
tender spot.
This roused him to another performance, a fury of struggle in which he
fought and roared and barked and clawed at the rope, and thrashed with
his tail, and chased the two boys up a tree until his activities abated.
All day long they tormented the alligator, exhausting every resource in
their efforts to get him, as they expressed it, “to cut up some more.”
But after five or six hours there was no more fight in him.
When the alligator showed plainly that he had made positively his last
appearance as an entertainer, the boys decided it was time to start for
home.
“How we gwine git our rope back?” Little Bit asked.
“Let that old sucker keep his old rope. I don’t want it,” Org said,
wiping the sweat from his face on the sleeve of his shirt and sitting
down in utter weariness.
“Marse Tom will bust us ef we leaves dat rope out in dese here woods,”
Little Bit warned him. “Ropes comes high in de store ef you got to pay
fer ’em.”
“I’ll tell Uncle Tom where it is, and let him come after it when he
wants it,” Org replied.
“You better not let dat white man know we been out here monkeyin’ wid a
alligator,” Little Bit said. “He’ll sell our mule an’ put me in jail an’
flay de hide offen you.”
“That’s so,” Org agreed. “Well, the old alligator is nearly dead. Let’s
tie our end of the rope to the saddle and make old Jinx drag the
alligator up to the house. Then when he dies we can get the rope off
him.”
Little Bit agreed to this, and it was not hard to do. They had whipped
the alligator until there was no more fight in him, and wearied him
until there was not more strength to fight. Their hardest work was
untwisting the rope, for as they got nearer to the alligator they had to
pry the rope from around the roots and snags with a pole. They never got
the courage to get close to those jaws which had snapped at them so
terribly.
Jinx did not object to a little light hauling when a white boy walked on
one side and a black boy on the other, acting as escort of honor. The
alligator was easily dragged over the marsh-grass and along the animal
trails toward the town. Although dragged for over three miles, he at no
time showed resistance or attempted to “cut up.”
In the rear of the Gaitskill stables there was a large pig-pen, to which
admittance was gained by a gate. Org led the mule in such a way that the
alligator faced the gate. Then he led the mule around to the other side
of the pen, led him forward, and thus dragged the alligator through the
open gate.
Then the boys took a rake, hung one of the teeth through the loop in the
rope, and by considerable juggling they managed to make the loop loose
and large.
“Now, if he kicks around any before he dies, he’ll walk out of that
rope,” Org announced. “Then we won’t have to say anything about it.”
“Dat big old animile ain’t gwine die,” Little Bit chuckled. “Us ain’t
hurt him none, an’ by dis time to-morrer he’ll be ready to fix fer
anodder fight.”
“I’m through fighting alligators,” Org said wearily. “I never was as
hungry and tired in my life. But we’ll keep this old sucker in his pen
and make him our pet alligator.”