Alligator Bayou - Donna Jo Napoli [23]
Ben shrugs. “All right, Rock, don’t smoke it, if you that particular.” He lights it with the lantern flame, takes a puff, and passes it.
We all puff and pass, including Rock, till the butt is too short to hold.
Ben throws it in the water. Fsst, it’s gone.
Rock points. “There.”
Ben stands and holds the lantern high.
I can see it now. A single, small, shining yellow ball.
Charles poles us closer.
The yellow ball has a black vertical slit down the center. An eye.
Rock moves to the far end of the skiff and waves his arms.
Don’t! I want to shout. I huddle tighter.
The yellow ball stays fixed on the lantern light.
“Good,” says Charles. “This one mine.”
“It ought to be mine,” says Ben. “By rights and all.”
“My family got rights, too,” says Charles. “’Cause of Tricia.”
I don’t know what they’re talking about.
Charles steps to the center and Ben takes his place at the head, still holding the lantern. The yellow ball follows that lantern as we close in. Charles leans toward me and Cirone. “Be ready to move quick to steady the skiff. It’ll trick you how fast it can flip.”
I grip the rim of the side hard. Steadying skiffs?
Charles holds on to the side nearest the ’gator as Rock poles us up beside him.
That ’gator is still looking at the light. He doesn’t seem to see us at all.
Charles punches the ’gator in the back of the head.
I gasp.
The ’gator bobs a little, but still looks at the light.
“Pretty small,” says Charles appraisingly. “Mind if we catch only a small one, Mr. Calo-whatever?”
“No,” I whisper.
“What you say? Speak up.”
“I don’t mind.”
Rock makes a lasso out of the rope and throws it in a big circle onto the surface of the water, with that ’gator eye at the center.
“Ready?” Charles takes a spear out of his sack. It’s short, and sharp at both ends. He holds it over his head and jumps out of the skiff. Jumps right into the swamp, right onto the ’gator’s back! I can’t believe it! The skiff slaps side to side in the water and I’m clinging to the rim and screaming inside my head. Charles is dead. We’re all dead.
When I can see him again, he’s got one arm around the ’gator’s neck and Rock’s pulling the lasso tight. The animal finally seems to come awake, opens his huge jaws in a roar, and throws his head side to side. Charles jams the spear in his mouth.
The ’gator snaps his jaws shut. The whole spear disappears inside, his head is that big. He throws his entire body side to side now. Rock and Ben pull together on the rope, tightening it around the ’gator’s throat. But then they stop and let the rope run through their hands, and I don’t know why they’re stopping, because the ’gator is still alive. It hurls itself now. It rolls. And Charles clings to its back, arms locked around its neck.
Ben stands with the lantern, moving it, trying to keep Charles in sight. But we don’t pole the boat. We don’t move to help. We just watch. I can’t stand this. I don’t want to look, but I have to look.
That fight between Charles and the ’gator goes on forever. They roll, struggle, go under, come up. Every time I catch a glimpse of Charles, he looks worse. A tangle of moss covers him. His eyes are closed, and the side of his head is pressed against the top of the ’gator’s head. Then he’s gone again, as the animal twists away. Sometimes it seems they must both be drowned, they’re underwater so long. But when that ’gator comes up again, there’s Charles, stuck like a leech.
Finally, Charles and the ’gator are still. Pinpricks go up my arms and neck.
“He’s dead,” says Cirone in Sicilian, his voice cracking in sadness. He makes the sign of the cross.
Then Charles lifts his head and smiles, like it’s all easy fun, like he’s riding on the back of a floating log.
And Ben is laughing and pointing at Cirone.
My eyes go to that ’gator, though. He doesn’t move. I wait for the powerful tail to thrash. Charles couldn’t have strangled him. No one could be that strong.
Rock poles us close, and Ben puts down the lantern and pulls Charles onto the side rim. Cirone and I reach out to help when whap! The skiff flips! We’re