Dipped to Death

by Kelly Lane

  She chortled good-naturedly as she took Claudia’s arm.

  Claudia finally scrambled over to the last canoe and sat on the middle seat. Then she looked down at the water.

  “Wiggy!” gasped Claudia. “I can’t do this. Please, take me back to the plantation.”

  “Shut up, Claudia, and just sit still in the damn canoe. We all came together in one van, and we’re not going back. Besides, we need to get going. There’s stuff I want to see out here.”

  “Now, folks,” said Skeets, “a swamp is a wetland habitat with large landmasses that are flooded with shallow water. There are freshwater swamps and saltwater swamps. This is a freshwater swamp.”

  Carrying a small cooler, Pottie Moss climbed into the first canoe and then into the second canoe. “I got your insulin, right here, Skeets. Don’t let me forget to give it to you . . .”

  “Alright, folks, looks like we’re off!” In the stern of the farthest canoe, with Claudia in the center and Spencer in the bow, Skeets pulled on the recoil starter on the outboard motor. The Lilliputian engine started right up. It sounded more like a bug zapper than a boat engine.

  “Here we go!” cried Pottie Moss from the bow of the center boat. Coop was in the center, and Wiggy was in the stern.

  “Little lady,” Skeets called to the twin in the bow of our boat, “if you just throw that line on the bow off the pier, we’ll be off!”

  “Oh no!” cried Claudia.

  “Oh, Claudia, shut up,” said Wiggy.

  “We’re in this together,” cried Coop. “It’s too late to turn back now.”

  Sitting in the center of the first canoe, with a twin in the bow and a twin in the stern, and picnic fixings in between, I pushed the canoe away from the pier.

  I wondered whether Coop’s advice to Claudia had been about the canoe ride, or something else.

  CHAPTER 52

  “Why is the water so brown?” asked Claudia.

  “Tannins from rotting leaves leach into the water, causing it to become brown,” answered Skeets. “Speaking of the water, folks, swamp water is characterized by stagnation. Very slow-moving swamp waters are often adjacent to lakes or rivers, like the little river we’re in now. Pretty soon we’re going to access the Big Swamp.”

  “Ugh,” said Claudia. She swatted around her face. “So many bugs!”

  Already, it’d been fifteen or twenty minutes, and we were winding down Snake River. At one point, the river’d been so narrow that I worried the three-wide canoe raft wouldn’t be able to pass through. My canoe ended up scraping the vegetation on our side of the muddy riverbank, but we managed to eke by.

  Claudia looked green. Spencer kept his face buried in his phone, while Coop and Wiggy surveyed the land around us and the twins slapped at bugs, as Skeets pointed out a number of snapping turtles, frogs, several wading birds, and even a few deer standing in a field on the left riverbank . . . probably part of the Taylor Farm, I figured. Coop and Wiggy took particular interest in that field. They even snapped a few photos with their cell phones. Also, Skeets showed us several narrow offshoots of the river, explaining that the narrow, slow-moving waterways were favorite hunting spots for water moccasin snakes.

  Claudia started crying. She made this high-pitched wail that reminded me of nails on a chalkboard. Pottie Moss held her hands to her own ears and started chanting, “Lalalalala” ostensibly to block out Claudia’s screeching. Spencer put earbuds in his ears. Coop complained. Wiggy cussed a lot. The twins thought it was all absolutely hysterical.

  After Claudia finally stopped her boo-hooing, Pottie Moss pointed out all sorts of quirky plant life, including the carnivorous pitcher plant that ate bugs to survive, and the water tupelo tree, which, she explained, sometimes developed a hollow middle called a “chimney” that was usually a home to bats.

  Claudia said she felt faint. Pottie Moss started talking about the bladderwort plant, with leaves that have small air sacs or bladders that trap small water creatures like larvae, nematodes, water fleas, protozoa, and small worms. Eventually the trapped creatures die and their bodies decompose, feeding the bladderwort. Claudia cried out that she had to “get out of this hell-forsaken place.” She jammed her head between her knees to keep from fainting. And it struck me that Pottie Moss enjoyed seeing Claudia squirm. Certainly, I did.

  Wiggy and Cooper, in the center canoe, continued pointing to the surrounding farmland and whispering back and forth. Wiggy even took out a map, and several times he asked Skeets to confirm where, exactly, we were on the map. Coop took photos of the land beside the river with his smartphone. Wiggy spouted off something about acreage, and Spencer made calculations on his phone, when he wasn’t busy taking selfies or playing games, that is.

  There was little doubt in my mind; for the Bostoners, the swamp tour was not about nature. Not at all. No, it was about land . . . land with some sort of potential to make them money.

  And lots of it.

  If only I hadn’t snooped at Greatwoods and gotten Ian upset, maybe I’d know what it was all about by now . . .

  Claudia asked, “Do I dare ask why it’s called the Snake River? We’re not really going to see any snakes, are we?”

  Skeets laughed. “Well, ma’am, we call it the Snake River for two reasons. First, because it twists and winds around like a snake. And second,” he chuckled, “because there are more snakes out here than any other place in Abundance County. In fact, there are twenty-seven different varieties of snakes out here. The water moccasin is the largest and one of the most venomous.”

  “Oh my God,” cried Claudia. “I can’t do this. We have to turn back. If I see a snake, I’ll die!”

  “No goddamned snake is going to come anywhere near you,” said Wiggy. “It’d be too damn scared.”

  Coop and Spencer cracked up. The twins sniggered as they slapped at bugs.

  “Shh!” I warned them.

  There was a low growling sound from somewhere behind us.

  “What was that?” cried Claudia.

  “Gator!” said Skeets. “Yee-haa! They’ve been so quiet today, I worried that we wouldn’t see one out here. Normally, we’d have seen a bunch by now.”

  “No!” Claudia cried out. She put her head back down between her knees.

  Skeets started reciting his gator spiel.

  “Alligators are found in swamps and marshes all over South Georgia. A full-grown alligator is about fifteen feet in length and can weigh about seven hundred or eight hundred pounds. Of course, a bunch of gators have been found in these parts weighing as much as one thousand pounds or more. Like Rip. Know how he got that name?”

  “How?” asked Wiggy.

  “’Cause Rip is spelled R-I-P, which stands for ‘rest in peace’!” Skeets slapped his knee and hollered in delight as Pottie Moss laughed.

  “Rumor has it, Rip ate a Cherokee man who tried to wrassle him once,” said Pottie Moss.

  “Please. I need to go back . . .” Claudia’s voice was barely more than a whisper. She sat clutching her hands in her lap.

  “Anyways, moving on,” said Skeets cheerily, “all alligators have massive tails that help them move and steer through water. And boy, oh, boy, they can sure be fast . . . whooo-wee . . .”

  “Cool,” said Spencer. “Do you see one now?”

  He looked to his right and then to his left.

  “Nope. But they’re in the water for sure. Usually, there’s a few sunning on the shoreline, over there.” Skeets pointed to a low, marshy area with tall green grasses. “But I don’t see any. Not sure why not. But their dark, blackish brown color helps them hide in the water, helpin’ them to sneak up and kill other smaller animals. There’s a bunch out here. They’re probably all around us. We just can’t see ’em.”

  There was another low bellow. This time it was coming from somewhere in the river ahead of us. Still with her head down, Claudia shrieke
d.

  “Claudia, if you don’t shut up, I’m gonna toss you into the brown water,” said Wiggy.

  “Gosh, woman, don’t you ever let up?” said Coop. “I don’t know how Dex stood you for all those years. He’s probably glad he’s dead.”

  For the first time on the trip, no one said anything. For several minutes, the only sounds we heard were the singing and screeching of birds, frogs, and bugs, along with the dinky engine pushing our canoe raft along the river. Because the engine was mounted off to one side, and no one except Skeets was using a paddle to steer much, the three-canoe raft traveled at a slight angle through the water.

  There were more growls. Seated in the bow of my canoe, Charlene giggled.

  “Sounds like burping to me.” She slapped at her shoulder. Then, at her legs.

  Behind me, her sister Darlene cracked up.

  “No, no! It’s farting!”

  The two of them broke out into peals of laughter.

  “Hi-dee-ho! There’s one,” said Skeets. He pointed out in front of us. “See him? Over there, by the bank? That’s a bull gator croaking over there, for sure. Looks to be eight hundred pounds or more.”

  “Good God,” whispered Claudia. She sat up to look around.

  The river had opened up, and over in a marshy area of grasses and woody growth near the water’s edge, we could see a large alligator very slowly moving toward the water. We’d never have noticed him, if he hadn’t bellowed. Then, most silently, he slipped into the river, and with just his eyes and the top of his long body visible, he swam stealthily through the water, barely making a ripple.

  Suddenly, there were low bellows and groans all around us. To me, they sounded like lions growling.

  Everyone was silent. Except Claudia. She was whimpering.

  After a while, Pottie Moss cleared her throat.

  “As we get closer to the Big Swamp, you’ll notice more cypress trees, with the beautiful Spanish moss hanging from their limbs. Cypress trees are quite common in swamp and wetland habitats. These trees are easily recognized by their woody ‘knees’ that stick up above the water, around the trees. The ‘knees’ bring oxygen to the roots of the trees.”

  “Also,” said Skeets, “notice how our river has become more stagnant as we near the Big Swamp. See it ahead?”

  The group all looked ahead, nodding and mumbling, to where we could see the river opening up to what looked like a lake. Except there was green vegetation and lily pads floating on top of the water. After a few minutes, we’d left most of the bellowing behind, and a few minutes later, we were out in the open swamp, surrounded by lily pads. Here and there, some grasses stuck out of the water. Alligator Island was just ahead.

  Wiggy lit his pipe and puffed contently as he surveyed the land around the Big Swamp.

  “Back in the old days, swamps like this were often drained to provide land for agriculture,” explained Skeets. “Also, to reduce the spread of diseases borne by swamp insects.”

  “Diseases?” asked Claudia.

  “Swamp plants have flexible stems, floating leaves, or deep roots that grow underwater,” said Pottie Moss, changing the subject. “There are even plants that grow and shrink according to the water level. There are water lilies, pickerelweed, and yellow-eyed grass. And we’ve got lots of shrubs and trees growing on floating mats of peat. We call ’em tree islands. Look, there’s one over there.” She pointed. “Of course, the Big Swamp has many dry islands with woody plants. Like Alligator Island. We’re almost there,” said Pottie Moss.

  If we had a regular boat, we’d have been there thirty minutes ago, I thought. Maybe forty.

  I rolled my eyes.

  We chugged along silently for another few minutes. Then there was another alligator growl. And another.

  “Oh, please, I don’t want to see another alligator!” cried Claudia.

  “Lookee over there.”

  Skeets pointed to a dark blob on the water, maybe twenty feet away. It blinked. Then it bellowed. Claudia gripped her seat and blanched.

  “Cool,” whispered Spencer. He raised his phone, ready to take a selfie, once the gator came into the photo frame with him.

  “Hot diggity,” said Coop. “Now this is worth the money.”

  The gator snorted again. Then it disappeared beneath the water.

  “Sounds like it was a big’un, too,” said Skeets, smiling. “Maybe it’s Suitcase.”

  “Go on, Skeets,” said Pottie Moss. “Tell the folks about Suitcase.”

  “Ol’ Suitcase and I are longtime friends.” Skeets held up his left hand. Most of his ring finger was missing. Claudia gasped. “Let me tell you, folks,” Skeets continued, “I have a healthy respect for that gator. He got my finger and a good part of my arse!”

  “I suppose you all don’t have seasickness bags on board?” Claudia asked. She looked positively green.

  “Give it a rest,” Wiggy said. “I’m beginning to wish Dex had taken you with him when he left this world.”

  “That’s a terrible thing to say!”

  Skeets kept telling his story.

  “There ain’t nothin’ much to wrestling a gator, as long as you keep your fingers out of his mouth. And I never mess much with small gators. They bite hard and spin fast,” said Skeets. “So when I used to look for a gator to wrassle, I always went lookin’ for the biggest damn gator I could find. And ten years ago, I found him. Suitcase.

  “Even back then, he was a monster . . . about fourteen feet long and way more than a thousand pounds. I was over on the prison side of the swamp, hunting for snapping turtles, when I spied him. He was about thirty feet in front of me, in about twenty inches of water. I wanted to get on him from behind—never get on a gator from the side or the front; if you do, you’re pretty much guaranteed to lose a nut or two.”

  Spencer made a choking sound.

  “Anyway, I didn’t have a buddy to distract him, and I didn’t have a towel or a shirt to throw over his eyes so he couldn’t see me coming . . . It was hot that day, and I wasn’t wearing a shirt. So it was just me and Suitcase. I got a running start behind him, and with my hands out in front of me, I leapt low and deep onto him from the bank. I grabbed him around the neck with my hands between the back of his jaws and his front legs, except he took off, heading toward deeper water. Still, I pushed down on his neck as hard as I could to force his head under the water and to the ground. Just so y’all know, folks, by pinning his head to the ground, gator can’t open his jaws ’cause they open their jaws just like a man does, meaning the bottom jaw moves—the top don’t.”

  Everybody except Skeets and Pottie Moss started opening and closing their jaws.

  “Anyway, I was up on old Suitcase’s back, right behind his front shoulders, and I got my knees around him, squeezing his sides. I started to get my calves back to pin his hind legs when all of a sudden he starts ‘death rolling’ and I lost control of him as we started spinning violently.

  “We went at it in the water for a while, thrashing around. And eventually, he dislodged me, and somehow the bastard bit me on the arse, barely missing my manhood,” he laughed.

  “Damn,” said Coop.

  “Eventually, we worked our way back into shallower water, and while straddling ol’ Suitcase’s back, I managed to get back on top and pin his mouth in the water with my right hand, thinking I’d put enough pressure on him to keep the ol’ bugger’s mouth shut. Only, when I reached over front of his snout with my left hand to muzzle him—that was my mistake ’cause I shoulda been using my more dominant hand—his jaws clamped down on all four of my fingers. We rolled in the water a good long time until I finally broke free. ’Cept about two inches of my ring finger was missing. Suitcase swam away; with two flicks of his tail he was gone. And I saw my finger floating in the water and grabbed it. Only, when I got to the hospital, the doc said it was too late to reattach it.”
/>   Pottie Moss was chuckling. “He used to joke all the time about how that ol’ Suitcase just loved his finger food! Skeets has still got that finger, too, don’t ya, Skeets! We keep it in a pickle jar on the kitchen windowsill.”

  Claudia groaned. “Now I am gonna be sick.”

  “Number one rule when you wrassle gators is not if you’re gonna get bit, but when you’re gonna get bit. Heck, I was pretty lucky. I’ve seen where entire limbs come off folks . . .”

  Suddenly, when we were no more than fifty yards from Alligator Island, the little Sea Horse motor sputtered and died.

  Skeets cussed.

  “Don’t tell me you ran out of gas, old man,” said Wiggy.

  “Naw, we got plenty of gas, see?”

  To prove his point, Skeets held up a little plastic gas container attached to the motor with a black hose. He shook the container, sloshing the gas inside.

  Less than ten feet from my canoe, another alligator popped his head above the water’s surface. He growled big . . . like a lion.

  Claudia cried out.

  “That wretched prehistoric monster is as long as this stupid canoe,” Claudia hissed. “Did it ever occur to you people that a beast like that could flip us over with one knock of his tail? I’m not kidding. I want out of this godforsaken place . . . Now!”

  Unfortunately for Claudia, as bad as she wanted to get out of the swamp, it was impossible. At least until Skeets got his little Sea Horse engine running again.

  We’d have to stick it out with the alligators.

  A three-hour tour . . .

  CHAPTER 53

  After the Sea Horse motor died, we paddled the rest of the way to Alligator Island. It only took a few minutes. Honestly, we were faster moving through the water paddling than when we’d used the engine.

  The minute we hopped onto the sandy soil, Claudia started shrieking that we needed to call someone to come pick her up, because she wasn’t staying in the scary swamp one moment longer.