on the hook discouraged us somewhat.
Charlie had seen Tansy home in the middle of the night. I suppose theyâd come out to the crick together, and they went back together. Theyâd tied up Stentor down the road, out of sight.
It beat me how those two had come up with a plan to spook me so quick. For Peteâs sake, Miss Myrt hadnât cooled before theyâd cooked up a scheme. And she wasnât stiff before they scared the p-waddinâ out of me. I blamed Tansy. Sheâd be the brains of the outfit.
But Charlie and Tansy? The two of them with their heads together was a new one on me.
By dawnâs early light, Lloyd rode Siren into the crick to give her a drink. We hitched her to the wagon, poured water on the embers, and set off for home on the crown of the road.
âHoo-boy,â Lloyd said. Him and J.W. were up on the board, crowding me. âYou shoulda had a look at your face. When you seen Tansy being the ghost of Miss Myrt, you went whiter than any sheet.â
âYou went bright green when you thought Charlie was Old Man Lichtenbergerâs ghost.â
âI was just surprised,â Lloyd said. âThen I tripped. I was cool as a cucumber.â
âSame color as one too,â I said. We rattled on behind Sirenâs switching tail.
Presently, Lloyd said, âIt was worse for you.â
âHow come?â I said.
âBecause Charlieâs your pal.â
That was pretty wise for a ten-year-old. Too wise, and it made me think. When a girl mixes into things, even Tansy, you donât know who your pals are, and thatâs the truth. I changed the subject, and then me and Lloyd voiced our hopes that theyâd shut down Hominy Ridge School.
When we got home, Tansy was at the stove, looking way too solid to ever be a ghost. She was frying up a pan of eggs. âGo on down to the henhouse and see what you see,â she said over her shoulder. Sheâd already gathered the eggs. They were there in two pails. âGo on,â she said, and we went.
The Rhode Island Reds were in the yard, all down at one end standing on each otherâs heads. They were way too quiet and watchful. For two cents I wouldnât have approached the henhouse at all.
It was dim inside, and slick underfoot. We were just in the door when I skidded to a stop. There was a big, long bullsnake right there on the henhouse floor. Part of him. Heâd crawled in through a knothole in the wall and tried to crawl out the same way.
But heâd swallowed an egg whole, and it made a lump in him that wouldnât let him fit through the knothole. He didnât have the sense to try another way out. You could see where heâd thrashed around, but now he was quiet, playing possum. Lloyd gaped around me at him. I guess we both gaped.
We went outside to see the rest of him. Seemed like weâd had about enough snakes for the time being. But ten or twelve inches of this one hung down the side of the henhouse with his mean-looking head in the dust.
We went for the ax and chopped him through at the wall. âYou want to cut the egg out of him?â Lloyd asked.
âYou want to eat it?â I said, so we left it. We divvied up the snake with the ax for the hens to feed on and buried the head. I didnât see this as a bad sign at the time. Later I wondered.
There was a day between before Miss Myrtâs funeral. That was about as long as you could wait on a funeral in this weather. But she had a brother coming from French Lick. The idea that a teacher would have a brother at all stumped Lloyd.
Baz Ellenbogen, who hadnât made it through the first reader under Miss Myrt some years back, was the grave digger. As Baz himself said, he never dug a grave he enjoyed more. But the day wasnât to be pure pleasure. Far from it. And I still think the snake in the henhouse was an evil omen of trouble coming.
On the morning of Miss Myrtâs funeral, we hoed weeds in the