“Can only figure it was a hot summer and he wanted to cool off.”

“Snakes are cold-blooded. They don’t have to cool off.”

“Might’ve come up from the sewer.”

“I was out in my johnboat one early morning before it was light, looking for duck when a damn water moccasin dropped into my boat, right on top of my foot, I kid you not. He must’ve been that big around.” He made a huge circle with his fingers.

“Every time you tell that story, Ansel, the darn thing gets bigger.”

“What’dya do?” Smudge asked as Bubba sat in silence, his face ashen.

“Kicked the damn thing as hard as I could. It sailed right over my head, all wriggly, and I could feel it brush my hair as it went past before splashing in the water.”

“We had one right here in the cooler.” Myrtle came over to join in. She pulled out a chair as if dinner no longer mattered.

“It was the worse scare of my life, fellas. Apparently he was out back sunning hisself on the loading dock when Beane went into the walk-in cooler to get a barrel of pickles. Must’ve walked right by that God-awful rattlesnake and neither noticed the other. All we could figure after the fact is while Beane had the cooler door open, the snake went on in and got locked up. So little ole me goes in there the next morning for bacon and the minute I opened that door and step inside, I hear something rattling.”

She paused, shivering, shutting her eyes. Everyone was silent and horror-struck as they hung on to every word.

“Well,” Myrtle went on, “I didn’t move. I looked around and couldn’t see nothing at first and then I heard the rattle again. By then I pretty much knew what it was. I mean a rattlesnake’s rattle has a rattle all its own and that’s what I was hearing sort of in the direction of the ten-gallon buckets of potato salad and coleslaw.” She paused again.

“Where was it?” The man in overalls could wait no longer.

“I’ll bet it was eating a rat back there.”

“We don’t got rats in the cooler,” Myrtle was quick to defend.

“Then where the hell was it, Myrtle?” Smudge said.

“That far from me.” She held her index fingers six inches apart.

Everybody gasped.

“It was coiled up right next to the mop, its tail sticking up and rattling to beat the band.”

“What’cha do!” Voices chimed in.

“Why, I got bit,” Myrtle said. “Right there on my left calf. Happened so fast I hardly felt a thing and then that snake was gone like a streak of grease. I was in the hospital a week, and let me tell you, my leg swole up so big they thought they might have to cut it off.”

No one spoke. Myrtle got up.

“Your food ought to be ready,” she said, heading back to the kitchen.

Ruby Sink tried for hours to get Lelia Ehrhart on the phone, but when call waiting kicked in, whoever was on the line simply ignored it.