Proof The Bible Is True

Rattlesnakes were common in the Smoky Mountains, where I grew up, and I knew to avoid them at all cost. But the timber rattler I came up against one sorry day when I was nine had been hiding under the roots of an old tree stump. I didn’t notice until it was coiled like a tight spring, its forked tongue flicking, tasting the air—searching for me. I tried not to move a muscle. If I was standing up, my boots might help protect my legs from a strike, I thought. But I wasn’t standing. I was crouched down on my haunches, eye to eye with the huge reptile.

 

I’d disturbed the snake while hunting for ginseng with my younger brother, Buddy Earl. Digging for those plants was not only fun but profitable. We sold them to an old medicine woman who lived on North Mountain. Miss Mable made tonic from the dried, powdered root, and she always paid in silver dollars.

 

Moving my head as slowly as I could, I glanced to the right in search of Buddy Earl, but he was nowhere to be seen. Probably found his own ginseng to dig up, I thought. Would I still be alive by the time he came back? My legs were starting to cramp pretty badly. I couldn’t stay in the same position for much longer, but the snake would surely lunge if I tried to run. I was trapped.

 

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