We rummaged the clothes we’d got, and found eight dollars in silver sewed up in the lining of an old blanket overcoat. Jim said he reckoned the people in that house stole the coat, because if they’d a knowed the money was there they wouldn’t a left it. I said I reckoned they killed him, too; but Jim didn’t want to talk about that.

I says:
“Now you think it’s bad luck; but what did you say when I fetched in the snake-skin that I found on the top of the ridge day before yesterday? You said it was the worst bad luck in the world to touch a snake-skin with my hands. Well, here’s your bad luck! We’ve raked in all this truck and eight dollars besides. I wish we could have some bad luck like this every day, Jim.”
“Never you mind, honey, never you mind. Don’t you git too peart. It’s a-comin’. Mind I tell you, it’s a-comin’.”
It did come, too. It was a Tuesday that we had that talk. Well, after dinner Friday we was laying around in the grass at the upper end of the ridge, and got out of tobacco. I went to the cavern to get some, and found a rattlesnake in there. I killed him, and curled him up on the foot of Jim’s blanket, ever so natural, thinking there’d be some fun when Jim found him there. Well, by night I forgot all about the snake, and when Jim flung himself down on the blanket while I struck a light the snake’s mate was there, and bit him.
He jumped up yelling, and the first thing the light showed was the varmint curled up and ready for another spring. I laid him out in a second with a stick, and Jim grabbed pap’s whisky-jug and begun to pour it down.
He was barefooted, and the snake bit him right on the heel. That all comes of my being such a fool as to not remember that wherever you leave a dead snake its mate always comes there and curls around it. Jim told me to chop off the snake’s head and throw it away, and then skin the body and roast a piece of it. I done it, and he eat it and said it would help cure him. He made me take off the rattles and tie them around his wrist, too. He said that that would help. Then I slid out quiet and throwed the snakes clear away amongst the bushes; for I warn’t going to let Jim find out it was all my fault, not if I could help it.
Jim sucked and sucked at the jug, and now and then he got out of his head and pitched around and yelled; but every time he come to himself he went to sucking at the jug again. His foot swelled up pretty big, and so did his leg; but by and by the drunk begun to come, and so I judged he was all right; but I’d druther been bit with a snake than pap’s whisky.
Jim was laid up for four days and nights. Then the swelling was all gone and he was around again. I made up my mind I wouldn’t ever take a-holt of a snake-skin again with my hands, now that I see what had come of it. Jim said he reckoned I would believe him next time. And he said that handling a snake-skin was such awful bad luck that maybe we hadn’t got to the end of it yet. He said he druther see the new moon over his left shoulder as much as a thousand times than take up a snake-skin in his hand.

Well, I was getting to feel that way myself, though I’ve always reckoned that looking at the new moon over your left shoulder is one of the carelessest and foolishest things a body can do. Old Hank Bunker done it once, and bragged about it; and in less than two years he got drunk and fell off of the shot-tower, and spread himself out so that he was just a kind of a layer, as you may say; and they slid him edgeways between two barn doors for a coffin, and buried him so, so they say, but I didn’t see it. Pap told me. But anyway it all come of looking at the moon that way, like a fool.

Well, the days went along, and the river went down between its banks again; and about the first thing we done was to bait one of the big hooks with a skinned rabbit and set it and catch a catfish that was as big as a man, being six foot two inches long, and weighed over two hundred pounds. We couldn’t handle him, of course; he would a flung us into Illinois. We just set there and watched him rip and tear around till he drownded. We found a brass button in his stomach and a round ball, and lots of rubbage. We split the ball open with the hatchet, and there was a spool in it. Jim said he’d had it there a long time, to coat it over so and make a ball of it. It was as big a fish as was ever catched in the Mississippi, I reckon. Jim said he hadn’t ever seen a bigger one. He would a been worth a good deal over at the village. They peddle out such a fish as that by the pound in the market-house there; everybody buys some of him; his meat’s as white as snow and makes a good fry.
Next morning I said it was getting slow and dull, and I wanted to get a stirring up some way. I said I reckoned I would slip over the river and find out what was going on. Jim liked that notion; but he said I must go in the dark and look sharp. Then he studied it over and said, couldn’t I put on some of them old things and dress up like a girl? That was a good notion, too. So we shortened up one of the calico gowns, and I turned up my trouser-legs to my knees and got into it. Jim hitched it behind with the hooks, and it was a fair fit. I put on the sun-bonnet and tied it under my chin, and then for a body to look in and see my face was like looking down a joint of stove-pipe. Jim said nobody would know me, even in the daytime, hardly. I practiced around all day to get the hang of the things, and by and by I could do pretty well in them, only Jim said I didn’t walk like a girl; and he said I must quit pulling up my gown to get at my britches-pocket. I took notice, and done better.
I started up the Illinois shore in the canoe just after dark.

Después de desayunar yo quería hablar del muerto y suponer cómo lo habrían matado, pero Jim no quería. Dijo que traía mala suerte, y además, dijo, podía venir a perseguirnos, porque un hombre que no estaba enterrado tenía más probabilidades de andar haciendo el fantasma que uno bien plantado y cómodo. Aquello parecía bastante razonable, así que no dije más, pero no pude dejar de pensar en aquello ni de tener ganas de saber quién le había pegado un tiro a aquel hombre y por qué.
Buscamos entre la ropa que nos habíamos llevado y encontramos ocho dólares en monedas cosidas en el forro de un viejo capote. Jim dijo que según él la gente de la casa había robado el capote, porque si hubieran sabido que estaba el dinero, no lo habrían dejado. Dije que seguro que también ellos lo habían matado, pero Jim no quería hablar de aquello. Voy y digo:
––Bueno, tú crees que trae mala suerte, pero, ¿qué dijiste cuando traje la piel de serpiente que encontré en el cerro ayer? Dijiste que era la peor mala suerte del mundo tocar una piel de serpiente con las manos. Bueno, ¡pues mira la mala suerte! Nos hemos traído todo esto y encima ocho dólares. Ojala tuviéramos una mala suerte así todos los días, Jim.
––No pienses más, mi niño, no pienses más. No te animes demasiado. Ya llegará. Recuerda lo que te digo, ya llegará.
Y sí que llegó. Fue un martes cuando hablamos de eso. Bueno, el viernes después de comer estábamos tumbados en la hierba en la cima del cerro y nos quedamos sin tabaco. Fui a la cueva a buscar algo y me encontré con una serpiente de cascabel. La maté y la puse enroscada al pie de la manta de Jim, de lo más natural, pensando lo que me divertiría cuando Jim la encontrase. Bueno, por la noche se me olvidó lo de la serpiente, y cuando Jim se tumbó en la manta mientras yo encendía un farol allí estaba la compañera de la serpiente y le picó.

Pegó un salto y un grito, y lo primero que vimos a la luz fue al bicho enroscado y listo para volver a picar. Lo maté en un segundo con un palo y Jim agarró la damajuana de whisky de padre y empezó a verterla.
Estaba descalzo y la serpiente le había picado en el talón. Y todo eso porque yo había sido tan idiota que no recordé que siempre que mata uno a una serpiente aparece su compañera, que se le enrosca encima. Jim me dijo que cortase la cabeza a la serpiente y la tirase y después le quitara la piel al cadáver y asara un trozo. Fue lo que hice, y se lo comió y dijo que serviría para curarlo.

Me hizo quitar los cascabeles y atárselos a la muñeca. Dijo que eso también lo aliviaría. Después salí en silencio y tiré las serpientes muy lejos entre los arbustos, porque no iba a dejar que Jim se enterase de que todo era culpa mía, si podía evitarlo.
Jim chupó y chupó de la damajuana y de vez en cuando le daba la furia y se retorcía gritando, pero cada vez que volvía en sí chupaba de la garrafa. Se le hinchó mucho el pie y lo mismo le pasó con la pierna. Pero al rato le empezó a llegar la borrachera, así que pensé que estaba bien, aunque yo hubiera preferido que me mordiese una serpiente que el whisky de padre.