A GOOD PRICE

Charlie Price was considered the "black sheep" of his family.  The other Price children (all fourteen of them) were fine upstanding members of the community.  Not Charlie...he drank  too much, smoked too much, and cussed worse than you ever heard.  Then there was the gambling and fighting, which often landed him in jail for the weekend.  (He was a regular).  Charlie never kept a red cent in his pocket,  and couldn't even afford a sway back mule to ride.  If it wasn't for his chickens, and a good milk cow, I guess he would have starved.  Well, he could fish too, so that helped out.  My daddy was the exact opposite of Charlie, but he never had anything bad to say  about the man.  Daddy even tried to find something to give Charlie, but there wasn't much he could part with.  He did find an old broom, and Charlie was glad to get it.  It made a pretty fair fishing pole when he got done with it.  I used to think about how I was glad Charlie wasn't my kin, but that was before I fell into Watson's Creek.  I'll never forget that day, even if I lose my wits.  Charlie had taken his fishing broom down to the creek bank, and managed to hook two big catfish.  There were several of us kids wading along the shallow bank, and I was being careful to watch for quicksand.  Daddy said he "liked to fell"  into it before, and for me to watch out.  Lots of folks went to Watson's creek, and nobody ever stepped off into quicksand, so I figured maybe Daddy really didn't see it, but still, it couldn't hurt to watch.  I left the other kids and went to look at Charlie's catfish.  They were spectacular!  Of course, I wanted to pick one up because; well I don't know why, I just did.  That old catfish was a lot heavier for me to hold than it was for Charlie, and that surprised me.  I guess the catfish was surprised too.  He was suddenly free, and headed for home!  I couldn't let it happen!  After all it was my fault, and I knew Charlie was depending on having the fish for supper.  I had caught a suckling pig once, but the pig didn't have a big old dorsal fin, or whiskers which could stab you.  I got two big cuts, and a stab wound trying to catch that slippery, slimy, nasty, flopping, ugly...catfish.  I was bleeding bad, but hardly noticed.  My sites were set on the fish, and the fish had his sites set on the water.    By this time, I was on my belly, still trying to win the chase.  Charlie yelled at me to let the fish go, and tried to grab me by the foot, but he slipped and fell in the mud.  I slid into the creek with all my clothes and shoes to weigh me down, and suddenly felt the difference in the mud.  It was the quicksand Daddy told me about, and I was caught in it, hands first.  I couldn't keep my head above the water, even though it wasn't much deeper than a puddle.  The mud wouldn't let me free my hands, and I couldn't fight, so it didn't take long for me to lose consciousness.  I was drowning in a foot of water!  Charlie took hold of the broom pole, and slam-anchored it in the mud beside the quicksand.  With his right hand holding the broom pole, he stretched his long thin lanky left arm, and dug down till he had me firmly around my waist.  There was so much pressure on Charlie's arm that it broke, but he still pulled me out. It was up to him to start me breathing, but he didn't know how, so he just jerked that broom pole out of the mud and whacked me three good times on the back.   I woke up in my own bed with my hands bandaged.  Charlie and daddy were standing over me.  I had a hard time breathing, and couldn't speak at first.  It wasn't long  though, before I could ask questions, and that's when I found out what Charlie did to save me.  His left arm was in a splint, and I felt so bad for putting this trouble on him.  He told me not to worry, because the broken arm was a small price to pay for my life.  My daddy told Charlie  that he could never repay him for saving me, and Charlie said he could never repay daddy for the broom pole, which caught lots of fish, and kept him fed.  Even though a lot of people still considered Charlie the black sheep of his family, daddy always said that Charlie was "A Good Price".