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You know, it ain’t possible to go through life without meeting your match some time or other. Brer Rabbit was no exception.
One day he and Brer Turtle were having a good laugh, remembering the time Brer Turtle conked Brer Fox on the head.
Brer Turtle said, “If Brer Fox had chased me instead of you, I would’ve been caught just as sure as you’re born.”
Brer Rabbit chuckled. “Brer Turtle, I could’ve caught you myself.”
Brer Turtle looked incredulous. “You must be joking, Brer Rabbit. You couldn’t have caught me if your feet had turned to wheels and your tail to a motor.”
“Hold on a minute!” Brer Rabbit couldn’t believe his big ears. “You so slow that when you moving you look like you standing still.”
“I ain’t got time to beat my lips with you over it. I got fifty dollars say I’m the fastest.”
“And I got fifty say you been shaving the hair off your legs or something, but I know you done lost your mind.”
“Brer Rabbit, I hate to take your money, but if that’s what you want, that’s what you got.”
Brer Rabbit laughed. “I’ll leave you so far behind that I can plant greens at the beginning of the race and by the time you cross the finish line, them greens will be ready to pick.”
“I hope your feet as fast as your mouth.”
They got Brer Buzzard to be the race judge and hold the bet money. It was to be a five-mile race, with posts set a mile apart. Brer Turtle claimed he could race faster going through the woods. Everybody told him he was out of his mind. How could he expect to beat Brer Rabbit, who would be running on the road! Brer Turtle said, “Watch me.”
Brer Rabbit went into training. He bought a red jogging suit, a green sweatband, and some yellow Adidas sneakers, and he jogged ten miles every day. Then he’d come home and do a whole mess of pushups, sit-ups, and skip rope to his records. Some folks wondered if he was training for a race or “Soul Train.”
Brer Turtle didn’t do a thing. You see, it’s a strange thing about the Turtle family. There were six of ’em, including Brer Turtle, and they all looked alike. The only way to tell them apart was to put’ em under a magnifying glass, and even then you could make a mistake.
On the day of the race, folks was there from all over. Even the TV network were there, so the folks on the Moon could see it. Miz Meadows and the girls brought lunch baskets and lots of Dr. Pepper to drink. Brer Rabbit showed up in his shades, wearing a gold jogging suit with a tan stripe, and when he took that off, he had on emerald-green racing shorts. Everybody ooohed and aaahed and rushed to get his autograph.
Meanwhile, Brer Turtle and his family had been up with the sun. He had put his wife in the woods at the starting line, and he stationed each of his children near the other posts. Brer Turtle hid himself in the woods at the finish line.
Race time came and Brer Rabbit hollered, “You ready, Brer Turtle?”
Miz Turtle was off a little ways in the woods and, disguising her voice, hollered, “Let’s go!”
Brer Turkey Buzzard fired the gun and the race was on. Brer Rabbit took off like a 747 jet. Miz Turtle went home.
Brer Rabbit came to the one-mile post. “Where you at, Brer Turtle?”
Brer Turtle’s young’un crawled on the road and said, “Right with you, Brer Rabbit.”
Brer Rabbit started running a little faster. He came to the two-mile post. “Where you at, Brer Turtle?”
“Right with you,” came the answer.
Brer Rabbit ran a little faster. He passed the three-mile post, the four-mile post, and every time he hollered for Brer Turtle, the answer came back, “Right with you!”
The finish line was in sight now, a quarter mile away. Brer Rabbit could see Brer Buzzard with the checkered flag, but he didn’t see Brer Turtle come out of the woods and hide behind the post marking the finish line.
“Give me the money, Brer Buzzard! Give me the money!” Brer Rabbit started hollering, and Miz Meadows and the girls started cheering like they’d lost their senses.
Brer Rabbit was a hundred yards from the finish line when Brer Turtle came from behind the post and crossed the line. “Soon as I catch my breath, I be pleased to take that fifty dollars, Brer Buzzard.”
Brer Buzzard handed over the money, and Brer Turtle went home.
Brer Rabbit was mad after he lost the race to Brer Turtle. The neighbors could hear him cussing and carrying on so bad that they almost called the police. Brer Rabbit had to get even with Brer Turtle. But as hard as he thought, as long as he thought, as wide and high as he thought, he didn’t have a thought.
That just made him more mad. He decided finally, “If I can’t get even with Brer Turtle, then I’ll show Miz Meadows and the girls that I’m still the boss of Brer Fox!”
Unfortunately, Brer Rabbit did his deciding out loud. Mr. Jack Sparrow was sitting in a nearby tree, and he heard every word. The period on Brer Rabbit’s sentence was hardly dry before Mr. Jack Sparrow started chirping:
“I’m gon’ to tell Brer Fox! I’m gon’ to tell Brer Fox! Just as sho’ as you born, I’m gon’ to tell Brer Fox!” And he flew off.
Brer Rabbit got a little worried. To tell the truth, he was downright scared, and he lit out for home. His eyes were on the ground and his feet were in the air and consequently he didn’t see Brer Fox until he’d bumped into him and almost knocked him over.
“What’s the matter, Brer Rabbit? You in an awful hurry today.”
“Brer Fox! I been looking all over for you! What’s this I hear about you going to beat me up, beat my wife up, beat my children up, and tear my house down?” He looked mad enough to chew concrete.
“What are you talking about?” Brer Fox wanted to know.
“You heard me! What did I do to make you want to do all that to me and mine?”
“Brer Rabbit, I don’t know who told you that, but it’s a lie!” Brer Fox started to get a little heated. “Who been telling lies on me?”
Brer Rabbit hemmed and hawed and pretended like he didn’t want to say, but finally: “It was Mr. Jack Sparrow. I couldn’t believe my ears, but he swore up, down, and sideways that it was the truth.”
Brer Fox didn’t say another word. He took off down the road looking for Mr. Jack Sparrow. Brer Rabbit smiled and went on home.
Brer Fox hadn’t gone far when he heard somebody call his name. “Brer Fox!”
It was Mr. Jack Sparrow, but Brer Fox kept walking like he hadn’t heard.
“Brer Fox! Brer Fox!” Mr. Jack Sparrow called, flying around his head.
Brer Fox make like he still ain’t heard. Then he came to a tree stump and sat down like he was tired.
“Brer Fox!” said Mr. Jack Sparrow, lighting on the ground beside him. “I got something to tell you.”
“Get on my tail, Mr. Jack Sparrow. You know, I’m deaf in one ear and can’t hear out of the other.”
Mr. Jack Sparrow hopped on his tail.
“Believe you better get on my back, Mr. Jack Sparrow. I’m deaf in one ear and can’t hear out the other.”
Mr. Jack Sparrow hopped on his back.
“Naw, that won’t do either. Still can’t hear. Hop on my head.”
Mr. Jack Sparrow hopped on his head.
“Doggone it. Believe you better hop on my tooth. I’m deaf in one ear and can’t hear out the other, but I got a little hearing in my eyetooth.”
Mr. Jack Sparrow hopped on Brer Fox’s tooth, and Brer Fox opened his mouth real wide and – GULP!
Tattletales never do come to a good end.
When Brer Rabbit wasn’t getting in and out of trouble, he was courting. Miz Meadows had a sister, Miz Motts, and she moved down from Philly-Me-York. Brer Rabbit decided to court both of them. Now don’t come asking me about Brer Rabbit’s family arrangements. How folks arranges their families is their business. Ain’t yours and it definitely ain’t mine.
Courting back in them days ain’t like it is now. Well, wait a minute. Come to think of it, I don’t know how it is now, being a married man. But back in my time, you took a girl to a restaurant and spent some money; then you took her to a movie show or something like that and spent some more money. She goes home happy and you go home broke. In Brer Rabbit’s time, it was the way it’s supposed to be: You went to the girl’s house before breakfast and stayed until after dinner.
One morning about breakfast time Brer Rabbit went over to see Miz Motts, but she wasn’t home. Somebody else might have spent the whole day waiting, or wore themselves out hunting all over the community for her. Not Brer Rabbit. She wasn’t home? That was her tough luck! He went on over to Miz Meadows’s house, and who should be there but Miz Motts.
Well, they all had a good time that day laughing and talking and carrying on. Long about nightfall Brer Rabbit said he had to go. The ladies asked him to stay for supper. Brer Rabbit was tempted, but it wasn’t safe for him to be out after dark, what with the other animals always scheming against him. So he excused himself and headed for home.
He hadn’t gone far when he saw a big basket sitting by the side of the road. He looked up the road and didn’t see nobody. He looked down the road and didn’t see nobody. He looked before and behind and all around. He didn’t see nobody. He listened and he listened some more. He didn’t hear nothing. He waited and he waited, but nobody came.
Brer Rabbit tipped over to the basket and peeked inside. It was full of grass. He reached in, got a little, and chewed on it for a while, his eyes closed. “Well, it looks like sparrow grass. It feels like sparrow grass. It tastes like sparrow grass, and it seems to me that that’s what it is!”
Having reached that scientific conclusion, he jumped up in the air, clicked his heels together, and dived headfirst into all that sweet sparrow grass, and landed right on top of Brer Wolf, who was hiding underneath.
Brer Rabbit knew he was caught this time, but he laughed. “I knew you were in here, Brer Wolf. I knew you by the smell. I was just trying to scare you.”
Brer Wolf grinned and licked his lips real slow. “Glad you knowed me, Brer Rabbit, ’cause I knew you the minute you jumped in. I told Brer Fox yesterday that this was the way to catch you, and catch you I did!”
Brer Rabbit got seriously scared and he started begging Brer Wolf to let him go. Brer Wolf ’s grin got bigger and Brer Rabbit could see the saliva sliding down his big teeth. Brer Wolf climbed out of the basket holding Brer Rabbit by the neck.
“Where you taking me, Brer Wolf?”
“Down to the creek.”
“What you taking me down there for?”
“So I can wash my hands after I skin you.”
“Oh, Brer Wolf! Please let me go!”
“You make me laugh.”
“You don’t understand. That sparrow grass made me sick.”
“You don’t know about sick, Brer Rabbit, until I get done with you.”
“Where I come from, nobody eats sick folk.”
“Where I come from, them’s the only ones we eat.”
They got down to the creek and Brer Rabbit was desperate now. He begged and he pleaded and he pleaded and he begged and Brer Wolf grinned and grinned.
Brer Wolf squeezed Brer Rabbit’s neck a little harder while he decided what to do.
Brer Rabbit started crying and boo-hooing.
“Ber – ber – Brer Wooly – ooly – oolf, if you gon’ kill me and eat me, you got to do it right,” he blubbered.
“What you mean?”
“I want you to be polite, Brer Wooly – ooly – oolf!”
“And how am I supposed to do that?”
“I want you to say grace, Brer Wolf, and say it quick, please, because I’m getting weak.”
“And how I say grace, Brer Rabbit?”
“You fold your hands under your chin, close your eyes, and say, ‘Bless us and put us in the crack where Ole Boy can’t find us.’ Say it quick, ’cause I’m going fast.”
Brer Wolf folded his hands under his chin, shut his eyes, and said, “Bless us and – ” He didn’t get any further, because the minute he folded his hands, Brer Rabbit jumped up off the ground. He took off from there so fast it took his shadow a week to catch him.
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