LOW WATER (Continued from page 7) Then while we looked he turned and swam out of that hole. He went downstream to where the water was so shallow that the upper part of his body came out of water and the sun flashed on his back. It was dark olive with black spots that got lighter towards his belly. There were touches of pink around the lower fins. Whitey made a movement toward him, and the fish swam back to his hole under the rock. "Where do you suppose he came from," asked Whitey in that same awed whisper. "I guess he came down from Brady's," I said. Brady's is where they built a dam just below the swimming pool. We'd seen a big fish suck in flies up there one evening, but we'd never got close enough to tell just how big he was. We'd met a fisherman once who told us he'd hooked a "monster" fish up in the swimming hole that had broken the tip section of his pole and got away. Whitey and I decided that this was the fish. "What'll we do with him?" asked Whitey. "He's too scared to eat anything," I said, "and too far under the rock to snag." "Let's try to spear him," Whitey. said. "It might work," I said. "You stand on one side and Len will stand on the other. I'll try to stab him with the fork." "Like hell," yelled Whitey, "Whose fork is it anyway, I'll be the one to stab him." "Gimme that fork!" I clenched my fist and started after him. He raised the fork over his head like a club and waved it at me. I guess I hesitated. "Whats the trouble, boys?" Whitey and I both jumped. It was Mrs. Brady standing on the bank. Len was standing by her looking meek. Mrs. Brady was getting old. The skin was beginning to hang loose on the sides of her neck like on a turkey. That's where being old shows first. She had dark rings under her eyes, but she was all painted up with lipstick and rouge like mother wears to parties only brighter. Her husband was a lawyer who lives out here in the summer, but lots of times he stays in town for a week or so. They really throw some parties at their place some nights when he's there and when he ain't. We watched them one night, only Len got sleepy and I had to take him home. Well anyway there she was asking us what we were doing, so I showed her the fish under the rock, and before I thought I told her we were going to try to spear the fish. She couldn't see the fish at first. I threw a rock up by him that stirred him a little. When she saw him I thought I heard her swear, but I'm not sure. "Let me try to get him," she said, and she looked pretty excited. "If you'll help me I'll give you all something nice. I'll go in and get some boots and be right out. Will you help me boys?" She didn't even wait for us to answer, but hurried up the path to her house in a running waddle. I looked at Whitey. I figured that if we let her try to stab the fish, I wouldn't have to fight. "We'll let her do it," I said, like it was all settled. I don't think he wanted to fight very bad either because he said OK. We just stood there and watched that big old fish wave his tail like he was tired to death. Pretty soon, Mrs. Brady came again. She was wearing some shorts and a pair of fishing boots that were too big for her, and she was carrying a fish net. With her other hand she kept pulling up the boots. She hadn't taken the time to fasten them to her belt, and they kept falling down around her knees. When she got out to us, Whitey gave her the fork. I told him and Len to go up around the rock to keep the fish from going that way. She told me that she would try to stab the fish, and if she did she would give me the net and I should try to net him. We moved to the fish kind of cautious. She was shaking like an aspen leaf. The old fish just lay there flicking his tail. When we got close enough so that I could see she could reach him with the fork, she handed me the net. She leaned over and slipped the fork under the water. She was breathing hard and sweating all over. Her boot fell down. Her leg was white and bumpy like bread-dough with big blue veins running through it. When she got the fork right up close to the belly of the trout she pushed it in hard and quick. For a minute I couldn't see anything but foam and sand and blood and her being shaken around like she had a cow on the end of a rope. But that big old fish was pretty sick, and he couldn't last very long. Pretty soon she sort of led him out from under the rock on the end of the fork and slipped the net around him, and lifted him out of the water. Even with his tail folded up in the bottom of the net, his head stuck up over the rim. It took both hands to lift him. She had stabbed him just back of the front fins in the white part of his belly, and he was pretty bloody. I thought she might get sick, but she just giggled like a girl and grabbed the net out of my hands. Len and Whitey came down to see, and she started to take the fork out of where it had got tangled in the net. Right then the fish made one last flop and fell in the river. She moaned and made a dive for him right on her stomach in the water. The fish wasn't trying to get away though; he was floating on his side as good as dead. She got one hand in his gill and stood up. She had cut her left hand on the rocks or the teeth of the trout or something, but she didn't even notice. In her other hand she held the fish wtih her finger running up through one of his gills. The blood of the fish was running down her arm and dripping off her elbow into the river. The whole front of Sixteen LOW WATER (Continued from preceding page) her was wet and smudged with red from her blood and the fish blood. Her face was smeared with water and sweat and her hair hung in lank damp strands. She stood there panting and staring at that fish. She had a look in her eyes like my sister the day after she got married. Then with her left hand, which was still bleeding, she began to stroke the speckled sides and dish-white belly of that fish. All at once I felt awful cold in my guts. "Let's go home, Whitey," I said. She turned around to us. "Come on in boys, and I'll give you something." As Whitey looked towards me something flashed through my mind .... I was sitting on the steps late one night watching a party through the bannisters. One of the ladies had told how she had seen Mrs. Brady invite the postman inside one day and how he hadn't come out for a long time. And they had all raised their eyebrows and laughed in the special way they do sometimes. And one of the other ladies had started to say, "That's nothing" when mother saw me and made me go to bed .... "Let's go in," said Whitey. "No," I hollered and ran down the river path towards home as fast as I could. UNCLE JAMISON by Marion Williams MY Uncle Jamison never went to school much, and he was never a pillar in his community, but I've seen him give a real, heart-warming, honest-to-goodness answer to a question that most folks would have called foolish. Why that gentleman was so wrapped up in his son Jackie, that he tried to answer every question that little tartar asked, even the one about, "Papa, where does the light go when it's out?" This prompted the only paper Uncle Jamison ever wrote in his life, and I must let you read it for yourself. * * * Light is a serious problem for an old man to attack, becuz light is as old as Father Adam, or maybe a few days older, but anyway, light goes out. I have found this out through experience, becuz the day the horse we called Nelly broke Pa's leg and made him so he had to lay down flat on his back, not bein' able to set down or stand up either, for six weeks, I distinctly remember that the light in the barn went out and Pa got in Nelly's way a tryin' to find the door. Now if the light goes out like I've jest said it does, and my trainin' didn't make me no liar, then it must have some-wheres to go. I've got my own idees about where this here place is, and maybe you've got yourn, but I do know that when the light goes out it is very hard to find a switch on the wall without bumping your shins on some chair that's been left a settin' in the middle of the floor. Many's the switchin' my boy Jackie has got for not puffin' things where they belong. Now this here switch is where some folks believe the light goes, and not bein' no debater like Abe Lincoln or that feller he argued with, I wouldn't want to take sides on the question, becuz I might not say the right things. Of course there's more than one kind of light in this great big world. All these modern girls has got lights in their lives, and it's only when their beaus goes somewhere without 'em that these lights are really out. Where they go is entirely different from where Jackie's light goes. They may end up at the White City, one of these motion-picture houses, the swimmin' pool dadgummit, the swimmin' holes of my day were a darn' sight better or they may be out cold if they're the wrong sort of beaus for nice girls to have. Now I don't mention this kind of light becuz it has any bearing on the case. I only mention it so that nobody can 'cuse be of not brin' in all the evidence. You know, lawyer can lose cases if they don't tell all they know, and this here case about where the light goes when its out is very important to get settled, cause my son Jackie ain't never goin' to find out how much his dad don't know if this feller can help it. Jackie, your light goes to heaven. All that nice bright light that you have turned out at eight o'clock if your dad's an old meanie and at any time after ten-thirty if he's modern goes right up to heaven and gets polished off and shined up and sent back to earth again when its rested. That's where the light goes. What do you suppose makes all them stars twinkle so if it ain't God's housekeeper a shinin' 'em up? Heaven's an awful clean place from all I've he'erd of it, and I guess the light ain't no exception. Anyway, maybe it wouldn't be light if it wasn't bright and shiny. And Jackie, remember that wherever light goes, its a darn' good place to be, and where there's light there ain't usually nothin' that can harm you. Its only where there's darkness and people wohse minds is all darkness that there's danger a lurkin' and, Jackie, if you can take the light with you even to them places, there ain't a thing in the world that can hurt you. * * * That was Uncle Jamison's philosophy. What to most folks was merely a foolish question was to him a chance to help a boy by giving a real answer, an answer with the faith of years behind it. "By their works ye shall know them," said the Good Book that was Uncle Jamison's sole education, and by his work, reflected in the lives of those around him, I knew Uncle Jamison. A heart full of natural goodness, a love for people, and an utter lack of selfishness made him great humble, yes, but great my Uncle Jamison. Seventeen