Berry Patch Tales

'Hey, Jeb!' Ned Scoopenberry called. 'What's that thing stickin' out of sugar sand?'

'Let's have a look,' Jeb Boggenskrog answered. 'It looks like some more litter got dumped by partyin' guzzleboozers.'

Ned moved closer to the dark object boldly framed in the white sand. When Jeb bent his knee for a closer look, Ned knelt to brush away the sand. 'Lookie here, it's a heel that's still part of an old dress shoe!' he said.

Both Pinelands berry men dug deeper into the sand with their hands. 'It's a right smart pair of dress shoes and they're hard-stuck in the sand!' Ned shouted his surprise. 'None like 'em worn hereabouts.'

They tugged their ears and stroked their chins, glanced nervously at the shoes, and then stared at each other for a long moment. 'They sure do look like city-slicker shoes that's attached to one of them fellers who got gibberzonked and pitched out here to turn into 'Indian artifacts' those archialley-gists come diggin' for.'

'Aw, poppin' poopwhistles, Jeb, you're always worryin' about the clandestine retreats of those slickers-they do peel off the ready for our birch tops, pine cones and snappin' turkle soup. And mayhaps they're only the preacher's shoes that got tossed out with his hail and brimstone.'

Lowering a squinched eye toward the exposed shoe, Jeb concluded in his best Sunday preacher's mime, 'The heel and soul of this matter is that no real stump jumper gets born with his shoes and socks already stitched on. These shoes were worn by a feller who grew into 'em ... and we'd better get out of here before his friends come back.'

'That left shoe just wiggled a whisker toward the other,' Ned calmly observed. 'Mayhaps be a crawlin' critter livin' inside it.'

When both shoes began to move as though worn by an upside-down toe-tapper, both men sank to their knees and dug energetically into the loose sand with their hands. Soon down to their elbows, Jeb suddenly stopped. 'There's somethin' very un-Piney touchin' my finger tips,' he said in a quivering voice.