KING COON

King Coon

One day during the winter, Billy and Freddy pulled up at my house in
an old four door car lead sled of some kind. They were smiling and
happier than I had ever seen them. They jumped out of the car and
said, “Ronald you’ve got to see what we got in the trunk.” Oh Lord, I hope
it’s not a woman, I thought to myself. To my relief I was staring down at
the biggest, and I mean the biggest, coon I had ever seen. I have to this day
never seen one this big. It looked like a German Shepard dog. It took up a
whole lot of this car’s trunk. Its hind foot was the size of a 5-year-old child
and it weighed close to 45 to 50 pounds. it was dead of course, but not a
bullet hole in him anywhere on his body. Billy and Freddy, who would normally be very laid back, quiet, and slow of speech, were talking very fast
and waving their arms around telling me how they came about being in
possession of this sure ‘nuff King Coon. Both of them were talking at the
same time. I’m looking left at Billy and right at Freddy trying to keep up
with story. It seems that they were coon huntin’ last night with a pack of
hounds and treed this monster. The King Coon came down the tree of his
own free will and accord and jumped into the pack of hounds (about six or
seven dogs). “He commenced to whoopin’ dogs,” Freddy said. One after another each dog would get tired of fighting or getting bit and give up and
leave. Coons are mean, folks. They always have a bad temper. They are not
as cute and cuddly as they look. After thrashing all the dogs and running
them off, the King Coon began to saunter off into the night. Billy and
Freddy were standing there looking at the coon in amazement and awe!
Then Billy said, “We can’t let him get away.” The two sharp thinking hill-
billies then proceeded to jump on the coon and have hand to hand combat
(or hand to paw combat). Billy said, “Look here where he bit a hole in my
ear” and Freddy said, “Look where he bit through my hand” showing me
the meaty part of his hand between the thumb and pointer finger. At that
point, I began to examine the two fellows and they were scratched and bit
all over their heads, ears, arms, hands, and probably some areas I couldn’t
see. They were very proud of their battle scars and showed them to me as
if they were blue ribbons from the county fair. Freddy said, “We finally got
him in a choke hold and choked the life out of him.” “It was a terrible fight,”
they said. “This coon will bring a whole lot of money from the fur buyer!”
they exclaimed. “Why didn’t you just shoot him? He might have rabies.” I
asked and pointed out. They looked at me like I had committed a Cardinal
Sin. They looked at me like I look at someone if they don’t like country
music. In a disgusted sounding reply they said, “Well, it wouldn’t bring as
much money if it had a bullet hole in it.” No shit. True story.