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CHAPTER FIVE
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I had shut the door to. Then I turned around, and there he was. I
used to be scared of him all the time, he tanned me so much. I
reckoned I was scared now, too; but in a minute I see I was
mistaken. That is, after the first jolt, as you may say, when my
breath sort of hitched- he being so unexpected; but right away
after, I see I warn't scared of him worth bothering about.
He was most fifty, and he looked it. His hair was long and tangled
and greasy, and hung down, and you could see his eyes shining
through like he was behind vines. It was all black, no gray; so was
his long, mixed-up whiskers. There warn't no color in his face,
where his face showed; it was white; not like another man's white, but
a white to make a body sick, a white to make a body's flesh crawl- a
tree-toad white, a fish-belly white. As for his clothes- just rags,
that was all. He had one ankle resting on 'tother knee; the boot on
that foot was busted, and two of his toes stuck through, and he worked
them now and then. His hat was laying on the floor; an old black
slouch with the top caved in, like a lid.
I stood a-looking at him; he set there a-looking at me, with his
chair tilted back a little. I set the candle down. I noticed the
window was up; so he had clumb in by the shed. He kept a-looking me
all over. By-and-by he says:
"Starchy clothes- very. You think you're a good deal of a big-bug,
don't you?"
"Maybe I am, maybe I ain't," I says.
"Don't you give me none o' your lip," says he. "You've put on
considerble many frills since I been away. I'll take you down a peg
before I get done with you. You're educated, too, they say; can read
and write. You think you're better'n your father, now, don't you,
because he can't? I'll take it out of you. Who told you you might
meddle with such hifalut'n foolishness, hey?- who told you you could?"
"The widow. She told me."
"The widow, hey?- and who told the widow she could put in her shovel
about a thing that ain't none of her business?"
"Nobody never told her."
"Well, I'll learn her how to meddle. And looky here- you drop that
school, you hear? I'll learn people to bring up a boy to put on airs
over his own father and let on to be better'n what he is. You lemme
catch you fooling around that school again, you hear? Your mother
couldn't read, and she couldn't write, nuther, before she died. None
of the family couldn't, before they died. I can't; and here you're
a-swelling yourself up like this. I ain't the man to stand it- you
hear? Say- lemme hear you read."
I took up a book and begun something about General Washington and
the wars. When I'd read about a half a minute, he fetched the book a
whack with his hand and knocked it across the house. He says:
"It's so. You can do it. I had my doubts when you told me. Now looky
here; you stop that putting on frills. I won't have it. I'll lay for
you, my smarty; and if I catch you about that school I'll tan you
good. First you know you'll get religion, too. I never see such a
son."
He took up a little blue and yaller picture of some cows and a
boy, and says:
"What's this?"
"It's something they give me for learning my lessons good."
He tore it up, and says-
"I'll give you something better- I'll give you a cowhide."
He set there a-mumbling and a-growling a minute, and then he says-
"Ain't you a sweet-scented dandy, though? A bed; and bedclothes; and
a look'n-glass; and a piece of carpet on the floor- and your own
father got to sleep with the hogs in the tanyard. I never see such a
son. I bet I'll take some o' these frills out o' you before I'm done
with you. Why there ain't no end to your airs- they say you're rich.
Hey?- how's that?"
"They lie- that's how."
"Looky here- mind how you talk to me; I'm a-standing about all I can
stand, now- so don't gimme no sass. I've been in town two days, and
I hain't heard nothing but about you bein' rich. I heard about it away
down the river, too. That's why I come. You git me that money
to-morrow- I want it."
"I hain't got no money."
"It's a lie. Judge Thatcher's got it. You git it. I want it."
"I hain't got no money, I tell you. You ask Judge Thatcher; he'll
tell you the same."
"All right. I'll ask him; and I'll make him pungle, too, or I'll
know the reason why. Say- how much you got in your pocket? I want it."
"I hain't got only a dollar, and I want that to-"
"It don't make no difference what you want it for- you just shell it
out."
He took it and bit it to see if it was good, and then he said he was
going down town to get some whisky; said he hadn't had a drink all
day. When he had got out on the shed, he put his head in again, and
cussed me for putting on frills and trying to be better than him;
and when I reckoned he was gone, he come back and put his head in
again, and told me to mind about that school, because he was going
to lay for me and lick me if I didn't drop that.
Next day he was drunk, and he went to Judge Thatcher's and
bullyragged him and tried to make him give up the money, but he
couldn't, and then he swore he'd make the law force him.
The judge and the widow went to law to get the court to take me away
from him and let one of them be my guardian; but it was a new judge
that had just come, and he didn't know the old man; so he said
courts mustn't interfere and separate families if they could help
it; said he'd druther not take a child away from its father. So
Judge Thatcher and the widow had to quit on the business.
That pleased the old man till he couldn't rest. He said he'd cowhide
me till I was black and blue if I didn't raise some money for him. I
borrowed three dollars from Judge Thatcher, and pap took it and got
drunk and went a-blowing around and cussing and whooping and
carrying on; and he kept it up all over town, with a tin pan, till
most midnight; then they jailed him, and next day they had him
before court, and jailed him again for a week. But he said he was
satisfied; said he was boss of his son, and he'd make it warm for him.
When he got out the new judge said he was agoing to make a man of
him. So he took him to his own house, and dressed him up clean and
nice, and had him to breakfast and dinner and supper with the
family, and was just old pie to him, so to speak. And after supper
he talked to him about temperance and such things till the old man
cried, and said he'd been a fool, and fooled away his life; but now he
was agoing to turn over a new leaf and be a man nobody wouldn't be
ashamed of, and he hoped the judge would help him and not look down on
him. The judge said he could hug him for them words; so he cried,
and his wife she cried again; pap said he'd been a man that had always
been misunderstood before, and the judge said he believed it. The
old man said that what a man wanted that was down, was sympathy; and
the judge said it was so; so they cried again. And when it was
bedtime, the old man rose up and held out his hand, and says:
"Look at it, gentlemen and ladies all; take ahold of it; shake it.
There's a hand that was the hand of a hog; but it ain't so no more;
it's the hand of a man that's started in on a new life, and 'll die
before he'll go back. You mark them words- don't forget I said them.
It's a clean hand now; shake it- don't be afeard."
So they shook it, one after the other, all around, and cried. The
judge's wife she kissed it. Then the old man he signed a pledge-
made his mark. The judge said it was the holiest time on record, or
something like that. Then they tucked the old man into a beautiful
room, which was the spare room, and in the night sometime he got
powerful thirsty and clumb out onto the porch-roof and slid down a
stanchion and traded his new coat for a jug of forty-rod, and clumb
back again and had a good old time; and towards daylight he crawled
out again, drunk as a fiddler, and rolled off the porch and broke
his left arm in two places and was most froze to death when somebody
found him after sun-up. And when they come to look at that spare room,
they had to take soundings before they could navigate it.
The judge he felt kind of sore. He said he reckoned a body could
reform the ole man with a shot-gun, maybe, but he didn't know no other
way.
CH_6
CHAPTER SIX
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Well, pretty soon the old man was up and around again, and then he
went for Judge Thatcher in the courts to make him give up that
money, and he went for me, too, for not stopping school. He catched me
a couple of times and thrashed me, but I went to school just the same,
and dodged him or outrun him most of the time. I didn't want to go
to school much, before, but I reckoned I'd go now to spite pap. That
law trial was a slow business; appeared like they warn't ever going to
get started on it; so every now and then I'd borrow two or three
dollars off of the judge for him, to keep from getting a cowhiding.
Every time he got money he got drunk; and every time he got drunk he
raised Cain around town; and every time he raised Cain he got
jailed. He was just suited- this kind of thing was right in his line.
He got to hanging around the widow's too much, and so she told him
at last, that if he didn't quit using around there she would make
trouble for him. Well, wasn't he mad? He said he would show who was
Huck Finn's boss. So he watched out for me one day in the spring,
and catched me, and took me up the river about three miles, in a
skiff, and crossed over to the Illinois shore where it was woody and
there warn't no houses but an old log hut in a place where the
timber was so thick you couldn't find it if you didn't know where it
was.
He kept me with him all the time, and I never got a chance to run
off. We lived in that old cabin, and he always locked the door and put
the key under his head, nights. He had a gun which he had stole, I
reckon, and we fished and hunted, and that was what we lived on. Every
little while he locked me in and went down to the store, three
miles, to the ferry, and traded fish and game for whisky and fetched
it home and got drunk and had a good time, and licked me. The widow
she found out where I was, by-and-by, and she sent a man over to try
to get hold of me, but pap drove him off with the gun, and it warn't
long after that till I was used to being where I was, and liked it,
all but the cowhide part.
It was kind of lazy and jolly, laying off comfortable all day,
smoking and fishing, and no books nor study. Two months or more run
along, and my clothes got to be all rags and dirt, and I didn't see
how I'd ever got to like it so well at the widow's, where you had to
wash, and eat on a plate, and comb up, and go to bed and get up
regular, and be forever bothering over a book and have old Miss Watson
pecking at you all the time. I didn't want to go back no more. I had
stopped cussing, because the widow didn't like it; but now I took to
it again because pap hadn't no objections. It was pretty good times up
in the woods there take it all around.
But by-and-by pap got too handy with his hick'ry, and I couldn't
stand it. I was all over welts. He got to going away so much, too, and
locking me in. Once he locked me in and was gone three days. It was
dreadful lonesome. I judged he had got drowned and I wasn't ever going
to get out any more. I was scared. I made up my mind I would fix up
some way to leave there. I had tried to get out of that cabin many a
time, but I couldn't find no way. There warn't a window to it big
enought for a dog to get through. I couldn't get up the chimbly, it
was too narrow. The door was thick solid oak slabs. Pap was pretty
careful not to leave a knife or anything in the cabin when he was
away; I reckon I had hunted the place over as much as a hundred times;
well, I was most all the time at it, because it was about the only way
to put in the time. But this time I found something at last; I found
an old rusty wood-saw without any handle; it was laid in between a
rafter and the clapboards of the roof. I greased it up and went to
work. There was an old horse-blanket nailed against the logs at the
far end of the cabin behind the table, to keep the wind from blowing
through the chinks and putting the candle out. I got under the table
and raised the blanket and went to work to saw a section of the big
bottom log out, big enough to let me through. Well, it was a good long
job, but I was getting towards the end of it when I heard pap's gun in
the woods. I got rid of the signs of my work, and dropped the
blanket and hid my saw, and pretty soon pap came in.
Pap warn't in a good humor- so he was his natural self. He said he
was down to town, and everything was going wrong. His lawyer said he
reckoned he would win his lawsuit and get the money, if they ever
got started on the trial; but then there was ways to put it off a long
time, and Judge Thatcher knowed how to do it. And he said people
allowed there'd be another trial to get me away from him and give me
to the widow for my guardian, and they guessed it would win, this
time. This shook me up considerable, because I didn't want to go
back to the widow's any more and be so cramped up and sivilized, as
they called it. Then the old man got to cussing, and cussed everything
and everybody he could think of, and then cussed them all over again
to make sure he hadn't skipped any, and after that he polished off
with a kind of a general cuss all round, including a considerable
parcel of people which he didn't know the names of, and so called them
what's-his-name, when he got to them, and went right along with his
cussing.
He said he would like to see the widow get me. He said he would
watch out, and if they tried to come any such game on him he knowed of
a place six or seven mile off, to stow me in, where they might hunt
till they dropped and they couldn't find me. That made me pretty
uneasy again, but only for a minute; I reckoned I wouldn't stay on
hand till he got that chance.
The old man made me go to the skiff and fetch the things he had got.
There was a fifty-pound sack of corn meal, and a side of bacon,
ammunition, and a four-gallon jug of whisky, and an old book and two
newspapers for wadding, besides some tow. I toted up a load, and
went back and set down on the bow of the skiff to rest. I thought it
all over, and I reckoned I would walk off with the gun and some lines,
and take to the woods when I run away. I guessed I wouldn't stay in
one place, but just tramp right across the country, mostly night
times, and hunt and fish to keep alive, and so get so far away that
the old man nor the widow couldn't ever find me any more. I judged I
would saw out and leave that night if pap got drunk enough, and I
reckoned he would. I got so full of it I didn't notice how long I
was staying, till the old man hollered and asked me whether I was
asleep or drownded.
I got the things all up to the cabin, and then it was about dark.
While I was cooking supper the old man took a swig or two and got sort
of warmed up, and went to ripping again. He had been drunk over in
town, and laid in the gutter all night, and he was a sight to look at.
A body would a thought he was Adam, he was just all mud. Whenever
his liquor begun to work, he most always went for the govment. This
time he says:
"Call this a govment! why, just look at it and see what it's like.
Here's the law a-standing ready to take a man's son away from him- a
man's own son, which he has had all the trouble and all the anxiety
and all the expense of raising. Yes, just as that man has got that son
raised at last, and ready to go to work and begin to do suthin' for
him and give him a rest, the law up and goes for him. And they call
that govment! That ain't all, nuther. The law backs that old Judge
Thatcher up and helps him to keep me out o' my property. Here's what
the law does. The law takes a man worth six thousand dollars and
upards, and jams him into an old trap of a cabin like this, and lets
him go round in clothes that ain't fitten for a hog. They call that
govment! A man can't get his rights in a govment like this.
Sometimes I've a mighty notion to just leave the country for good
and all. Yes, and I told 'em so; I told old Thatcher so to his face.
Lots of 'em heard me, and can tell what I said. Says I, for two
cents I'd leave the blamed country and never come anear it agin.
Them's the very words. I says, look at my hat- if you call it a hat-
but the lid raises up and the rest of it goes down till it's below
my chin, and then it ain't rightly a hat at all, but more like my head
was shoved up through a jint o' stove-pipe. Look at it, says I- such a
hat for me to wear- one of the wealthiest men in this town, if I could
git my rights.
"Oh, yes, this is a wonderful govment, wonderful. Why, looky here.
There was a free nigger there, from Ohio; a mulatter, most as white as
a white man. He had the whitest shirt on you ever see, too, and the
shiniest hat; and there ain't a man in that town that's got as fine
clothes as what he had; and he had a gold watch and chain, and a
silver-headed cane- the awfulest old gray-headed nabob in the State.
And what do you think? they said he was a p'fessor in a college, and
could talk all kinds of languages, and knowed everything. And that
ain't the wust. They said he could vote, when he was at home. Well,
that let me out. Thinks I, what is the country a-coming to? It was
'lection day, and I was just about to go and vote, myself, if I warn't
too drunk to get there; but when they told me there was a State in
this country where they'd let that nigger vote, I drawed out. I says
I'll never vote agin. Them's the very words I said; they all heard me;
and the country may rot for all me- I'll never vote agin as long as
I live. And to see the cool way of that nigger- why, he wouldn't a
give me the road if I hadn't shoved him out o' the way. I says to
the people, why ain't this nigger put up at auction and sold- that's
what I want to know. And what do you reckon they said? Why, they
said he couldn't be sold till he'd been in the State six months, and
he hadn't been there that long yet. There, now- that's a specimen.
They call that a govment that can't sell a free nigger till he's
been in the State six months. Here's a govment that calls itself a
govment, and lets on to be a govment, and thinks it is a govment,
and yet's got to set stock-still for six whole months before it can
take ahold of a prowling, thieving, infernal, white-shirted nigger,
and-"
Pap was agoing on so, he never noticed where his old limber legs was
taking him to, so he went head over heels over the tub of salt pork,
and barked both shins, and the rest of his speech was all the
hottest kind of language- mostly hove at the nigger and the govment,
though he give the tub some, too, all along, here and there. He hopped
around the cabin considerable, first on one leg and then on the other,
holding first one shin and then the other one, and at last he let
out with his left foot all of a sudden and fetched the tub a
rattling kick. But it warn't good judgment, because that was the
boot that had a couple of his toes leaking out of the front end of it;
so now he raised a howl that fairly made a body's hair raise, and down
he went in the dirt, and rolled there, and held his toes; and the
cussing he done then laid over anything he had ever done previous.
He said so his own self, afterwards. He had heard old Sowberry Hagan
in his best days, and he said it laid over him, too; but I reckon that
was sort of piling it on, maybe.
After supper pap took the jug, and said he had enough whisky there
for two drunks and one delirium tremens. That was always his word. I
judged he would be blind drunk in about an hour, and then I would
steal the key, or saw myself out, one or 'tother. He drank, and drank,
and tumbled down on his blankets, by-and-by; but luck didn't run my
way. He didn't go sound asleep, but was uneasy. He groaned, and
moaned, and thrashed around this way and that, for a long time. At
last I got so sleepy I couldn't keep my eyes open, all I could do, and
so before I knowed what I was about I was sound asleep, and the candle
burning.
I don't know how long I was asleep, but all of a sudden there was an
awful scream and I was up. There was pap, looking wild and skipping
around every which way and yelling about snakes. He said they was
crawling up his legs; and then he would give a jump and scream, and
say one had bit him on the cheek- but I couldn't see no snakes. He
started and run round and round the cabin, hollering "take him off!
take him off! he's biting me on the neck!" I never see a man look so
wild in the eyes. Pretty soon he was all fagged out, and fell down
panting; then he rolled over and over, wonderful fast, kicking
things every which way, and striking and grabbing at the air with
his hands, and screaming, and saying there was devils ahold of him. He
wore out, by-and-by, and laid still a while, moaning. Then he laid
stiller, and didn't make a sound. I could hear the owls and the
wolves, away off in the woods, and it seemed terrible still. He was
laying over by the corner. By-and-by he raised up, part way, and
listened, with his head to one side. He says very low:
"Tramp- tramp- tramp; that's the dead; tramp- tramp- tramp;
they're coming after me; but I won't go- Oh, they're here! don't touch
me- don't! hands off- they're cold; let go- Oh, let a poor devil
alone!"
Then he went down on all fours and crawled off begging them to let
him alone, and he rolled himself up in his blanket and wallowed in
under the old pine table, still a-begging; and then he went to crying.
I could hear him through the blanket.
By-and-by he rolled out and jumped up on his feet looking wild,
and he see me and went for me. He chased me round and round the place,
with a clasp-knife, calling me the Angel of Death and saying he
would kill me and then I couldn't come for him no more. I begged,
and told him I was only Huck, but he laughed such a screechy laugh,
and roared and cussed, and kept on chasing me up. Once when I turned
short and dodged under his arm he made a grab and got me by the jacket
between my shoulders, and I thought I was gone; but I slid out of
the jacket quick as lightning, and saved myself. Pretty soon he was
all tired out, and dropped down with his back against the door, and
said he would rest a minute and then kill me. He put his knife under
him, and said he would sleep and get strong, and then he would see who
was who.
So he dozed off, pretty soon. By-and-by I got the old splitbottom
chair and clumb up, as easy as I could, not to make any noise, and got
down the gun. I slipped the ramrod down it to make sure it was loaded,
and then I laid it across the turnip barrel, pointing towards pap, and
set down behind it to wait for him to stir. And how slow and still the
time did drag along.
CH_7
CHAPTER SEVEN
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Git up! what you 'bout!"
I opened my eyes and looked around, trying to make out where I
was. It was after sun-up, and I had been sound asleep. Pap was
standing over me, looking sour- and sick, too. He says-
"What you doin' with this gun?"
I judged he didn't know nothing about what he had been doing, so I
says:
"Somebody tried to get in, so I was laying for him."
"Why didn't you roust me out?"
"Well I tried to, but I couldn't; I couldn't budge you."
"Well, all right. Don't stand there palavering all day, but out with
you and see if there's a fish on the lines for breakfast. I'll be
along in a minute."
He unlocked the door and I cleared out, up the river bank. I noticed
some pieces of limbs and such things floating down, and a sprinkling
of bark; so I knowed the river had begun to rise. I reckoned I would
have great times now, if I was over at the town. The June rise used to
be always luck for me; because as soon as that rise begins, here comes
cord-wood floating down, and pieces of log rafts- sometimes a dozen
logs together; so all you have to do is to catch them and sell them to
the wood yards and the sawmill.
I went along up the bank with one eye out for pap and 'tother one
out for what the rise might fetch along. Well, all at once, here comes
a canoe; just a beauty, too, about thirteen or fourteen foot long,
riding high like a duck. I shot head first off of the bank, like a
frog, clothes and all on, and struck out for the canoe. I just
expected there'd be somebody laying down in it, because people often
done that to fool folks, and when a chap had pulled a skiff out most
to it they'd raise up and laugh at him. But it warn't so this time. It
was a drift-canoe, sure enough, and I clumb in and paddled her ashore.
Thinks I, the old man will be glad when he sees this- she's worth
ten dollars. But when I got to shore pap wasn't in sight yet, and as I
was running her into a little creek like a gully, all hung over with
vines and willows, I struck another idea; I judged I'd hide her
good, and then, stead of taking to the woods when I run off, I'd go
down the river about fifty mile and camp in one place for good, and
not have such a rough time tramping on foot.
It was pretty close to the shanty, and I thought I heard the old man
coming, all the time; but I got her hid; and then I out and looked
around a bunch of willows, and there was the old man down the path a
piece just drawing a bead on a bird with his gun. So he hadn't seen
anything.
When he got along, I was hard at it taking up a "trot" line. He
abused me a little for being so slow, but I told him I fell in the
river and that was what made me so long. I knowed he would see I was
wet, and then he would be asking questions. We got five cat-fish off
of the lines and went home.
While we laid off, after breakfast, to sleep up, both of us being
about wore out, I got to thinking that if I could fix up some way to
keep pap and the widow from trying to follow me, it would be a
certainer thing than trusting to luck to get far enough off before
they missed me; you see, all kinds of things might happen. Well, I
didn't see no way for a while, but by-and-by pap raised up a minute,
to drink another barrel of water, and he says:
"Another time a man comes a-prowling round here, you roust me out,
you hear? That man warn't here for no good. I'd a shot him. Next time,
you roust me out, you hear?"
Then he dropped down and went to sleep again- but what he had been
saying give me the very idea I wanted. I says to myself, I can fix
it now so nobody won't think of following me.
About twelve o'clock we turned out and went along up the bank. The
river was coming up pretty fast, and lots of driftwood going by on the
rise. By-and-by, along comes part of a log raft- nine logs fast
together. We went out with the skiff and towed it ashore. Then we
had dinner. Anybody but pap would a waited and seen the day through,
so as to catch more stuff; but that warn't pap's style. Nine logs
was enough for one time; he must shove right over to town and sell. So
he locked me in and took the skiff and started off towing the raft
about half-past three. I judged he wouldn't come back that night. I
waited till I reckoned he had got a good start, then I out with my saw
and went to work on that log again. Before he was side of the river
I was out of the hole; him and his raft was just a speck on the
water away off yonder.
I took the sack of corn meal and took it to where the canoe was hid,
and shoved the vines and branches apart and put it in; then I done the
same with the side of bacon; then the whisky jug; I took all the
coffee and sugar there was, and all the ammunition; I took the
wadding; I took the bucket and gourd, I took a dipper and a tin cup,
and my old saw and two blankets, and the skillet and the coffee-pot. I
took fish-lines and matches and other things- everything that was
worth a cent. I cleaned out the place. I wanted an axe, but there
wasn't any, only the one out at the wood pile, and I knowed why I
was going to leave that. I fetched out the gun, and now I was done.
I had wore the ground a good deal, crawling out of the hole and
dragging out so many things. So I fixed that as good as I could from
the outside by scattering dust on the place, which covered up the
smoothness and the sawdust. Then I fixed the piece of log back in
its place, and put two rocks under it and one against it to hold it
there,- for it was bent up at that place, and didn't quite touch
ground. If you stood four or five foot away and didn't know it was
sawed, you wouldn't ever notice it; and besides, this was the back
of the cabin and it warn't likely anybody would go fooling around
there.
It was all grass clear to the canoe; so I hadn't left a track. I
followed around to see. I stood on the bank and looked out over the
river. All safe. So I took the gun and went up a piece into the
woods and was hunting around for some birds, when I see a wild pig;
hogs soon went wild in them bottoms after they had got away from the
prairie farms. I shot this fellow and took him into camp.
I took the axe and smashed in the door- I beat it and hacked it
considerable, a-doing it. I fetched the pig in and took him back
nearly to the table and hacked into his throat with the axe, and
laid him down on the ground to bleed- I say ground, because it was
ground- hard packed, and no boards. Well, next I took an old sack
and put a lot of big rocks in it,- all I could drag- and I started
it from the pig and dragged it to the door and through the woods
down to the river and dumped it in, and down it sunk, out of sight.
You could easy see that something had been dragged over the ground.
I did wish Tom Sawyer was there, I knowed he would take an interest in
this kind of business, and throw in the fancy touches. Nobody could
spread himself like Tom Sawyer in such a thing as that.
Well, last I pulled out some of my hair, and bloodied the axe
good, and stuck it on the back side, and slung the axe in the
corner. Then I took the pig and held him to my breast with my jacket
(so he couldn't drip) till I got a good piece below the house and then
dumped him into the river. Now I thought of something else. So I
went and got the bag of meal and my old saw out of the canoe and
fetched them to the house. I took the bag to where it used to stand,
and ripped a hole in the bottom of it with the saw, for there warn't
no knives and forks on the place- pap done everything with his
clasp-knife, about the cooking. Then I carried the sack about a
hundred yards across the grass and through the willows east of the
house, to a shallow lake that was five mile wide and full of rushes-
and ducks too, you might say, in the season. There was a slough or a
creek leading out of it on the other side, that went miles away, I
don't know where, but it didn't go to the river. The meal sifted out
and made a little track all the way to the lake. I dropped pap's
whetstone there too, so as to look like it had been done by
accident. Then I tied up the rip in the meal sack with a string, so it
wouldn't leak no more, and took it and my saw to the canoe again.
It was about dark, now; so I dropped the canoe down the river
under some willows that hung over the bank, and waited for the moon to
rise. I made fast to a willow; then I took a bite to eat, and
by-and-by laid down in the canoe to smoke a pipe and lay out a plan. I
says to myself, they'll follow the track of that sackful of rocks to
the shore and then drag the river for me. And they'll follow that meal
track to the lake and go browsing down the creek that leads out of
it to find the robbers that killed me and took the things. They
won't ever hunt the river for anything but my dead carcass. They'll
soon get tired of that, and won't bother no more about me. All
right; I can stop anywhere I want to. Jackson's Island is good
enough for me; I know that island pretty well, and nobody ever comes
there. And then I can paddle over to town, nights, and slink around
and pick up things I want. Jackson's Island's the place.
I was pretty tired, and the first thing I knowed, I was asleep. When
I woke up I didn't know where I was, for a minute. I set up and looked
around, a little scared. Then I remembered. The river looked miles and
miles across. The moon was so bright I could a counted the drift
logs that went a slipping along, black and still, hundreds of yards
out from shore. Everything was dead quiet, and it looked late, and
smelt late. You know what I mean- I don't know the words to put it in.
I took a good gap and a stretch, and was just going to unhitch and
start, when I heard a sound away over the water. Pretty soon I made it
out. It was that dull kind of a regular sound that comes from oars
working in rowlocks when it's a still night. I peeped out through
the willow branches, and there it was- a skiff, away across the water.
I couldn't tell how many was in it. It kept a-coming, and when it
was abreast of me I see there warn't but one man in it. Thinks I,
maybe it's pap, though I warn't expecting him. He dropped below me,
with the current, and by-and-by he come a-swinging up shore in the
easy water, and he went by so close I could a reached out the gun
and touched him. Well, it was pap, sure enough- and sober, too, by the
way he laid to his oars.
I didn't lose no time. The next minute I was a-spinning down
stream soft but quick in the shade of the bank. I made two mile and
a half, and then struck out a quarter of a mile or more towards the
middle of the river, because soon I would be passing the ferry landing
and people might see me and hail me. I got out amongst the
drift-wood and then laid down in the bottom of the canoe and let her
float. I laid there and had a good rest and a smoke out of my pipe,
looking away into the sky, not a cloud in it. The sky looks ever so
deep when you lay down on your back in the moonshine; I never knowed
it before. And how far a body can hear on the water such nights! I
heard people talking at the ferry landing. I heard what they said,
too, every word of it. One man said it was getting towards the long
days and the short nights, now. 'Tother one said this warn't one of
the short ones, he reckoned- and then they laughed, and he said it
over again and they laughed again; then they waked up another fellow
and told him, and laughed, but he didn't laugh; he ripped out
something brisk and said let him alone. The first fellow said he
'lowed to tell it to his old woman- she would think it was pretty
good; but he said that warn't nothing to some things he had said in
his tune. I heard one man say it was nearly three o'clock, and he
hoped daylight wouldn't wait more than about a week longer. After
that, the talk got further and further away, and I couldn't make out
the words any more, but I could hear the mumble; and now and then a
laugh, too, but it seemed a long ways off.
I was away below the ferry now. I rose up and there was Jackson's
Island, about two mile and a half down stream, heavy-timbered and
standing up out of the middle of the river, big and dark and solid,
like a steamboat without any lights. There warn't any signs of the bar
at the head- it was all under water, now.
It didn't take me long to get there. I shot past the head at a
ripping rate, the current was so swift, and then I got into dead water
and landed on the side towards the Illinois shore. I run the canoe
into a deep dent in the bank that I knowed about; I had to part the
willow branches to get in; and when I made fast nobody could a seen
the canoe from the outside.
I went up and set down on a log at the head of the island and looked
out on the big river and the black driftwood, and away over to the
town, three mile away, where there was three or four lights twinkling.
A monstrous big lumber raft was about a mile up stream, coming along
down, with a lantern in the middle of it. I watched it come creeping
down, and when it was most abreast of where I stood I heard a man say,
"Stern oars, there! heave her head to stabboard!" I heard that just as
plain as if the man was by my side.
There was a little gray in the sky, now; so I stepped into the woods
and laid down for a nap before breakfast.
CH_8
CHAPTER EIGHT
-
The sun was up so high when I waked, that I judged it was after
eight o'clock. I laid there in the grass and the cool shade,
thinking about things and feeling rested and ruther comfortable and
satisfied. I could see the sun out at one or two holes, but mostly
it was big trees all about, and gloomy in there amongst them. There
was freckled places on the ground where the light sifted down
through the leaves, and the freckled places swapped about a little,
showing there was a little breeze up there. A couple of squirrels
set on a limb and jabbered at me very friendly.
I was powerful lazy and comfortable- didn't want to get up and
cook breakfast. Well, I was dozing off again, when I think I hears a
deep sound of "boom!" away up the river. I rouses up and rests my
elbow and listens; pretty soon I hears it again. I hopped up and
went and looked out a hole in the leaves, and I see a bunch of smoke
laying on the water a long ways up- about abreast the ferry. And there
was the ferryboat full of people, floating along down. I knowed what
was the matter, now. "Boom!" I see the white smoke squirt out of the
ferry-boat's side. You see, they was firing cannon over the water,
trying to make my carcass come to the top.
I was pretty hungry, but it warn't going to do for me to start a
fire, because they might see the smoke. So I set there and watched the
cannon-smoke and listened to the boom. The river was a mile wide,
there, and it always looks pretty on a summer morning- so I was having
a good enough time seeing them hunt for my remainders, if I only had a
bite to eat. Well, then I happened to think how they always put
quicksilver in loaves of bread and float them off because they
always go right to the drownded carcass and stop there. So says I,
I'll keep a lookout, and if any of them's floating around after me,
I'll give them a show. I changed to the Illinois edge of the island to
see what luck I could have, and I warn't disappointed. A big double
loaf come along, and I most got it, with a long stick, but my foot
slipped and she floated out further. Of course I was where the current
set in the closest to the shore- I knowed enough for that. But
by-and-by along comes another one, and this time I won. I took out the
plug and shook out the little dab of quicksilver, and set my teeth in.
It was "baker's bread"- what the quality eat- none of your low-down
corn-pone.
I got a good place amongst the leaves, and set there on a log,
munching the bread and watching the ferry-boat, and very well
satisfied. And then something struck me. I says, now I reckon the
widow or the parson or somebody prayed that this bread would find
me, and here it has gone and done it. So there ain't no doubt but
there is something in that thing. That is, there's something in it
when a body like the widow or the parson prays, but it don't work
for me, and I reckon it don't work for only just the right kind.
I lit a pipe and had a good long smoke and went on watching. The
ferry-boat was floating with the current, and I allowed I'd have a
chance to see who was aboard when she come along, because she would
come in close, where the bread did. When she'd got pretty well along
down towards me, I put out my pipe and went to where I fished out
the bread, and laid down behind a log on the bank in a little open
place. Where the log forked I could peep through.
By-and-by she come along, and she drifted in so close that they
could a run out a plank and walked ashore. Most everybody was on the
boat. Pap, and Judge Thatcher, and Bessie Thatcher, and Jo Harper, and
Tom Sawyer, and his old Aunt Polly, and Sid and Mary, and plenty more.
Everybody was talking about the murder, but the captain broke in and
says:
"Look sharp, now; the current sets in the closest here, and maybe
he's washed ashore and got tangled amongst the brush at the water's
edge. I hope so, anyway."
I didn't hope so. They all crowded up and leaned over the rails,
nearly in my face, and kept still, watching with all their might. I
could see them first-rate, but they couldn't see me. Then the
captain sung out:
"Stand away!" and the cannon let off such a blast right before me
that it made me deef with the noise and pretty near blind with the
smoke, and I judged I was gone. If they'd a had some bullets in, I
reckon they'd a got the corpse they was after. Well, I see I warn't
hurt, thanks to goodness. The boat floated on and went out of sight
around the shoulder of the island. I could hear the booming, now and
then, further and further off, and by-and-by after an hour, I didn't
hear it no more. The island was three mile long. I judged they had got
to the foot, and was giving it up. But they didn't yet a while. They
turned around the foot of the island and started up the channel on the
Missouri side, under steam, and booming once in a while as they
went. I crossed over to that side and watched them. When they got
abreast of the head of the island they quit shooting and dropped
over to the Missouri shore and went home to the town.
I knowed I was all right now. Nobody else would come a-hunting after
me. I got my traps out of the canoe and made me a nice camp in the
thick woods. I made a kind of a tent out of my blankets to put my
things under so the rain couldn't get at them. I catched a cat-fish
and haggled him open with my saw, and towards sundown I started my
camp fire and had supper. Then I set out a line to catch some fish for
breakfast.
When it was dark I set by my camp fire smoking, and feeling pretty
satisfied; but by-and-by it got sort of lonesome, and so I went and
set on the bank and listened to the currents washing along, and
counted the stars and drift-logs and rafts that come down, and then
went to bed; there ain't no better way to put in time when you are
lonesome; you can't stay so, you soon get over it.
And so for three days and nights. No difference- just the same
thing. But the next day I went exploring around down through the
island. I was boss of it; it all belonged to me, so to say, and I
wanted to know all about it; but mainly I wanted to put in the time. I
found plenty strawberries, ripe and prime; and green summer-grapes,
and green razberries; and the green blackberries was just beginning to
show. They would all come handy by-and-by, I judged.
Well, I went fooling along in the deep woods till I judged I
warn't far from the foot of the island. I had my gun along, but I
hadn't shot nothing, it was for protection; thought I would kill
some game nigh home. About this time I mighty near stepped on a good
sized snake, and it went sliding off through the grass and flowers,
and I after it, trying to get a shot at it. I clipped along, and all
of a sudden I bounded right on to the ashes of a camp fire that was
still smoking.
My heart jumped up amongst my lungs. I never waited for to look
further, but uncocked my gun and went sneaking back on my tip-toes
as fast as ever I could. Every now and then I stopped a second,
amongst the thick leaves, and listened; but my breath come so hard I
couldn't hear nothing else. I slunk along another piece further,
then listened again; and so on, and so on; if I see a stump, I took it
for a man; if I trod on a stick and broke it, it made me feel like a
person had cut one of my breaths in two and I only got half, and the
short half, too.
When I got to camp I warn't feeling very brash, there warn't much
sand in my craw; but I says, this ain't no time to be fooling
around. So I got all my traps into my canoe again so as to have them
out of sight, and I put out the fire and scattered the ashes around to
look like an old last year's camp, and then clumb a tree.
I reckon I was up in the tree two hours; but I didn't see nothing, I
didn't hear nothing- I only thought I heard and seen as much as a
thousand things. Well, I couldn't stay up there forever; so at last
I got down, but I kept in the thick woods and on the lookout all the
time. All I could get to eat was berries and what was left over from
breakfast.
By the time it was night I was pretty hungry. So when it was good
and dark, I slid out from shore before moonrise and paddled over to
the Illinois bank- about a quarter of a mile. I went out in the
woods and cooked a supper, and I had about made up my mind I would
stay there all night, when I hear a plunkety-plunk, plunkety-plunk,
and says to myself, horses coming; and next I hear people's voices.
I got everything into the canoe as quick as I could, and then went
creeping through the woods to see what I could find out. I hadn't
got far when I hear a man say:
"We better camp here, if we can find a good place; the horses is
about beat out. Let's look around."
I didn't wait, but shoved out and paddled away easy. I tied up in
the old place, and reckoned I would sleep in the canoe.
I didn't sleep much. I couldn't, somehow, for thinking. And every
time I waked up I thought somebody had me by the neck. So the sleep
didn't do me no good. By-and-by I says to myself, I can't live this
way; I'm agoing to find out who it is that's here on the island with
me; I'll find it out or bust. Well, I felt better, right off.
So I took my paddle and slid out from shore just a step or two,
and then let the canoe drop along down amongst the shadows. The moon
was shining, and outside of the shadows it made it most as light as
day. I poked along well onto an hour, everything still as rocks and
sound asleep. Well by this time I was most down to the foot of the
island. A little ripply, cool breeze begun to blow, and that was as
good as saying the night was about done. I give her a turn with the
paddle and brung her nose to shore; then I got my gun and slipped
out and into the edge of the woods. I set down there on a log and
looked out through the leaves. I see the moon go off watch and the
darkness begin to blanket the river. But in a little while I see a
pale streak over the tree-tops, and knowed the day was coming. So I
took my gun and slipped off towards where I had run across that camp
fire, stopping every minute or two to listen. But I hadn't no luck,
somehow; I couldn't seem to find the place. But by-and-by, sure
enough, I catched a glimpse of fire, away through the trees. I went
for it, cautious and slow. By-and-by I was close enough to have a
look, and there laid a man on the ground. It most give me the
fan-tods. He had a blanket around his head, and his head was nearly in
the fire. I set there behind a clump of bushes, in about six foot of
him, and kept my eyes on him steady. It was getting gray daylight,
now. Pretty soon he gapped, and stretched himself, and hove off the
blanket, and it was Miss Watson's Jim! I bet I was glad to see him.
I says:
"Hello, Jim!" and skipped out.
He bounced up and stared at me wild. Then he drops down on his
knees, and puts his hands together and says:
"Doan' hurt me- don't! I hain't ever done no harm to a ghos'. I
awluz liked dead people, en done all I could for 'em. You go en git in
de river agin, whah you b'longs, en doan' do nuffn to Ole Jim, 'at 'uz
awluz yo' fren'."
Well, I warn't long making him understand I warn't dead. I was
ever so glad to see Jim. I warn't lonesome, now. I told him I warn't
afraid of him telling the people where I was. I talked along, but he
only set there and looked at me; never said nothing. Then I says:
"It's good daylight. Le's get breakfast. Make up your camp fire
good."
"What's de use er makin' up de camp fire to cook strawbries en
sich truck? But you got a gun, hain't you? Den we kin git sumfn better
den strawbries."
"Strawberries and such truck," I says. "Is that what you live on?"
"I couldn' git nuffn else," he says.
"Why, how long you been on the island, Jim?"
"I come heah de night arter you's killed."
"Yes- indeedy."
"What, all that time?"
"And ain't you had nothing but that kind of rubbage to eat?"
"No, sah- nuffn else."
"Well, you must be most starved, ain't you?"
"I reckon I could eat a hoss. I think I could. How long you ben on
de islan'?"
"Since the night I got killed."
"No! W'y, what has you lived on? But you got a gun. Oh, yes, you got
a gun. Dat's good. Now you kill sumfn en I'll make up de fire."
So we went over to where the canoe was, and while he built a fire in
a grassy open place amongst the trees, I fetched meal and bacon and
coffee, and coffee-pot and frying-pan, and sugar and tin cups, and the
nigger was set back considerable, because he reckoned it was all
done with witchcraft. I catched a good big cat-fish, too, and Jim
cleaned him with his knife, and fried him.
When breakfast was ready, we lolled on the grass and eat it
smoking hot. Jim laid it in with all his might, for he was most
about starved. Then when we had got pretty well stuffed, we laid off
and lazied.
By-and-by Jim says:
"But looky here, Huck, who wuz it dat 'uz killed in dat shanty, ef
it warn't you?"
Then I told him the whole thing, and he said it was smart. He said
Tom Sawyer couldn't get up no better plan than what I had. Then I
says:
"How do you come to be here, Jim, and how'd you get here?"
He looked pretty uneasy, and didn't say nothing for a minute. Then
he says:
"Maybe I better not tell."
"Why, Jim?"
"Well, dey's reasons. But you wouldn' tell on me ef I 'uz to tell
you, would you, Huck?"
"Blamed if I would, Jim."
"Well, I b'lieve you, Huck. I- I run off."
"But mind, you said you wouldn't tell- you know you said you
wouldn't tell, Huck."
"Well, I did. I said I wouldn't, and I'll stick to it. Honest
injun I will. People would call me a low down Abolitionist and despise
me for keeping mum- but that don't make no difference. I ain't
agoing to tell, and I ain't agoing back there anyways. So now, le's
know all about it."
"Well, you see, it' uz dis way. Ole Missus- dat's Miss Watson- she
pecks on me all de time, en treats me pooty rough, but she awluz
said she wouldn' sell me down to Orleans. But I noticed dey wuz a
nigger trader roun' de place considable, lately, en I begin to git
oneasy. Well, one night I creeps to de do', pooty late, en de do'
warn't quite shet, en I hear ole missus tell de widder she gwyne to
sell me down to Orleans, but she didn' want to, but she could git
eight hund'd dollars for me, en it 'uz sich a big stack of money she
couldn' resis'. De widder she try to git her to say she wouldn' do it,
but I never waited to hear de res'. I lit out mighty quick, I tell
you.
"I tuck out en shin down de hill en 'spec to steal a skit 'long de
sho' som'ers 'bove de town, but dey wuz people a-stirrin' yit, so I
hid in de ole tumble-down cooper shop on de bank to wait for everybody
to go 'way. Well, I wuz dah all night. Dey wuz somebody roun' all de
time. 'Long 'bout six in de mawnin', skifts begin to go by, en 'bout
eight er nine every skit dat went 'long wuz talkin' 'bout how yo'
pap come over to de town en say you's killed. Dese las' skifts wuz
full o' ladies en genlmen agoin' over for to see de place. Sometimes
dey'd pull up at de sho' en take a res' b'fo' dey started acrost, so
by de talk I got to know all 'bout de killin'. I 'uz powerful sorry
you's killed, Huck, but I ain't no mo, now.
"I laid dah under de shavins all day. I 'uz hungry, but I warn't
afeared; bekase I knowed ole missus en de widder wuz goin' to start to
de camp meetn' right arter breakfas' en be gone all day, en dey
knows I goes off wid de cattle 'bout daylight, so dey wouldn' 'spec to
see me roun' de place, en so dey wouldn' miss me tell arter dark in de
evenin'. De yuther servants wouldn' miss me, kase dey'd shin out en
take holiday, soon as de ole folks 'uz out'n de way.
"Well, when it come dark I tuck out up de river road, en went
'bout two mile er more to whah dey warn't no houses. I'd made up my
mine 'bout what I's agwyne to do. You see ef I kep' on tryin' to git
away afoot, de dogs 'ud track me; ef I stole a skift to cross over,
dey'd miss dat skift, you see, en dey'd know 'bout whah I'd lan' on de
yuther side en whah to pick up my track. So I says, a raff is what I's
arter; it doan' make no track.
"I see a light a-comin'roun'de p'int, bymeby, so I wade' in en
shove' a log ahead o' me, en swum more'n half-way acrost de river,
en got in 'mongst de drift-wood, en kep' my head down low, en kinder
swum agin de current tell de raff come along. Den I swum to de stern
uv it, en tuck aholt. It clouded up en 'uz pooty dark for a little
while. So I clumb up en laid down on de planks. De men 'uz all 'way
yonder in de middle, whah de lantern wuz. De river wuz arisin' en
dey wuz a good current; so I reck'n'd 'at by fo' in de mawnin' I'd
be twenty-five mile down de river, en den I'd slip in, jis' b'fo'
daylight, en swim asho' en take to de woods on de Illinoi side.
"But I didn'have no luck. When we 'uz mos' down to de head er de
islan', a man begin to come aft wid de lantern. I see it warn't no use
fer to wait, so I slid overboard, en struck out fer de islan'. Well, I
had a notion I could lan' mos' anywheres, but I couldn't- bank too
bluff. I 'uz mos' to de foot er de islan' b'fo' I foun' a good
place. I went into de woods en jedged I wouldn' fool wid raffs no mo',
long as dey move de lantern roun' so. I had my pipe en a plug er
dog-leg, en some matches in my cap, en dey warn't wet, so I 'uz all
right."
"And so you ain't had no meat nor bread to eat all this time? Why
didn't you get mud-turkles?"
"How you gwyne to git'm? You can't slip up on um en grab um; en
how's a body gwyne to hit um wid a rock? How could a body do it in
de night? en I warn't gwyne to show mysef on de bank in de daytime."
"Well, that's so. You've had to keep in the woods all the time, of
course. Did you hear 'em shooting the cannon?"
"Oh, yes. I knowed dey was arter you. I see um go by heah; watched
um thoo de bushes."
Some young birds come along, flying a yard or two at a time and
lighting. Jim said it was a sign it was going to rain. He said it
was a sign when young chickens flew that way, and so he reckoned it
was the same way when young birds done it. I was going to catch some
of them, but Jim wouldn't let me. He said it was death. He said his
father laid mighty sick once, and some of them catched a bird, and his
old granny said his father would die, and he did.
And Jim said you musn't count the things you are going to cook for
dinner, because that would bring bad luck. The same if you shook the
table-cloth after sundown. And he said if a man owned a bee-hive,
and that man died, the bees must be told about it before sun-up next
morning, or else the bees would all weaken down and quit work and die.
Jim said bees wouldn't sting idiots; but I didn't believe that,
because I had tried them lots of times myself, and they wouldn't sting
me.
I had heard about some of these things before, but not all of
them. Jim knowed all kinds of signs. He said he knowed most
everything. I said it looked to me like all the signs was about bad
luck, and so I asked him if there warn't any goodluck signs. He says:
"Mighty few- an' dey ain' no use to a body. What you want to know
when good luck's a-comin' for? want to keep it off?" And he said:
"Ef you's got hairy arms en a hairy breas', it's a sign dat you's
agwyne to be rich. Well, dey's some use in a sign like dat, 'kase it's
so fur ahead. You see, maybe you's got to be po' a long time fust,
en so you might git discourage' en kill yo'sef 'f you didn'know by
de sign dat you gwyne be rich bymeby."
"Have you got hairy arms and a hairy breast, Jim?"
"What's de use to ax dat question? don' see I has?"
"Well, are you rich?"
"No, but I ben rich wunst, and gwyne to be rich agin. Wunst I had
foteen dollars, but I tuck to specalat'n', en got busted out."
"What did you speculate in, Jim?"
"Well, fust I tackled stock."
"What kind of stock?"
"Why, live stock. Cattle, you know. I put ten dollars in a cow.
But I ain't gwyne to resk no mo' money in stock. De cow up 'n' died on
my han's."
"So you lost the ten dollars."
"No, I didn'lose it all. I on'y los' 'bout nine of it. I sole de
hide en taller for a dollar en ten cents."
"You had five dollars and ten cents left. Did you speculate any
more?"
"Yes. You know dat one-laigged nigger dat b'longs to old Misto
Bradish? well, he sot up a bank, en say anybody dat put in a dollar
would git fo' dollars mo' at de en' er de year. Well, all de niggers
went in, but dey didn'have much. I wuz de on'y one dat had much. So
I stuck out for mo' dan fo' dollars, en I said 'f I didn' git it I'd
start a bank mysef. Well o' course dat nigger want' keep me out er
de business, bekase he say dey warn't business 'nough for two banks,
so he say I could put in my five dollars en he pay me thirty-five at
de en' er de year.
"So I done it. Den I reck'n'd I'd inves' de thirty-five dollars
right off en keep things a-movin'. Dey wuz a nigger name' Bob, dat had
ketched a wood-flat, en his marster didn'know it; en I bought it off'n
him en told him to take de thirty-five dollars when de en' er de
year come; but somebody stole de wood-flat dat night, en nex' day de
one-laigged nigger say de bank's busted. So dey didn' none uv us git
no money."
"What did you do with the ten cents, Jim?"
"Well, I 'uz gwyne to spen' it, but I had a dream, en de dream
tole me to give it to a nigger name' Balum- Balum's Ass dey call him
for short, he's one er dem chuckle-heads, you know. But he's lucky,
dey say, en I see I warn't lucky. De dream say let Balum inves' de ten
cents en he'd make a raise for me. Well, Balum he tuck de money, en
when he wuz in church he hear de preacher say dat whoever give to de
po' len' to de Lord, en boun' to git his money back a hund'd times. So
Balum he tuck en give de ten cents to de po', en laid low to see
what wuz gwyne to come of it."
"Well, what did come of it, Jim?"
"Nuffn' never come of it. I couldn' manage to k'leck dat money no
way; en Balum he couldn'. I ain'gwyne to len' no mo' money 'dout I see
de security. Boun' to get yo' money back a hund'd times, de preacher
says! Ef I could git de ten cents back, I'd call it squah, en be
glad er de chanst."
"Well, it's all right, anyway, Jim, long as you're going to be
rich again some time or other."
"Yes- en I's rich now, come to look at it. I owns mysef, en I's wuth
eight hundred dollars. I wisht I had de money, I wouldn' want no mo'."
CH_9
CHAPTER NINE
-
I wanted to go and look at a place right about the middle of the
island, that I'd found when I was exploring; so we started, and soon
got to it, because the island was only three miles long and a
quarter of a mile wide.
This place was a tolerable long steep hill or ridge, about forty
foot high. We had a rough time getting to the top, the sides was so
steep and the bushes so thick. We tramped and clumb around all over
it, and by-and-by found a good big cavern in the rock, most up to
the top on the side towards Illinois. The cavern was as big as two
or three rooms bunched together, and Jim could stand up straight in
it. It was cool in there. Jim was for putting our traps in there,
right away, but I said we didn't want to be climbing up and down there
all the time.
Jim said if we had the canoe hid in a good place, and had all the
traps in the cavern, we could rush there if anybody was to come to the
island, and they would never find us without dogs. And besides, he
said them little birds had said it was going to rain, and did I want
the things to get wet?
So we went back and got the canoe and paddled up abreast the cavern,
and lugged all the traps up there. Then we hunted up a place close
by to hide the canoe in, amongst the thick willows. We took some
fish off of the lines and set them again, and begun to get ready for
dinner.
The door of the cavern was big enough to roll a hogshead in, and
on one side of the door the floor stuck out a little bit and was
flat and a good place to build a fire on. So we built it there and
cooked dinner.
We spread the blankets inside for a carpet, and eat our dinner in
there. We put all the other things handy at the back of the cavern.
Pretty soon it darkened up and begun to thunder and lighten; so the
birds was right about it. Directly it begun to rain, and it rained
like all fury, too, and I never see the wind blow so. It was one of
these regular summer storms. It would get so dark that it looked all
blue-black outside, and lovely; and the rain would thrash along by
so thick that the trees off a little ways looked dim and spider-webby;
and here would come a blast of wind that would bend the trees down and
turn up the pale underside of the leaves; and then a perfect ripper of
a gust would follow along and set the branches to tossing their arms
as if they was just wild; and next, when it was just about the
bluest and blackest- fst! it was as bright as glory and you'd have a
little glimpse of tree-tops a-plunging about, away off yonder in the
storm, hundreds of yards further than you could see before; dark as
sin again in a second, and now you'd hear the thunder let go with an
awful crash and then go rumbling, grumbling, tumbling down the sky
towards the under side of the world, like rolling empty barrels down
stairs, where it's long stairs and they bounce a good deal, you know.
"Jim, this is nice," I says. "I wouldn't want to be nowhere else but
here. Pass me along another hunk of fish and some hot corn-bread."
"Well, you wouldn't a ben here, 'f it hadn't a ben for Jim. You'd
a ben down dah in de woods widout any dinner, en gittn' mos' drownded,
too, dat you would, honey. Chickens knows when it's gwyne to rain,
en so do de birds, chile."
The river went on raising and raising for ten or twelve days, till
at last it was over the banks. The water was three or four foot deep
on the island in the low places and on the Illinois bottom. On that
side it was a good many miles wide; but on the Missouri side it was
the same old distance across- a half a mile- because the Missouri
shore was just a wall of high bluffs.
Daytimes we paddled all over the island in the canoe. It was
mighty cool and shady in the deep woods even if the sun was blazing
outside. We went winding in and out amongst the trees; and sometimes
the vines hung so thick we had to back away and go some other way.
Well, on every old broken-down tree, you could see rabbits, and
snakes, and such things; and when the island had been overflowed a day
or two, they got so tame, on account of being hungry, that you could
paddle right up and put your hand on them if you wanted to; but not
the snakes and turtles- they would slide off in the water. The ridge
our cavern was in, was full of them. We could a had pets enough if
we'd wanted them.
One night we catched a little section of a lumber raft- nice pine
planks. It was twelve foot wide and about fifteen or sixteen foot
long, and the top stood above water six or seven inches, a solid level
floor. We could see saw-logs go by in the daylight, sometimes, but
we let them go; we didn't show ourselves in daylight.
Another night, when we was up at the head of the island, just before
daylight, here comes a frame house down, on the west side. She was a
two-story, and tilted over, considerable. We paddled out and got
aboard- clumb in at an up-stairs window. But it was too dark to see
yet, so we made the canoe fast and set in her to wait for daylight.
The light begun to come before we got to the foot of the island.
Then we looked in at the window. We could make out a bed, and a table,
and two old chairs, and lots of things around about on the floor;
and there was clothes hanging against the wall. There was something
laying on the floor in the far corner that looked like a man. So Jim
says:
"Hello, you!"
But it didn't budge. So I hollered again, and then Jim says:
"De man ain't asleep- he's dead. You hold still- I'll go en see."
He went and bent down and looked, and says:
"It's a dead man. Yes, indeedy; naked, too. He's shot in de back.
I reck'n he's ben dead two er three days. Come in, Huck, but doan'
look at his face-it's too gashly."
I didn't look at him at all. Jim throwed some old rags over him, but
he needn't done it; I didn't want to see him. There was heaps of old
greasy cards scattered around over the floor, and old whisky
bottles, and a couple of masks made out of black cloth; and all over
the walls was the ignorantest kind of words and pictures, made with
charcoal. There was two old dirty calico dresses, and a sun-bonnet,
and some women's under-clothes, hanging against the wall, and some
men's clothing, too. We put the lot into the canoe; it might come
good. There was a boy's old speckled straw hat on the floor; I took
that too. And there was a bottle that had milk in it; and it had a rag
stopper for a baby to suck. We would a took the bottle, but it was
broke. There was a seedy old chest, and an old hair trunk with the
hinges broke. They stood open, but there warn't nothing left in them
that was any account. The way things was scattered about, we
reckoned the people left in a hurry and warn't fixed so as to carry
off most of their stuff.
We got an old tin lantern, and a butcher knife without any handle,
and a bran-new Barlow knife worth two bits in any store, and a lot
of tallow candles, and a tin candlestick, and a gourd, and a tin
cup, and a ratty old bed-quilt off the bed, and a reticule with
needles and pins and beeswax and buttons and thread and all such truck
in it, and a hatchet and some nails, and a fish-line as thick as my
little finger, with some monstrous hooks on it, and a roll of
buckskin, and a leather dog-collar, and a horse-shoe, and some vials
of medicine that didn't have no label on them; and just as we was
leaving I found a tolerable good curry-comb, and Jim he found a
ratty old fiddle-bow, and a wooden leg. The straps was broke off of
it, but barring that, it was a good enough leg, though it was too long
for me and not long enough for Jim, and we couldn't find the other
one, though we hunted all around.
And so, take it all around, we made a good haul. When we was ready
to shove off, we was a quarter of a mile below the island, and it
was pretty broad day; so I made Jim lay down in the canoe and cover up
with the quilt, because if he set up, people could tell he was a
nigger a good ways off. I paddled over to the Illinois shore, and
drifted down most a half a mile doing it. I crept up the dead water
under the bank, and hadn't no accidents and didn't see nobody. We
got home all safe.
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