The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain is a coming-of-age story set in the fictional town of St. Petersburg, Missouri, along the Mississippi River. The novel follows the mischievous and adventurous Tom Sawyer as he navigates childhood with his best friend, Huckleberry Finn, getting into trouble, exploring caves, and uncovering hidden treasures. Along the way, Tom grows from a carefree boy to someone who learns about responsibility, courage, and the complexities of human nature.
- Chapter 1
- Chapter 2
- Chapter 3
- Chapter 4
- Chapter 5
- Chapter 6
- Chapter 7
- Chapter 8
- Chapter 9
- Chapter 10
- Chapter 11
- Chapter 12
- Chapter 13
- Chapter 14
- Chapter 15
- Chapter 16
- Chapter 17
- Chapter 18
- Chapter 19
- Chapter 20
- Chapter 21
- Chapter 22
- Chapter 23
- Chapter 24
- Chapter 25
- Chapter 26
- Chapter 27
- Chapter 28
- Chapter 29
- Chapter 30
- Chapter 31
- Chapter 32
- Chapter 33
- Chapter 34
- Chapter 35
- Free downloads: PDF
Chapter 1
âTom!â
No answer.
âTOM!â
No answer.
âWhatâs gone with that boy, I wonder? You TOM!â
No answer.
The old lady pulled her spectacles down and looked over them about the room; then she put them up and looked out under them. She seldom or never looked through them for so small a thing as a boy; they were her state pair, the pride of her heart, and were built for âstyle,â not serviceâshe could have seen through a pair of stove-lids just as well. She looked perplexed for a moment, and then said, not fiercely, but still loud enough for the furniture to hear:
âWell, I lay if I get hold of you Iâllââ
She did not finish, for by this time she was bending down and punching under the bed with the broom, and so she needed breath to punctuate the punches with. She resurrected nothing but the cat.
âI never did see the beat of that boy!â
She went to the open door and stood in it and looked out among the tomato vines and âjimpsonâ weeds that constituted the garden. No Tom. So she lifted up her voice at an angle calculated for distance and shouted:
âY-o-u-u TOM!â
There was a slight noise behind her and she turned just in time to seize a small boy by the slack of his roundabout and arrest his flight.
âThere! I might âaâ thought of that closet. What you been doing in there?â
âNothing.â
âNothing! Look at your hands. And look at your mouth. What is that truck?â
âI donât know, aunt.â
âWell, I know. Itâs jamâthatâs what it is. Forty times Iâve said if you didnât let that jam alone Iâd skin you. Hand me that switch.â
The switch hovered in the airâthe peril was desperateâ
âMy! Look behind you, aunt!â
The old lady whirled round, and snatched her skirts out of danger. The lad fled on the instant, scrambled up the high board-fence, and disappeared over it.

His aunt Polly stood surprised a moment, and then broke into a gentle laugh.
âHang the boy, canât I never learn anything? Ainât he played me tricks enough like that for me to be looking out for him by this time? But old fools is the biggest fools there is. Canât learn an old dog new tricks, as the saying is. But my goodness, he never plays them alike, two days, and how is a body to know whatâs coming? He âpears to know just how long he can torment me before I get my dander up, and he knows if he can make out to put me off for a minute or make me laugh, itâs all down again and I canât hit him a lick. I ainât doing my duty by that boy, and thatâs the Lordâs truth, goodness knows. Spare the rod and spile the child, as the Good Book says. Iâm a laying up sin and suffering for us both, I know. Heâs full of the Old Scratch, but laws-a-me! heâs my own dead sisterâs boy, poor thing, and I ainât got the heart to lash him, somehow. Every time I let him off, my conscience does hurt me so, and every time I hit him my old heart most breaks. Well-a-well, man that is born of woman is of few days and full of trouble, as the Scripture says, and I reckon itâs so. Heâll play hookey this evening,[*] and Iâll just be obleeged to make him work, tomorrow, to punish him. Itâs mighty hard to make him work Saturdays, when all the boys is having holiday, but he hates work more than he hates anything else, and Iâve got to do some of my duty by him, or Iâll be the ruination of the child.â
[*] Southwestern for âafternoonâ
Tom did play hookey, and he had a very good time. He got back home barely in season to help Jim saw next-dayâs wood and split the kindlings before supperâat least he was there in time to tell his adventures to Jim while Jim did three-fourths of the work. Tomâs younger brother (or rather half-brother) Sid was already through with his part of the work (picking up chips), for he was a quiet boy, and had no adventurous, trouble-some ways.

While Tom was eating his supper, and stealing sugar as opportunity offered, Aunt Polly asked him questions that were full of guile, and very deepâfor she wanted to trap him into damaging revealments. Like many other simple-hearted souls, it was her pet vanity to believe she was endowed with a talent for dark and mysterious diplomacy, and she loved to contemplate her most transparent devices as marvels of low cunning. Said she:
âTom, it was middling warm in school, warnât it?â
âYesâm.â
âPowerful warm, warnât it?â
âYesâm.â
âDidnât you want to go in a-swimming, Tom?â
A bit of a scare shot through Tomâa touch of uncomfortable suspicion. He searched Aunt Pollyâs face, but it told him nothing. So he said:
âNoâmâwell, not very much.â
The old lady reached out her hand and felt Tomâs shirt, and said:
âBut you ainât too warm now, though.â And it flattered her to reflect that she had discovered that the shirt was dry without anybody knowing that that was what she had in her mind. But in spite of her, Tom knew where the wind lay, now. So he forestalled what might be the next move:
âSome of us pumped on our headsâmineâs damp yet. See?â
Aunt Polly was vexed to think she had overlooked that bit of circumstantial evidence, and missed a trick. Then she had a new inspiration:
âTom, you didnât have to undo your shirt collar where I sewed it, to pump on your head, did you? Unbutton your jacket!â
The trouble vanished out of Tomâs face. He opened his jacket. His shirt collar was securely sewed.
âBother! Well, go âlong with you. Iâd made sure youâd played hookey and been a-swimming. But I forgive ye, Tom. I reckon youâre a kind of a singed cat, as the saying isâbetterân you look. This time.â
She was half sorry her sagacity had miscarried, and half glad that Tom had stumbled into obedient conduct for once.
But Sidney said:
âWell, now, if I didnât think you sewed his collar with white thread, but itâs black.â
âWhy, I did sew it with white! Tom!â
But Tom did not wait for the rest. As he went out at the door he said:
âSiddy, Iâll lick you for that.â
In a safe place Tom examined two large needles which were thrust into the lapels of his jacket, and had thread bound about themâone needle carried white thread and the other black. He said:
âSheâd never noticed if it hadnât been for Sid. Confound it! sometimes she sews it with white, and sometimes she sews it with black. I wish to gee-miny sheâd stick to one or tâotherâI canât keep the run of âem. But I bet you Iâll lam Sid for that. Iâll learn him!â
He was not the Model Boy of the village. He knew the model boy very well thoughâand loathed him.
Within two minutes, or even less, he had forgotten all his troubles. Not because his troubles were one whit less heavy and bitter to him than a manâs are to a man, but because a new and powerful interest bore them down and drove them out of his mind for the timeâjust as menâs misfortunes are forgotten in the excitement of new enterprises. This new interest was a valued novelty in whistling and he was suffering to practise it undisturbed. It consisted in a peculiar bird-like turn, a sort of liquid warble, produced by touching the tongue to the roof of the mouth at short intervals in the midst of the musicâthe reader probably remembers how to do it, if he has ever been a boy. Diligence and attention soon gave him the knack of it, and he strode down the street with his mouth full of harmony and his soul full of gratitude. He felt much as an astronomer feels who has discovered a new planetâno doubt, as far as strong, deep, unalloyed pleasure is concerned, the advantage was with the boy, not the astronomer.
The summer evenings were long. It was not dark, yet. Presently Tom checked his whistle. A stranger was before himâa boy a shade larger than himself. A new-comer of any age or either sex was an impressive curiosity in the poor little shabby village of St. Petersburg. This boy was well dressed, tooâwell dressed on a week-day. This was simply astounding. His cap was a dainty thing, his close-buttoned blue cloth roundabout was new and natty, and so were his pantaloons. He had shoes onâand it was only Friday. He even wore a necktie, a bright bit of ribbon. He had a citified air about him that ate into Tomâs vitals. The more Tom stared at the splendid marvel, the higher he turned up his nose at his finery and the shabbier and shabbier his own outfit seemed to him to grow. Neither boy spoke. If one moved, the other movedâbut only sidewise, in a circle; they kept face to face and eye to eye all the time. Finally Tom said:
âI can lick you!â
âIâd like to see you try it.â
âWell, I can do it.â
âNo you canât, either.â
âYes I can.â
âNo you canât.â
âI can.â
âYou canât.â
âCan!â
âCanât!â
An uncomfortable pause. Then Tom said:
âWhatâs your name?â
ââTisnât any of your business, maybe.â
âWell I âlow Iâll make it my business.â
âWell why donât you?â
âIf you say much, I will.â
âMuchâmuchâmuch. There now.â
âOh, you think youâre mighty smart, donât you? I could lick you with one hand tied behind me, if I wanted to.â
âWell why donât you do it? You say you can do it.â
âWell I will, if you fool with me.â
âOh yesâIâve seen whole families in the same fix.â
âSmarty! You think youâre some, now, donât you? Oh, what a hat!â
âYou can lump that hat if you donât like it. I dare you to knock it offâand anybody thatâll take a dare will suck eggs.â
âYouâre a liar!â
âYouâre another.â
âYouâre a fighting liar and dasnât take it up.â
âAwâtake a walk!â
âSayâif you give me much more of your sass Iâll take and bounce a rock offân your head.â
âOh, of course you will.â
âWell I will.â
âWell why donât you do it then? What do you keep saying you will for? Why donât you do it? Itâs because youâre afraid.â
âI ainât afraid.â
âYou are.â
âI ainât.â
âYou are.â

Another pause, and more eying and sidling around each other. Presently they were shoulder to shoulder. Tom said:
âGet away from here!â
âGo away yourself!â
âI wonât.â
âI wonât either.â
So they stood, each with a foot placed at an angle as a brace, and both shoving with might and main, and glowering at each other with hate. But neither could get an advantage. After struggling till both were hot and flushed, each relaxed his strain with watchful caution, and Tom said:
âYouâre a coward and a pup. Iâll tell my big brother on you, and he can thrash you with his little finger, and Iâll make him do it, too.â
âWhat do I care for your big brother? Iâve got a brother thatâs bigger than he isâand whatâs more, he can throw him over that fence, too.â [Both brothers were imaginary.]
âThatâs a lie.â
âYour saying so donât make it so.â
Tom drew a line in the dust with his big toe, and said:
âI dare you to step over that, and Iâll lick you till you canât stand up. Anybody thatâll take a dare will steal sheep.â
The new boy stepped over promptly, and said:
âNow you said youâd do it, now letâs see you do it.â
âDonât you crowd me now; you better look out.â
âWell, you said youâd do itâwhy donât you do it?â
âBy jingo! for two cents I will do it.â
The new boy took two broad coppers out of his pocket and held them out with derision. Tom struck them to the ground. In an instant both boys were rolling and tumbling in the dirt, gripped together like cats; and for the space of a minute they tugged and tore at each otherâs hair and clothes, punched and scratched each otherâs nose, and covered themselves with dust and glory. Presently the confusion took form, and through the fog of battle Tom appeared, seated astride the new boy, and pounding him with his fists. âHoller ânuff!â said he.
The boy only struggled to free himself. He was cryingâmainly from rage.
âHoller ânuff!ââand the pounding went on.
At last the stranger got out a smothered ââNuff!â and Tom let him up and said:
âNow thatâll learn you. Better look out who youâre fooling with next time.â
The new boy went off brushing the dust from his clothes, sobbing, snuffling, and occasionally looking back and shaking his head and threatening what he would do to Tom the ânext time he caught him out.â To which Tom responded with jeers, and started off in high feather, and as soon as his back was turned the new boy snatched up a stone, threw it and hit him between the shoulders and then turned tail and ran like an antelope. Tom chased the traitor home, and thus found out where he lived. He then held a position at the gate for some time, daring the enemy to come outside, but the enemy only made faces at him through the window and declined. At last the enemyâs mother appeared, and called Tom a bad, vicious, vulgar child, and ordered him away. So he went away; but he said he ââlowedâ to âlayâ for that boy.

He got home pretty late that night, and when he climbed cautiously in at the window, he uncovered an ambuscade, in the person of his aunt; and when she saw the state his clothes were in her resolution to turn his Saturday holiday into captivity at hard labor became adamantine in its firmness.
Chapter 2
Saturday morning was come, and all the summer world was bright and fresh, and brimming with life. There was a song in every heart; and if the heart was young the music issued at the lips. There was cheer in every face and a spring in every step. The locust-trees were in bloom and the fragrance of the blossoms filled the air. Cardiff Hill, beyond the village and above it, was green with vegetation and it lay just far enough away to seem a Delectable Land, dreamy, reposeful, and inviting.
Tom appeared on the sidewalk with a bucket of whitewash and a long-handled brush. He surveyed the fence, and all gladness left him and a deep melancholy settled down upon his spirit. Thirty yards of board fence nine feet high. Life to him seemed hollow, and existence but a burden. Sighing, he dipped his brush and passed it along the topmost plank; repeated the operation; did it again; compared the insignificant whitewashed streak with the far-reaching continent of unwhitewashed fence, and sat down on a tree-box discouraged. Jim came skipping out at the gate with a tin pail, and singing Buffalo Gals. Bringing water from the town pump had always been hateful work in Tomâs eyes, before, but now it did not strike him so. He remembered that there was company at the pump. Boys and girls were always there waiting their turns, resting, trading playthings, quarrelling, fighting, skylarking. And he remembered that although the pump was only a hundred and fifty yards off, Jim never got back with a bucket of water under an hourâand even then somebody generally had to go after him. Tom said:
âSay, Jim, Iâll fetch the water if youâll whitewash some.â
Jim shook his head and said:
âCanât, Mars Tom. Ole missis, she tole me I got to go anâ git dis water anâ not stop foolinâ rounâ wid anybody. She say she specâ Mars Tom gwine to ax me to whitewash, anâ so she tole me go âlong anâ âtend to my own businessâshe âlowed sheâd âtend to de whitewashinâ.â
âOh, never you mind what she said, Jim. Thatâs the way she always talks. Gimme the bucketâI wonât be gone only a a minute. She wonât ever know.â
âOh, I dasnât, Mars Tom. Ole missis sheâd take anâ tar de head offân me. âDeed she would.â
âShe! She never licks anybodyâwhacks âem over the head with her thimbleâand who cares for that, Iâd like to know. She talks awful, but talk donât hurtâanyways it donât if she donât cry. Jim, Iâll give you a marvel. Iâll give you a white alley!â
Jim began to waver.
âWhite alley, Jim! And itâs a bully taw.â
âMy! Datâs a mighty gay marvel, I tell you! But Mars Tom Iâs powerful âfraid ole missisââ
âAnd besides, if you will Iâll show you my sore toe.â
Jim was only humanâthis attraction was too much for him. He put down his pail, took the white alley, and bent over the toe with absorbing interest while the bandage was being unwound. In another moment he was flying down the street with his pail and a tingling rear, Tom was whitewashing with vigor, and Aunt Polly was retiring from the field with a slipper in her hand and triumph in her eye.

But Tomâs energy did not last. He began to think of the fun he had planned for this day, and his sorrows multiplied. Soon the free boys would come tripping along on all sorts of delicious expeditions, and they would make a world of fun of him for having to workâthe very thought of it burnt him like fire. He got out his worldly wealth and examined itâbits of toys, marbles, and trash; enough to buy an exchange of work, maybe, but not half enough to buy so much as half an hour of pure freedom. So he returned his straitened means to his pocket, and gave up the idea of trying to buy the boys. At this dark and hopeless moment an inspiration burst upon him! Nothing less than a great, magnificent inspiration.
He took up his brush and went tranquilly to work. Ben Rogers hove in sight presentlyâthe very boy, of all boys, whose ridicule he had been dreading. Benâs gait was the hop-skip-and-jumpâproof enough that his heart was light and his anticipations high. He was eating an apple, and giving a long, melodious whoop, at intervals, followed by a deep-toned ding-dong-dong, ding-dong-dong, for he was personating a steamboat. As he drew near, he slackened speed, took the middle of the street, leaned far over to starboard and rounded to ponderously and with laborious pomp and circumstanceâfor he was personating the Big Missouri, and considered himself to be drawing nine feet of water. He was boat and captain and engine-bells combined, so he had to imagine himself standing on his own hurricane-deck giving the orders and executing them:
âStop her, sir! Ting-a-ling-ling!â The headway ran almost out, and he drew up slowly toward the sidewalk.
âShip up to back! Ting-a-ling-ling!â His arms straightened and stiffened down his sides.
âSet her back on the stabboard! Ting-a-ling-ling! Chow! ch-chow-wow! Chow!â His right hand, mean-time, describing stately circlesâfor it was representing a forty-foot wheel.
âLet her go back on the labboard! Ting-a-ling-ling! Chow-ch-chow-chow!â The left hand began to describe circles.
âStop the stabboard! Ting-a-ling-ling! Stop the labboard! Come ahead on the stabboard! Stop her! Let your outside turn over slow! Ting-a-ling-ling! Chow-ow-ow! Get out that head-line! lively now! Comeâout with your spring-lineâwhatâre you about there! Take a turn round that stump with the bight of it! Stand by that stage, nowâlet her go! Done with the engines, sir! Ting-a-ling-ling! SHâT! SâHâT! SHâT!â (trying the gauge-cocks).
Tom went on whitewashingâpaid no attention to the steamboat. Ben stared a moment and then said: âHi-Yi! Youâre up a stump, ainât you!â
No answer. Tom surveyed his last touch with the eye of an artist, then he gave his brush another gentle sweep and surveyed the result, as before. Ben ranged up alongside of him. Tomâs mouth watered for the apple, but he stuck to his work. Ben said:
âHello, old chap, you got to work, hey?â
Tom wheeled suddenly and said:
âWhy, itâs you, Ben! I warnât noticing.â
âSayâIâm going in a-swimming, I am. Donât you wish you could? But of course youâd druther workâwouldnât you? Course you would!â
Tom contemplated the boy a bit, and said:
âWhat do you call work?â
âWhy, ainât that work?â
Tom resumed his whitewashing, and answered carelessly:
âWell, maybe it is, and maybe it ainât. All I know, is, it suits Tom Sawyer.â
âOh come, now, you donât mean to let on that you like it?â
The brush continued to move.
âLike it? Well, I donât see why I oughtnât to like it. Does a boy get a chance to whitewash a fence every day?â
That put the thing in a new light. Ben stopped nibbling his apple. Tom swept his brush daintily back and forthâstepped back to note the effectâadded a touch here and thereâcriticised the effect againâBen watching every move and getting more and more interested, more and more absorbed. Presently he said:
âSay, Tom, let me whitewash a little.â
Tom considered, was about to consent; but he altered his mind:
âNoânoâI reckon it wouldnât hardly do, Ben. You see, Aunt Pollyâs awful particular about this fenceâright here on the street, you knowâbut if it was the back fence I wouldnât mind and she wouldnât. Yes, sheâs awful particular about this fence; itâs got to be done very careful; I reckon there ainât one boy in a thousand, maybe two thousand, that can do it the way itâs got to be done.â
âNoâis that so? Oh come, nowâlemme just try. Only just a littleâIâd let you, if you was me, Tom.â
âBen, Iâd like to; but Aunt Pollyâwell, Jim wanted to do it, but she wouldnât let him; Sid wanted to do it, and she wouldnât let Sid. Now donât you see how Iâm fixed? If you was to tackle this fence and anything was to happen to itââ
âOh, shucks, Iâll be just as careful. Now lemme try. SayâIâll give you the core of my apple.â
âWell, hereâNo, Ben, now donât. Iâm afeardââ
âIâll give you all of it!â
Tom gave up the brush with reluctance in his face, but alacrity in his heart. And while the late steamer Big Missouri worked and sweated in the sun, the retired artist sat on a barrel in the shade close by, dangled his legs, munched his apple, and planned the slaughter of more innocents. There was no lack of material; boys happened along every little while; they came to jeer, but remained to whitewash. By the time Ben was fagged out, Tom had traded the next chance to Billy Fisher for a kite, in good repair; and when he played out, Johnny Miller bought in for a dead rat and a string to swing it withâand so on, and so on, hour after hour. And when the middle of the afternoon came, from being a poor poverty-stricken boy in the morning, Tom was literally rolling in wealth. He had besides the things before mentioned, twelve marbles, part of a jews-harp, a piece of blue bottle-glass to look through, a spool cannon, a key that wouldnât unlock anything, a fragment of chalk, a glass stopper of a decanter, a tin soldier, a couple of tadpoles, six fire-crackers, a kitten with only one eye, a brass door-knob, a dog-collarâbut no dogâthe handle of a knife, four pieces of orange-peel, and a dilapidated old window sash.

He had had a nice, good, idle time all the whileâplenty of companyâand the fence had three coats of whitewash on it! If he hadnât run out of whitewash he would have bankrupted every boy in the village.
Tom said to himself that it was not such a hollow world, after all. He had discovered a great law of human action, without knowing itânamely, that in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to attain. If he had been a great and wise philosopher, like the writer of this book, he would now have comprehended that Work consists of whatever a body is obliged to do, and that Play consists of whatever a body is not obliged to do. And this would help him to understand why constructing artificial flowers or performing on a tread-mill is work, while rolling ten-pins or climbing Mont Blanc is only amusement. There are wealthy gentlemen in England who drive four-horse passenger-coaches twenty or thirty miles on a daily line, in the summer, because the privilege costs them considerable money; but if they were offered wages for the service, that would turn it into work and then they would resign.
The boy mused awhile over the substantial change which had taken place in his worldly circumstances, and then wended toward headquarters to report.

Chapter 3
Tom presented himself before Aunt Polly, who was sitting by an open window in a pleasant rearward apartment, which was bedroom, breakfast-room, dining-room, and library, combined. The balmy summer air, the restful quiet, the odor of the flowers, and the drowsing murmur of the bees had had their effect, and she was nodding over her knittingâfor she had no company but the cat, and it was asleep in her lap. Her spectacles were propped up on her gray head for safety. She had thought that of course Tom had deserted long ago, and she wondered at seeing him place himself in her power again in this intrepid way. He said: âMaynât I go and play now, aunt?â
âWhat, aâready? How much have you done?â
âItâs all done, aunt.â
âTom, donât lie to meâI canât bear it.â
âI ainât, aunt; it is all done.â
Aunt Polly placed small trust in such evidence. She went out to see for herself; and she would have been content to find twenty per cent. of Tomâs statement true. When she found the entire fence white-washed, and not only whitewashed but elaborately coated and recoated, and even a streak added to the ground, her astonishment was almost unspeakable. She said:
âWell, I never! Thereâs no getting round it, you can work when youâre a mind to, Tom.â And then she diluted the compliment by adding, âBut itâs powerful seldom youâre a mind to, Iâm bound to say. Well, go âlong and play; but mind you get back some time in a week, or Iâll tan you.â
She was so overcome by the splendor of his achievement that she took him into the closet and selected a choice apple and delivered it to him, along with an improving lecture upon the added value and flavor a treat took to itself when it came without sin through virtuous effort. And while she closed with a happy Scriptural flourish, he âhookedâ a doughnut.
Then he skipped out, and saw Sid just starting up the outside stairway that led to the back rooms on the second floor. Clods were handy and the air was full of them in a twinkling. They raged around Sid like a hail-storm; and before Aunt Polly could collect her surprised faculties and sally to the rescue, six or seven clods had taken personal effect, and Tom was over the fence and gone. There was a gate, but as a general thing he was too crowded for time to make use of it. His soul was at peace, now that he had settled with Sid for calling attention to his black thread and getting him into trouble.

Tom skirted the block, and came round into a muddy alley that led by the back of his auntâs cow-stable. He presently got safely beyond the reach of capture and punishment, and hastened toward the public square of the village, where two âmilitaryâ companies of boys had met for conflict, according to previous appointment. Tom was General of one of these armies, Joe Harper (a bosom friend) General of the other. These two great commanders did not condescend to fight in personâthat being better suited to the still smaller fryâbut sat together on an eminence and conducted the field operations by orders delivered through aides-de-camp. Tomâs army won a great victory, after a long and hard-fought battle. Then the dead were counted, prisoners exchanged, the terms of the next disagreement agreed upon, and the day for the necessary battle appointed; after which the armies fell into line and marched away, and Tom turned homeward alone.

As he was passing by the house where Jeff Thatcher lived, he saw a new girl in the gardenâa lovely little blue-eyed creature with yellow hair plaited into two long-tails, white summer frock and embroidered pantalettes. The fresh-crowned hero fell without firing a shot. A certain Amy Lawrence vanished out of his heart and left not even a memory of herself behind. He had thought he loved her to distraction; he had regarded his passion as adoration; and behold it was only a poor little evanescent partiality. He had been months winning her; she had confessed hardly a week ago; he had been the happiest and the proudest boy in the world only seven short days, and here in one instant of time she had gone out of his heart like a casual stranger whose visit is done.
He worshipped this new angel with furtive eye, till he saw that she had discovered him; then he pretended he did not know she was present, and began to âshow offâ in all sorts of absurd boyish ways, in order to win her admiration. He kept up this grotesque foolishness for some time; but by-and-by, while he was in the midst of some dangerous gymnastic performances, he glanced aside and saw that the little girl was wending her way toward the house. Tom came up to the fence and leaned on it, grieving, and hoping she would tarry yet awhile longer. She halted a moment on the steps and then moved toward the door. Tom heaved a great sigh as she put her foot on the threshold. But his face lit up, right away, for she tossed a pansy over the fence a moment before she disappeared.

The boy ran around and stopped within a foot or two of the flower, and then shaded his eyes with his hand and began to look down street as if he had discovered something of interest going on in that direction. Presently he picked up a straw and began trying to balance it on his nose, with his head tilted far back; and as he moved from side to side, in his efforts, he edged nearer and nearer toward the pansy; finally his bare foot rested upon it, his pliant toes closed upon it, and he hopped away with the treasure and disappeared round the corner. But only for a minuteâonly while he could button the flower inside his jacket, next his heartâor next his stomach, possibly, for he was not much posted in anatomy, and not hypercritical, anyway.
He returned, now, and hung about the fence till nightfall, âshowing off,â as before; but the girl never exhibited herself again, though Tom comforted himself a little with the hope that she had been near some window, meantime, and been aware of his attentions. Finally he strode home reluctantly, with his poor head full of visions.
All through supper his spirits were so high that his aunt wondered âwhat had got into the child.â He took a good scolding about clodding Sid, and did not seem to mind it in the least. He tried to steal sugar under his auntâs very nose, and got his knuckles rapped for it. He said:
âAunt, you donât whack Sid when he takes it.â
âWell, Sid donât torment a body the way you do. Youâd be always into that sugar if I warnât watching you.â
Presently she stepped into the kitchen, and Sid, happy in his immunity, reached for the sugar-bowlâa sort of glorying over Tom which was wellnigh unbearable. But Sidâs fingers slipped and the bowl dropped and broke. Tom was in ecstasies. In such ecstasies that he even controlled his tongue and was silent. He said to himself that he would not speak a word, even when his aunt came in, but would sit perfectly still till she asked who did the mischief; and then he would tell, and there would be nothing so good in the world as to see that pet model âcatch it.â He was so brimful of exultation that he could hardly hold himself when the old lady came back and stood above the wreck discharging lightnings of wrath from over her spectacles. He said to himself, âNow itâs coming!â And the next instant he was sprawling on the floor! The potent palm was uplifted to strike again when Tom cried out:
âHold on, now, what âer you belting me for?âSid broke it!â
Aunt Polly paused, perplexed, and Tom looked for healing pity. But when she got her tongue again, she only said:
âUmf! Well, you didnât get a lick amiss, I reckon. You been into some other audacious mischief when I wasnât around, like enough.â

Then her conscience reproached her, and she yearned to say something kind and loving; but she judged that this would be construed into a confession that she had been in the wrong, and discipline forbade that. So she kept silence, and went about her affairs with a troubled heart. Tom sulked in a corner and exalted his woes. He knew that in her heart his aunt was on her knees to him, and he was morosely gratified by the consciousness of it. He would hang out no signals, he would take notice of none. He knew that a yearning glance fell upon him, now and then, through a film of tears, but he refused recognition of it. He pictured himself lying sick unto death and his aunt bending over him beseeching one little forgiving word, but he would turn his face to the wall, and die with that word unsaid. Ah, how would she feel then? And he pictured himself brought home from the river, dead, with his curls all wet, and his sore heart at rest. How she would throw herself upon him, and how her tears would fall like rain, and her lips pray God to give her back her boy and she would never, never abuse him any more! But he would lie there cold and white and make no signâa poor little sufferer, whose griefs were at an end. He so worked upon his feelings with the pathos of these dreams, that he had to keep swallowing, he was so like to choke; and his eyes swam in a blur of water, which overflowed when he winked, and ran down and trickled from the end of his nose. And such a luxury to him was this petting of his sorrows, that he could not bear to have any worldly cheeriness or any grating delight intrude upon it; it was too sacred for such contact; and so, presently, when his cousin Mary danced in, all alive with the joy of seeing home again after an age-long visit of one week to the country, he got up and moved in clouds and darkness out at one door as she brought song and sunshine in at the other.

He wandered far from the accustomed haunts of boys, and sought desolate places that were in harmony with his spirit. A log raft in the river invited him, and he seated himself on its outer edge and contemplated the dreary vastness of the stream, wishing, the while, that he could only be drowned, all at once and unconsciously, without undergoing the uncomfortable routine devised by nature. Then he thought of his flower. He got it out, rumpled and wilted, and it mightily increased his dismal felicity. He wondered if she would pity him if she knew? Would she cry, and wish that she had a right to put her arms around his neck and comfort him? Or would she turn coldly away like all the hollow world? This picture brought such an agony of pleasurable suffering that he worked it over and over again in his mind and set it up in new and varied lights, till he wore it threadbare. At last he rose up sighing and departed in the darkness.

About half-past nine or ten oâclock he came along the deserted street to where the Adored Unknown lived; he paused a moment; no sound fell upon his listening ear; a candle was casting a dull glow upon the curtain of a second-story window. Was the sacred presence there? He climbed the fence, threaded his stealthy way through the plants, till he stood under that window; he looked up at it long, and with emotion; then he laid him down on the ground under it, disposing himself upon his back, with his hands clasped upon his breast and holding his poor wilted flower. And thus he would dieâout in the cold world, with no shelter over his homeless head, no friendly hand to wipe the death-damps from his brow, no loving face to bend pityingly over him when the great agony came. And thus she would see him when she looked out upon the glad morning, and oh! would she drop one little tear upon his poor, lifeless form, would she heave one little sigh to see a bright young life so rudely blighted, so untimely cut down?
The window went up, a maid-servantâs discordant voice profaned the holy calm, and a deluge of water drenched the prone martyrâs remains!

The strangling hero sprang up with a relieving snort. There was a whiz as of a missile in the air, mingled with the murmur of a curse, a sound as of shivering glass followed, and a small, vague form went over the fence and shot away in the gloom.
Not long after, as Tom, all undressed for bed, was surveying his drenched garments by the light of a tallow dip, Sid woke up; but if he had any dim idea of making any âreferences to allusions,â he thought better of it and held his peace, for there was danger in Tomâs eye.
Tom turned in without the added vexation of prayers, and Sid made mental note of the omission.

Chapter 4
The sun rose upon a tranquil world, and beamed down upon the peaceful village like a benediction. Breakfast over, Aunt Polly had family worship: it began with a prayer built from the ground up of solid courses of Scriptural quotations, welded together with a thin mortar of originality; and from the summit of this she delivered a grim chapter of the Mosaic Law, as from Sinai.
Then Tom girded up his loins, so to speak, and went to work to âget his verses.â Sid had learned his lesson days before. Tom bent all his energies to the memorizing of five verses, and he chose part of the Sermon on the Mount, because he could find no verses that were shorter. At the end of half an hour Tom had a vague general idea of his lesson, but no more, for his mind was traversing the whole field of human thought, and his hands were busy with distracting recreations. Mary took his book to hear him recite, and he tried to find his way through the fog:
âBlessed are theâaâaââ
âPoorââ
âYesâpoor; blessed are the poorâaâaââ
âIn spiritââ
âIn spirit; blessed are the poor in spirit, for theyâtheyââ
âTheirsââ
âFor theirs. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they that mourn, for theyâtheyââ
âShââ
âFor theyâaââ
âS, H, Aââ
âFor they S, HâOh, I donât know what it is!â
âShall!â
âOh, shall! for they shallâfor they shallâaâaâshall mournâaâaâblessed are they that shallâthey thatâaâthey that shall mourn, for they shallâaâshall what? Why donât you tell me, Mary?âwhat do you want to be so mean for?â
âOh, Tom, you poor thick-headed thing, Iâm not teasing you. I wouldnât do that. You must go and learn it again. Donât you be discouraged, Tom, youâll manage itâand if you do, Iâll give you something ever so nice. There, now, thatâs a good boy.â
âAll right! What is it, Mary, tell me what it is.â
âNever you mind, Tom. You know if I say itâs nice, it is nice.â
âYou bet you thatâs so, Mary. All right, Iâll tackle it again.â
And he did âtackle it againââand under the double pressure of curiosity and prospective gain he did it with such spirit that he accomplished a shining success. Mary gave him a brand-new âBarlowâ knife worth twelve and a half cents; and the convulsion of delight that swept his system shook him to his foundations. True, the knife would not cut anything, but it was a âsure-enoughâ Barlow, and there was inconceivable grandeur in thatâthough where the Western boys ever got the idea that such a weapon could possibly be counterfeited to its injury is an imposing mystery and will always remain so, perhaps. Tom contrived to scarify the cupboard with it, and was arranging to begin on the bureau, when he was called off to dress for Sunday-school.

Mary gave him a tin basin of water and a piece of soap, and he went outside the door and set the basin on a little bench there; then he dipped the soap in the water and laid it down; turned up his sleeves; poured out the water on the ground, gently, and then entered the kitchen and began to wipe his face diligently on the towel behind the door. But Mary removed the towel and said:
âNow ainât you ashamed, Tom. You mustnât be so bad. Water wonât hurt you.â
Tom was a trifle disconcerted. The basin was refilled, and this time he stood over it a little while, gathering resolution; took in a big breath and began. When he entered the kitchen presently, with both eyes shut and groping for the towel with his hands, an honorable testimony of suds and water was dripping from his face. But when he emerged from the towel, he was not yet satisfactory, for the clean territory stopped short at his chin and his jaws, like a mask; below and beyond this line there was a dark expanse of unirrigated soil that spread downward in front and backward around his neck. Mary took him in hand, and when she was done with him he was a man and a brother and his saturated hair was neatly brushed, and its short curls wrought into a dainty and symmetrical general effect. [He privately smoothed out the curls, with labor and difficulty, and plastered his hair close down to his head; for he held curls to be effeminate, and his own filled his life with bitterness.] Then Mary got out a suit of his clothing that had been used only on Sundays during two yearsâthey were simply called his âother clothesââand so by that we know the size of his wardrobe. The girl âput him to rightsâ after he had dressed himself; she buttoned his neat roundabout up to his chin, turned his vast shirt collar down over his shoulders, brushed him off and crowned him with his speckled straw hat. He now looked exceedingly improved and uncomfortable. He was fully as uncomfortable as he looked; for there was a restraint about whole clothes and cleanliness that galled him. He hoped that Mary would forget his shoes, but the hope was blighted; she coated them thoroughly with tallow, as was the custom, and brought them out. He lost his temper and said he was always being made to do everything he didnât want to do. But Mary said, persuasively:
âPlease, Tomâthatâs a good boy.â
So he got into the shoes snarling. Mary was soon ready, and the three children set out for Sunday-schoolâa place that Tom hated with his whole heart; but Sid and Mary were fond of it.

Sabbath-school hours were from nine to half-past ten; and then church service. Two of the children always remained for the sermon voluntarily, and the other always remained tooâfor stronger reasons. The churchâs high-backed, uncushioned pews would seat about three hundred persons; the edifice was but a small, plain affair, with a sort of pine board tree-box on top of it for a steeple. At the door Tom dropped back a step and accosted a Sunday-dressed comrade:
âSay, Billy, got a yaller ticket?â
âYes.â
âWhatâll you take for her?â
âWhatâll you give?â
âPiece of lickrish and a fish-hook.â
âLess see âem.â
Tom exhibited. They were satisfactory, and the property changed hands. Then Tom traded a couple of white alleys for three red tickets, and some small trifle or other for a couple of blue ones. He waylaid other boys as they came, and went on buying tickets of various colors ten or fifteen minutes longer. He entered the church, now, with a swarm of clean and noisy boys and girls, proceeded to his seat and started a quarrel with the first boy that came handy. The teacher, a grave, elderly man, interfered; then turned his back a moment and Tom pulled a boyâs hair in the next bench, and was absorbed in his book when the boy turned around; stuck a pin in another boy, presently, in order to hear him say âOuch!â and got a new reprimand from his teacher. Tomâs whole class were of a patternârestless, noisy, and troublesome. When they came to recite their lessons, not one of them knew his verses perfectly, but had to be prompted all along. However, they worried through, and each got his rewardâin small blue tickets, each with a passage of Scripture on it; each blue ticket was pay for two verses of the recitation. Ten blue tickets equalled a red one, and could be exchanged for it; ten red tickets equalled a yellow one; for ten yellow tickets the superintendent gave a very plainly bound Bible (worth forty cents in those easy times) to the pupil. How many of my readers would have the industry and application to memorize two thousand verses, even for a DorĂ© Bible? And yet Mary had acquired two Bibles in this wayâit was the patient work of two yearsâand a boy of German parentage had won four or five. He once recited three thousand verses without stopping; but the strain upon his mental faculties was too great, and he was little better than an idiot from that day forthâa grievous misfortune for the school, for on great occasions, before company, the superintendent (as Tom expressed it) had always made this boy come out and âspread himself.â Only the older pupils managed to keep their tickets and stick to their tedious work long enough to get a Bible, and so the delivery of one of these prizes was a rare and noteworthy circumstance; the successful pupil was so great and conspicuous for that day that on the spot every scholarâs heart was fired with a fresh ambition that often lasted a couple of weeks. It is possible that Tomâs mental stomach had never really hungered for one of those prizes, but unquestionably his entire being had for many a day longed for the glory and the eclat that came with it.

In due course the superintendent stood up in front of the pulpit, with a closed hymn-book in his hand and his forefinger inserted between its leaves, and commanded attention. When a Sunday-school superintendent makes his customary little speech, a hymn-book in the hand is as necessary as is the inevitable sheet of music in the hand of a singer who stands forward on the platform and sings a solo at a concertâthough why, is a mystery: for neither the hymn-book nor the sheet of music is ever referred to by the sufferer. This superintendent was a slim creature of thirty-five, with a sandy goatee and short sandy hair; he wore a stiff standing-collar whose upper edge almost reached his ears and whose sharp points curved forward abreast the corners of his mouthâa fence that compelled a straight lookout ahead, and a turning of the whole body when a side view was required; his chin was propped on a spreading cravat which was as broad and as long as a bank-note, and had fringed ends; his boot toes were turned sharply up, in the fashion of the day, like sleigh-runnersâan effect patiently and laboriously produced by the young men by sitting with their toes pressed against a wall for hours together. Mr. Walters was very earnest of mien, and very sincere and honest at heart; and he held sacred things and places in such reverence, and so separated them from worldly matters, that unconsciously to himself his Sunday-school voice had acquired a peculiar intonation which was wholly absent on week-days. He began after this fashion:
âNow, children, I want you all to sit up just as straight and pretty as you can and give me all your attention for a minute or two. Thereâthat is it. That is the way good little boys and girls should do. I see one little girl who is looking out of the windowâI am afraid she thinks I am out there somewhereâperhaps up in one of the trees making a speech to the little birds. [Applausive titter.] I want to tell you how good it makes me feel to see so many bright, clean little faces assembled in a place like this, learning to do right and be good.â And so forth and so on. It is not necessary to set down the rest of the oration. It was of a pattern which does not vary, and so it is familiar to us all.
The latter third of the speech was marred by the resumption of fights and other recreations among certain of the bad boys, and by fidgetings and whisperings that extended far and wide, washing even to the bases of isolated and incorruptible rocks like Sid and Mary. But now every sound ceased suddenly, with the subsidence of Mr. Waltersâ voice, and the conclusion of the speech was received with a burst of silent gratitude.
A good part of the whispering had been occasioned by an event which was more or less rareâthe entrance of visitors: lawyer Thatcher, accompanied by a very feeble and aged man; a fine, portly, middle-aged gentleman with iron-gray hair; and a dignified lady who was doubtless the latterâs wife. The lady was leading a child. Tom had been restless and full of chafings and repinings; conscience-smitten, tooâhe could not meet Amy Lawrenceâs eye, he could not brook her loving gaze. But when he saw this small newcomer his soul was all ablaze with bliss in a moment. The next moment he was âshowing offâ with all his mightâcuffing boys, pulling hair, making facesâin a word, using every art that seemed likely to fascinate a girl and win her applause. His exaltation had but one alloyâthe memory of his humiliation in this angelâs gardenâand that record in sand was fast washing out, under the waves of happiness that were sweeping over it now.
The visitors were given the highest seat of honor, and as soon as Mr. Waltersâ speech was finished, he introduced them to the school. The middle-aged man turned out to be a prodigious personageâno less a one than the county judgeâaltogether the most august creation these children had ever looked uponâand they wondered what kind of material he was made ofâand they half wanted to hear him roar, and were half afraid he might, too. He was from Constantinople, twelve miles awayâso he had travelled, and seen the worldâthese very eyes had looked upon the county court-houseâwhich was said to have a tin roof. The awe which these reflections inspired was attested by the impressive silence and the ranks of staring eyes. This was the great Judge Thatcher, brother of their own lawyer. Jeff Thatcher immediately went forward, to be familiar with the great man and be envied by the school. It would have been music to his soul to hear the whisperings:
âLook at him, Jim! Heâs a going up there. Sayâlook! heâs a going to shake hands with himâhe is shaking hands with him! By jings, donât you wish you was Jeff?â
Mr. Walters fell to âshowing off,â with all sorts of official bustlings and activities, giving orders, delivering judgments, discharging directions here, there, everywhere that he could find a target. The librarian âshowed offâârunning hither and thither with his arms full of books and making a deal of the splutter and fuss that insect authority delights in. The young lady teachers âshowed offââbending sweetly over pupils that were lately being boxed, lifting pretty warning fingers at bad little boys and patting good ones lovingly. The young gentlemen teachers âshowed offâ with small scoldings and other little displays of authority and fine attention to disciplineâand most of the teachers, of both sexes, found business up at the library, by the pulpit; and it was business that frequently had to be done over again two or three times (with much seeming vexation). The little girls âshowed offâ in various ways, and the little boys âshowed offâ with such diligence that the air was thick with paper wads and the murmur of scufflings. And above it all the great man sat and beamed a majestic judicial smile upon all the house, and warmed himself in the sun of his own grandeurâfor he was âshowing off,â too.
There was only one thing wanting to make Mr. Waltersâ ecstasy complete, and that was a chance to deliver a Bible-prize and exhibit a prodigy. Several pupils had a few yellow tickets, but none had enoughâhe had been around among the star pupils inquiring. He would have given worlds, now, to have that German lad back again with a sound mind.
And now at this moment, when hope was dead, Tom Sawyer came forward with nine yellow tickets, nine red tickets, and ten blue ones, and demanded a Bible. This was a thunderbolt out of a clear sky. Walters was not expecting an application from this source for the next ten years. But there was no getting around itâhere were the certified checks, and they were good for their face. Tom was therefore elevated to a place with the Judge and the other elect, and the great news was announced from headquarters. It was the most stunning surprise of the decade, and so profound was the sensation that it lifted the new hero up to the judicial oneâs altitude, and the school had two marvels to gaze upon in place of one. The boys were all eaten up with envyâbut those that suffered the bitterest pangs were those who perceived too late that they themselves had contributed to this hated splendor by trading tickets to Tom for the wealth he had amassed in selling whitewashing privileges. These despised themselves, as being the dupes of a wily fraud, a guileful snake in the grass.
The prize was delivered to Tom with as much effusion as the superintendent could pump up under the circumstances; but it lacked somewhat of the true gush, for the poor fellowâs instinct taught him that there was a mystery here that could not well bear the light, perhaps; it was simply preposterous that this boy had warehoused two thousand sheaves of Scriptural wisdom on his premisesâa dozen would strain his capacity, without a doubt.
Amy Lawrence was proud and glad, and she tried to make Tom see it in her faceâbut he wouldnât look. She wondered; then she was just a grain troubled; next a dim suspicion came and wentâcame again; she watched; a furtive glance told her worldsâand then her heart broke, and she was jealous, and angry, and the tears came and she hated everybody. Tom most of all (she thought).
Tom was introduced to the Judge; but his tongue was tied, his breath would hardly come, his heart quakedâpartly because of the awful greatness of the man, but mainly because he was her parent. He would have liked to fall down and worship him, if it were in the dark. The Judge put his hand on Tomâs head and called him a fine little man, and asked him what his name was. The boy stammered, gasped, and got it out:
âTom.â
âOh, no, not Tomâit isââ
âThomas.â
âAh, thatâs it. I thought there was more to it, maybe. Thatâs very well. But youâve another one I daresay, and youâll tell it to me, wonât you?â
âTell the gentleman your other name, Thomas,â said Walters, âand say sir. You mustnât forget your manners.â
âThomas Sawyerâsir.â

âThatâs it! Thatâs a good boy. Fine boy. Fine, manly little fellow. Two thousand verses is a great manyâvery, very great many. And you never can be sorry for the trouble you took to learn them; for knowledge is worth more than anything there is in the world; itâs what makes great men and good men; youâll be a great man and a good man yourself, some day, Thomas, and then youâll look back and say, Itâs all owing to the precious Sunday-school privileges of my boyhoodâitâs all owing to my dear teachers that taught me to learnâitâs all owing to the good superintendent, who encouraged me, and watched over me, and gave me a beautiful Bibleâa splendid elegant Bibleâto keep and have it all for my own, alwaysâitâs all owing to right bringing up! That is what you will say, Thomasâand you wouldnât take any money for those two thousand versesâno indeed you wouldnât. And now you wouldnât mind telling me and this lady some of the things youâve learnedâno, I know you wouldnâtâfor we are proud of little boys that learn. Now, no doubt you know the names of all the twelve disciples. Wonât you tell us the names of the first two that were appointed?â
Tom was tugging at a button-hole and looking sheepish. He blushed, now, and his eyes fell. Mr. Waltersâ heart sank within him. He said to himself, it is not possible that the boy can answer the simplest questionâwhy did the Judge ask him? Yet he felt obliged to speak up and say:
âAnswer the gentleman, Thomasâdonât be afraid.â
Tom still hung fire.
âNow I know youâll tell me,â said the lady. âThe names of the first two disciples wereââ
âDavid and Goliah!â
Let us draw the curtain of charity over the rest of the scene.

Chapter 5
About half-past ten the cracked bell of the small church began to ring, and presently the people began to gather for the morning sermon. The Sunday-school children distributed themselves about the house and occupied pews with their parents, so as to be under supervision. Aunt Polly came, and Tom and Sid and Mary sat with herâTom being placed next the aisle, in order that he might be as far away from the open window and the seductive outside summer scenes as possible. The crowd filed up the aisles: the aged and needy postmaster, who had seen better days; the mayor and his wifeâfor they had a mayor there, among other unnecessaries; the justice of the peace; the widow Douglas, fair, smart, and forty, a generous, good-hearted soul and well-to-do, her hill mansion the only palace in the town, and the most hospitable and much the most lavish in the matter of festivities that St. Petersburg could boast; the bent and venerable Major and Mrs. Ward; lawyer Riverson, the new notable from a distance; next the belle of the village, followed by a troop of lawn-clad and ribbon-decked young heart-breakers; then all the young clerks in town in a bodyâfor they had stood in the vestibule sucking their cane-heads, a circling wall of oiled and simpering admirers, till the last girl had run their gantlet; and last of all came the Model Boy, Willie Mufferson, taking as heedful care of his mother as if she were cut glass. He always brought his mother to church, and was the pride of all the matrons. The boys all hated him, he was so good. And besides, he had been âthrown up to themâ so much. His white handkerchief was hanging out of his pocket behind, as usual on Sundaysâaccidentally. Tom had no handkerchief, and he looked upon boys who had as snobs.

The congregation being fully assembled, now, the bell rang once more, to warn laggards and stragglers, and then a solemn hush fell upon the church which was only broken by the tittering and whispering of the choir in the gallery. The choir always tittered and whispered all through service. There was once a church choir that was not ill-bred, but I have forgotten where it was, now. It was a great many years ago, and I can scarcely remember anything about it, but I think it was in some foreign country.
The minister gave out the hymn, and read it through with a relish, in a peculiar style which was much admired in that part of the country. His voice began on a medium key and climbed steadily up till it reached a certain point, where it bore with strong emphasis upon the topmost word and then plunged down as if from a spring-board:

Shall I be car-ri-ed toe the skies, on flowâry beds
of ease,
Whilst others fight to win the prize, and sail throâ blood
-y seas?
He was regarded as a wonderful reader. At church âsociablesâ he was always called upon to read poetry; and when he was through, the ladies would lift up their hands and let them fall helplessly in their laps, and âwallâ their eyes, and shake their heads, as much as to say, âWords cannot express it; it is too beautiful, TOO beautiful for this mortal earth.â
After the hymn had been sung, the Rev. Mr. Sprague turned himself into a bulletin-board, and read off ânoticesâ of meetings and societies and things till it seemed that the list would stretch out to the crack of doomâa queer custom which is still kept up in America, even in cities, away here in this age of abundant newspapers. Often, the less there is to justify a traditional custom, the harder it is to get rid of it.
And now the minister prayed. A good, generous prayer it was, and went into details: it pleaded for the church, and the little children of the church; for the other churches of the village; for the village itself; for the county; for the State; for the State officers; for the United States; for the churches of the United States; for Congress; for the President; for the officers of the Government; for poor sailors, tossed by stormy seas; for the oppressed millions groaning under the heel of European monarchies and Oriental despotisms; for such as have the light and the good tidings, and yet have not eyes to see nor ears to hear withal; for the heathen in the far islands of the sea; and closed with a supplication that the words he was about to speak might find grace and favor, and be as seed sown in fertile ground, yielding in time a grateful harvest of good. Amen.
There was a rustling of dresses, and the standing congregation sat down. The boy whose history this book relates did not enjoy the prayer, he only endured itâif he even did that much. He was restive all through it; he kept tally of the details of the prayer, unconsciouslyâfor he was not listening, but he knew the ground of old, and the clergymanâs regular route over itâand when a little trifle of new matter was interlarded, his ear detected it and his whole nature resented it; he considered additions unfair, and scoundrelly. In the midst of the prayer a fly had lit on the back of the pew in front of him and tortured his spirit by calmly rubbing its hands together, embracing its head with its arms, and polishing it so vigorously that it seemed to almost part company with the body, and the slender thread of a neck was exposed to view; scraping its wings with its hind legs and smoothing them to its body as if they had been coat-tails; going through its whole toilet as tranquilly as if it knew it was perfectly safe. As indeed it was; for as sorely as Tomâs hands itched to grab for it they did not dareâhe believed his soul would be instantly destroyed if he did such a thing while the prayer was going on. But with the closing sentence his hand began to curve and steal forward; and the instant the âAmenâ was out the fly was a prisoner of war. His aunt detected the act and made him let it go.
The minister gave out his text and droned along monotonously through an argument that was so prosy that many a head by and by began to nodâand yet it was an argument that dealt in limitless fire and brimstone and thinned the predestined elect down to a company so small as to be hardly worth the saving. Tom counted the pages of the sermon; after church he always knew how many pages there had been, but he seldom knew anything else about the discourse. However, this time he was really interested for a little while. The minister made a grand and moving picture of the assembling together of the worldâs hosts at the millennium when the lion and the lamb should lie down together and a little child should lead them. But the pathos, the lesson, the moral of the great spectacle were lost upon the boy; he only thought of the conspicuousness of the principal character before the on-looking nations; his face lit with the thought, and he said to himself that he wished he could be that child, if it was a tame lion.

Now he lapsed into suffering again, as the dry argument was resumed. Presently he bethought him of a treasure he had and got it out. It was a large black beetle with formidable jawsâa âpinchbug,â he called it. It was in a percussion-cap box. The first thing the beetle did was to take him by the finger. A natural fillip followed, the beetle went floundering into the aisle and lit on its back, and the hurt finger went into the boyâs mouth. The beetle lay there working its helpless legs, unable to turn over. Tom eyed it, and longed for it; but it was safe out of his reach. Other people uninterested in the sermon found relief in the beetle, and they eyed it too. Presently a vagrant poodle dog came idling along, sad at heart, lazy with the summer softness and the quiet, weary of captivity, sighing for change. He spied the beetle; the drooping tail lifted and wagged. He surveyed the prize; walked around it; smelt at it from a safe distance; walked around it again; grew bolder, and took a closer smell; then lifted his lip and made a gingerly snatch at it, just missing it; made another, and another; began to enjoy the diversion; subsided to his stomach with the beetle between his paws, and continued his experiments; grew weary at last, and then indifferent and absent-minded. His head nodded, and little by little his chin descended and touched the enemy, who seized it. There was a sharp yelp, a flirt of the poodleâs head, and the beetle fell a couple of yards away, and lit on its back once more. The neighboring spectators shook with a gentle inward joy, several faces went behind fans and hand-kerchiefs, and Tom was entirely happy. The dog looked foolish, and probably felt so; but there was resentment in his heart, too, and a craving for revenge. So he went to the beetle and began a wary attack on it again; jumping at it from every point of a circle, lighting with his fore-paws within an inch of the creature, making even closer snatches at it with his teeth, and jerking his head till his ears flapped again. But he grew tired once more, after a while; tried to amuse himself with a fly but found no relief; followed an ant around, with his nose close to the floor, and quickly wearied of that; yawned, sighed, forgot the beetle entirely, and sat down on it. Then there was a wild yelp of agony and the poodle went sailing up the aisle; the yelps continued, and so did the dog; he crossed the house in front of the altar; he flew down the other aisle; he crossed before the doors; he clamored up the home-stretch; his anguish grew with his progress, till presently he was but a woolly comet moving in its orbit with the gleam and the speed of light. At last the frantic sufferer sheered from its course, and sprang into its masterâs lap; he flung it out of the window, and the voice of distress quickly thinned away and died in the distance.

By this time the whole church was red-faced and suffocating with suppressed laughter, and the sermon had come to a dead standstill. The discourse was resumed presently, but it went lame and halting, all possibility of impressiveness being at an end; for even the gravest sentiments were constantly being received with a smothered burst of unholy mirth, under cover of some remote pew-back, as if the poor parson had said a rarely facetious thing. It was a genuine relief to the whole congregation when the ordeal was over and the benediction pronounced.
Tom Sawyer went home quite cheerful, thinking to himself that there was some satisfaction about divine service when there was a bit of variety in it. He had but one marring thought; he was willing that the dog should play with his pinchbug, but he did not think it was upright in him to carry it off.

Chapter 6
Monday morning found Tom Sawyer miserable. Monday morning always found him soâbecause it began another weekâs slow suffering in school. He generally began that day with wishing he had had no intervening holiday, it made the going into captivity and fetters again so much more odious.
Tom lay thinking. Presently it occurred to him that he wished he was sick; then he could stay home from school. Here was a vague possibility. He canvassed his system. No ailment was found, and he investigated again. This time he thought he could detect colicky symptoms, and he began to encourage them with considerable hope. But they soon grew feeble, and presently died wholly away. He reflected further. Suddenly he discovered something. One of his upper front teeth was loose. This was lucky; he was about to begin to groan, as a âstarter,â as he called it, when it occurred to him that if he came into court with that argument, his aunt would pull it out, and that would hurt. So he thought he would hold the tooth in reserve for the present, and seek further. Nothing offered for some little time, and then he remembered hearing the doctor tell about a certain thing that laid up a patient for two or three weeks and threatened to make him lose a finger. So the boy eagerly drew his sore toe from under the sheet and held it up for inspection. But now he did not know the necessary symptoms. However, it seemed well worth while to chance it, so he fell to groaning with considerable spirit.
But Sid slept on unconscious.
Tom groaned louder, and fancied that he began to feel pain in the toe.
No result from Sid.
Tom was panting with his exertions by this time. He took a rest and then swelled himself up and fetched a succession of admirable groans.
Sid snored on.
Tom was aggravated. He said, âSid, Sid!â and shook him. This course worked well, and Tom began to groan again. Sid yawned, stretched, then brought himself up on his elbow with a snort, and began to stare at Tom. Tom went on groaning. Sid said:
âTom! Say, Tom!â [No response.] âHere, Tom! TOM! What is the matter, Tom?â And he shook him and looked in his face anxiously.
Tom moaned out:
âOh, donât, Sid. Donât joggle me.â
âWhy, whatâs the matter, Tom? I must call auntie.â
âNoânever mind. Itâll be over by and by, maybe. Donât call anybody.â
âBut I must! Donât groan so, Tom, itâs awful. How long you been this way?â
âHours. Ouch! Oh, donât stir so, Sid, youâll kill me.â
âTom, why didnât you wake me sooner? Oh, Tom, donât! It makes my flesh crawl to hear you. Tom, what is the matter?â
âI forgive you everything, Sid. [Groan.] Everything youâve ever done to me. When Iâm goneââ
âOh, Tom, you ainât dying, are you? Donât, Tomâoh, donât. Maybeââ
âI forgive everybody, Sid. [Groan.] Tell âem so, Sid. And Sid, you give my window-sash and my cat with one eye to that new girl thatâs come to town, and tell herââ
But Sid had snatched his clothes and gone. Tom was suffering in reality, now, so handsomely was his imagination working, and so his groans had gathered quite a genuine tone.
Sid flew downstairs and said:
âOh, Aunt Polly, come! Tomâs dying!â
âDying!â
âYesâm. Donât waitâcome quick!â
âRubbage! I donât believe it!â
But she fled upstairs, nevertheless, with Sid and Mary at her heels. And her face grew white, too, and her lip trembled. When she reached the bedside she gasped out:
âYou, Tom! Tom, whatâs the matter with you?â
âOh, auntie, Iâmââ
âWhatâs the matter with youâwhat is the matter with you, child?â
âOh, auntie, my sore toeâs mortified!â
The old lady sank down into a chair and laughed a little, then cried a little, then did both together. This restored her and she said:
âTom, what a turn you did give me. Now you shut up that nonsense and climb out of this.â
The groans ceased and the pain vanished from the toe. The boy felt a little foolish, and he said:
âAunt Polly, it seemed mortified, and it hurt so I never minded my tooth at all.â
âYour tooth, indeed! Whatâs the matter with your tooth?â
âOne of themâs loose, and it aches perfectly awful.â
âThere, there, now, donât begin that groaning again. Open your mouth. Wellâyour tooth is loose, but youâre not going to die about that. Mary, get me a silk thread, and a chunk of fire out of the kitchen.â
Tom said:
âOh, please, auntie, donât pull it out. It donât hurt any more. I wish I may never stir if it does. Please donât, auntie. I donât want to stay home from school.â

âOh, you donât, donât you? So all this row was because you thought youâd get to stay home from school and go a-fishing? Tom, Tom, I love you so, and you seem to try every way you can to break my old heart with your outrageousness.â By this time the dental instruments were ready. The old lady made one end of the silk thread fast to Tomâs tooth with a loop and tied the other to the bedpost. Then she seized the chunk of fire and suddenly thrust it almost into the boyâs face. The tooth hung dangling by the bedpost, now.
But all trials bring their compensations. As Tom wended to school after breakfast, he was the envy of every boy he met because the gap in his upper row of teeth enabled him to expectorate in a new and admirable way. He gathered quite a following of lads interested in the exhibition; and one that had cut his finger and had been a centre of fascination and homage up to this time, now found himself suddenly without an adherent, and shorn of his glory. His heart was heavy, and he said with a disdain which he did not feel that it wasnât anything to spit like Tom Sawyer; but another boy said, âSour grapes!â and he wandered away a dismantled hero.
Shortly Tom came upon the juvenile pariah of the village, Huckleberry Finn, son of the town drunkard. Huckleberry was cordially hated and dreaded by all the mothers of the town, because he was idle and lawless and vulgar and badâand because all their children admired him so, and delighted in his forbidden society, and wished they dared to be like him. Tom was like the rest of the respectable boys, in that he envied Huckleberry his gaudy outcast condition, and was under strict orders not to play with him. So he played with him every time he got a chance. Huckleberry was always dressed in the cast-off clothes of full-grown men, and they were in perennial bloom and fluttering with rags. His hat was a vast ruin with a wide crescent lopped out of its brim; his coat, when he wore one, hung nearly to his heels and had the rearward buttons far down the back; but one suspender supported his trousers; the seat of the trousers bagged low and contained nothing, the fringed legs dragged in the dirt when not rolled up.

Huckleberry came and went, at his own free will. He slept on doorsteps in fine weather and in empty hogsheads in wet; he did not have to go to school or to church, or call any being master or obey anybody; he could go fishing or swimming when and where he chose, and stay as long as it suited him; nobody forbade him to fight; he could sit up as late as he pleased; he was always the first boy that went barefoot in the spring and the last to resume leather in the fall; he never had to wash, nor put on clean clothes; he could swear wonderfully. In a word, everything that goes to make life precious that boy had. So thought every harassed, hampered, respectable boy in St. Petersburg.
Tom hailed the romantic outcast:
âHello, Huckleberry!â
âHello yourself, and see how you like it.â
âWhatâs that you got?â
âDead cat.â
âLemme see him, Huck. My, heâs pretty stiff. Whereâd you get him?â
âBought him offân a boy.â
âWhat did you give?â
âI give a blue ticket and a bladder that I got at the slaughter-house.â
âWhereâd you get the blue ticket?â
âBought it offân Ben Rogers two weeks ago for a hoop-stick.â
âSayâwhat is dead cats good for, Huck?â
âGood for? Cure warts with.â
âNo! Is that so? I know something thatâs better.â
âI bet you donât. What is it?â
âWhy, spunk-water.â
âSpunk-water! I wouldnât give a dern for spunk-water.â
âYou wouldnât, wouldnât you? Dâyou ever try it?â
âNo, I hainât. But Bob Tanner did.â
âWho told you so!â
âWhy, he told Jeff Thatcher, and Jeff told Johnny Baker, and Johnny told Jim Hollis, and Jim told Ben Rogers, and Ben told me. There now!â
âWell, what of it? Theyâll all lie. Now you tell me how Bob Tanner done it, Huck.â
âWhy, he took and dipped his hand in a rotten stump where the rain-water was.â
âIn the daytime?â
âCertainly.â
âWith his face to the stump?â
âYes. Least I reckon so.â
âDid he say anything?â
âI donât reckon he did. I donât know.â
âAha! Talk about trying to cure warts with spunk-water such a blame fool way as that! Why, that ainât a-going to do any good. You got to go all by yourself, to the middle of the woods, where you know thereâs a spunk-water stump, and just as itâs midnight you back up against the stump and jam your hand in and say:
âBarley-corn, barley-corn, meal shorts,
Spunk-water, spunk-water, swaller these warts,â
and then walk away quick, eleven steps, with your eyes shut, and then turn around three times and walk home without speaking to anybody. Because if you speak the charmâs busted.â
âWell, that sounds like a good way; but that ainât the way Bob Tanner done.â
âNo, sir, you can bet he didnât, becuz heâs the wartiest boy in this town; and he wouldnât have a wart on him if heâd knowed how to work spunk-water. Iâve took off thousands of warts off of my hands that way, Huck. I play with frogs so much that Iâve always got considerable many warts. Sometimes I take âem off with a bean.â
âYes, beanâs good. Iâve done that.â
âHave you? Whatâs your way?â
âYou take and split the bean, and cut the wart so as to get some blood, and then you put the blood on one piece of the bean and take and dig a hole and bury it âbout midnight at the crossroads in the dark of the moon, and then you burn up the rest of the bean. You see that piece thatâs got the blood on it will keep drawing and drawing, trying to fetch the other piece to it, and so that helps the blood to draw the wart, and pretty soon off she comes.â
âYes, thatâs it, Huckâthatâs it; though when youâre burying it if you say âDown bean; off wart; come no more to bother me!â itâs better. Thatâs the way Joe Harper does, and heâs been nearly to Coonville and most everywheres. But sayâhow do you cure âem with dead cats?â
âWhy, you take your cat and go and get in the grave-yard âlong about midnight when somebody that was wicked has been buried; and when itâs midnight a devil will come, or maybe two or three, but you canât see âem, you can only hear something like the wind, or maybe hear âem talk; and when theyâre taking that feller away, you heave your cat after âem and say, âDevil follow corpse, cat follow devil, warts follow cat, Iâm done with ye!â Thatâll fetch any wart.â
âSounds right. Dâyou ever try it, Huck?â
âNo, but old Mother Hopkins told me.â
âWell, I reckon itâs so, then. Becuz they say sheâs a witch.â
âSay! Why, Tom, I know she is. She witched pap. Pap says so his own self. He come along one day, and he see she was a-witching him, so he took up a rock, and if she hadnât dodged, heâd a got her. Well, that very night he rolled offân a shed wherâ he was a layin drunk, and broke his arm.â
âWhy, thatâs awful. How did he know she was a-witching him?â
âLord, pap can tell, easy. Pap says when they keep looking at you right stiddy, theyâre a-witching you. Specially if they mumble. Becuz when they mumble theyâre saying the Lordâs Prayer backards.â

âSay, Hucky, when you going to try the cat?â
âTo-night. I reckon theyâll come after old Hoss Williams to-night.â
âBut they buried him Saturday. Didnât they get him Saturday night?â
âWhy, how you talk! How could their charms work till midnight?âand then itâs Sunday. Devils donât slosh around much of a Sunday, I donât reckon.â
âI never thought of that. Thatâs so. Lemme go with you?â
âOf courseâif you ainât afeard.â
âAfeard! âTainât likely. Will you meow?â
âYesâand you meow back, if you get a chance. Last time, you kepâ me a-meowing around till old Hays went to throwing rocks at me and says âDern that cat!â and so I hove a brick through his windowâbut donât you tell.â
âI wonât. I couldnât meow that night, becuz auntie was watching me, but Iâll meow this time. Sayâwhatâs that?â
âNothing but a tick.â
âWhereâd you get him?â
âOut in the woods.â
âWhatâll you take for him?â
âI donât know. I donât want to sell him.â
âAll right. Itâs a mighty small tick, anyway.â
âOh, anybody can run a tick down that donât belong to them. Iâm satisfied with it. Itâs a good enough tick for me.â
âSho, thereâs ticks a plenty. I could have a thousand of âem if I wanted to.â
âWell, why donât you? Becuz you know mighty well you canât. This is a pretty early tick, I reckon. Itâs the first one Iâve seen this year.â
âSay, HuckâIâll give you my tooth for him.â
âLess see it.â
Tom got out a bit of paper and carefully unrolled it. Huckleberry viewed it wistfully. The temptation was very strong. At last he said:
âIs it genuwyne?â
Tom lifted his lip and showed the vacancy.
âWell, all right,â said Huckleberry, âitâs a trade.â
Tom enclosed the tick in the percussion-cap box that had lately been the pinchbugâs prison, and the boys separated, each feeling wealthier than before.
When Tom reached the little isolated frame school-house, he strode in briskly, with the manner of one who had come with all honest speed. He hung his hat on a peg and flung himself into his seat with business-like alacrity. The master, throned on high in his great splint-bottom arm-chair, was dozing, lulled by the drowsy hum of study. The interruption roused him.
âThomas Sawyer!â
Tom knew that when his name was pronounced in full, it meant trouble.
âSir!â
âCome up here. Now, sir, why are you late again, as usual?â
Tom was about to take refuge in a lie, when he saw two long tails of yellow hair hanging down a back that he recognized by the electric sympathy of love; and by that form was the only vacant place on the girlsâ side of the school-house. He instantly said:
âI stopped to talk with Huckleberry Finn!â
The masterâs pulse stood still, and he stared helplessly. The buzz of study ceased. The pupils wondered if this foolhardy boy had lost his mind. The master said:
âYouâyou did what?â
âStopped to talk with Huckleberry Finn.â
There was no mistaking the words.
âThomas Sawyer, this is the most astounding confession I have ever listened to. No mere ferule will answer for this offence. Take off your jacket.â

The masterâs arm performed until it was tired and the stock of switches notably diminished. Then the order followed:
âNow, sir, go and sit with the girls! And let this be a warning to you.â
The titter that rippled around the room appeared to abash the boy, but in reality that result was caused rather more by his worshipful awe of his unknown idol and the dread pleasure that lay in his high good fortune. He sat down upon the end of the pine bench and the girl hitched herself away from him with a toss of her head. Nudges and winks and whispers traversed the room, but Tom sat still, with his arms upon the long, low desk before him, and seemed to study his book.
By and by attention ceased from him, and the accustomed school murmur rose upon the dull air once more. Presently the boy began to steal furtive glances at the girl. She observed it, âmade a mouthâ at him and gave him the back of her head for the space of a minute. When she cautiously faced around again, a peach lay before her. She thrust it away. Tom gently put it back. She thrust it away again, but with less animosity. Tom patiently returned it to its place. Then she let it remain. Tom scrawled on his slate, âPlease take itâI got more.â The girl glanced at the words, but made no sign. Now the boy began to draw something on the slate, hiding his work with his left hand. For a time the girl refused to notice; but her human curiosity presently began to manifest itself by hardly perceptible signs. The boy worked on, apparently unconscious. The girl made a sort of non-committal attempt to see, but the boy did not betray that he was aware of it. At last she gave in and hesitatingly whispered:
âLet me see it.â

Tom partly uncovered a dismal caricature of a house with two gable ends to it and a corkscrew of smoke issuing from the chimney. Then the girlâs interest began to fasten itself upon the work and she forgot everything else. When it was finished, she gazed a moment, then whispered:
âItâs niceâmake a man.â
The artist erected a man in the front yard, that resembled a derrick. He could have stepped over the house; but the girl was not hypercritical; she was satisfied with the monster, and whispered:
âItâs a beautiful manânow make me coming along.â
Tom drew an hour-glass with a full moon and straw limbs to it and armed the spreading fingers with a portentous fan. The girl said:
âItâs ever so niceâI wish I could draw.â
âItâs easy,â whispered Tom, âIâll learn you.â
âOh, will you? When?â
âAt noon. Do you go home to dinner?â
âIâll stay if you will.â
âGoodâthatâs a whack. Whatâs your name?â
âBecky Thatcher. Whatâs yours? Oh, I know. Itâs Thomas Sawyer.â
âThatâs the name they lick me by. Iâm Tom when Iâm good. You call me Tom, will you?â
âYes.â
Now Tom began to scrawl something on the slate, hiding the words from the girl. But she was not backward this time. She begged to see. Tom said:
âOh, it ainât anything.â
âYes it is.â
âNo it ainât. You donât want to see.â
âYes I do, indeed I do. Please let me.â
âYouâll tell.â
âNo I wonâtâdeed and deed and double deed wonât.â
âYou wonât tell anybody at all? Ever, as long as you live?â
âNo, I wonât ever tell anybody. Now let me.â
âOh, you donât want to see!â
âNow that you treat me so, I will see.â And she put her small hand upon his and a little scuffle ensued, Tom pretending to resist in earnest but letting his hand slip by degrees till these words were revealed: âI love you.â
âOh, you bad thing!â And she hit his hand a smart rap, but reddened and looked pleased, nevertheless.
Just at this juncture the boy felt a slow, fateful grip closing on his ear, and a steady lifting impulse. In that wise he was borne across the house and deposited in his own seat, under a peppering fire of giggles from the whole school. Then the master stood over him during a few awful moments, and finally moved away to his throne without saying a word. But although Tomâs ear tingled, his heart was jubilant.

As the school quieted down Tom made an honest effort to study, but the turmoil within him was too great. In turn he took his place in the reading class and made a botch of it; then in the geography class and turned lakes into mountains, mountains into rivers, and rivers into continents, till chaos was come again; then in the spelling class, and got âturned down,â by a succession of mere baby words, till he brought up at the foot and yielded up the pewter medal which he had worn with ostentation for months.
Chapter 7
The harder Tom tried to fasten his mind on his book, the more his ideas wandered. So at last, with a sigh and a yawn, he gave it up. It seemed to him that the noon recess would never come. The air was utterly dead. There was not a breath stirring. It was the sleepiest of sleepy days. The drowsing murmur of the five and twenty studying scholars soothed the soul like the spell that is in the murmur of bees. Away off in the flaming sunshine, Cardiff Hill lifted its soft green sides through a shimmering veil of heat, tinted with the purple of distance; a few birds floated on lazy wing high in the air; no other living thing was visible but some cows, and they were asleep. Tomâs heart ached to be free, or else to have something of interest to do to pass the dreary time. His hand wandered into his pocket and his face lit up with a glow of gratitude that was prayer, though he did not know it. Then furtively the percussion-cap box came out. He released the tick and put him on the long flat desk. The creature probably glowed with a gratitude that amounted to prayer, too, at this moment, but it was premature: for when he started thankfully to travel off, Tom turned him aside with a pin and made him take a new direction.
Tomâs bosom friend sat next him, suffering just as Tom had been, and now he was deeply and gratefully interested in this entertainment in an instant. This bosom friend was Joe Harper. The two boys were sworn friends all the week, and embattled enemies on Saturdays. Joe took a pin out of his lapel and began to assist in exercising the prisoner. The sport grew in interest momently. Soon Tom said that they were interfering with each other, and neither getting the fullest benefit of the tick. So he put Joeâs slate on the desk and drew a line down the middle of it from top to bottom.
âNow,â said he, âas long as he is on your side you can stir him up and Iâll let him alone; but if you let him get away and get on my side, youâre to leave him alone as long as I can keep him from crossing over.â
âAll right, go ahead; start him up.â
The tick escaped from Tom, presently, and crossed the equator. Joe harassed him awhile, and then he got away and crossed back again. This change of base occurred often. While one boy was worrying the tick with absorbing interest, the other would look on with interest as strong, the two heads bowed together over the slate, and the two souls dead to all things else. At last luck seemed to settle and abide with Joe. The tick tried this, that, and the other course, and got as excited and as anxious as the boys themselves, but time and again just as he would have victory in his very grasp, so to speak, and Tomâs fingers would be twitching to begin, Joeâs pin would deftly head him off, and keep possession. At last Tom could stand it no longer. The temptation was too strong. So he reached out and lent a hand with his pin. Joe was angry in a moment. Said he:
âTom, you let him alone.â
âI only just want to stir him up a little, Joe.â
âNo, sir, it ainât fair; you just let him alone.â
âBlame it, I ainât going to stir him much.â
âLet him alone, I tell you.â
âI wonât!â
âYou shallâheâs on my side of the line.â
âLook here, Joe Harper, whose is that tick?â
âI donât care whose tick he isâheâs on my side of the line, and you shaânât touch him.â
âWell, Iâll just bet I will, though. Heâs my tick and Iâll do what I blame please with him, or die!â
A tremendous whack came down on Tomâs shoulders, and its duplicate on Joeâs; and for the space of two minutes the dust continued to fly from the two jackets and the whole school to enjoy it. The boys had been too absorbed to notice the hush that had stolen upon the school awhile before when the master came tiptoeing down the room and stood over them. He had contemplated a good part of the performance before he contributed his bit of variety to it.
When school broke up at noon, Tom flew to Becky Thatcher, and whispered in her ear:
âPut on your bonnet and let on youâre going home; and when you get to the corner, give the rest of âem the slip, and turn down through the lane and come back. Iâll go the other way and come it over âem the same way.â
So the one went off with one group of scholars, and the other with another. In a little while the two met at the bottom of the lane, and when they reached the school they had it all to themselves. Then they sat together, with a slate before them, and Tom gave Becky the pencil and held her hand in his, guiding it, and so created another surprising house. When the interest in art began to wane, the two fell to talking. Tom was swimming in bliss. He said:
âDo you love rats?â
âNo! I hate them!â
âWell, I do, tooâlive ones. But I mean dead ones, to swing round your head with a string.â
âNo, I donât care for rats much, anyway. What I like is chewing-gum.â
âOh, I should say so! I wish I had some now.â
âDo you? Iâve got some. Iâll let you chew it awhile, but you must give it back to me.â
That was agreeable, so they chewed it turn about, and dangled their legs against the bench in excess of contentment.
âWas you ever at a circus?â said Tom.
âYes, and my paâs going to take me again some time, if Iâm good.â
âI been to the circus three or four timesâlots of times. Church ainât shucks to a circus. Thereâs things going on at a circus all the time. Iâm going to be a clown in a circus when I grow up.â
âOh, are you! That will be nice. Theyâre so lovely, all spotted up.â
âYes, thatâs so. And they get slathers of moneyâmost a dollar a day, Ben Rogers says. Say, Becky, was you ever engaged?â
âWhatâs that?â
âWhy, engaged to be married.â
âNo.â
âWould you like to?â
âI reckon so. I donât know. What is it like?â
âLike? Why it ainât like anything. You only just tell a boy you wonât ever have anybody but him, ever ever ever, and then you kiss and thatâs all. Anybody can do it.â
âKiss? What do you kiss for?â
âWhy, that, you know, is toâwell, they always do that.â
âEverybody?â
âWhy, yes, everybody thatâs in love with each other. Do you remember what I wrote on the slate?â
âYeâyes.â
âWhat was it?â
âI shaânât tell you.â
âShall I tell you?â
âYeâyesâbut some other time.â
âNo, now.â
âNo, not nowâto-morrow.â
âOh, no, now. Please, BeckyâIâll whisper it, Iâll whisper it ever so easy.â
Becky hesitating, Tom took silence for consent, and passed his arm about her waist and whispered the tale ever so softly, with his mouth close to her ear. And then he added:
âNow you whisper it to meâjust the same.â
She resisted, for a while, and then said:
âYou turn your face away so you canât see, and then I will. But you mustnât ever tell anybodyâwill you, Tom? Now you wonât, will you?â
âNo, indeed, indeed I wonât. Now, Becky.â
He turned his face away. She bent timidly around till her breath stirred his curls and whispered, âIâloveâyou!â
Then she sprang away and ran around and around the desks and benches, with Tom after her, and took refuge in a corner at last, with her little white apron to her face. Tom clasped her about her neck and pleaded:
âNow, Becky, itâs all doneâall over but the kiss. Donât you be afraid of thatâit ainât anything at all. Please, Becky.â And he tugged at her apron and the hands.
By and by she gave up, and let her hands drop; her face, all glowing with the struggle, came up and submitted. Tom kissed the red lips and said:
âNow itâs all done, Becky. And always after this, you know, you ainât ever to love anybody but me, and you ainât ever to marry anybody but me, ever never and forever. Will you?â
âNo, Iâll never love anybody but you, Tom, and Iâll never marry anybody but youâand you ainât to ever marry anybody but me, either.â
âCertainly. Of course. Thatâs part of it. And always coming to school or when weâre going home, youâre to walk with me, when there ainât anybody lookingâand you choose me and I choose you at parties, because thatâs the way you do when youâre engaged.â
âItâs so nice. I never heard of it before.â
âOh, itâs ever so gay! Why, me and Amy Lawrenceââ
The big eyes told Tom his blunder and he stopped, confused.
âOh, Tom! Then I ainât the first youâve ever been engaged to!â
The child began to cry. Tom said:
âOh, donât cry, Becky, I donât care for her any more.â
âYes, you do, Tomâyou know you do.â

Tom tried to put his arm about her neck, but she pushed him away and turned her face to the wall, and went on crying. Tom tried again, with soothing words in his mouth, and was repulsed again. Then his pride was up, and he strode away and went outside. He stood about, restless and uneasy, for a while, glancing at the door, every now and then, hoping she would repent and come to find him. But she did not. Then he began to feel badly and fear that he was in the wrong. It was a hard struggle with him to make new advances, now, but he nerved himself to it and entered. She was still standing back there in the corner, sobbing, with her face to the wall. Tomâs heart smote him. He went to her and stood a moment, not knowing exactly how to proceed. Then he said hesitatingly:
âBecky, IâI donât care for anybody but you.â
No replyâbut sobs.
âBeckyââpleadingly. âBecky, wonât you say something?â
More sobs.
Tom got out his chiefest jewel, a brass knob from the top of an andiron, and passed it around her so that she could see it, and said:
âPlease, Becky, wonât you take it?â
She struck it to the floor. Then Tom marched out of the house and over the hills and far away, to return to school no more that day. Presently Becky began to suspect. She ran to the door; he was not in sight; she flew around to the play-yard; he was not there. Then she called:
âTom! Come back, Tom!â
She listened intently, but there was no answer. She had no companions but silence and loneliness. So she sat down to cry again and upbraid herself; and by this time the scholars began to gather again, and she had to hide her griefs and still her broken heart and take up the cross of a long, dreary, aching afternoon, with none among the strangers about her to exchange sorrows with.

Chapter 8
Tom dodged hither and thither through lanes until he was well out of the track of returning scholars, and then fell into a moody jog. He crossed a small âbranchâ two or three times, because of a prevailing juvenile superstition that to cross water baffled pursuit. Half an hour later he was disappearing behind the Douglas mansion on the summit of Cardiff Hill, and the school-house was hardly distinguishable away off in the valley behind him. He entered a dense wood, picked his pathless way to the centre of it, and sat down on a mossy spot under a spreading oak. There was not even a zephyr stirring; the dead noonday heat had even stilled the songs of the birds; nature lay in a trance that was broken by no sound but the occasional far-off hammering of a wood-pecker, and this seemed to render the pervading silence and sense of loneliness the more profound. The boyâs soul was steeped in melancholy; his feelings were in happy accord with his surroundings. He sat long with his elbows on his knees and his chin in his hands, meditating. It seemed to him that life was but a trouble, at best, and he more than half envied Jimmy Hodges, so lately released; it must be very peaceful, he thought, to lie and slumber and dream forever and ever, with the wind whispering through the trees and caressing the grass and the flowers over the grave, and nothing to bother and grieve about, ever any more. If he only had a clean Sunday-school record he could be willing to go, and be done with it all. Now as to this girl. What had he done? Nothing. He had meant the best in the world, and been treated like a dogâlike a very dog. She would be sorry some dayâmaybe when it was too late. Ah, if he could only die temporarily!
But the elastic heart of youth cannot be compressed into one constrained shape long at a time. Tom presently began to drift insensibly back into the concerns of this life again. What if he turned his back, now, and disappeared mysteriously? What if he went awayâever so far away, into unknown countries beyond the seasâand never came back any more! How would she feel then! The idea of being a clown recurred to him now, only to fill him with disgust. For frivolity and jokes and spotted tights were an offense, when they intruded themselves upon a spirit that was exalted into the vague august realm of the romantic. No, he would be a soldier, and return after long years, all war-worn and illustrious. Noâbetter still, he would join the Indians, and hunt buffaloes and go on the warpath in the mountain ranges and the trackless great plains of the Far West, and away in the future come back a great chief, bristling with feathers, hideous with paint, and prance into Sunday-school, some drowsy summer morning, with a blood-curdling war-whoop, and sear the eyeballs of all his companions with unappeasable envy. But no, there was something gaudier even than this. He would be a pirate! That was it! now his future lay plain before him, and glowing with unimaginable splendor. How his name would fill the world, and make people shudder! How gloriously he would go plowing the dancing seas, in his long, low, black-hulled racer, the Spirit of the Storm, with his grisly flag flying at the fore! And at the zenith of his fame, how he would suddenly appear at the old village and stalk into church, brown and weather-beaten, in his black velvet doublet and trunks, his great jack-boots, his crimson sash, his belt bristling with horse-pistols, his crime-rusted cutlass at his side, his slouch hat with waving plumes, his black flag unfurled, with the skull and crossbones on it, and hear with swelling ecstasy the whisperings, âItâs Tom Sawyer the Pirate!âthe Black Avenger of the Spanish Main!â

Yes, it was settled; his career was determined. He would run away from home and enter upon it. He would start the very next morning. Therefore he must now begin to get ready. He would collect his resources together. He went to a rotten log near at hand and began to dig under one end of it with his Barlow knife. He soon struck wood that sounded hollow. He put his hand there and uttered this incantation impressively:
âWhat hasnât come here, come! Whatâs here, stay here!â
Then he scraped away the dirt, and exposed a pine shingle. He took it up and disclosed a shapely little treasure-house whose bottom and sides were of shingles. In it lay a marble. Tomâs astonishment was boundless! He scratched his head with a perplexed air, and said:
âWell, that beats anything!â
Then he tossed the marble away pettishly, and stood cogitating. The truth was, that a superstition of his had failed, here, which he and all his comrades had always looked upon as infallible. If you buried a marble with certain necessary incantations, and left it alone a fortnight, and then opened the place with the incantation he had just used, you would find that all the marbles you had ever lost had gathered themselves together there, meantime, no matter how widely they had been separated. But now, this thing had actually and unquestionably failed. Tomâs whole structure of faith was shaken to its foundations. He had many a time heard of this thing succeeding but never of its failing before. It did not occur to him that he had tried it several times before, himself, but could never find the hiding-places afterward. He puzzled over the matter some time, and finally decided that some witch had interfered and broken the charm. He thought he would satisfy himself on that point; so he searched around till he found a small sandy spot with a little funnel-shaped depression in it. He laid himself down and put his mouth close to this depression and calledâ
âDoodle-bug, doodle-bug, tell me what I want to know! Doodle-bug, doodle-bug, tell me what I want to know!â
The sand began to work, and presently a small black bug appeared for a second and then darted under again in a fright.
âHe dasnât tell! So it was a witch that done it. I just knowed it.â
He well knew the futility of trying to contend against witches, so he gave up discouraged. But it occurred to him that he might as well have the marble he had just thrown away, and therefore he went and made a patient search for it. But he could not find it. Now he went back to his treasure-house and carefully placed himself just as he had been standing when he tossed the marble away; then he took another marble from his pocket and tossed it in the same way, saying:
âBrother, go find your brother!â
He watched where it stopped, and went there and looked. But it must have fallen short or gone too far; so he tried twice more. The last repetition was successful. The two marbles lay within a foot of each other.
Just here the blast of a toy tin trumpet came faintly down the green aisles of the forest. Tom flung off his jacket and trousers, turned a suspender into a belt, raked away some brush behind the rotten log, disclosing a rude bow and arrow, a lath sword and a tin trumpet, and in a moment had seized these things and bounded away, barelegged, with fluttering shirt. He presently halted under a great elm, blew an answering blast, and then began to tiptoe and look warily out, this way and that. He said cautiouslyâto an imaginary company:
âHold, my merry men! Keep hid till I blow.â
Now appeared Joe Harper, as airily clad and elaborately armed as Tom. Tom called:
âHold! Who comes here into Sherwood Forest without my pass?â

âGuy of Guisborne wants no manâs pass. Who art thou thatâthatââ
âDares to hold such language,â said Tom, promptingâfor they talked âby the book,â from memory.
âWho art thou that dares to hold such language?â
âI, indeed! I am Robin Hood, as thy caitiff carcase soon shall know.â
âThen art thou indeed that famous outlaw? Right gladly will I dispute with thee the passes of the merry wood. Have at thee!â
They took their lath swords, dumped their other traps on the ground, struck a fencing attitude, foot to foot, and began a grave, careful combat, âtwo up and two down.â Presently Tom said:
âNow, if youâve got the hang, go it lively!â
So they âwent it lively,â panting and perspiring with the work. By and by Tom shouted:
âFall! fall! Why donât you fall?â
âI shaânât! Why donât you fall yourself? Youâre getting the worst of it.â
âWhy, that ainât anything. I canât fall; that ainât the way it is in the book. The book says, âThen with one back-handed stroke he slew poor Guy of Guisborne.â Youâre to turn around and let me hit you in the back.â
There was no getting around the authorities, so Joe turned, received the whack and fell.
âNow,â said Joe, getting up, âyou got to let me kill you. Thatâs fair.â
âWhy, I canât do that, it ainât in the book.â
âWell, itâs blamed meanâthatâs all.â
âWell, say, Joe, you can be Friar Tuck or Much the millerâs son, and lam me with a quarter-staff; or Iâll be the Sheriff of Nottingham and you be Robin Hood a little while and kill me.â
This was satisfactory, and so these adventures were carried out. Then Tom became Robin Hood again, and was allowed by the treacherous nun to bleed his strength away through his neglected wound. And at last Joe, representing a whole tribe of weeping outlaws, dragged him sadly forth, gave his bow into his feeble hands, and Tom said, âWhere this arrow falls, there bury poor Robin Hood under the greenwood tree.â Then he shot the arrow and fell back and would have died, but he lit on a nettle and sprang up too gaily for a corpse.

The boys dressed themselves, hid their accoutrements, and went off grieving that there were no outlaws any more, and wondering what modern civilization could claim to have done to compensate for their loss. They said they would rather be outlaws a year in Sherwood Forest than President of the United States forever.
Chapter 9
At half-past nine, that night, Tom and Sid were sent to bed, as usual. They said their prayers, and Sid was soon asleep. Tom lay awake and waited, in restless impatience. When it seemed to him that it must be nearly daylight, he heard the clock strike ten! This was despair. He would have tossed and fidgeted, as his nerves demanded, but he was afraid he might wake Sid. So he lay still, and stared up into the dark. Everything was dismally still. By and by, out of the stillness, little, scarcely perceptible noises began to emphasize themselves. The ticking of the clock began to bring itself into notice. Old beams began to crack mysteriously. The stairs creaked faintly. Evidently spirits were abroad. A measured, muffled snore issued from Aunt Pollyâs chamber. And now the tiresome chirping of a cricket that no human ingenuity could locate, began. Next the ghastly ticking of a death-watch in the wall at the bedâs head made Tom shudderâit meant that somebodyâs days were numbered. Then the howl of a far-off dog rose on the night air, and was answered by a fainter howl from a remoter distance. Tom was in an agony. At last he was satisfied that time had ceased and eternity begun; he began to doze, in spite of himself; the clock chimed eleven, but he did not hear it. And then there came, mingling with his half-formed dreams, a most melancholy caterwauling. The raising of a neighboring window disturbed him. A cry of âScat! you devil!â and the crash of an empty bottle against the back of his auntâs woodshed brought him wide awake, and a single minute later he was dressed and out of the window and creeping along the roof of the âellâ on all fours. He âmeowâdâ with caution once or twice, as he went; then jumped to the roof of the woodshed and thence to the ground. Huckleberry Finn was there, with his dead cat. The boys moved off and disappeared in the gloom. At the end of half an hour they were wading through the tall grass of the graveyard.

It was a graveyard of the old-fashioned Western kind. It was on a hill, about a mile and a half from the village. It had a crazy board fence around it, which leaned inward in places, and outward the rest of the time, but stood upright nowhere. Grass and weeds grew rank over the whole cemetery. All the old graves were sunken in, there was not a tombstone on the place; round-topped, worm-eaten boards staggered over the graves, leaning for support and finding none. âSacred to the memory ofâ So-and-So had been painted on them once, but it could no longer have been read, on the most of them, now, even if there had been light.
A faint wind moaned through the trees, and Tom feared it might be the spirits of the dead, complaining at being disturbed. The boys talked little, and only under their breath, for the time and the place and the pervading solemnity and silence oppressed their spirits. They found the sharp new heap they were seeking, and ensconced themselves within the protection of three great elms that grew in a bunch within a few feet of the grave.
Then they waited in silence for what seemed a long time. The hooting of a distant owl was all the sound that troubled the dead stillness. Tomâs reflections grew oppressive. He must force some talk. So he said in a whisper:
âHucky, do you believe the dead people like it for us to be here?â
Huckleberry whispered:
âI wisht I knowed. Itâs awful solemn like, ainât it?â
âI bet it is.â
There was a considerable pause, while the boys canvassed this matter inwardly. Then Tom whispered:
âSay, Huckyâdo you reckon Hoss Williams hears us talking?â
âOâ course he does. Least his sperrit does.â
Tom, after a pause:
âI wish Iâd said Mister Williams. But I never meant any harm. Everybody calls him Hoss.â
âA body canât be too particâlar how they talk âbout these-yer dead people, Tom.â
This was a damper, and conversation died again.
Presently Tom seized his comradeâs arm and said:
âSh!â
âWhat is it, Tom?â And the two clung together with beating hearts.
âSh! There âtis again! Didnât you hear it?â
âIââ
âThere! Now you hear it.â
âLord, Tom, theyâre coming! Theyâre coming, sure. Whatâll we do?â
âI dono. Think theyâll see us?â
âOh, Tom, they can see in the dark, same as cats. I wisht I hadnât come.â
âOh, donât be afeard. I donât believe theyâll bother us. We ainât doing any harm. If we keep perfectly still, maybe they wonât notice us at all.â
âIâll try to, Tom, but, Lord, Iâm all of a shiver.â
âListen!â
The boys bent their heads together and scarcely breathed. A muffled sound of voices floated up from the far end of the graveyard.
âLook! See there!â whispered Tom. âWhat is it?â
âItâs devil-fire. Oh, Tom, this is awful.â
Some vague figures approached through the gloom, swinging an old-fashioned tin lantern that freckled the ground with innumerable little spangles of light. Presently Huckleberry whispered with a shudder:
âItâs the devils sure enough. Three of âem! Lordy, Tom, weâre goners! Can you pray?â
âIâll try, but donât you be afeard. They ainât going to hurt us. âNow I lay me down to sleep, Iâââ

âSh!â
âWhat is it, Huck?â
âTheyâre humans! One of âem is, anyway. One of âemâs old Muff Potterâs voice.â
âNoââtainât so, is it?â
âI bet I know it. Donât you stir nor budge. He ainât sharp enough to notice us. Drunk, the same as usual, likelyâblamed old rip!â
âAll right, Iâll keep still. Now theyâre stuck. Canât find it. Here they come again. Now theyâre hot. Cold again. Hot again. Red hot! Theyâre pâinted right, this time. Say, Huck, I know another oâ them voices; itâs Joe.â
âThatâs soâthat murderinâ half-breed! Iâd druther they was devils a dern sight. What kin they be up to?â
The whisper died wholly out, now, for the three men had reached the grave and stood within a few feet of the boysâ hiding-place.
âHere it is,â said the third voice; and the owner of it held the lantern up and revealed the face of young Doctor Robinson.
Potter and Joe were carrying a handbarrow with a rope and a couple of shovels on it. They cast down their load and began to open the grave. The doctor put the lantern at the head of the grave and came and sat down with his back against one of the elm trees. He was so close the boys could have touched him.
âHurry, men!â he said, in a low voice; âthe moon might come out at any moment.â
They growled a response and went on digging. For some time there was no noise but the grating sound of the spades discharging their freight of mould and gravel. It was very monotonous. Finally a spade struck upon the coffin with a dull woody accent, and within another minute or two the men had hoisted it out on the ground. They pried off the lid with their shovels, got out the body and dumped it rudely on the ground. The moon drifted from behind the clouds and exposed the pallid face. The barrow was got ready and the corpse placed on it, covered with a blanket, and bound to its place with the rope. Potter took out a large spring-knife and cut off the dangling end of the rope and then said:
âNow the cussed thingâs ready, Sawbones, and youâll just out with another five, or here she stays.â
âThatâs the talk!â said Joe.
âLook here, what does this mean?â said the doctor. âYou required your pay in advance, and Iâve paid you.â
âYes, and you done more than that,â said Joe, approaching the doctor, who was now standing. âFive years ago you drove me away from your fatherâs kitchen one night, when I come to ask for something to eat, and you said I warnât there for any good; and when I swore Iâd get even with you if it took a hundred years, your father had me jailed for a vagrant. Did you think Iâd forget? That blood ainât in me for nothing. And now Iâve got you, and you got to settle, you know!â
He was threatening the doctor, with his fist in his face, by this time. The doctor struck out suddenly and stretched the ruffian on the ground. Potter dropped his knife, and exclaimed:
âHere, now, donât you hit my pard!â and the next moment he had grappled with the doctor and the two were struggling with might and main, trampling the grass and tearing the ground with their heels. Joe sprang to his feet, his eyes flaming with passion, snatched up Potterâs knife, and went creeping, catlike and stooping, round and round about the combatants, seeking an opportunity. All at once the doctor flung himself free, seized the heavy headboard of Williamsâ grave and felled Potter to the earth with itâand in the same instant the half-breed saw his chance and drove the knife to the hilt in the young manâs breast. He reeled and fell partly upon Potter, flooding him with his blood, and in the same moment the clouds blotted out the dreadful spectacle and the two frightened boys went speeding away in the dark.
Presently, when the moon emerged again, Joe was standing over the two forms, contemplating them. The doctor murmured inarticulately, gave a long gasp or two and was still. The half-breed muttered:
âThat score is settledâdamn you.â
Then he robbed the body. After which he put the fatal knife in Potterâs open right hand, and sat down on the dismantled coffin. Threeâfourâfive minutes passed, and then Potter began to stir and moan. His hand closed upon the knife; he raised it, glanced at it, and let it fall, with a shudder. Then he sat up, pushing the body from him, and gazed at it, and then around him, confusedly. His eyes met Joeâs.
âLord, how is this, Joe?â he said.
âItâs a dirty business,â said Joe, without moving.
âWhat did you do it for?â
âI! I never done it!â
âLook here! That kind of talk wonât wash.â
Potter trembled and grew white.
âI thought Iâd got sober. Iâd no business to drink to-night. But itâs in my head yetâworseân when we started here. Iâm all in a muddle; canât recollect anything of it, hardly. Tell me, Joeâhonest, now, old fellerâdid I do it? Joe, I never meant toââpon my soul and honor, I never meant to, Joe. Tell me how it was, Joe. Oh, itâs awfulâand him so young and promising.â
âWhy, you two was scuffling, and he fetched you one with the headboard and you fell flat; and then up you come, all reeling and staggering like, and snatched the knife and jammed it into him, just as he fetched you another awful clipâand here youâve laid, as dead as a wedge til now.â

âOh, I didnât know what I was a-doing. I wish I may die this minute if I did. It was all on account of the whiskey and the excitement, I reckon. I never used a weepon in my life before, Joe. Iâve fought, but never with weepons. Theyâll all say that. Joe, donât tell! Say you wonât tell, Joeâthatâs a good feller. I always liked you, Joe, and stood up for you, too. Donât you remember? You wonât tell, will you, Joe?â And the poor creature dropped on his knees before the stolid murderer, and clasped his appealing hands.
âNo, youâve always been fair and square with me, Muff Potter, and I wonât go back on you. There, now, thatâs as fair as a man can say.â
âOh, Joe, youâre an angel. Iâll bless you for this the longest day I live.â And Potter began to cry.
âCome, now, thatâs enough of that. This ainât any time for blubbering. You be off yonder way and Iâll go this. Move, now, and donât leave any tracks behind you.â
Potter started on a trot that quickly increased to a run. The half-breed stood looking after him. He muttered:
âIf heâs as much stunned with the lick and fuddled with the rum as he had the look of being, he wonât think of the knife till heâs gone so far heâll be afraid to come back after it to such a place by himselfâchicken-heart!â
Two or three minutes later the murdered man, the blanketed corpse, the lidless coffin, and the open grave were under no inspection but the moonâs. The stillness was complete again, too.

Chapter 10
The two boys flew on and on, toward the village, speechless with horror. They glanced backward over their shoulders from time to time, apprehensively, as if they feared they might be followed. Every stump that started up in their path seemed a man and an enemy, and made them catch their breath; and as they sped by some outlying cottages that lay near the village, the barking of the aroused watch-dogs seemed to give wings to their feet.
âIf we can only get to the old tannery before we break down!â whispered Tom, in short catches between breaths. âI canât stand it much longer.â
Huckleberryâs hard pantings were his only reply, and the boys fixed their eyes on the goal of their hopes and bent to their work to win it. They gained steadily on it, and at last, breast to breast, they burst through the open door and fell grateful and exhausted in the sheltering shadows beyond. By and by their pulses slowed down, and Tom whispered:
âHuckleberry, what do you reckonâll come of this?â
âIf Doctor Robinson dies, I reckon hangingâll come of it.â
âDo you though?â
âWhy, I know it, Tom.â
Tom thought a while, then he said:
âWhoâll tell? We?â
âWhat are you talking about? Sâpose something happened and Joe didnât hang? Why, heâd kill us some time or other, just as dead sure as weâre a laying here.â
âThatâs just what I was thinking to myself, Huck.â
âIf anybody tells, let Muff Potter do it, if heâs fool enough. Heâs generally drunk enough.â
Tom said nothingâwent on thinking. Presently he whispered:
âHuck, Muff Potter donât know it. How can he tell?â
âWhatâs the reason he donât know it?â
âBecause heâd just got that whack when Joe done it. Dâyou reckon he could see anything? Dâyou reckon he knowed anything?â
âBy hokey, thatâs so, Tom!â
âAnd besides, look-a-hereâmaybe that whack done for him!â
âNo, âtaint likely, Tom. He had liquor in him; I could see that; and besides, he always has. Well, when papâs full, you might take and belt him over the head with a church and you couldnât phase him. He says so, his own self. So itâs the same with Muff Potter, of course. But if a man was dead sober, I reckon maybe that whack might fetch him; I dono.â
After another reflective silence, Tom said:
âHucky, you sure you can keep mum?â
âTom, we got to keep mum. You know that. That devil wouldnât make any more of drownding us than a couple of cats, if we was to squeak âbout this and they didnât hang him. Now, look-a-here, Tom, less take and swear to one anotherâthatâs what we got to doâswear to keep mum.â
âIâm agreed. Itâs the best thing. Would you just hold hands and swear that weââ
âOh no, that wouldnât do for this. Thatâs good enough for little rubbishy common thingsâspecially with gals, cuz they go back on you anyway, and blab if they get in a huffâbut there orter be writing âbout a big thing like this. And blood.â
Tomâs whole being applauded this idea. It was deep, and dark, and awful; the hour, the circumstances, the surroundings, were in keeping with it. He picked up a clean pine shingle that lay in the moon-light, took a little fragment of âred keelâ out of his pocket, got the moon on his work, and painfully scrawled these lines, emphasizing each slow down-stroke by clamping his tongue between his teeth, and letting up the pressure on the up-strokes.
âHuck Finn and Tom Sawyer swears they will keep mum about This and They wish They may Drop down dead in Their Tracks if They ever Tell and Rot.â
Huckleberry was filled with admiration of Tomâs facility in writing, and the sublimity of his language. He at once took a pin from his lapel and was going to prick his flesh, but Tom said:
âHold on! Donât do that. A pinâs brass. It might have verdigrease on it.â
âWhatâs verdigrease?â
âItâs pâison. Thatâs what it is. You just swaller some of it onceâyouâll see.â
So Tom unwound the thread from one of his needles, and each boy pricked the ball of his thumb and squeezed out a drop of blood. In time, after many squeezes, Tom managed to sign his initials, using the ball of his little finger for a pen. Then he showed Huckleberry how to make an H and an F, and the oath was complete. They buried the shingle close to the wall, with some dismal ceremonies and incantations, and the fetters that bound their tongues were considered to be locked and the key thrown away.
A figure crept stealthily through a break in the other end of the ruined building, now, but they did not notice it.
âTom,â whispered Huckleberry, âdoes this keep us from ever tellingâalways?â
âOf course it does. It donât make any difference what happens, we got to keep mum. Weâd drop down deadâdonât you know that?â
âYes, I reckon thatâs so.â
They continued to whisper for some little time. Presently a dog set up a long, lugubrious howl just outsideâwithin ten feet of them. The boys clasped each other suddenly, in an agony of fright.
âWhich of us does he mean?â gasped Huckleberry.
âI donoâpeep through the crack. Quick!â
âNo, you, Tom!â
âI canâtâI canât do it, Huck!â
âPlease, Tom. There âtis again!â
âOh, lordy, Iâm thankful!â whispered Tom. âI know his voice. Itâs Bull Harbison.â
âOh, thatâs goodâI tell you, Tom, I was most scared to death; Iâd a bet anything it was a stray dog.â
The dog howled again. The boysâ hearts sank once more.
âOh, my! that ainât no Bull Harbison!â whispered Huckleberry. âDo, Tom!â
Tom, quaking with fear, yielded, and put his eye to the crack. His whisper was hardly audible when he said:
âOh, Huck, itâs a stray dog!â
âQuick, Tom, quick! Who does he mean?â
âHuck, he must mean us bothâweâre right together.â
âOh, Tom, I reckon weâre goners. I reckon there ainât no mistake âbout where Iâll go to. I been so wicked.â
âDad fetch it! This comes of playing hookey and doing everything a fellerâs told not to do. I might a been good, like Sid, if Iâd a triedâbut no, I wouldnât, of course. But if ever I get off this time, I lay Iâll just waller in Sunday-schools!â And Tom began to snuffle a little.
âYou bad!â and Huckleberry began to snuffle too. âConsound it, Tom Sawyer, youâre just old pie, âlong-side oâ what I am. Oh, lordy, lordy, lordy, I wisht I only had half your chance.â
Tom choked off and whispered:
âLook, Hucky, look! Heâs got his back to us!â
Hucky looked, with joy in his heart.
âWell, he has, by jingoes! Did he before?â
âYes, he did. But I, like a fool, never thought. Oh, this is bully, you know. Now who can he mean?â
The howling stopped. Tom pricked up his ears.
âSh! Whatâs that?â he whispered.
âSounds likeâlike hogs grunting. Noâitâs somebody snoring, Tom.â
âThat is it! Where âbouts is it, Huck?â
âI bleeve itâs down at âtother end. Sounds so, anyway. Pap used to sleep there, sometimes, âlong with the hogs, but laws bless you, he just lifts things when he snores. Besides, I reckon he ainât ever coming back to this town any more.â
The spirit of adventure rose in the boysâ souls once more.
âHucky, do you dasât to go if I lead?â
âI donât like to, much. Tom, sâpose itâs Joe!â

Tom quailed. But presently the temptation rose up strong again and the boys agreed to try, with the understanding that they would take to their heels if the snoring stopped. So they went tiptoeing stealthily down, the one behind the other. When they had got to within five steps of the snorer, Tom stepped on a stick, and it broke with a sharp snap. The man moaned, writhed a little, and his face came into the moonlight. It was Muff Potter. The boysâ hearts had stood still, and their hopes too, when the man moved, but their fears passed away now. They tip-toed out, through the broken weather-boarding, and stopped at a little distance to exchange a parting word. That long, lugubrious howl rose on the night air again! They turned and saw the strange dog standing within a few feet of where Potter was lying, and facing Potter, with his nose pointing heavenward.
âOh, geeminy, itâs him!â exclaimed both boys, in a breath.
âSay, Tomâthey say a stray dog come howling around Johnny Millerâs house, âbout midnight, as much as two weeks ago; and a whippoorwill come in and lit on the banisters and sung, the very same evening; and there ainât anybody dead there yet.â
âWell, I know that. And suppose there ainât. Didnât Gracie Miller fall in the kitchen fire and burn herself terrible the very next Saturday?â
âYes, but she ainât dead. And whatâs more, sheâs getting better, too.â
âAll right, you wait and see. Sheâs a goner, just as dead sure as Muff Potterâs a goner.â
Then they separated, cogitating. When Tom crept in at his bedroom window the night was almost spent. He undressed with excessive caution, and fell asleep congratulating himself that nobody knew of his escapade. He was not aware that the gently-snoring Sid was awake, and had been so for an hour.
When Tom awoke, Sid was dressed and gone. There was a late look in the light, a late sense in the atmosphere. He was startled. Why had he not been calledâpersecuted till he was up, as usual? The thought filled him with bodings. Within five minutes he was dressed and down-stairs, feeling sore and drowsy. The family were still at table, but they had finished breakfast. There was no voice of rebuke; but there were averted eyes; there was a silence and an air of solemnity that struck a chill to the culpritâs heart. He sat down and tried to seem gay, but it was up-hill work; it roused no smile, no response, and he lapsed into silence and let his heart sink down to the depths.
After breakfast his aunt took him aside, and Tom almost brightened in the hope that he was going to be flogged; but it was not so. His aunt wept over him and asked him how he could go and break her old heart so; and finally told him to go on, and ruin himself and bring her gray hairs with sorrow to the grave, for it was no use for her to try any more. This was worse than a thousand whippings, and Tomâs heart was sorer now than his body. He cried, he pleaded for forgiveness, promised to reform over and over again, and then received his dismissal, feeling that he had won but an imperfect forgiveness and established but a feeble confidence.

He left the presence too miserable to even feel revengeful toward Sid; and so the latterâs prompt retreat through the back gate was unnecessary. He moped to school gloomy and sad, and took his flogging, along with Joe Harper, for playing hookey the day before, with the air of one whose heart was busy with heavier woes and wholly dead to trifles. Then he betook himself to his seat, rested his elbows on his desk and his jaws in his hands, and stared at the wall with the stony stare of suffering that has reached the limit and can no further go. His elbow was pressing against some hard substance. After a long time he slowly and sadly changed his position, and took up this object with a sigh. It was in a paper. He unrolled it. A long, lingering, colossal sigh followed, and his heart broke. It was his brass andiron knob!
This final feather broke the camelâs back.
Chapter 11
Close upon the hour of noon the whole village was suddenly electrified with the ghastly news. No need of the as yet un-dreamed-of telegraph; the tale flew from man to man, from group to group, from house to house, with little less than telegraphic speed. Of course the schoolmaster gave holiday for that afternoon; the town would have thought strangely of him if he had not.

A gory knife had been found close to the murdered man, and it had been recognized by somebody as belonging to Muff Potterâso the story ran. And it was said that a belated citizen had come upon Potter washing himself in the âbranchâ about one or two oâclock in the morning, and that Potter had at once sneaked offâsuspicious circumstances, especially the washing which was not a habit with Potter. It was also said that the town had been ransacked for this âmurdererâ (the public are not slow in the matter of sifting evidence and arriving at a verdict), but that he could not be found. Horsemen had departed down all the roads in every direction, and the Sheriff âwas confidentâ that he would be captured before night.
All the town was drifting toward the graveyard. Tomâs heartbreak vanished and he joined the procession, not because he would not a thousand times rather go anywhere else, but because an awful, unaccountable fascination drew him on. Arrived at the dreadful place, he wormed his small body through the crowd and saw the dismal spectacle. It seemed to him an age since he was there before. Somebody pinched his arm. He turned, and his eyes met Huckleberryâs. Then both looked elsewhere at once, and wondered if anybody had noticed anything in their mutual glance. But everybody was talking, and intent upon the grisly spectacle before them.
âPoor fellow!â âPoor young fellow!â âThis ought to be a lesson to grave robbers!â âMuff Potterâll hang for this if they catch him!â This was the drift of remark; and the minister said, âIt was a judgment; His hand is here.â
Now Tom shivered from head to heel; for his eye fell upon the stolid face of Joe. At this moment the crowd began to sway and struggle, and voices shouted, âItâs him! itâs him! heâs coming himself!â
âWho? Who?â from twenty voices.
âMuff Potter!â
âHallo, heâs stopped!âLook out, heâs turning! Donât let him get away!â
People in the branches of the trees over Tomâs head said he wasnât trying to get awayâhe only looked doubtful and perplexed.
âInfernal impudence!â said a bystander; âwanted to come and take a quiet look at his work, I reckonâdidnât expect any company.â
The crowd fell apart, now, and the Sheriff came through, ostentatiously leading Potter by the arm. The poor fellowâs face was haggard, and his eyes showed the fear that was upon him. When he stood before the murdered man, he shook as with a palsy, and he put his face in his hands and burst into tears.
âI didnât do it, friends,â he sobbed; ââpon my word and honor I never done it.â

âWhoâs accused you?â shouted a voice.
This shot seemed to carry home. Potter lifted his face and looked around him with a pathetic hopelessness in his eyes. He saw Joe, and exclaimed:
âOh, Joe, you promised me youâd neverââ
âIs that your knife?â and it was thrust before him by the Sheriff.
Potter would have fallen if they had not caught him and eased him to the ground. Then he said:
âSomething told me ât if I didnât come back and getââ He shuddered; then waved his nerveless hand with a vanquished gesture and said, âTell âem, Joe, tell âemâit ainât any use any more.â
Then Huckleberry and Tom stood dumb and staring, and heard the stony-hearted liar reel off his serene statement, they expecting every moment that the clear sky would deliver Godâs lightnings upon his head, and wondering to see how long the stroke was delayed. And when he had finished and still stood alive and whole, their wavering impulse to break their oath and save the poor betrayed prisonerâs life faded and vanished away, for plainly this miscreant had sold himself to Satan and it would be fatal to meddle with the property of such a power as that.
âWhy didnât you leave? What did you want to come here for?â somebody said.
âI couldnât help itâI couldnât help it,â Potter moaned. âI wanted to run away, but I couldnât seem to come anywhere but here.â And he fell to sobbing again.
Joe repeated his statement, just as calmly, a few minutes afterward on the inquest, under oath; and the boys, seeing that the lightnings were still withheld, were confirmed in their belief that Joe had sold himself to the devil. He was now become, to them, the most balefully interesting object they had ever looked upon, and they could not take their fascinated eyes from his face.
They inwardly resolved to watch him nights, when opportunity should offer, in the hope of getting a glimpse of his dread master.
Joe helped to raise the body of the murdered man and put it in a wagon for removal; and it was whispered through the shuddering crowd that the wound bled a little! The boys thought that this happy circumstance would turn suspicion in the right direction; but they were disappointed, for more than one villager remarked:
âIt was within three feet of Muff Potter when it done it.â
Tomâs fearful secret and gnawing conscience disturbed his sleep for as much as a week after this; and at breakfast one morning Sid said:
âTom, you pitch around and talk in your sleep so much that you keep me awake half the time.â
Tom blanched and dropped his eyes.
âItâs a bad sign,â said Aunt Polly, gravely. âWhat you got on your mind, Tom?â
âNothing. Nothing ât I know of.â But the boyâs hand shook so that he spilled his coffee.
âAnd you do talk such stuff,â Sid said. âLast night you said, âItâs blood, itâs blood, thatâs what it is!â You said that over and over. And you said, âDonât torment me soâIâll tell!â Tell what? What is it youâll tell?â
Everything was swimming before Tom. There is no telling what might have happened, now, but luckily the concern passed out of Aunt Pollyâs face and she came to Tomâs relief without knowing it. She said:
âSho! Itâs that dreadful murder. I dream about it most every night myself. Sometimes I dream itâs me that done it.â
Mary said she had been affected much the same way. Sid seemed satisfied. Tom got out of the presence as quick as he plausibly could, and after that he complained of toothache for a week, and tied up his jaws every night. He never knew that Sid lay nightly watching, and frequently slipped the bandage free and then leaned on his elbow listening a good while at a time, and afterward slipped the bandage back to its place again. Tomâs distress of mind wore off gradually and the toothache grew irksome and was discarded. If Sid really managed to make anything out of Tomâs disjointed mutterings, he kept it to himself.
It seemed to Tom that his schoolmates never would get done holding inquests on dead cats, and thus keeping his trouble present to his mind. Sid noticed that Tom never was coroner at one of these inquiries, though it had been his habit to take the lead in all new enterprises; he noticed, too, that Tom never acted as a witnessâand that was strange; and Sid did not overlook the fact that Tom even showed a marked aversion to these inquests, and always avoided them when he could. Sid marvelled, but said nothing. However, even inquests went out of vogue at last, and ceased to torture Tomâs conscience.
Every day or two, during this time of sorrow, Tom watched his opportunity and went to the little grated jail-window and smuggled such small comforts through to the âmurdererâ as he could get hold of. The jail was a trifling little brick den that stood in a marsh at the edge of the village, and no guards were afforded for it; indeed, it was seldom occupied. These offerings greatly helped to ease Tomâs conscience.
The villagers had a strong desire to tar-and-feather Joe and ride him on a rail, for body-snatching, but so formidable was his character that nobody could be found who was willing to take the lead in the matter, so it was dropped. He had been careful to begin both of his inquest-statements with the fight, without confessing the grave-robbery that preceded it; therefore it was deemed wisest not to try the case in the courts at present.

Chapter 12
One of the reasons why Tomâs mind had drifted away from its secret troubles was, that it had found a new and weighty matter to interest itself about. Becky Thatcher had stopped coming to school. Tom had struggled with his pride a few days, and tried to âwhistle her down the wind,â but failed. He began to find himself hanging around her fatherâs house, nights, and feeling very miserable. She was ill. What if she should die! There was distraction in the thought. He no longer took an interest in war, nor even in piracy. The charm of life was gone; there was nothing but dreariness left. He put his hoop away, and his bat; there was no joy in them any more. His aunt was concerned. She began to try all manner of remedies on him. She was one of those people who are infatuated with patent medicines and all new-fangled methods of producing health or mending it. She was an inveterate experimenter in these things. When something fresh in this line came out she was in a fever, right away, to try it; not on herself, for she was never ailing, but on anybody else that came handy. She was a subscriber for all the âHealthâ periodicals and phrenological frauds; and the solemn ignorance they were inflated with was breath to her nostrils. All the ârotâ they contained about ventilation, and how to go to bed, and how to get up, and what to eat, and what to drink, and how much exercise to take, and what frame of mind to keep oneâs self in, and what sort of clothing to wear, was all gospel to her, and she never observed that her health-journals of the current month customarily upset everything they had recommended the month before. She was as simple-hearted and honest as the day was long, and so she was an easy victim. She gathered together her quack periodicals and her quack medicines, and thus armed with death, went about on her pale horse, metaphorically speaking, with âhell following after.â But she never suspected that she was not an angel of healing and the balm of Gilead in disguise, to the suffering neighbors.

The water treatment was new, now, and Tomâs low condition was a windfall to her. She had him out at daylight every morning, stood him up in the wood-shed and drowned him with a deluge of cold water; then she scrubbed him down with a towel like a file, and so brought him to; then she rolled him up in a wet sheet and put him away under blankets till she sweated his soul clean and âthe yellow stains of it came through his poresââas Tom said.
Yet notwithstanding all this, the boy grew more and more melancholy and pale and dejected. She added hot baths, sitz baths, shower baths, and plunges. The boy remained as dismal as a hearse. She began to assist the water with a slim oatmeal diet and blister-plasters. She calculated his capacity as she would a jugâs, and filled him up every day with quack cure-alls.
Tom had become indifferent to persecution by this time. This phase filled the old ladyâs heart with consternation. This indifference must be broken up at any cost. Now she heard of Pain-killer for the first time. She ordered a lot at once. She tasted it and was filled with gratitude. It was simply fire in a liquid form. She dropped the water treatment and everything else, and pinned her faith to Pain-killer. She gave Tom a teaspoonful and watched with the deepest anxiety for the result. Her troubles were instantly at rest, her soul at peace again; for the âindifferenceâ was broken up. The boy could not have shown a wilder, heartier interest, if she had built a fire under him.
Tom felt that it was time to wake up; this sort of life might be romantic enough, in his blighted condition, but it was getting to have too little sentiment and too much distracting variety about it. So he thought over various plans for relief, and finally hit upon that of professing to be fond of Pain-killer. He asked for it so often that he became a nuisance, and his aunt ended by telling him to help himself and quit bothering her. If it had been Sid, she would have had no misgivings to alloy her delight; but since it was Tom, she watched the bottle clandestinely. She found that the medicine did really diminish, but it did not occur to her that the boy was mending the health of a crack in the sitting-room floor with it.
One day Tom was in the act of dosing the crack when his auntâs yellow cat came along, purring, eyeing the teaspoon avariciously, and begging for a taste. Tom said:
âDonât ask for it unless you want it, Peter.â
But Peter signified that he did want it.
âYou better make sure.â
Peter was sure.
âNow youâve asked for it, and Iâll give it to you, because there ainât anything mean about me; but if you find you donât like it, you mustnât blame anybody but your own self.â
Peter was agreeable. So Tom pried his mouth open and poured down the Pain-killer. Peter sprang a couple of yards in the air, and then delivered a war-whoop and set off round and round the room, banging against furniture, upsetting flower-pots, and making general havoc. Next he rose on his hind feet and pranced around, in a frenzy of enjoyment, with his head over his shoulder and his voice proclaiming his unappeasable happiness. Then he went tearing around the house again spreading chaos and destruction in his path. Aunt Polly entered in time to see him throw a few double summersets, deliver a final mighty hurrah, and sail through the open window, carrying the rest of the flower-pots with him. The old lady stood petrified with astonishment, peering over her glasses; Tom lay on the floor expiring with laughter.
âTom, what on earth ails that cat?â
âI donât know, aunt,â gasped the boy.
âWhy, I never see anything like it. What did make him act so?â
âDeed I donât know, Aunt Polly; cats always act so when theyâre having a good time.â

âThey do, do they?â There was something in the tone that made Tom apprehensive.
âYesâm. That is, I believe they do.â
âYou do?â
âYesâm.â
The old lady was bending down, Tom watching, with interest emphasized by anxiety. Too late he divined her âdrift.â The handle of the telltale tea-spoon was visible under the bed-valance. Aunt Polly took it, held it up. Tom winced, and dropped his eyes. Aunt Polly raised him by the usual handleâhis earâand cracked his head soundly with her thimble.
âNow, sir, what did you want to treat that poor dumb beast so, for?â
âI done it out of pity for himâbecause he hadnât any aunt.â
âHadnât any aunt!âyou numskull. What has that got to do with it?â
âHeaps. Because if heâd had one sheâd a burnt him out herself! Sheâd a roasted his bowels out of him âthout any more feeling than if he was a human!â
Aunt Polly felt a sudden pang of remorse. This was putting the thing in a new light; what was cruelty to a cat might be cruelty to a boy, too. She began to soften; she felt sorry. Her eyes watered a little, and she put her hand on Tomâs head and said gently:
âI was meaning for the best, Tom. And, Tom, it did do you good.â
Tom looked up in her face with just a perceptible twinkle peeping through his gravity.
âI know you was meaning for the best, aunty, and so was I with Peter. It done him good, too. I never see him get around so sinceââ
âOh, go âlong with you, Tom, before you aggravate me again. And you try and see if you canât be a good boy, for once, and you neednât take any more medicine.â
Tom reached school ahead of time. It was noticed that this strange thing had been occurring every day latterly. And now, as usual of late, he hung about the gate of the schoolyard instead of playing with his comrades. He was sick, he said, and he looked it. He tried to seem to be looking everywhere but whither he really was lookingâdown the road. Presently Jeff Thatcher hove in sight, and Tomâs face lighted; he gazed a moment, and then turned sorrowfully away. When Jeff arrived, Tom accosted him; and âled upâ warily to opportunities for remark about Becky, but the giddy lad never could see the bait. Tom watched and watched, hoping whenever a frisking frock came in sight, and hating the owner of it as soon as he saw she was not the right one. At last frocks ceased to appear, and he dropped hopelessly into the dumps; he entered the empty schoolhouse and sat down to suffer. Then one more frock passed in at the gate, and Tomâs heart gave a great bound. The next instant he was out, and âgoing onâ like an Indian; yelling, laughing, chasing boys, jumping over the fence at risk of life and limb, throwing handsprings, standing on his headâdoing all the heroic things he could conceive of, and keeping a furtive eye out, all the while, to see if Becky Thatcher was noticing. But she seemed to be unconscious of it all; she never looked. Could it be possible that she was not aware that he was there? He carried his exploits to her immediate vicinity; came war-whooping around, snatched a boyâs cap, hurled it to the roof of the schoolhouse, broke through a group of boys, tumbling them in every direction, and fell sprawling, himself, under Beckyâs nose, almost upsetting herâand she turned, with her nose in the air, and he heard her say: âMf! some people think theyâre mighty smartâalways showing off!â
Tomâs cheeks burned. He gathered himself up and sneaked off, crushed and crestfallen.

Chapter 13
Tomâs mind was made up now. He was gloomy and desperate. He was a forsaken, friendless boy, he said; nobody loved him; when they found out what they had driven him to, perhaps they would be sorry; he had tried to do right and get along, but they would not let him; since nothing would do them but to be rid of him, let it be so; and let them blame him for the consequencesâwhy shouldnât they? What right had the friendless to complain? Yes, they had forced him to it at last: he would lead a life of crime. There was no choice.
By this time he was far down Meadow Lane, and the bell for school to âtake upâ tinkled faintly upon his ear. He sobbed, now, to think he should never, never hear that old familiar sound any moreâit was very hard, but it was forced on him; since he was driven out into the cold world, he must submitâbut he forgave them. Then the sobs came thick and fast.
Just at this point he met his soulâs sworn comrade, Joe Harperâhard-eyed, and with evidently a great and dismal purpose in his heart. Plainly here were âtwo souls with but a single thought.â Tom, wiping his eyes with his sleeve, began to blubber out something about a resolution to escape from hard usage and lack of sympathy at home by roaming abroad into the great world never to return; and ended by hoping that Joe would not forget him.
But it transpired that this was a request which Joe had just been going to make of Tom, and had come to hunt him up for that purpose. His mother had whipped him for drinking some cream which he had never tasted and knew nothing about; it was plain that she was tired of him and wished him to go; if she felt that way, there was nothing for him to do but succumb; he hoped she would be happy, and never regret having driven her poor boy out into the unfeeling world to suffer and die.
As the two boys walked sorrowing along, they made a new compact to stand by each other and be brothers and never separate till death relieved them of their troubles. Then they began to lay their plans. Joe was for being a hermit, and living on crusts in a remote cave, and dying, some time, of cold and want and grief; but after listening to Tom, he conceded that there were some conspicuous advantages about a life of crime, and so he consented to be a pirate.
Three miles below St. Petersburg, at a point where the Mississippi River was a trifle over a mile wide, there was a long, narrow, wooded island, with a shallow bar at the head of it, and this offered well as a rendezvous. It was not inhabited; it lay far over toward the further shore, abreast a dense and almost wholly unpeopled forest. So Jacksonâs Island was chosen. Who were to be the subjects of their piracies was a matter that did not occur to them. Then they hunted up Huckleberry Finn, and he joined them promptly, for all careers were one to him; he was indifferent. They presently separated to meet at a lonely spot on the river-bank two miles above the village at the favorite hourâwhich was midnight. There was a small log raft there which they meant to capture. Each would bring hooks and lines, and such provision as he could steal in the most dark and mysterious wayâas became outlaws. And before the afternoon was done, they had all managed to enjoy the sweet glory of spreading the fact that pretty soon the town would âhear something.â All who got this vague hint were cautioned to âbe mum and wait.â
About midnight Tom arrived with a boiled ham and a few trifles, and stopped in a dense undergrowth on a small bluff overlooking the meeting-place. It was starlight, and very still. The mighty river lay like an ocean at rest. Tom listened a moment, but no sound disturbed the quiet. Then he gave a low, distinct whistle. It was answered from under the bluff. Tom whistled twice more; these signals were answered in the same way. Then a guarded voice said:
âWho goes there?â
âTom Sawyer, the Black Avenger of the Spanish Main. Name your names.â
âHuck Finn the Red-Handed, and Joe Harper the Terror of the Seas.â Tom had furnished these titles, from his favorite literature.
ââTis well. Give the countersign.â
Two hoarse whispers delivered the same awful word simultaneously to the brooding night:
âBlood!â
Then Tom tumbled his ham over the bluff and let himself down after it, tearing both skin and clothes to some extent in the effort. There was an easy, comfortable path along the shore under the bluff, but it lacked the advantages of difficulty and danger so valued by a pirate.
The Terror of the Seas had brought a side of bacon, and had about worn himself out with getting it there. Finn the Red-Handed had stolen a skillet and a quantity of half-cured leaf tobacco, and had also brought a few corn-cobs to make pipes with. But none of the pirates smoked or âchewedâ but himself. The Black Avenger of the Spanish Main said it would never do to start without some fire. That was a wise thought; matches were hardly known there in that day. They saw a fire smouldering upon a great raft a hundred yards above, and they went stealthily thither and helped themselves to a chunk. They made an imposing adventure of it, saying, âHist!â every now and then, and suddenly halting with finger on lip; moving with hands on imaginary dagger-hilts; and giving orders in dismal whispers that if âthe foeâ stirred, to âlet him have it to the hilt,â because âdead men tell no tales.â They knew well enough that the raftsmen were all down at the village laying in stores or having a spree, but still that was no excuse for their conducting this thing in an unpiratical way.
They shoved off, presently, Tom in command, Huck at the after oar and Joe at the forward. Tom stood amidships, gloomy-browed, and with folded arms, and gave his orders in a low, stern whisper:
âLuff, and bring her to the wind!â
âAye-aye, sir!â
âSteady, steady-y-y-y!â
âSteady it is, sir!â
âLet her go off a point!â
âPoint it is, sir!â
As the boys steadily and monotonously drove the raft toward mid-stream it was no doubt understood that these orders were given only for âstyle,â and were not intended to mean anything in particular.
âWhat sailâs she carrying?â
âCourses, topsâls, and flying-jib, sir.â
âSend the râyals up! Lay out aloft, there, half a dozen of yeâforetopmaststunsâl! Lively, now!â
âAye-aye, sir!â
âShake out that maintogalansâl! Sheets and braces! now my hearties!â
âAye-aye, sir!â
âHellum-a-leeâhard a port! Stand by to meet her when she comes! Port, port! Now, men! With a will! Stead-y-y-y!â
âSteady it is, sir!â

The raft drew beyond the middle of the river; the boys pointed her head right, and then lay on their oars. The river was not high, so there was not more than a two or three mile current. Hardly a word was said during the next three-quarters of an hour. Now the raft was passing before the distant town. Two or three glimmering lights showed where it lay, peacefully sleeping, beyond the vague vast sweep of star-gemmed water, unconscious of the tremendous event that was happening. The Black Avenger stood still with folded arms, âlooking his lastâ upon the scene of his former joys and his later sufferings, and wishing âsheâ could see him now, abroad on the wild sea, facing peril and death with dauntless heart, going to his doom with a grim smile on his lips. It was but a small strain on his imagination to remove Jacksonâs Island beyond eye-shot of the village, and so he âlooked his lastâ with a broken and satisfied heart. The other pirates were looking their last, too; and they all looked so long that they came near letting the current drift them out of the range of the island. But they discovered the danger in time, and made shift to avert it. About two oâclock in the morning the raft grounded on the bar two hundred yards above the head of the island, and they waded back and forth until they had landed their freight. Part of the little raftâs belongings consisted of an old sail, and this they spread over a nook in the bushes for a tent to shelter their provisions; but they themselves would sleep in the open air in good weather, as became outlaws.
They built a fire against the side of a great log twenty or thirty steps within the sombre depths of the forest, and then cooked some bacon in the frying-pan for supper, and used up half of the corn âponeâ stock they had brought. It seemed glorious sport to be feasting in that wild, free way in the virgin forest of an unexplored and uninhabited island, far from the haunts of men, and they said they never would return to civilization. The climbing fire lit up their faces and threw its ruddy glare upon the pillared tree-trunks of their forest temple, and upon the varnished foliage and festooning vines.
When the last crisp slice of bacon was gone, and the last allowance of corn pone devoured, the boys stretched themselves out on the grass, filled with contentment. They could have found a cooler place, but they would not deny themselves such a romantic feature as the roasting campfire.

âAinât it gay?â said Joe.
âItâs nuts!â said Tom. âWhat would the boys say if they could see us?â
âSay? Well, theyâd just die to be hereâhey, Hucky!â
âI reckon so,â said Huckleberry; âanyways, Iâm suited. I donât want nothing betterân this. I donât ever get enough to eat, genâallyâand here they canât come and pick at a feller and bullyrag him so.â
âItâs just the life for me,â said Tom. âYou donât have to get up, mornings, and you donât have to go to school, and wash, and all that blame foolishness. You see a pirate donât have to do anything, Joe, when heâs ashore, but a hermit he has to be praying considerable, and then he donât have any fun, anyway, all by himself that way.â
âOh yes, thatâs so,â said Joe, âbut I hadnât thought much about it, you know. Iâd a good deal rather be a pirate, now that Iâve tried it.â
âYou see,â said Tom, âpeople donât go much on hermits, nowadays, like they used to in old times, but a pirateâs always respected. And a hermitâs got to sleep on the hardest place he can find, and put sackcloth and ashes on his head, and stand out in the rain, andââ
âWhat does he put sackcloth and ashes on his head for?â inquired Huck.
âI dono. But theyâve got to do it. Hermits always do. Youâd have to do that if you was a hermit.â
âDernâd if I would,â said Huck.
âWell, what would you do?â
âI dono. But I wouldnât do that.â
âWhy, Huck, youâd have to. Howâd you get around it?â
âWhy, I just wouldnât stand it. Iâd run away.â
âRun away! Well, you would be a nice old slouch of a hermit. Youâd be a disgrace.â
The Red-Handed made no response, being better employed. He had finished gouging out a cob, and now he fitted a weed stem to it, loaded it with tobacco, and was pressing a coal to the charge and blowing a cloud of fragrant smokeâhe was in the full bloom of luxurious contentment. The other pirates envied him this majestic vice, and secretly resolved to acquire it shortly. Presently Huck said:
âWhat does pirates have to do?â
Tom said:
âOh, they have just a bully timeâtake ships and burn them, and get the money and bury it in awful places in their island where thereâs ghosts and things to watch it, and kill everybody in the shipsâmake âem walk a plank.â
âAnd they carry the women to the island,â said Joe; âthey donât kill the women.â
âNo,â assented Tom, âthey donât kill the womenâtheyâre too noble. And the womenâs always beautiful, too.â
âAnd donât they wear the bulliest clothes! Oh no! All gold and silver and diâmonds,â said Joe, with enthusiasm.
âWho?â said Huck.
âWhy, the pirates.â
Huck scanned his own clothing forlornly.
âI reckon I ainât dressed fitten for a pirate,â said he, with a regretful pathos in his voice; âbut I ainât got none but these.â
But the other boys told him the fine clothes would come fast enough, after they should have begun their adventures. They made him understand that his poor rags would do to begin with, though it was customary for wealthy pirates to start with a proper wardrobe.
Gradually their talk died out and drowsiness began to steal upon the eyelids of the little waifs. The pipe dropped from the fingers of the Red-Handed, and he slept the sleep of the conscience-free and the weary. The Terror of the Seas and the Black Avenger of the Spanish Main had more difficulty in getting to sleep. They said their prayers inwardly, and lying down, since there was nobody there with authority to make them kneel and recite aloud; in truth, they had a mind not to say them at all, but they were afraid to proceed to such lengths as that, lest they might call down a sudden and special thunderbolt from heaven. Then at once they reached and hovered upon the imminent verge of sleepâbut an intruder came, now, that would not âdown.â It was conscience. They began to feel a vague fear that they had been doing wrong to run away; and next they thought of the stolen meat, and then the real torture came. They tried to argue it away by reminding conscience that they had purloined sweetmeats and apples scores of times; but conscience was not to be appeased by such thin plausibilities; it seemed to them, in the end, that there was no getting around the stubborn fact that taking sweetmeats was only âhooking,â while taking bacon and hams and such valuables was plain simple stealingâand there was a command against that in the Bible. So they inwardly resolved that so long as they remained in the business, their piracies should not again be sullied with the crime of stealing. Then conscience granted a truce, and these curiously inconsistent pirates fell peacefully to sleep.
Chapter 14
When Tom awoke in the morning, he wondered where he was. He sat up and rubbed his eyes and looked around. Then he comprehended. It was the cool gray dawn, and there was a delicious sense of repose and peace in the deep pervading calm and silence of the woods. Not a leaf stirred; not a sound obtruded upon great Natureâs meditation. Beaded dewdrops stood upon the leaves and grasses. A white layer of ashes covered the fire, and a thin blue breath of smoke rose straight into the air. Joe and Huck still slept.
Now, far away in the woods a bird called; another answered; presently the hammering of a woodpecker was heard. Gradually the cool dim gray of the morning whitened, and as gradually sounds multiplied and life manifested itself. The marvel of Nature shaking off sleep and going to work unfolded itself to the musing boy. A little green worm came crawling over a dewy leaf, lifting two-thirds of his body into the air from time to time and âsniffing around,â then proceeding againâfor he was measuring, Tom said; and when the worm approached him, of its own accord, he sat as still as a stone, with his hopes rising and falling, by turns, as the creature still came toward him or seemed inclined to go elsewhere; and when at last it considered a painful moment with its curved body in the air and then came decisively down upon Tomâs leg and began a journey over him, his whole heart was gladâfor that meant that he was going to have a new suit of clothesâwithout the shadow of a doubt a gaudy piratical uniform. Now a procession of ants appeared, from nowhere in particular, and went about their labors; one struggled manfully by with a dead spider five times as big as itself in its arms, and lugged it straight up a tree-trunk. A brown spotted lady-bug climbed the dizzy height of a grass blade, and Tom bent down close to it and said, âLady-bug, lady-bug, fly away home, your house is on fire, your childrenâs alone,â and she took wing and went off to see about itâwhich did not surprise the boy, for he knew of old that this insect was credulous about conflagrations, and he had practised upon its simplicity more than once. A tumblebug came next, heaving sturdily at its ball, and Tom touched the creature, to see it shut its legs against its body and pretend to be dead. The birds were fairly rioting by this time. A catbird, the Northern mocker, lit in a tree over Tomâs head, and trilled out her imitations of her neighbors in a rapture of enjoyment; then a shrill jay swept down, a flash of blue flame, and stopped on a twig almost within the boyâs reach, cocked his head to one side and eyed the strangers with a consuming curiosity; a gray squirrel and a big fellow of the âfoxâ kind came skurrying along, sitting up at intervals to inspect and chatter at the boys, for the wild things had probably never seen a human being before and scarcely knew whether to be afraid or not. All Nature was wide awake and stirring, now; long lances of sunlight pierced down through the dense foliage far and near, and a few butterflies came fluttering upon the scene.
Tom stirred up the other pirates and they all clattered away with a shout, and in a minute or two were stripped and chasing after and tumbling over each other in the shallow limpid water of the white sandbar. They felt no longing for the little village sleeping in the distance beyond the majestic waste of water. A vagrant current or a slight rise in the river had carried off their raft, but this only gratified them, since its going was something like burning the bridge between them and civilization.

They came back to camp wonderfully refreshed, glad-hearted, and ravenous; and they soon had the camp-fire blazing up again. Huck found a spring of clear cold water close by, and the boys made cups of broad oak or hickory leaves, and felt that water, sweetened with such a wildwood charm as that, would be a good enough substitute for coffee. While Joe was slicing bacon for breakfast, Tom and Huck asked him to hold on a minute; they stepped to a promising nook in the river-bank and threw in their lines; almost immediately they had reward. Joe had not had time to get impatient before they were back again with some handsome bass, a couple of sun-perch and a small catfishâprovisions enough for quite a family. They fried the fish with the bacon, and were astonished; for no fish had ever seemed so delicious before. They did not know that the quicker a fresh-water fish is on the fire after he is caught the better he is; and they reflected little upon what a sauce open-air sleeping, open-air exercise, bathing, and a large ingredient of hunger make, too.
They lay around in the shade, after breakfast, while Huck had a smoke, and then went off through the woods on an exploring expedition. They tramped gayly along, over decaying logs, through tangled underbrush, among solemn monarchs of the forest, hung from their crowns to the ground with a drooping regalia of grape-vines. Now and then they came upon snug nooks carpeted with grass and jeweled with flowers.

They found plenty of things to be delighted with, but nothing to be astonished at. They discovered that the island was about three miles long and a quarter of a mile wide, and that the shore it lay closest to was only separated from it by a narrow channel hardly two hundred yards wide. They took a swim about every hour, so it was close upon the middle of the afternoon when they got back to camp. They were too hungry to stop to fish, but they fared sumptuously upon cold ham, and then threw themselves down in the shade to talk. But the talk soon began to drag, and then died. The stillness, the solemnity that brooded in the woods, and the sense of loneliness, began to tell upon the spirits of the boys. They fell to thinking. A sort of undefined longing crept upon them. This took dim shape, presentlyâit was budding homesickness. Even Finn the Red-Handed was dreaming of his doorsteps and empty hogsheads. But they were all ashamed of their weakness, and none was brave enough to speak his thought.
For some time, now, the boys had been dully conscious of a peculiar sound in the distance, just as one sometimes is of the ticking of a clock which he takes no distinct note of. But now this mysterious sound became more pronounced, and forced a recognition. The boys started, glanced at each other, and then each assumed a listening attitude. There was a long silence, profound and unbroken; then a deep, sullen boom came floating down out of the distance.
âWhat is it!â exclaimed Joe, under his breath.
âI wonder,â said Tom in a whisper.
ââTainât thunder,â said Huckleberry, in an awed tone, âbecuz thunderââ
âHark!â said Tom. âListenâdonât talk.â
They waited a time that seemed an age, and then the same muffled boom troubled the solemn hush.
âLetâs go and see.â
They sprang to their feet and hurried to the shore toward the town. They parted the bushes on the bank and peered out over the water. The little steam ferry-boat was about a mile below the village, drifting with the current. Her broad deck seemed crowded with people. There were a great many skiffs rowing about or floating with the stream in the neighborhood of the ferryboat, but the boys could not determine what the men in them were doing. Presently a great jet of white smoke burst from the ferryboatâs side, and as it expanded and rose in a lazy cloud, that same dull throb of sound was borne to the listeners again.

âI know now!â exclaimed Tom; âsomebodyâs drownded!â
âThatâs it!â said Huck; âthey done that last summer, when Bill Turner got drownded; they shoot a cannon over the water, and that makes him come up to the top. Yes, and they take loaves of bread and put quicksilver in âem and set âem afloat, and wherever thereâs anybody thatâs drownded, theyâll float right there and stop.â
âYes, Iâve heard about that,â said Joe. âI wonder what makes the bread do that.â
âOh, it ainât the bread, so much,â said Tom; âI reckon itâs mostly what they say over it before they start it out.â
âBut they donât say anything over it,â said Huck. âIâve seen âem and they donât.â
âWell, thatâs funny,â said Tom. âBut maybe they say it to themselves. Of course they do. Anybody might know that.â
The other boys agreed that there was reason in what Tom said, because an ignorant lump of bread, uninstructed by an incantation, could not be expected to act very intelligently when set upon an errand of such gravity.
âBy jings, I wish I was over there, now,â said Joe.
âI do too,â said Huck. âIâd give heaps to know who it is.â
The boys still listened and watched. Presently a revealing thought flashed through Tomâs mind, and he exclaimed:
âBoys, I know whoâs drowndedâitâs us!â
They felt like heroes in an instant. Here was a gorgeous triumph; they were missed; they were mourned; hearts were breaking on their account; tears were being shed; accusing memories of unkindness to these poor lost lads were rising up, and unavailing regrets and remorse were being indulged; and best of all, the departed were the talk of the whole town, and the envy of all the boys, as far as this dazzling notoriety was concerned. This was fine. It was worth while to be a pirate, after all.
As twilight drew on, the ferryboat went back to her accustomed business and the skiffs disappeared. The pirates returned to camp. They were jubilant with vanity over their new grandeur and the illustrious trouble they were making. They caught fish, cooked supper and ate it, and then fell to guessing at what the village was thinking and saying about them; and the pictures they drew of the public distress on their account were gratifying to look uponâfrom their point of view. But when the shadows of night closed them in, they gradually ceased to talk, and sat gazing into the fire, with their minds evidently wandering elsewhere. The excitement was gone, now, and Tom and Joe could not keep back thoughts of certain persons at home who were not enjoying this fine frolic as much as they were. Misgivings came; they grew troubled and unhappy; a sigh or two escaped, unawares. By and by Joe timidly ventured upon a roundabout âfeelerâ as to how the others might look upon a return to civilizationânot right now, butâ
Tom withered him with derision! Huck, being uncommitted as yet, joined in with Tom, and the waverer quickly âexplained,â and was glad to get out of the scrape with as little taint of chicken-hearted home-sickness clinging to his garments as he could. Mutiny was effectually laid to rest for the moment.

As the night deepened, Huck began to nod, and presently to snore. Joe followed next. Tom lay upon his elbow motionless, for some time, watching the two intently. At last he got up cautiously, on his knees, and went searching among the grass and the flickering reflections flung by the campfire. He picked up and inspected several large semi-cylinders of the thin white bark of a sycamore, and finally chose two which seemed to suit him. Then he knelt by the fire and painfully wrote something upon each of these with his âred keelâ; one he rolled up and put in his jacket pocket, and the other he put in Joeâs hat and removed it to a little distance from the owner. And he also put into the hat certain schoolboy treasures of almost inestimable valueâamong them a lump of chalk, an India-rubber ball, three fishhooks, and one of that kind of marbles known as a âsure ânough crystal.â Then he tiptoed his way cautiously among the trees till he felt that he was out of hearing, and straightway broke into a keen run in the direction of the sandbar.
Chapter 15
A few minutes later Tom was in the shoal water of the bar, wading toward the Illinois shore. Before the depth reached his middle he was halfway over; the current would permit no more wading, now, so he struck out confidently to swim the remaining hundred yards. He swam quartering upstream, but still was swept downward rather faster than he had expected. However, he reached the shore finally, and drifted along till he found a low place and drew himself out. He put his hand on his jacket pocket, found his piece of bark safe, and then struck through the woods, following the shore, with streaming garments. Shortly before ten oâclock he came out into an open place opposite the village, and saw the ferryboat lying in the shadow of the trees and the high bank. Everything was quiet under the blinking stars. He crept down the bank, watching with all his eyes, slipped into the water, swam three or four strokes and climbed into the skiff that did âyawlâ duty at the boatâs stern. He laid himself down under the thwarts and waited, panting.
Presently the cracked bell tapped and a voice gave the order to âcast off.â A minute or two later the skiffâs head was standing high up, against the boatâs swell, and the voyage was begun. Tom felt happy in his success, for he knew it was the boatâs last trip for the night. At the end of a long twelve or fifteen minutes the wheels stopped, and Tom slipped overboard and swam ashore in the dusk, landing fifty yards downstream, out of danger of possible stragglers.
He flew along unfrequented alleys, and shortly found himself at his auntâs back fence. He climbed over, approached the âell,â and looked in at the sitting-room window, for a light was burning there. There sat Aunt Polly, Sid, Mary, and Joe Harperâs mother, grouped together, talking. They were by the bed, and the bed was between them and the door. Tom went to the door and began to softly lift the latch; then he pressed gently and the door yielded a crack; he continued pushing cautiously, and quaking every time it creaked, till he judged he might squeeze through on his knees; so he put his head through and began, warily.
âWhat makes the candle blow so?â said Aunt Polly. Tom hurried up. âWhy, that doorâs open, I believe. Why, of course it is. No end of strange things now. Go âlong and shut it, Sid.â
Tom disappeared under the bed just in time. He lay and âbreathedâ himself for a time, and then crept to where he could almost touch his auntâs foot.
âBut as I was saying,â said Aunt Polly, âhe warnât bad, so to sayâonly mischeevous. Only just giddy, and harum-scarum, you know. He warnât any more responsible than a colt. He never meant any harm, and he was the best-hearted boy that ever wasââand she began to cry.
âIt was just so with my Joeâalways full of his devilment, and up to every kind of mischief, but he was just as unselfish and kind as he could beâand laws bless me, to think I went and whipped him for taking that cream, never once recollecting that I throwed it out myself because it was sour, and I never to see him again in this world, never, never, never, poor abused boy!â And Mrs. Harper sobbed as if her heart would break.
âI hope Tomâs better off where he is,â said Sid, âbut if heâd been better in some waysââ
âSid!â Tom felt the glare of the old ladyâs eye, though he could not see it. âNot a word against my Tom, now that heâs gone! Godâll take care of himânever you trouble yourself, sir! Oh, Mrs. Harper, I donât know how to give him up! I donât know how to give him up! He was such a comfort to me, although he tormented my old heart out of me, âmost.â

âThe Lord giveth and the Lord hath taken awayâBlessed be the name of the Lord! But itâs so hardâOh, itâs so hard! Only last Saturday my Joe busted a firecracker right under my nose and I knocked him sprawling. Little did I know then, how soonâOh, if it was to do over again Iâd hug him and bless him for it.â
âYes, yes, yes, I know just how you feel, Mrs. Harper, I know just exactly how you feel. No longer ago than yesterday noon, my Tom took and filled the cat full of Pain-killer, and I did think the cretur would tear the house down. And God forgive me, I cracked Tomâs head with my thimble, poor boy, poor dead boy. But heâs out of all his troubles now. And the last words I ever heard him say was to reproachââ
But this memory was too much for the old lady, and she broke entirely down. Tom was snuffling, now, himselfâand more in pity of himself than anybody else. He could hear Mary crying, and putting in a kindly word for him from time to time. He began to have a nobler opinion of himself than ever before. Still, he was sufficiently touched by his auntâs grief to long to rush out from under the bed and overwhelm her with joyâand the theatrical gorgeousness of the thing appealed strongly to his nature, too, but he resisted and lay still.
He went on listening, and gathered by odds and ends that it was conjectured at first that the boys had got drowned while taking a swim; then the small raft had been missed; next, certain boys said the missing lads had promised that the village should âhear somethingâ soon; the wise-heads had âput this and that togetherâ and decided that the lads had gone off on that raft and would turn up at the next town below, presently; but toward noon the raft had been found, lodged against the Missouri shore some five or six miles below the villageâand then hope perished; they must be drowned, else hunger would have driven them home by nightfall if not sooner. It was believed that the search for the bodies had been a fruitless effort merely because the drowning must have occurred in mid-channel, since the boys, being good swimmers, would otherwise have escaped to shore. This was Wednesday night. If the bodies continued missing until Sunday, all hope would be given over, and the funerals would be preached on that morning. Tom shuddered.
Mrs. Harper gave a sobbing goodnight and turned to go. Then with a mutual impulse the two bereaved women flung themselves into each otherâs arms and had a good, consoling cry, and then parted. Aunt Polly was tender far beyond her wont, in her goodnight to Sid and Mary. Sid snuffled a bit and Mary went off crying with all her heart.
Aunt Polly knelt down and prayed for Tom so touchingly, so appealingly, and with such measureless love in her words and her old trembling voice, that he was weltering in tears again, long before she was through.
He had to keep still long after she went to bed, for she kept making broken-hearted ejaculations from time to time, tossing unrestfully, and turning over. But at last she was still, only moaning a little in her sleep. Now the boy stole out, rose gradually by the bedside, shaded the candle-light with his hand, and stood regarding her. His heart was full of pity for her. He took out his sycamore scroll and placed it by the candle. But something occurred to him, and he lingered considering. His face lighted with a happy solution of his thought; he put the bark hastily in his pocket. Then he bent over and kissed the faded lips, and straightway made his stealthy exit, latching the door behind him.
He threaded his way back to the ferry landing, found nobody at large there, and walked boldly on board the boat, for he knew she was tenantless except that there was a watchman, who always turned in and slept like a graven image. He untied the skiff at the stern, slipped into it, and was soon rowing cautiously upstream. When he had pulled a mile above the village, he started quartering across and bent himself stoutly to his work. He hit the landing on the other side neatly, for this was a familiar bit of work to him. He was moved to capture the skiff, arguing that it might be considered a ship and therefore legitimate prey for a pirate, but he knew a thorough search would be made for it and that might end in revelations. So he stepped ashore and entered the woods.
He sat down and took a long rest, torturing himself meanwhile to keep awake, and then started warily down the home-stretch. The night was far spent. It was broad daylight before he found himself fairly abreast the island bar. He rested again until the sun was well up and gilding the great river with its splendor, and then he plunged into the stream. A little later he paused, dripping, upon the threshold of the camp, and heard Joe say:
âNo, Tomâs true-blue, Huck, and heâll come back. He wonât desert. He knows that would be a disgrace to a pirate, and Tomâs too proud for that sort of thing. Heâs up to something or other. Now I wonder what?â

âWell, the things is ours, anyway, ainât they?â
âPretty near, but not yet, Huck. The writing says they are if he ainât back here to breakfast.â
âWhich he is!â exclaimed Tom, with fine dramatic effect, stepping grandly into camp.
A sumptuous breakfast of bacon and fish was shortly provided, and as the boys set to work upon it, Tom recounted (and adorned) his adventures. They were a vain and boastful company of heroes when the tale was done. Then Tom hid himself away in a shady nook to sleep till noon, and the other pirates got ready to fish and explore.
Chapter 16
After dinner all the gang turned out to hunt for turtle eggs on the bar. They went about poking sticks into the sand, and when they found a soft place they went down on their knees and dug with their hands. Sometimes they would take fifty or sixty eggs out of one hole. They were perfectly round white things a trifle smaller than an English walnut. They had a famous fried-egg feast that night, and another on Friday morning.

After breakfast they went whooping and prancing out on the bar, and chased each other round and round, shedding clothes as they went, until they were naked, and then continued the frolic far away up the shoal water of the bar, against the stiff current, which latter tripped their legs from under them from time to time and greatly increased the fun. And now and then they stooped in a group and splashed water in each otherâs faces with their palms, gradually approaching each other, with averted faces to avoid the strangling sprays, and finally gripping and struggling till the best man ducked his neighbor, and then they all went under in a tangle of white legs and arms and came up blowing, sputtering, laughing, and gasping for breath at one and the same time.
When they were well exhausted, they would run out and sprawl on the dry, hot sand, and lie there and cover themselves up with it, and by and by break for the water again and go through the original performance once more. Finally it occurred to them that their naked skin represented flesh-colored âtightsâ very fairly; so they drew a ring in the sand and had a circusâwith three clowns in it, for none would yield this proudest post to his neighbor.
Next they got their marbles and played âknucksâ and âringtawâ and âkeepsâ till that amusement grew stale. Then Joe and Huck had another swim, but Tom would not venture, because he found that in kicking off his trousers he had kicked his string of rattlesnake rattles off his ankle, and he wondered how he had escaped cramp so long without the protection of this mysterious charm. He did not venture again until he had found it, and by that time the other boys were tired and ready to rest. They gradually wandered apart, dropped into the âdumps,â and fell to gazing longingly across the wide river to where the village lay drowsing in the sun. Tom found himself writing âBECKYâ in the sand with his big toe; he scratched it out, and was angry with himself for his weakness. But he wrote it again, nevertheless; he could not help it. He erased it once more and then took himself out of temptation by driving the other boys together and joining them.
But Joeâs spirits had gone down almost beyond resurrection. He was so homesick that he could hardly endure the misery of it. The tears lay very near the surface. Huck was melancholy, too. Tom was downhearted, but tried hard not to show it. He had a secret which he was not ready to tell, yet, but if this mutinous depression was not broken up soon, he would have to bring it out. He said, with a great show of cheerfulness:
âI bet thereâs been pirates on this island before, boys. Weâll explore it again. Theyâve hid treasures here somewhere. Howâd you feel to light on a rotten chest full of gold and silverâhey?â
But it roused only faint enthusiasm, which faded out, with no reply. Tom tried one or two other seductions; but they failed, too. It was discouraging work. Joe sat poking up the sand with a stick and looking very gloomy. Finally he said:
âOh, boys, letâs give it up. I want to go home. Itâs so lonesome.â
âOh no, Joe, youâll feel better by and by,â said Tom. âJust think of the fishing thatâs here.â
âI donât care for fishing. I want to go home.â
âBut, Joe, there ainât such another swimming-place anywhere.â
âSwimmingâs no good. I donât seem to care for it, somehow, when there ainât anybody to say I shaânât go in. I mean to go home.â
âOh, shucks! Baby! You want to see your mother, I reckon.â
âYes, I do want to see my motherâand you would, too, if you had one. I ainât any more baby than you are.â And Joe snuffled a little.
âWell, weâll let the crybaby go home to his mother, wonât we, Huck? Poor thingâdoes it want to see its mother? And so it shall. You like it here, donât you, Huck? Weâll stay, wonât we?â
Huck said, âY-e-sââwithout any heart in it.
âIâll never speak to you again as long as I live,â said Joe, rising. âThere now!â And he moved moodily away and began to dress himself.
âWho cares!â said Tom. âNobody wants you to. Go âlong home and get laughed at. Oh, youâre a nice pirate. Huck and me ainât crybabies. Weâll stay, wonât we, Huck? Let him go if he wants to. I reckon we can get along without him, perâaps.â
But Tom was uneasy, nevertheless, and was alarmed to see Joe go sullenly on with his dressing. And then it was discomforting to see Huck eying Joeâs preparations so wistfully, and keeping up such an ominous silence. Presently, without a parting word, Joe began to wade off toward the Illinois shore. Tomâs heart began to sink. He glanced at Huck. Huck could not bear the look, and dropped his eyes. Then he said:
âI want to go, too, Tom. It was getting so lonesome anyway, and now itâll be worse. Letâs us go, too, Tom.â
âI wonât! You can all go, if you want to. I mean to stay.â
âTom, I better go.â
âWell, go âlongâwhoâs hendering you.â
Huck began to pick up his scattered clothes. He said:
âTom, I wisht youâd come, too. Now you think it over. Weâll wait for you when we get to shore.â
âWell, youâll wait a blame long time, thatâs all.â
Huck started sorrowfully away, and Tom stood looking after him, with a strong desire tugging at his heart to yield his pride and go along too. He hoped the boys would stop, but they still waded slowly on. It suddenly dawned on Tom that it was become very lonely and still. He made one final struggle with his pride, and then darted after his comrades, yelling:
âWait! Wait! I want to tell you something!â
They presently stopped and turned around. When he got to where they were, he began unfolding his secret, and they listened moodily till at last they saw the âpointâ he was driving at, and then they set up a warwhoop of applause and said it was âsplendid!â and said if he had told them at first, they wouldnât have started away. He made a plausible excuse; but his real reason had been the fear that not even the secret would keep them with him any very great length of time, and so he had meant to hold it in reserve as a last seduction.
The lads came gayly back and went at their sports again with a will, chattering all the time about Tomâs stupendous plan and admiring the genius of it. After a dainty egg and fish dinner, Tom said he wanted to learn to smoke, now. Joe caught at the idea and said he would like to try, too. So Huck made pipes and filled them. These novices had never smoked anything before but cigars made of grapevine, and they âbitâ the tongue, and were not considered manly anyway.
Now they stretched themselves out on their elbows and began to puff, charily, and with slender confidence. The smoke had an unpleasant taste, and they gagged a little, but Tom said:
âWhy, itâs just as easy! If Iâd a knowed this was all, Iâd a learnt long ago.â
âSo would I,â said Joe. âItâs just nothing.â
âWhy, many a time Iâve looked at people smoking, and thought well I wish I could do that; but I never thought I could,â said Tom.
âThatâs just the way with me, hainât it, Huck? Youâve heard me talk just that wayâhavenât you, Huck? Iâll leave it to Huck if I havenât.â
âYesâheaps of times,â said Huck.
âWell, I have too,â said Tom; âoh, hundreds of times. Once down by the slaughter-house. Donât you remember, Huck? Bob Tanner was there, and Johnny Miller, and Jeff Thatcher, when I said it. Donât you remember, Huck, âbout me saying that?â
âYes, thatâs so,â said Huck. âThat was the day after I lost a white alley. No, âtwas the day before.â
âThereâI told you so,â said Tom. âHuck recollects it.â
âI bleeve I could smoke this pipe all day,â said Joe. âI donât feel sick.â
âNeither do I,â said Tom. âI could smoke it all day. But I bet you Jeff Thatcher couldnât.â
âJeff Thatcher! Why, heâd keel over just with two draws. Just let him try it once. Heâd see!â
âI bet he would. And Johnny MillerâI wish could see Johnny Miller tackle it once.â
âOh, donât I!â said Joe. âWhy, I bet you Johnny Miller couldnât any more do this than nothing. Just one little snifter would fetch him.â
ââDeed it would, Joe. SayâI wish the boys could see us now.â
âSo do I.â
âSayâboys, donât say anything about it, and some time when theyâre around, Iâll come up to you and say, âJoe, got a pipe? I want a smoke.â And youâll say, kind of careless like, as if it warnât anything, youâll say, âYes, I got my old pipe, and another one, but my tobacker ainât very good.â And Iâll say, âOh, thatâs all right, if itâs strong enough.â And then youâll out with the pipes, and weâll light up just as caâm, and then just see âem look!â
âBy jings, thatâll be gay, Tom! I wish it was now!â
âSo do I! And when we tell âem we learned when we was off pirating, wonât they wish theyâd been along?â
âOh, I reckon not! Iâll just bet they will!â
So the talk ran on. But presently it began to flag a trifle, and grow disjointed. The silences widened; the expectoration marvellously increased. Every pore inside the boysâ cheeks became a spouting fountain; they could scarcely bail out the cellars under their tongues fast enough to prevent an inundation; little overflowings down their throats occurred in spite of all they could do, and sudden retchings followed every time. Both boys were looking very pale and miserable, now. Joeâs pipe dropped from his nerveless fingers. Tomâs followed. Both fountains were going furiously and both pumps bailing with might and main. Joe said feebly:
âIâve lost my knife. I reckon I better go and find it.â
Tom said, with quivering lips and halting utterance:
âIâll help you. You go over that way and Iâll hunt around by the spring. No, you neednât come, Huckâwe can find it.â

So Huck sat down again, and waited an hour. Then he found it lonesome, and went to find his comrades. They were wide apart in the woods, both very pale, both fast asleep. But something informed him that if they had had any trouble they had got rid of it.
They were not talkative at supper that night. They had a humble look, and when Huck prepared his pipe after the meal and was going to prepare theirs, they said no, they were not feeling very wellâsomething they ate at dinner had disagreed with them.
About midnight Joe awoke, and called the boys. There was a brooding oppressiveness in the air that seemed to bode something. The boys huddled themselves together and sought the friendly companionship of the fire, though the dull dead heat of the breathless atmosphere was stifling. They sat still, intent and waiting. The solemn hush continued. Beyond the light of the fire everything was swallowed up in the blackness of darkness. Presently there came a quivering glow that vaguely revealed the foliage for a moment and then vanished. By and by another came, a little stronger. Then another. Then a faint moan came sighing through the branches of the forest and the boys felt a fleeting breath upon their cheeks, and shuddered with the fancy that the Spirit of the Night had gone by. There was a pause. Now a weird flash turned night into day and showed every little grassblade, separate and distinct, that grew about their feet. And it showed three white, startled faces, too. A deep peal of thunder went rolling and tumbling down the heavens and lost itself in sullen rumblings in the distance. A sweep of chilly air passed by, rustling all the leaves and snowing the flaky ashes broadcast about the fire. Another fierce glare lit up the forest and an instant crash followed that seemed to rend the treetops right over the boysâ heads. They clung together in terror, in the thick gloom that followed. A few big raindrops fell pattering upon the leaves.
âQuick! boys, go for the tent!â exclaimed Tom.

They sprang away, stumbling over roots and among vines in the dark, no two plunging in the same direction. A furious blast roared through the trees, making everything sing as it went. One blinding flash after another came, and peal on peal of deafening thunder. And now a drenching rain poured down and the rising hurricane drove it in sheets along the ground. The boys cried out to each other, but the roaring wind and the booming thunderblasts drowned their voices utterly. However, one by one they straggled in at last and took shelter under the tent, cold, scared, and streaming with water; but to have company in misery seemed something to be grateful for. They could not talk, the old sail flapped so furiously, even if the other noises would have allowed them. The tempest rose higher and higher, and presently the sail tore loose from its fastenings and went winging away on the blast. The boys seized each othersâ hands and fled, with many tumblings and bruises, to the shelter of a great oak that stood upon the riverbank. Now the battle was at its highest. Under the ceaseless conflagration of lightning that flamed in the skies, everything below stood out in cleancut and shadowless distinctness: the bending trees, the billowy river, white with foam, the driving spray of spumeflakes, the dim outlines of the high bluffs on the other side, glimpsed through the drifting cloudrack and the slanting veil of rain. Every little while some giant tree yielded the fight and fell crashing through the younger growth; and the unflagging thunderpeals came now in ear-splitting explosive bursts, keen and sharp, and unspeakably appalling. The storm culminated in one matchless effort that seemed likely to tear the island to pieces, burn it up, drown it to the treetops, blow it away, and deafen every creature in it, all at one and the same moment. It was a wild night for homeless young heads to be out in.
But at last the battle was done, and the forces retired with weaker and weaker threatenings and grumblings, and peace resumed her sway. The boys went back to camp, a good deal awed; but they found there was still something to be thankful for, because the great sycamore, the shelter of their beds, was a ruin, now, blasted by the lightnings, and they were not under it when the catastrophe happened.
Everything in camp was drenched, the campfire as well; for they were but heedless lads, like their generation, and had made no provision against rain. Here was matter for dismay, for they were soaked through and chilled. They were eloquent in their distress; but they presently discovered that the fire had eaten so far up under the great log it had been built against (where it curved upward and separated itself from the ground), that a handbreadth or so of it had escaped wetting; so they patiently wrought until, with shreds and bark gathered from the under sides of sheltered logs, they coaxed the fire to burn again. Then they piled on great dead boughs till they had a roaring furnace, and were gladhearted once more. They dried their boiled ham and had a feast, and after that they sat by the fire and expanded and glorified their midnight adventure until morning, for there was not a dry spot to sleep on, anywhere around.
As the sun began to steal in upon the boys, drowsiness came over them, and they went out on the sandbar and lay down to sleep. They got scorched out by and by, and drearily set about getting breakfast. After the meal they felt rusty, and stiff-jointed, and a little homesick once more. Tom saw the signs, and fell to cheering up the pirates as well as he could. But they cared nothing for marbles, or circus, or swimming, or anything. He reminded them of the imposing secret, and raised a ray of cheer. While it lasted, he got them interested in a new device. This was to knock off being pirates, for a while, and be Indians for a change. They were attracted by this idea; so it was not long before they were stripped, and striped from head to heel with black mud, like so many zebrasâall of them chiefs, of courseâand then they went tearing through the woods to attack an English settlement.
By and by they separated into three hostile tribes, and darted upon each other from ambush with dreadful warwhoops, and killed and scalped each other by thousands. It was a gory day. Consequently it was an extremely satisfactory one.

They assembled in camp toward suppertime, hungry and happy; but now a difficulty aroseâhostile Indians could not break the bread of hospitality together without first making peace, and this was a simple impossibility without smoking a pipe of peace. There was no other process that ever they had heard of. Two of the savages almost wished they had remained pirates. However, there was no other way; so with such show of cheerfulness as they could muster they called for the pipe and took their whiff as it passed, in due form.
And behold, they were glad they had gone into savagery, for they had gained something; they found that they could now smoke a little without having to go and hunt for a lost knife; they did not get sick enough to be seriously uncomfortable. They were not likely to fool away this high promise for lack of effort. No, they practised cautiously, after supper, with right fair success, and so they spent a jubilant evening. They were proud and happy in their new acquirement. We will leave them to smoke and chatter and brag, since we have no further use for them at present.
Chapter 17
But there was no hilarity in the little town that same tranquil Saturday afternoon. The Harpers, and Aunt Pollyâs family, were being put into mourning, with great grief and many tears. An unusual quiet possessed the village, although it was ordinarily quiet enough, in all conscience. The villagers conducted their concerns with an absent air, and talked little; but they sighed often. The Saturday holiday seemed a burden to the children. They had no heart in their sports, and gradually gave them up.
In the afternoon Becky Thatcher found herself moping about the deserted schoolhouse yard, and feeling very melancholy. But she found nothing there to comfort her. She soliloquized:
âOh, if I only had a brass andiron-knob again! But I havenât got anything now to remember him by.â And she choked back a little sob.
Presently she stopped, and said to herself:
âIt was right here. Oh, if it was to do over again, I wouldnât say thatâI wouldnât say it for the whole world. But heâs gone now; Iâll never, never, never see him any more.â
This thought broke her down, and she wandered away, with tears rolling down her cheeks. Then quite a group of boys and girlsâplaymates of Tomâs and Joeâsâcame by, and stood looking over the paling fence and talking in reverent tones of how Tom did so-and-so the last time they saw him, and how Joe said this and that small trifle (pregnant with awful prophecy, as they could easily see now!)âand each speaker pointed out the exact spot where the lost lads stood at the time, and then added something like âand I was a-standing just soâjust as I am now, and as if you was himâI was as close as thatâand he smiled, just this wayâand then something seemed to go all over me, likeâawful, you knowâand I never thought what it meant, of course, but I can see now!â
Then there was a dispute about who saw the dead boys last in life, and many claimed that dismal distinction, and offered evidences, more or less tampered with by the witness; and when it was ultimately decided who did see the departed last, and exchanged the last words with them, the lucky parties took upon themselves a sort of sacred importance, and were gaped at and envied by all the rest. One poor chap, who had no other grandeur to offer, said with tolerably manifest pride in the remembrance:
âWell, Tom Sawyer he licked me once.â
But that bid for glory was a failure. Most of the boys could say that, and so that cheapened the distinction too much. The group loitered away, still recalling memories of the lost heroes, in awed voices.
When the Sunday-school hour was finished, the next morning, the bell began to toll, instead of ringing in the usual way. It was a very still Sabbath, and the mournful sound seemed in keeping with the musing hush that lay upon nature. The villagers began to gather, loitering a moment in the vestibule to converse in whispers about the sad event. But there was no whispering in the house; only the funereal rustling of dresses as the women gathered to their seats disturbed the silence there. None could remember when the little church had been so full before. There was finally a waiting pause, an expectant dumbness, and then Aunt Polly entered, followed by Sid and Mary, and they by the Harper family, all in deep black, and the whole congregation, the old minister as well, rose reverently and stood until the mourners were seated in the front pew. There was another communing silence, broken at intervals by muffled sobs, and then the minister spread his hands abroad and prayed. A moving hymn was sung, and the text followed: âI am the Resurrection and the Life.â
As the service proceeded, the clergyman drew such pictures of the graces, the winning ways, and the rare promise of the lost lads that every soul there, thinking he recognized these pictures, felt a pang in remembering that he had persistently blinded himself to them always before, and had as persistently seen only faults and flaws in the poor boys. The minister related many a touching incident in the lives of the departed, too, which illustrated their sweet, generous natures, and the people could easily see, now, how noble and beautiful those episodes were, and remembered with grief that at the time they occurred they had seemed rank rascalities, well deserving of the cowhide. The congregation became more and more moved, as the pathetic tale went on, till at last the whole company broke down and joined the weeping mourners in a chorus of anguished sobs, the preacher himself giving way to his feelings, and crying in the pulpit.
There was a rustle in the gallery, which nobody noticed; a moment later the church door creaked; the minister raised his streaming eyes above his handkerchief, and stood transfixed! First one and then another pair of eyes followed the ministerâs, and then almost with one impulse the congregation rose and stared while the three dead boys came marching up the aisle, Tom in the lead, Joe next, and Huck, a ruin of drooping rags, sneaking sheepishly in the rear! They had been hid in the unused gallery listening to their own funeral sermon!
Aunt Polly, Mary, and the Harpers threw themselves upon their restored ones, smothered them with kisses and poured out thanksgivings, while poor Huck stood abashed and uncomfortable, not knowing exactly what to do or where to hide from so many unwelcoming eyes. He wavered, and started to slink away, but Tom seized him and said:
âAunt Polly, it ainât fair. Somebodyâs got to be glad to see Huck.â
âAnd so they shall. Iâm glad to see him, poor motherless thing!â And the loving attentions Aunt Polly lavished upon him were the one thing capable of making him more uncomfortable than he was before.
Suddenly the minister shouted at the top of his voice: âPraise God from whom all blessings flowâsing!âand put your hearts in it!â

And they did. Old Hundred swelled up with a triumphant burst, and while it shook the rafters Tom Sawyer the Pirate looked around upon the envying juveniles about him and confessed in his heart that this was the proudest moment of his life.
As the âsoldâ congregation trooped out they said they would almost be willing to be made ridiculous again to hear Old Hundred sung like that once more.
Tom got more cuffs and kisses that dayâaccording to Aunt Pollyâs varying moodsâthan he had earned before in a year; and he hardly knew which expressed the most gratefulness to God and affection for himself.
Chapter 18
That was Tomâs great secretâthe scheme to return home with his brother pirates and attend their own funerals. They had paddled over to the Missouri shore on a log, at dusk on Saturday, landing five or six miles below the village; they had slept in the woods at the edge of the town till nearly daylight, and had then crept through back lanes and alleys and finished their sleep in the gallery of the church among a chaos of invalided benches.
At breakfast, Monday morning, Aunt Polly and Mary were very loving to Tom, and very attentive to his wants. There was an unusual amount of talk. In the course of it Aunt Polly said:
âWell, I donât say it wasnât a fine joke, Tom, to keep everybody suffering âmost a week so you boys had a good time, but it is a pity you could be so hard-hearted as to let me suffer so. If you could come over on a log to go to your funeral, you could have come over and give me a hint some way that you warnât dead, but only run off.â
âYes, you could have done that, Tom,â said Mary; âand I believe you would if you had thought of it.â
âWould you, Tom?â said Aunt Polly, her face lighting wistfully. âSay, now, would you, if youâd thought of it?â
âIâwell, I donât know. âTwould âaâ spoiled everything.â
âTom, I hoped you loved me that much,â said Aunt Polly, with a grieved tone that discomforted the boy. âIt would have been something if youâd cared enough to think of it, even if you didnât do it.â
âNow, auntie, that ainât any harm,â pleaded Mary; âitâs only Tomâs giddy wayâhe is always in such a rush that he never thinks of anything.â
âMoreâs the pity. Sid would have thought. And Sid would have come and done it, too. Tom, youâll look back, some day, when itâs too late, and wish youâd cared a little more for me when it would have cost you so little.â
âNow, auntie, you know I do care for you,â said Tom.
âIâd know it better if you acted more like it.â
âI wish now Iâd thought,â said Tom, with a repentant tone; âbut I dreamt about you, anyway. Thatâs something, ainât it?â
âIt ainât muchâa cat does that muchâbut itâs better than nothing. What did you dream?â
âWhy, Wednesday night I dreamt that you was sitting over there by the bed, and Sid was sitting by the woodbox, and Mary next to him.â
âWell, so we did. So we always do. Iâm glad your dreams could take even that much trouble about us.â
âAnd I dreamt that Joe Harperâs mother was here.â
âWhy, she was here! Did you dream any more?â
âOh, lots. But itâs so dim, now.â
âWell, try to recollectâcanât you?â
âSomehow it seems to me that the windâthe wind blowed theâtheââ
âTry harder, Tom! The wind did blow something. Come!â
Tom pressed his fingers on his forehead an anxious minute, and then said:
âIâve got it now! Iâve got it now! It blowed the candle!â
âMercy on us! Go on, Tomâgo on!â

âAnd it seems to me that you said, âWhy, I believe that that doorâââ
âGo on, Tom!â
âJust let me study a momentâjust a moment. Oh, yesâyou said you believed the door was open.â
âAs Iâm sitting here, I did! Didnât I, Mary! Go on!â
âAnd thenâand thenâwell I wonât be certain, but it seems like as if you made Sid go andâandââ
âWell? Well? What did I make him do, Tom? What did I make him do?â
âYou made himâyouâOh, you made him shut it.â
âWell, for the landâs sake! I never heard the beat of that in all my days! Donât tell me there ainât anything in dreams, any more. Sereny Harper shall know of this before Iâm an hour older. Iâd like to see her get around this with her rubbage âbout superstition. Go on, Tom!â
âOh, itâs all getting just as bright as day, now. Next you said I warnât bad, only mischeevous and harum-scarum, and not any more responsible thanâthanâI think it was a colt, or something.â
âAnd so it was! Well, goodness gracious! Go on, Tom!â
âAnd then you began to cry.â
âSo I did. So I did. Not the first time, neither. And thenââ
âThen Mrs. Harper she began to cry, and said Joe was just the same, and she wished she hadnât whipped him for taking cream when sheâd throwed it out her own selfââ
âTom! The sperrit was upon you! You was a prophesyingâthatâs what you was doing! Land alive, go on, Tom!â
âThen Sid he saidâhe saidââ
âI donât think I said anything,â said Sid.
âYes you did, Sid,â said Mary.
âShut your heads and let Tom go on! What did he say, Tom?â
âHe saidâI think he said he hoped I was better off where I was gone to, but if Iâd been better sometimesââ
âThere, dâyou hear that! It was his very words!â
âAnd you shut him up sharp.â
âI lay I did! There must âaâ been an angel there. There was an angel there, somewheres!â
âAnd Mrs. Harper told about Joe scaring her with a firecracker, and you told about Peter and the Pain-killerââ
âJust as true as I live!â
âAnd then there was a whole lot of talk âbout dragging the river for us, and âbout having the funeral Sunday, and then you and old Miss Harper hugged and cried, and she went.â
âIt happened just so! It happened just so, as sure as Iâm a-sitting in these very tracks. Tom, you couldnât told it more like if youâd âaâ seen it! And then what? Go on, Tom!â
âThen I thought you prayed for meâand I could see you and hear every word you said. And you went to bed, and I was so sorry that I took and wrote on a piece of sycamore bark, âWe ainât deadâwe are only off being pirates,â and put it on the table by the candle; and then you looked so good, laying there asleep, that I thought I went and leaned over and kissed you on the lips.â
âDid you, Tom, did you! I just forgive you everything for that!â And she seized the boy in a crushing embrace that made him feel like the guiltiest of villains.
âIt was very kind, even though it was only aâdream,â Sid soliloquized just audibly.
âShut up, Sid! A body does just the same in a dream as heâd do if he was awake. Hereâs a big Milum apple Iâve been saving for you, Tom, if you was ever found againânow go âlong to school. Iâm thankful to the good God and Father of us all Iâve got you back, thatâs long-suffering and merciful to them that believe on Him and keep His word, though goodness knows Iâm unworthy of it, but if only the worthy ones got His blessings and had His hand to help them over the rough places, thereâs few enough would smile here or ever enter into His rest when the long night comes. Go âlong Sid, Mary, Tomâtake yourselves offâyouâve hendered me long enough.â
The children left for school, and the old lady to call on Mrs. Harper and vanquish her realism with Tomâs marvellous dream. Sid had better judgment than to utter the thought that was in his mind as he left the house. It was this: âPretty thinâas long a dream as that, without any mistakes in it!â
What a hero Tom was become, now! He did not go skipping and prancing, but moved with a dignified swagger as became a pirate who felt that the public eye was on him. And indeed it was; he tried not to seem to see the looks or hear the remarks as he passed along, but they were food and drink to him. Smaller boys than himself flocked at his heels, as proud to be seen with him, and tolerated by him, as if he had been the drummer at the head of a procession or the elephant leading a menagerie into town. Boys of his own size pretended not to know he had been away at all; but they were consuming with envy, nevertheless. They would have given anything to have that swarthy sun-tanned skin of his, and his glittering notoriety; and Tom would not have parted with either for a circus.

At school the children made so much of him and of Joe, and delivered such eloquent admiration from their eyes, that the two heroes were not long in becoming insufferably âstuck-up.â They began to tell their adventures to hungry listenersâbut they only began; it was not a thing likely to have an end, with imaginations like theirs to furnish material. And finally, when they got out their pipes and went serenely puffing around, the very summit of glory was reached.
Tom decided that he could be independent of Becky Thatcher now. Glory was sufficient. He would live for glory. Now that he was distinguished, maybe she would be wanting to âmake up.â Well, let herâshe should see that he could be as indifferent as some other people. Presently she arrived. Tom pretended not to see her. He moved away and joined a group of boys and girls and began to talk. Soon he observed that she was tripping gayly back and forth with flushed face and dancing eyes, pretending to be busy chasing schoolmates, and screaming with laughter when she made a capture; but he noticed that she always made her captures in his vicinity, and that she seemed to cast a conscious eye in his direction at such times, too. It gratified all the vicious vanity that was in him; and so, instead of winning him, it only âset him upâ the more and made him the more diligent to avoid betraying that he knew she was about. Presently she gave over skylarking, and moved irresolutely about, sighing once or twice and glancing furtively and wistfully toward Tom. Then she observed that now Tom was talking more particularly to Amy Lawrence than to any one else. She felt a sharp pang and grew disturbed and uneasy at once. She tried to go away, but her feet were treacherous, and carried her to the group instead. She said to a girl almost at Tomâs elbowâwith sham vivacity:
âWhy, Mary Austin! you bad girl, why didnât you come to Sunday-school?â
âI did comeâdidnât you see me?â
âWhy, no! Did you? Where did you sit?â
âI was in Miss Petersâ class, where I always go. I saw you.â
âDid you? Why, itâs funny I didnât see you. I wanted to tell you about the picnic.â
âOh, thatâs jolly. Whoâs going to give it?â
âMy maâs going to let me have one.â
âOh, goody; I hope sheâll let me come.â
âWell, she will. The picnicâs for me. Sheâll let anybody come that I want, and I want you.â
âThatâs ever so nice. When is it going to be?â
âBy and by. Maybe about vacation.â
âOh, wonât it be fun! You going to have all the girls and boys?â
âYes, every one thatâs friends to meâor wants to beâ; and she glanced ever so furtively at Tom, but he talked right along to Amy Lawrence about the terrible storm on the island, and how the lightning tore the great sycamore tree âall to flindersâ while he was âstanding within three feet of it.â
âOh, may I come?â said Grace Miller.
âYes.â
âAnd me?â said Sally Rogers.
âYes.â
âAnd me, too?â said Susy Harper. âAnd Joe?â
âYes.â
And so on, with clapping of joyful hands till all the group had begged for invitations but Tom and Amy. Then Tom turned coolly away, still talking, and took Amy with him. Beckyâs lips trembled and the tears came to her eyes; she hid these signs with a forced gayety and went on chattering, but the life had gone out of the picnic, now, and out of everything else; she got away as soon as she could and hid herself and had what her sex call âa good cry.â Then she sat moody, with wounded pride, till the bell rang. She roused up, now, with a vindictive cast in her eye, and gave her plaited tails a shake and said she knew what sheâd do.

At recess Tom continued his flirtation with Amy with jubilant self-satisfaction. And he kept drifting about to find Becky and lacerate her with the performance. At last he spied her, but there was a sudden falling of his mercury. She was sitting cosily on a little bench behind the schoolhouse looking at a picture-book with Alfred Templeâand so absorbed were they, and their heads so close together over the book, that they did not seem to be conscious of anything in the world besides. Jealousy ran red-hot through Tomâs veins. He began to hate himself for throwing away the chance Becky had offered for a reconciliation. He called himself a fool, and all the hard names he could think of. He wanted to cry with vexation. Amy chatted happily along, as they walked, for her heart was singing, but Tomâs tongue had lost its function. He did not hear what Amy was saying, and whenever she paused expectantly he could only stammer an awkward assent, which was as often misplaced as otherwise. He kept drifting to the rear of the schoolhouse, again and again, to sear his eyeballs with the hateful spectacle there. He could not help it. And it maddened him to see, as he thought he saw, that Becky Thatcher never once suspected that he was even in the land of the living. But she did see, nevertheless; and she knew she was winning her fight, too, and was glad to see him suffer as she had suffered.

Amyâs happy prattle became intolerable. Tom hinted at things he had to attend to; things that must be done; and time was fleeting. But in vainâthe girl chirped on. Tom thought, âOh, hang her, ainât I ever going to get rid of her?â At last he must be attending to those thingsâand she said artlessly that she would be âaroundâ when school let out. And he hastened away, hating her for it.

âAny other boy!â Tom thought, grating his teeth. âAny boy in the whole town but that Saint Louis smarty that thinks he dresses so fine and is aristocracy! Oh, all right, I licked you the first day you ever saw this town, mister, and Iâll lick you again! You just wait till I catch you out! Iâll just take andââ
And he went through the motions of thrashing an imaginary boyâpummelling the air, and kicking and gouging. âOh, you do, do you? You holler ânough, do you? Now, then, let that learn you!â And so the imaginary flogging was finished to his satisfaction.
Tom fled home at noon. His conscience could not endure any more of Amyâs grateful happiness, and his jealousy could bear no more of the other distress. Becky resumed her picture inspections with Alfred, but as the minutes dragged along and no Tom came to suffer, her triumph began to cloud and she lost interest; gravity and absentmindedness followed, and then melancholy; two or three times she pricked up her ear at a footstep, but it was a false hope; no Tom came. At last she grew entirely miserable and wished she hadnât carried it so far. When poor Alfred, seeing that he was losing her, he did not know how, kept exclaiming: âOh, hereâs a jolly one! look at this!â she lost patience at last, and said, âOh, donât bother me! I donât care for them!â and burst into tears, and got up and walked away.
Alfred dropped alongside and was going to try to comfort her, but she said:
âGo away and leave me alone, canât you! I hate you!â
So the boy halted, wondering what he could have doneâfor she had said she would look at pictures all through the nooningâand she walked on, crying. Then Alfred went musing into the deserted schoolhouse. He was humiliated and angry. He easily guessed his way to the truthâthe girl had simply made a convenience of him to vent her spite upon Tom Sawyer. He was far from hating Tom the less when this thought occurred to him. He wished there was some way to get that boy into trouble without much risk to himself. Tomâs spelling-book fell under his eye. Here was his opportunity. He gratefully opened to the lesson for the afternoon and poured ink upon the page.

Becky, glancing in at a window behind him at the moment, saw the act, and moved on, without discovering herself. She started homeward, now, intending to find Tom and tell him; Tom would be thankful and their troubles would be healed. Before she was half way home, however, she had changed her mind. The thought of Tomâs treatment of her when she was talking about her picnic came scorching back and filled her with shame. She resolved to let him get whipped on the damaged spelling-bookâs account, and to hate him forever, into the bargain.
Chapter 19
Tom arrived at home in a dreary mood, and the first thing his aunt said to him showed him that he had brought his sorrows to an unpromising market:
âTom, Iâve a notion to skin you alive!â
âAuntie, what have I done?â
âWell, youâve done enough. Here I go over to Sereny Harper, like an old softy, expecting Iâm going to make her believe all that rubbage about that dream, when lo and behold you sheâd found out from Joe that you was over here and heard all the talk we had that night. Tom, I donât know what is to become of a boy that will act like that. It makes me feel so bad to think you could let me go to Sereny Harper and make such a fool of myself and never say a word.â
This was a new aspect of the thing. His smartness of the morning had seemed to Tom a good joke before, and very ingenious. It merely looked mean and shabby now. He hung his head and could not think of anything to say for a moment. Then he said:
âAuntie, I wish I hadnât done itâbut I didnât think.â
âOh, child, you never think. You never think of anything but your own selfishness. You could think to come all the way over here from Jacksonâs Island in the night to laugh at our troubles, and you could think to fool me with a lie about a dream; but you couldnât ever think to pity us and save us from sorrow.â
âAuntie, I know now it was mean, but I didnât mean to be mean. I didnât, honest. And besides, I didnât come over here to laugh at you that night.â
âWhat did you come for, then?â
âIt was to tell you not to be uneasy about us, because we hadnât got drownded.â
âTom, Tom, I would be the thankfullest soul in this world if I could believe you ever had as good a thought as that, but you know you never didâand I know it, Tom.â
âIndeed and âdeed I did, auntieâI wish I may never stir if I didnât.â
âOh, Tom, donât lieâdonât do it. It only makes things a hundred times worse.â
âIt ainât a lie, auntie; itâs the truth. I wanted to keep you from grievingâthat was all that made me come.â
âIâd give the whole world to believe thatâit would cover up a power of sins, Tom. Iâd âmost be glad youâd run off and acted so bad. But it ainât reasonable; because, why didnât you tell me, child?â
âWhy, you see, when you got to talking about the funeral, I just got all full of the idea of our coming and hiding in the church, and I couldnât somehow bear to spoil it. So I just put the bark back in my pocket and kept mum.â
âWhat bark?â
âThe bark I had wrote on to tell you weâd gone pirating. I wish, now, youâd waked up when I kissed youâI do, honest.â
The hard lines in his auntâs face relaxed and a sudden tenderness dawned in her eyes.
âDid you kiss me, Tom?â
âWhy, yes, I did.â
âAre you sure you did, Tom?â
âWhy, yes, I did, auntieâcertain sure.â
âWhat did you kiss me for, Tom?â
âBecause I loved you so, and you laid there moaning and I was so sorry.â
The words sounded like truth. The old lady could not hide a tremor in her voice when she said:
âKiss me again, Tom!âand be off with you to school, now, and donât bother me any more.â
The moment he was gone, she ran to a closet and got out the ruin of a jacket which Tom had gone pirating in. Then she stopped, with it in her hand, and said to herself:
âNo, I donât dare. Poor boy, I reckon heâs lied about itâbut itâs a blessed, blessed lie, thereâs such a comfort come from it. I hope the LordâI know the Lord will forgive him, because it was such good-heartedness in him to tell it. But I donât want to find out itâs a lie. I wonât look.â
She put the jacket away, and stood by musing a minute. Twice she put out her hand to take the garment again, and twice she refrained. Once more she ventured, and this time she fortified herself with the thought: âItâs a good lieâitâs a good lieâI wonât let it grieve me.â So she sought the jacket pocket. A moment later she was reading Tomâs piece of bark through flowing tears and saying: âI could forgive the boy, now, if heâd committed a million sins!â

Chapter 20
There was something about Aunt Pollyâs manner, when she kissed Tom, that swept away his low spirits and made him lighthearted and happy again. He started to school and had the luck of coming upon Becky Thatcher at the head of Meadow Lane. His mood always determined his manner. Without a momentâs hesitation he ran to her and said:
âI acted mighty mean today, Becky, and Iâm so sorry. I wonât ever, ever do that way again, as long as ever I liveâplease make up, wonât you?â
The girl stopped and looked him scornfully in the face:
âIâll thank you to keep yourself to yourself, Mr. Thomas Sawyer. Iâll never speak to you again.â
She tossed her head and passed on. Tom was so stunned that he had not even presence of mind enough to say âWho cares, Miss Smarty?â until the right time to say it had gone by. So he said nothing. But he was in a fine rage, nevertheless. He moped into the schoolyard wishing she were a boy, and imagining how he would trounce her if she were. He presently encountered her and delivered a stinging remark as he passed. She hurled one in return, and the angry breach was complete. It seemed to Becky, in her hot resentment, that she could hardly wait for school to âtake in,â she was so impatient to see Tom flogged for the injured spelling-book. If she had had any lingering notion of exposing Alfred Temple, Tomâs offensive fling had driven it entirely away.
Poor girl, she did not know how fast she was nearing trouble herself. The master, Mr. Dobbins, had reached middle age with an unsatisfied ambition. The darling of his desires was, to be a doctor, but poverty had decreed that he should be nothing higher than a village schoolmaster. Every day he took a mysterious book out of his desk and absorbed himself in it at times when no classes were reciting. He kept that book under lock and key. There was not an urchin in school but was perishing to have a glimpse of it, but the chance never came. Every boy and girl had a theory about the nature of that book; but no two theories were alike, and there was no way of getting at the facts in the case. Now, as Becky was passing by the desk, which stood near the door, she noticed that the key was in the lock! It was a precious moment. She glanced around; found herself alone, and the next instant she had the book in her hands. The titlepageâProfessor Somebodyâs Anatomyâcarried no information to her mind; so she began to turn the leaves. She came at once upon a handsomely engraved and colored frontispieceâa human figure, stark naked. At that moment a shadow fell on the page and Tom Sawyer stepped in at the door and caught a glimpse of the picture. Becky snatched at the book to close it, and had the hard luck to tear the pictured page half down the middle. She thrust the volume into the desk, turned the key, and burst out crying with shame and vexation.
âTom Sawyer, you are just as mean as you can be, to sneak up on a person and look at what theyâre looking at.â

âHow could I know you was looking at anything?â
âYou ought to be ashamed of yourself, Tom Sawyer; you know youâre going to tell on me, and oh, what shall I do, what shall I do! Iâll be whipped, and I never was whipped in school.â
Then she stamped her little foot and said:
âBe so mean if you want to! I know something thatâs going to happen. You just wait and youâll see! Hateful, hateful, hateful!ââand she flung out of the house with a new explosion of crying.
Tom stood still, rather flustered by this onslaught. Presently he said to himself:
âWhat a curious kind of a fool a girl is! Never been licked in school! Shucks! Whatâs a licking! Thatâs just like a girlâtheyâre so thin-skinned and chicken-hearted. Well, of course I ainât going to tell old Dobbins on this little fool, because thereâs other ways of getting even on her, that ainât so mean; but what of it? Old Dobbins will ask who it was tore his book. Nobodyâll answer. Then heâll do just the way he always doesâask first one and then tâother, and when he comes to the right girl heâll know it, without any telling. Girlsâ faces always tell on them. They ainât got any backbone. Sheâll get licked. Well, itâs a kind of a tight place for Becky Thatcher, because there ainât any way out of it.â Tom conned the thing a moment longer, and then added: âAll right, though; sheâd like to see me in just such a fixâlet her sweat it out!â
Tom joined the mob of skylarking scholars outside. In a few moments the master arrived and school âtook in.â Tom did not feel a strong interest in his studies. Every time he stole a glance at the girlsâ side of the room Beckyâs face troubled him. Considering all things, he did not want to pity her, and yet it was all he could do to help it. He could get up no exultation that was really worthy the name. Presently the spelling-book discovery was made, and Tomâs mind was entirely full of his own matters for a while after that. Becky roused up from her lethargy of distress and showed good interest in the proceedings. She did not expect that Tom could get out of his trouble by denying that he spilt the ink on the book himself; and she was right. The denial only seemed to make the thing worse for Tom. Becky supposed she would be glad of that, and she tried to believe she was glad of it, but she found she was not certain. When the worst came to the worst, she had an impulse to get up and tell on Alfred Temple, but she made an effort and forced herself to keep stillâbecause, said she to herself, âheâll tell about me tearing the picture sure. I wouldnât say a word, not to save his life!â
Tom took his whipping and went back to his seat not at all broken-hearted, for he thought it was possible that he had unknowingly upset the ink on the spelling-book himself, in some skylarking boutâhe had denied it for formâs sake and because it was custom, and had stuck to the denial from principle.
A whole hour drifted by, the master sat nodding in his throne, the air was drowsy with the hum of study. By and by, Mr. Dobbins straightened himself up, yawned, then unlocked his desk, and reached for his book, but seemed undecided whether to take it out or leave it. Most of the pupils glanced up languidly, but there were two among them that watched his movements with intent eyes. Mr. Dobbins fingered his book absently for a while, then took it out and settled himself in his chair to read! Tom shot a glance at Becky. He had seen a hunted and helpless rabbit look as she did, with a gun levelled at its head. Instantly he forgot his quarrel with her. Quickâsomething must be done! done in a flash, too! But the very imminence of the emergency paralyzed his invention. Good!âhe had an inspiration! He would run and snatch the book, spring through the door and fly. But his resolution shook for one little instant, and the chance was lostâthe master opened the volume. If Tom only had the wasted opportunity back again! Too late. There was no help for Becky now, he said. The next moment the master faced the school. Every eye sank under his gaze. There was that in it which smote even the innocent with fear. There was silence while one might count tenâthe master was gathering his wrath. Then he spoke: âWho tore this book?â
There was not a sound. One could have heard a pin drop. The stillness continued; the master searched face after face for signs of guilt.
âBenjamin Rogers, did you tear this book?â
A denial. Another pause.
âJoseph Harper, did you?â
Another denial. Tomâs uneasiness grew more and more intense under the slow torture of these proceedings. The master scanned the ranks of boysâconsidered a while, then turned to the girls:
âAmy Lawrence?â
A shake of the head.
âGracie Miller?â
The same sign.
âSusan Harper, did you do this?â
Another negative. The next girl was Becky Thatcher. Tom was trembling from head to foot with excitement and a sense of the hopelessness of the situation.
âRebecca Thatcherâ [Tom glanced at her faceâit was white with terror]ââdid you tearâno, look me in the faceâ [her hands rose in appeal]ââdid you tear this book?â
A thought shot like lightning through Tomâs brain. He sprang to his feet and shoutedââI done it!â

The school stared in perplexity at this incredible folly. Tom stood a moment, to gather his dismembered faculties; and when he stepped forward to go to his punishment the surprise, the gratitude, the adoration that shone upon him out of poor Beckyâs eyes seemed pay enough for a hundred floggings. Inspired by the splendor of his own act, he took without an outcry the most merciless flaying that even Mr. Dobbins had ever administered; and also received with indifference the added cruelty of a command to remain two hours after school should be dismissedâfor he knew who would wait for him outside till his captivity was done, and not count the tedious time as loss, either.
Tom went to bed that night planning vengeance against Alfred Temple; for with shame and repentance Becky had told him all, not forgetting her own treachery; but even the longing for vengeance had to give way, soon, to pleasanter musings, and he fell asleep at last with Beckyâs latest words lingering dreamily in his earâ
âTom, how could you be so noble!â

Chapter 21
Vacation was approaching. The schoolmaster, always severe, grew severer and more exacting than ever, for he wanted the school to make a good showing on âExaminationâ day. His rod and his ferule were seldom idle nowâat least among the smaller pupils. Only the biggest boys, and young ladies of eighteen and twenty, escaped lashing. Mr. Dobbinsâ lashings were very vigorous ones, too; for although he carried, under his wig, a perfectly bald and shiny head, he had only reached middle age, and there was no sign of feebleness in his muscle. As the great day approached, all the tyranny that was in him came to the surface; he seemed to take a vindictive pleasure in punishing the least shortcomings. The consequence was, that the smaller boys spent their days in terror and suffering and their nights in plotting revenge. They threw away no opportunity to do the master a mischief. But he kept ahead all the time. The retribution that followed every vengeful success was so sweeping and majestic that the boys always retired from the field badly worsted. At last they conspired together and hit upon a plan that promised a dazzling victory. They swore in the signpainterâs boy, told him the scheme, and asked his help. He had his own reasons for being delighted, for the master boarded in his fatherâs family and had given the boy ample cause to hate him. The masterâs wife would go on a visit to the country in a few days, and there would be nothing to interfere with the plan; the master always prepared himself for great occasions by getting pretty well fuddled, and the signpainterâs boy said that when the dominie had reached the proper condition on Examination Evening he would âmanage the thingâ while he napped in his chair; then he would have him awakened at the right time and hurried away to school.
In the fulness of time the interesting occasion arrived. At eight in the evening the schoolhouse was brilliantly lighted, and adorned with wreaths and festoons of foliage and flowers. The master sat throned in his great chair upon a raised platform, with his blackboard behind him. He was looking tolerably mellow. Three rows of benches on each side and six rows in front of him were occupied by the dignitaries of the town and by the parents of the pupils. To his left, back of the rows of citizens, was a spacious temporary platform upon which were seated the scholars who were to take part in the exercises of the evening; rows of small boys, washed and dressed to an intolerable state of discomfort; rows of gawky big boys; snowbanks of girls and young ladies clad in lawn and muslin and conspicuously conscious of their bare arms, their grandmothersâ ancient trinkets, their bits of pink and blue ribbon and the flowers in their hair. All the rest of the house was filled with non-participating scholars.

The exercises began. A very little boy stood up and sheepishly recited, âYouâd scarce expect one of my age to speak in public on the stage,â etc.âaccompanying himself with the painfully exact and spasmodic gestures which a machine might have usedâsupposing the machine to be a trifle out of order. But he got through safely, though cruelly scared, and got a fine round of applause when he made his manufactured bow and retired.
A little shamefaced girl lisped, âMary had a little lamb,â etc., performed a compassion-inspiring curtsy, got her meed of applause, and sat down flushed and happy.
Tom Sawyer stepped forward with conceited confidence and soared into the unquenchable and indestructible âGive me liberty or give me deathâ speech, with fine fury and frantic gesticulation, and broke down in the middle of it. A ghastly stage-fright seized him, his legs quaked under him and he was like to choke. True, he had the manifest sympathy of the house but he had the houseâs silence, too, which was even worse than its sympathy. The master frowned, and this completed the disaster. Tom struggled awhile and then retired, utterly defeated. There was a weak attempt at applause, but it died early.
âThe Boy Stood on the Burning Deckâ followed; also âThe Assyrian Came Down,â and other declamatory gems. Then there were reading exercises, and a spelling fight. The meagre Latin class recited with honor. The prime feature of the evening was in order, nowâoriginal âcompositionsâ by the young ladies. Each in her turn stepped forward to the edge of the platform, cleared her throat, held up her manuscript (tied with dainty ribbon), and proceeded to read, with labored attention to âexpressionâ and punctuation. The themes were the same that had been illuminated upon similar occasions by their mothers before them, their grandmothers, and doubtless all their ancestors in the female line clear back to the Crusades. âFriendshipâ was one; âMemories of Other Daysâ; âReligion in Historyâ; âDream Landâ; âThe Advantages of Cultureâ; âForms of Political Government Compared and Contrastedâ; âMelancholyâ; âFilial Loveâ; âHeart Longings,â etc., etc.

A prevalent feature in these compositions was a nursed and petted melancholy; another was a wasteful and opulent gush of âfine languageâ; another was a tendency to lug in by the ears particularly prized words and phrases until they were worn entirely out; and a peculiarity that conspicuously marked and marred them was the inveterate and intolerable sermon that wagged its crippled tail at the end of each and every one of them. No matter what the subject might be, a brainracking effort was made to squirm it into some aspect or other that the moral and religious mind could contemplate with edification. The glaring insincerity of these sermons was not sufficient to compass the banishment of the fashion from the schools, and it is not sufficient today; it never will be sufficient while the world stands, perhaps. There is no school in all our land where the young ladies do not feel obliged to close their compositions with a sermon; and you will find that the sermon of the most frivolous and the least religious girl in the school is always the longest and the most relentlessly pious. But enough of this. Homely truth is unpalatable.
Let us return to the âExamination.â The first composition that was read was one entitled âIs this, then, Life?â Perhaps the reader can endure an extract from it:
âIn the common walks of life, with what delightful emotions does the youthful mind look forward to some anticipated scene of festivity! Imagination is busy sketching rose-tinted pictures of joy. In fancy, the voluptuous votary of fashion sees herself amid the festive throng, âthe observed of all observers.â Her graceful form, arrayed in snowy robes, is whirling through the mazes of the joyous dance; her eye is brightest, her step is lightest in the gay assembly.
âIn such delicious fancies time quickly glides by, and the welcome hour arrives for her entrance into the Elysian world, of which she has had such bright dreams. How fairy-like does everything appear to her enchanted vision! Each new scene is more charming than the last. But after a while she finds that beneath this goodly exterior, all is vanity, the flattery which once charmed her soul, now grates harshly upon her ear; the ballroom has lost its charms; and with wasted health and imbittered heart, she turns away with the conviction that earthly pleasures cannot satisfy the longings of the soul!â
And so forth and so on. There was a buzz of gratification from time to time during the reading, accompanied by whispered ejaculations of âHow sweet!â âHow eloquent!â âSo true!â etc., and after the thing had closed with a peculiarly afflicting sermon the applause was enthusiastic.
Then arose a slim, melancholy girl, whose face had the âinterestingâ paleness that comes of pills and indigestion, and read a âpoem.â Two stanzas of it will do:
âA MISSOURI MAIDENâS FAREWELL TO ALABAMA
âAlabama, goodbye! I love thee well!
But yet for a while do I leave thee now!
Sad, yes, sad thoughts of thee my heart doth swell,
And burning recollections throng my brow!
For I have wandered through thy flowery woods;
Have roamed and read near Tallapoosaâs stream;
Have listened to Tallasseeâs warring floods,
And wooed on Coosaâs side Auroraâs beam.
âYet shame I not to bear an oâerfull heart,
Nor blush to turn behind my tearful eyes;
âTis from no stranger land I now must part,
âTis to no strangers left I yield these sighs.
Welcome and home were mine within this State,
Whose vales I leaveâwhose spires fade fast from me
And cold must be mine eyes, and heart, and tĂȘte,
When, dear Alabama! they turn cold on thee!â
There were very few there who knew what âtĂȘteâ meant, but the poem was very satisfactory, nevertheless.
Next appeared a black-eyed, black-haired young lady, who paused an impressive moment, assumed a tragic expression, and began to read in a measured, solemn tone:

A VISION
Dark and tempestuous was night. Around the throne on high not a single star quivered; but the deep intonations of the heavy thunder constantly vibrated upon the ear; whilst the terrific lightning revelled in angry mood through the cloudy chambers of heaven, seeming to scorn the power exerted over its terror by the illustrious Franklin! Even the boisterous winds unanimously came forth from their mystic homes, and blustered about as if to enhance by their aid the wildness of the scene.
At such a time, so dark, so dreary, for human sympathy my very spirit sighed; but instead thereof,
âMy dearest friend, my counsellor, my comforter and guideâ My joy in grief, my second bliss in joy,â came to my side.
She moved like one of those bright beings pictured in the sunny walks of fancyâs Eden by the romantic and young, a queen of beauty unadorned save by her own transcendent loveliness. So soft was her step, it failed to make even a sound, and but for the magical thrill imparted by her genial touch, as other unobtrusive beauties, she would have glided away unperceivedâunsought. A strange sadness rested upon her features, like icy tears upon the robe of December, as she pointed to the contending elements without, and bade me contemplate the two beings presented.
This nightmare occupied some ten pages of manuscript and wound up with a sermon so destructive of all hope to non-Presbyterians that it took the first prize. This composition was considered to be the very finest effort of the evening. The mayor of the village, in delivering the prize to the author of it, made a warm speech in which he said that it was by far the most âeloquentâ thing he had ever listened to, and that Daniel Webster himself might well be proud of it.
It may be remarked, in passing, that the number of compositions in which the word âbeauteousâ was over-fondled, and human experience referred to as âlifeâs page,â was up to the usual average.
Now the master, mellow almost to the verge of geniality, put his chair aside, turned his back to the audience, and began to draw a map of America on the blackboard, to exercise the geography class upon. But he made a sad business of it with his unsteady hand, and a smothered titter rippled over the house. He knew what the matter was, and set himself to right it. He sponged out lines and remade them; but he only distorted them more than ever, and the tittering was more pronounced. He threw his entire attention upon his work, now, as if determined not to be put down by the mirth. He felt that all eyes were fastened upon him; he imagined he was succeeding, and yet the tittering continued; it even manifestly increased. And well it might. There was a garret above, pierced with a scuttle over his head; and down through this scuttle came a cat, suspended around the haunches by a string; she had a rag tied about her head and jaws to keep her from mewing; as she slowly descended she curved upward and clawed at the string, she swung downward and clawed at the intangible air. The tittering rose higher and higherâthe cat was within six inches of the absorbed teacherâs headâdown, down, a little lower, and she grabbed his wig with her desperate claws, clung to it, and was snatched up into the garret in an instant with her trophy still in her possession! And how the light did blaze abroad from the masterâs bald pateâfor the signpainterâs boy had gilded it!

That broke up the meeting. The boys were avenged. Vacation had come.

Chapter 22
Tom joined the new order of Cadets of Temperance, being attracted by the showy character of their âregalia.â He promised to abstain from smoking, chewing, and profanity as long as he remained a member. Now he found out a new thingânamely, that to promise not to do a thing is the surest way in the world to make a body want to go and do that very thing. Tom soon found himself tormented with a desire to drink and swear; the desire grew to be so intense that nothing but the hope of a chance to display himself in his red sash kept him from withdrawing from the order. Fourth of July was coming; but he soon gave that upâgave it up before he had worn his shackles over forty-eight hoursâand fixed his hopes upon old Judge Frazer, justice of the peace, who was apparently on his deathbed and would have a big public funeral, since he was so high an official. During three days Tom was deeply concerned about the Judgeâs condition and hungry for news of it. Sometimes his hopes ran highâso high that he would venture to get out his regalia and practise before the looking-glass. But the Judge had a most discouraging way of fluctuating. At last he was pronounced upon the mendâand then convalescent. Tom was disgusted; and felt a sense of injury, too. He handed in his resignation at onceâand that night the Judge suffered a relapse and died. Tom resolved that he would never trust a man like that again.
The funeral was a fine thing. The Cadets paraded in a style calculated to kill the late member with envy. Tom was a free boy again, howeverâthere was something in that. He could drink and swear, nowâbut found to his surprise that he did not want to. The simple fact that he could, took the desire away, and the charm of it.
Tom presently wondered to find that his coveted vacation was beginning to hang a little heavily on his hands.
He attempted a diaryâbut nothing happened during three days, and so he abandoned it.
The first of all the minstrel shows came to town, and made a sensation. Tom and Joe Harper got up a band of performers and were happy for two days.
Even the Glorious Fourth was in some sense a failure, for it rained hard, there was no procession in consequence, and the greatest man in the world (as Tom supposed), Mr. Benton, an actual United States Senator, proved an overwhelming disappointmentâfor he was not twenty-five feet high, nor even anywhere in the neighborhood of it.
A circus came. The boys played circus for three days afterward in tents made of rag carpetingâadmission, three pins for boys, two for girlsâand then circusing was abandoned.
A phrenologist and a mesmerizer cameâand went again and left the village duller and drearier than ever.
There were some boys-and-girlsâ parties, but they were so few and so delightful that they only made the aching voids between ache the harder.
Becky Thatcher was gone to her Constantinople home to stay with her parents during vacationâso there was no bright side to life anywhere.
The dreadful secret of the murder was a chronic misery. It was a very cancer for permanency and pain.
Then came the measles.

During two long weeks Tom lay a prisoner, dead to the world and its happenings. He was very ill, he was interested in nothing. When he got upon his feet at last and moved feebly downtown, a melancholy change had come over everything and every creature. There had been a ârevival,â and everybody had âgot religion,â not only the adults, but even the boys and girls. Tom went about, hoping against hope for the sight of one blessed sinful face, but disappointment crossed him everywhere. He found Joe Harper studying a Testament, and turned sadly away from the depressing spectacle. He sought Ben Rogers, and found him visiting the poor with a basket of tracts. He hunted up Jim Hollis, who called his attention to the precious blessing of his late measles as a warning. Every boy he encountered added another ton to his depression; and when, in desperation, he flew for refuge at last to the bosom of Huckleberry Finn and was received with a Scriptural quotation, his heart broke and he crept home and to bed realizing that he alone of all the town was lost, forever and forever.
And that night there came on a terrific storm, with driving rain, awful claps of thunder and blinding sheets of lightning. He covered his head with the bedclothes and waited in a horror of suspense for his doom; for he had not the shadow of a doubt that all this hubbub was about him. He believed he had taxed the forbearance of the powers above to the extremity of endurance and that this was the result. It might have seemed to him a waste of pomp and ammunition to kill a bug with a battery of artillery, but there seemed nothing incongruous about the getting up such an expensive thunderstorm as this to knock the turf from under an insect like himself.
By and by the tempest spent itself and died without accomplishing its object. The boyâs first impulse was to be grateful, and reform. His second was to waitâfor there might not be any more storms.
The next day the doctors were back; Tom had relapsed. The three weeks he spent on his back this time seemed an entire age. When he got abroad at last he was hardly grateful that he had been spared, remembering how lonely was his estate, how companionless and forlorn he was. He drifted listlessly down the street and found Jim Hollis acting as judge in a juvenile court that was trying a cat for murder, in the presence of her victim, a bird. He found Joe Harper and Huck Finn up an alley eating a stolen melon. Poor lads! theyâlike Tomâhad suffered a relapse.

Chapter 23
At last the sleepy atmosphere was stirredâand vigorously: the murder trial came on in the court. It became the absorbing topic of village talk immediately. Tom could not get away from it. Every reference to the murder sent a shudder to his heart, for his troubled conscience and fears almost persuaded him that these remarks were put forth in his hearing as âfeelersâ; he did not see how he could be suspected of knowing anything about the murder, but still he could not be comfortable in the midst of this gossip. It kept him in a cold shiver all the time. He took Huck to a lonely place to have a talk with him. It would be some relief to unseal his tongue for a little while; to divide his burden of distress with another sufferer. Moreover, he wanted to assure himself that Huck had remained discreet.
âHuck, have you ever told anybody aboutâthat?â
ââBout what?â
âYou know what.â
âOhââcourse I havenât.â
âNever a word?â
âNever a solitary word, so help me. What makes you ask?â
âWell, I was afeard.â
âWhy, Tom Sawyer, we wouldnât be alive two days if that got found out. You know that.â
Tom felt more comfortable. After a pause:
âHuck, they couldnât anybody get you to tell, could they?â
âGet me to tell? Why, if I wanted that devil to drownd me they could get me to tell. They ainât no different way.â
âWell, thatâs all right, then. I reckon weâre safe as long as we keep mum. But letâs swear again, anyway. Itâs more surer.â
âIâm agreed.â
So they swore again with dread solemnities.
âWhat is the talk around, Huck? Iâve heard a power of it.â
âTalk? Well, itâs just Muff Potter, Muff Potter, Muff Potter all the time. It keeps me in a sweat, constant, soâs I want to hide somâers.â
âThatâs just the same way they go on round me. I reckon heâs a goner. Donât you feel sorry for him, sometimes?â
âMost alwaysâmost always. He ainât no account; but then he hainât ever done anything to hurt anybody. Just fishes a little, to get money to get drunk onâand loafs around considerable; but lord, we all do thatâleastways most of usâpreachers and such like. But heâs kind of goodâhe give me half a fish, once, when there warnât enough for two; and lots of times heâs kind of stood by me when I was out of luck.â
âWell, heâs mended kites for me, Huck, and knitted hooks on to my line. I wish we could get him out of there.â
âMy! we couldnât get him out, Tom. And besides, âtwouldnât do any good; theyâd ketch him again.â
âYesâso they would. But I hate to hear âem abuse him so like the dickens when he never doneâthat.â
âI do too, Tom. Lord, I hear âem say heâs the bloodiest looking villain in this country, and they wonder he wasnât ever hung before.â
âYes, they talk like that, all the time. Iâve heard âem say that if he was to get free theyâd lynch him.â
âAnd theyâd do it, too.â
The boys had a long talk, but it brought them little comfort. As the twilight drew on, they found themselves hanging about the neighborhood of the little isolated jail, perhaps with an undefined hope that something would happen that might clear away their difficulties. But nothing happened; there seemed to be no angels or fairies interested in this luckless captive.
The boys did as they had often done beforeâwent to the cell grating and gave Potter some tobacco and matches. He was on the ground floor and there were no guards.

His gratitude for their gifts had always smote their consciences beforeâit cut deeper than ever, this time. They felt cowardly and treacherous to the last degree when Potter said:
âYouâve been mighty good to me, boysâbetterân anybody else in this town. And I donât forget it, I donât. Often I says to myself, says I, âI used to mend all the boysâ kites and things, and show âem where the good fishinâ places was, and befriend âem what I could, and now theyâve all forgot old Muff when heâs in trouble; but Tom donât, and Huck donâtâthey donât forget him,â says I, âand I donât forget them.â Well, boys, I done an awful thingâdrunk and crazy at the timeâthatâs the only way I account for itâand now I got to swing for it, and itâs right. Right, and best, too, I reckonâhope so, anyway. Well, we wonât talk about that. I donât want to make you feel bad; youâve befriended me. But what I want to say, is, donât you ever get drunkâthen you wonât ever get here. Stand a litter furder westâsoâthatâs it; itâs a prime comfort to see faces thatâs friendly when a bodyâs in such a muck of trouble, and there donât none come here but yourn. Good friendly facesâgood friendly faces. Git up on one anotherâs backs and let me touch âem. Thatâs it. Shake handsâyournâll come through the bars, but mineâs too big. Little hands, and weakâbut theyâve helped Muff Potter a power, and theyâd help him more if they could.â
Tom went home miserable, and his dreams that night were full of horrors. The next day and the day after, he hung about the courtroom, drawn by an almost irresistible impulse to go in, but forcing himself to stay out. Huck was having the same experience. They studiously avoided each other. Each wandered away, from time to time, but the same dismal fascination always brought them back presently. Tom kept his ears open when idlers sauntered out of the courtroom, but invariably heard distressing newsâthe toils were closing more and more relentlessly around poor Potter. At the end of the second day the village talk was to the effect that Joeâs evidence stood firm and unshaken, and that there was not the slightest question as to what the juryâs verdict would be.
Tom was out late, that night, and came to bed through the window. He was in a tremendous state of excitement. It was hours before he got to sleep. All the village flocked to the courthouse the next morning, for this was to be the great day. Both sexes were about equally represented in the packed audience. After a long wait the jury filed in and took their places; shortly afterward, Potter, pale and haggard, timid and hopeless, was brought in, with chains upon him, and seated where all the curious eyes could stare at him; no less conspicuous was Joe, stolid as ever. There was another pause, and then the judge arrived and the sheriff proclaimed the opening of the court. The usual whisperings among the lawyers and gathering together of papers followed. These details and accompanying delays worked up an atmosphere of preparation that was as impressive as it was fascinating.
Now a witness was called who testified that he found Muff Potter washing in the brook, at an early hour of the morning that the murder was discovered, and that he immediately sneaked away. After some further questioning, counsel for the prosecution said:
âTake the witness.â
The prisoner raised his eyes for a moment, but dropped them again when his own counsel said:
âI have no questions to ask him.â
The next witness proved the finding of the knife near the corpse. Counsel for the prosecution said:
âTake the witness.â
âI have no questions to ask him,â Potterâs lawyer replied.
A third witness swore he had often seen the knife in Potterâs possession.
âTake the witness.â
Counsel for Potter declined to question him. The faces of the audience began to betray annoyance. Did this attorney mean to throw away his clientâs life without an effort?
Several witnesses deposed concerning Potterâs guilty behavior when brought to the scene of the murder. They were allowed to leave the stand without being cross-questioned.
Every detail of the damaging circumstances that occurred in the graveyard upon that morning which all present remembered so well was brought out by credible witnesses, but none of them were cross-examined by Potterâs lawyer. The perplexity and dissatisfaction of the house expressed itself in murmurs and provoked a reproof from the bench. Counsel for the prosecution now said:
âBy the oaths of citizens whose simple word is above suspicion, we have fastened this awful crime, beyond all possibility of question, upon the unhappy prisoner at the bar. We rest our case here.â
A groan escaped from poor Potter, and he put his face in his hands and rocked his body softly to and fro, while a painful silence reigned in the courtroom. Many men were moved, and many womenâs compassion testified itself in tears. Counsel for the defence rose and said:
âYour honor, in our remarks at the opening of this trial, we foreshadowed our purpose to prove that our client did this fearful deed while under the influence of a blind and irresponsible delirium produced by drink. We have changed our mind. We shall not offer that plea.â [Then to the clerk:] âCall Thomas Sawyer!â
A puzzled amazement awoke in every face in the house, not even excepting Potterâs. Every eye fastened itself with wondering interest upon Tom as he rose and took his place upon the stand. The boy looked wild enough, for he was badly scared. The oath was administered.

âThomas Sawyer, where were you on the seventeenth of June, about the hour of midnight?â
Tom glanced at Joeâs iron face and his tongue failed him. The audience listened breathless, but the words refused to come. After a few moments, however, the boy got a little of his strength back, and managed to put enough of it into his voice to make part of the house hear:
âIn the graveyard!â
âA little bit louder, please. Donât be afraid. You wereââ
âIn the graveyard.â
A contemptuous smile flitted across Joeâs face.
âWere you anywhere near Horse Williamsâ grave?â
âYes, sir.â
âSpeak upâjust a trifle louder. How near were you?â
âNear as I am to you.â
âWere you hidden, or not?â
âI was hid.â
âWhere?â
âBehind the elms thatâs on the edge of the grave.â
Joe gave a barely perceptible start.
âAny one with you?â
âYes, sir. I went there withââ
âWaitâwait a moment. Never mind mentioning your companionâs name. We will produce him at the proper time. Did you carry anything there with you.â
Tom hesitated and looked confused.
âSpeak out, my boyâdonât be diffident. The truth is always respectable. What did you take there?â
âOnly aâaâdead cat.â
There was a ripple of mirth, which the court checked.
âWe will produce the skeleton of that cat. Now, my boy, tell us everything that occurredâtell it in your own wayâdonât skip anything, and donât be afraid.â
Tom beganâhesitatingly at first, but as he warmed to his subject his words flowed more and more easily; in a little while every sound ceased but his own voice; every eye fixed itself upon him; with parted lips and bated breath the audience hung upon his words, taking no note of time, rapt in the ghastly fascinations of the tale. The strain upon pent emotion reached its climax when the boy said:
ââand as the doctor fetched the board around and Muff Potter fell, Joe jumped with the knife andââ
Crash! Quick as lightning the criminal sprang for a window, tore his way through all opposers, and was gone!

Chapter 24
Tom was a glittering hero once moreâthe pet of the old, the envy of the young. His name even went into immortal print, for the village paper magnified him. There were some that believed he would be President, yet, if he escaped hanging.
As usual, the fickle, unreasoning world took Muff Potter to its bosom and fondled him as lavishly as it had abused him before. But that sort of conduct is to the worldâs credit; therefore it is not well to find fault with it.
Tomâs days were days of splendor and exultation to him, but his nights were seasons of horror. Joe infested all his dreams, and always with doom in his eye. Hardly any temptation could persuade the boy to stir abroad after nightfall. Poor Huck was in the same state of wretchedness and terror, for Tom had told the whole story to the lawyer the night before the great day of the trial, and Huck was sore afraid that his share in the business might leak out, yet, notwithstanding Joeâs flight had saved him the suffering of testifying in court. The poor fellow had got the attorney to promise secrecy, but what of that? Since Tomâs harassed conscience had managed to drive him to the lawyerâs house by night and wring a dread tale from lips that had been sealed with the dismalest and most formidable of oaths, Huckâs confidence in the human race was wellnigh obliterated.

Daily Muff Potterâs gratitude made Tom glad he had spoken; but nightly he wished he had sealed up his tongue.
Half the time Tom was afraid Joe would never be captured; the other half he was afraid he would be. He felt sure he never could draw a safe breath again until that man was dead and he had seen the corpse.
Rewards had been offered, the country had been scoured, but no Joe was found. One of those omniscient and awe-inspiring marvels, a detective, came up from St. Louis, moused around, shook his head, looked wise, and made that sort of astounding success which members of that craft usually achieve. That is to say, he âfound a clew.â But you canât hang a âclewâ for murder, and so after that detective had got through and gone home, Tom felt just as insecure as he was before.
The slow days drifted on, and each left behind it a slightly lightened weight of apprehension.
Chapter 25
There comes a time in every rightly-constructed boyâs life when he has a raging desire to go somewhere and dig for hidden treasure. This desire suddenly came upon Tom one day. He sallied out to find Joe Harper, but failed of success. Next he sought Ben Rogers; he had gone fishing. Presently he stumbled upon Huck Finn the Red-Handed. Huck would answer. Tom took him to a private place and opened the matter to him confidentially. Huck was willing. Huck was always willing to take a hand in any enterprise that offered entertainment and required no capital, for he had a troublesome superabundance of that sort of time which is not money. âWhereâll we dig?â said Huck.
âOh, most anywhere.â
âWhy, is it hid all around?â
âNo, indeed it ainât. Itâs hid in mighty particular places, Huckâsometimes on islands, sometimes in rotten chests under the end of a limb of an old dead tree, just where the shadow falls at midnight; but mostly under the floor in haânted houses.â
âWho hides it?â
âWhy, robbers, of courseâwhoâd you reckon? Sunday-school supârintendents?â
âI donât know. If âtwas mine I wouldnât hide it; Iâd spend it and have a good time.â
âSo would I. But robbers donât do that way. They always hide it and leave it there.â

âDonât they come after it any more?â
âNo, they think they will, but they generally forget the marks, or else they die. Anyway, it lays there a long time and gets rusty; and by and by somebody finds an old yellow paper that tells how to find the marksâa paper thatâs got to be ciphered over about a week because itâs mostly signs and hyâroglyphics.â
âHyroâwhich?â
âHyâroglyphicsâpictures and things, you know, that donât seem to mean anything.â
âHave you got one of them papers, Tom?â
âNo.â
âWell then, how you going to find the marks?â
âI donât want any marks. They always bury it under a haânted house or on an island, or under a dead tree thatâs got one limb sticking out. Well, weâve tried Jacksonâs Island a little, and we can try it again some time; and thereâs the old haânted house up the Still-House branch, and thereâs lots of dead-limb treesâdead loads of âem.â
âIs it under all of them?â
âHow you talk! No!â
âThen how you going to know which one to go for?â
âGo for all of âem!â
âWhy, Tom, itâll take all summer.â
âWell, what of that? Suppose you find a brass pot with a hundred dollars in it, all rusty and gray, or rotten chest full of diâmonds. Howâs that?â
Huckâs eyes glowed.
âThatâs bully. Plenty bully enough for me. Just you gimme the hundred dollars and I donât want no diâmonds.â
âAll right. But I bet you I ainât going to throw off on diâmonds. Some of âemâs worth twenty dollars apieceâthere ainât any, hardly, butâs worth six bits or a dollar.â
âNo! Is that so?â
âCertânlyâanybodyâll tell you so. Hainât you ever seen one, Huck?â
âNot as I remember.â
âOh, kings have slathers of them.â
âWell, I donâ know no kings, Tom.â
âI reckon you donât. But if you was to go to Europe youâd see a raft of âem hopping around.â
âDo they hop?â
âHop?âyour granny! No!â
âWell, what did you say they did, for?â
âShucks, I only meant youâd see âemânot hopping, of courseâwhat do they want to hop for?âbut I mean youâd just see âemâscattered around, you know, in a kind of a general way. Like that old humpbacked Richard.â
âRichard? Whatâs his other name?â
âHe didnât have any other name. Kings donât have any but a given name.â
âNo?â
âBut they donât.â
âWell, if they like it, Tom, all right; but I donât want to be a king and have only just a given name. But sayâwhere you going to dig first?â

âWell, I donât know. Sâpose we tackle that old dead-limb tree on the hill tâother side of Still-House branch?â
âIâm agreed.â
So they got a crippled pick and a shovel, and set out on their three-mile tramp. They arrived hot and panting, and threw themselves down in the shade of a neighboring elm to rest and have a smoke.
âI like this,â said Tom.
âSo do I.â
âSay, Huck, if we find a treasure here, what you going to do with your share?â
âWell, Iâll have pie and a glass of soda every day, and Iâll go to every circus that comes along. I bet Iâll have a gay time.â
âWell, ainât you going to save any of it?â
âSave it? What for?â
âWhy, so as to have something to live on, by and by.â
âOh, that ainât any use. Pap would come back to thish-yer town some day and get his claws on it if I didnât hurry up, and I tell you heâd clean it out pretty quick. What you going to do with yourn, Tom?â
âIâm going to buy a new drum, and a sureânough sword, and a red necktie and a bull pup, and get married.â
âMarried!â
âThatâs it.â
âTom, youâwhy, you ainât in your right mind.â
âWaitâyouâll see.â
âWell, thatâs the foolishest thing you could do. Look at pap and my mother. Fight! Why, they used to fight all the time. I remember, mighty well.â
âThat ainât anything. The girl Iâm going to marry wonât fight.â
âTom, I reckon theyâre all alike. Theyâll all comb a body. Now you better think âbout this awhile. I tell you you better. Whatâs the name of the gal?â
âIt ainât a gal at allâitâs a girl.â
âItâs all the same, I reckon; some says gal, some says girlâbothâs right, like enough. Anyway, whatâs her name, Tom?â
âIâll tell you some timeânot now.â
âAll rightâthatâll do. Only if you get married Iâll be more lonesomer than ever.â
âNo you wonât. Youâll come and live with me. Now stir out of this and weâll go to digging.â
They worked and sweated for half an hour. No result. They toiled another halfhour. Still no result. Huck said:
âDo they always bury it as deep as this?â
âSometimesânot always. Not generally. I reckon we havenât got the right place.â

So they chose a new spot and began again. The labor dragged a little, but still they made progress. They pegged away in silence for some time. Finally Huck leaned on his shovel, swabbed the beaded drops from his brow with his sleeve, and said:
âWhere you going to dig next, after we get this one?â
âI reckon maybe weâll tackle the old tree thatâs over yonder on Cardiff Hill back of the widowâs.â
âI reckon thatâll be a good one. But wonât the widow take it away from us, Tom? Itâs on her land.â
âShe take it away! Maybe sheâd like to try it once. Whoever finds one of these hid treasures, it belongs to him. It donât make any difference whose land itâs on.â
That was satisfactory. The work went on. By and by Huck said:
âBlame it, we must be in the wrong place again. What do you think?â
âIt is mighty curious, Huck. I donât understand it. Sometimes witches interfere. I reckon maybe thatâs whatâs the trouble now.â
âShucks! Witches ainât got no power in the daytime.â
âWell, thatâs so. I didnât think of that. Oh, I know what the matter is! What a blamed lot of fools we are! You got to find out where the shadow of the limb falls at midnight, and thatâs where you dig!â
âThen consound it, weâve fooled away all this work for nothing. Now hang it all, we got to come back in the night. Itâs an awful long way. Can you get out?â
âI bet I will. Weâve got to do it tonight, too, because if somebody sees these holes theyâll know in a minute whatâs here and theyâll go for it.â
âWell, Iâll come around and maow tonight.â
âAll right. Letâs hide the tools in the bushes.â
The boys were there that night, about the appointed time. They sat in the shadow waiting. It was a lonely place, and an hour made solemn by old traditions. Spirits whispered in the rustling leaves, ghosts lurked in the murky nooks, the deep baying of a hound floated up out of the distance, an owl answered with his sepulchral note. The boys were subdued by these solemnities, and talked little. By and by they judged that twelve had come; they marked where the shadow fell, and began to dig. Their hopes commenced to rise. Their interest grew stronger, and their industry kept pace with it. The hole deepened and still deepened, but every time their hearts jumped to hear the pick strike upon something, they only suffered a new disappointment. It was only a stone or a chunk. At last Tom said:
âIt ainât any use, Huck, weâre wrong again.â
âWell, but we canât be wrong. We spotted the shadder to a dot.â
âI know it, but then thereâs another thing.â
âWhatâs that?â
âWhy, we only guessed at the time. Like enough it was too late or too early.â
Huck dropped his shovel.
âThatâs it,â said he. âThatâs the very trouble. We got to give this one up. We canât ever tell the right time, and besides this kind of thingâs too awful, here this time of night with witches and ghosts a-fluttering around so. I feel as if somethingâs behind me all the time; and Iâm afeard to turn around, becuz maybe thereâs others in front a-waiting for a chance. I been creeping all over, ever since I got here.â
âWell, Iâve been pretty much so, too, Huck. They most always put in a dead man when they bury a treasure under a tree, to look out for it.â
âLordy!â
âYes, they do. Iâve always heard that.â
âTom, I donât like to fool around much where thereâs dead people. A bodyâs bound to get into trouble with âem, sure.â
âI donât like to stir âem up, either. Sâpose this one here was to stick his skull out and say something!â
âDonât Tom! Itâs awful.â
âWell, it just is. Huck, I donât feel comfortable a bit.â
âSay, Tom, letâs give this place up, and try somewheres else.â
âAll right, I reckon we better.â
âWhatâll it be?â
Tom considered awhile; and then said:
âThe haânted house. Thatâs it!â
âBlame it, I donât like haânted houses, Tom. Why, theyâre a dern sight worseân dead people. Dead people might talk, maybe, but they donât come sliding around in a shroud, when you ainât noticing, and peep over your shoulder all of a sudden and grit their teeth, the way a ghost does. I couldnât stand such a thing as that, Tomânobody could.â
âYes, but, Huck, ghosts donât travel around only at night. They wonât hender us from digging there in the daytime.â
âWell, thatâs so. But you know mighty well people donât go about that haânted house in the day nor the night.â
âWell, thatâs mostly because they donât like to go where a manâs been murdered, anywayâbut nothingâs ever been seen around that house except in the nightâjust some blue lights slipping by the windowsâno regular ghosts.â
âWell, where you see one of them blue lights flickering around, Tom, you can bet thereâs a ghost mighty close behind it. It stands to reason. Becuz you know that they donât anybody but ghosts use âem.â
âYes, thatâs so. But anyway they donât come around in the daytime, so whatâs the use of our being afeard?â
âWell, all right. Weâll tackle the haânted house if you say soâbut I reckon itâs taking chances.â

They had started down the hill by this time. There in the middle of the moonlit valley below them stood the âhaântedâ house, utterly isolated, its fences gone long ago, rank weeds smothering the very doorsteps, the chimney crumbled to ruin, the window-sashes vacant, a corner of the roof caved in. The boys gazed awhile, half expecting to see a blue light flit past a window; then talking in a low tone, as befitted the time and the circumstances, they struck far off to the right, to give the haunted house a wide berth, and took their way homeward through the woods that adorned the rearward side of Cardiff Hill.
Chapter 26
About noon the next day the boys arrived at the dead tree; they had come for their tools. Tom was impatient to go to the haunted house; Huck was measurably so, alsoâbut suddenly said:
âLookyhere, Tom, do you know what day it is?â
Tom mentally ran over the days of the week, and then quickly lifted his eyes with a startled look in themâ
âMy! I never once thought of it, Huck!â
âWell, I didnât neither, but all at once it popped onto me that it was Friday.â
âBlame it, a body canât be too careful, Huck. We might âaâ got into an awful scrape, tackling such a thing on a Friday.â
âMight! Better say we would! Thereâs some lucky days, maybe, but Friday ainât.â
âAny fool knows that. I donât reckon you was the first that found it out, Huck.â
âWell, I never said I was, did I? And Friday ainât all, neither. I had a rotten bad dream last nightâdreampt about rats.â
âNo! Sure sign of trouble. Did they fight?â
âNo.â
âWell, thatâs good, Huck. When they donât fight itâs only a sign that thereâs trouble around, you know. All we got to do is to look mighty sharp and keep out of it. Weâll drop this thing for today, and play. Do you know Robin Hood, Huck?â
âNo. Whoâs Robin Hood?â
âWhy, he was one of the greatest men that was ever in Englandâand the best. He was a robber.â

âCracky, I wisht I was. Who did he rob?â
âOnly sheriffs and bishops and rich people and kings, and such like. But he never bothered the poor. He loved âem. He always divided up with âem perfectly square.â
âWell, he must âaâ been a brick.â
âI bet you he was, Huck. Oh, he was the noblest man that ever was. They ainât any such men now, I can tell you. He could lick any man in England, with one hand tied behind him; and he could take his yew bow and plug a ten-cent piece every time, a mile and a half.â
âWhatâs a yew bow?â
âI donât know. Itâs some kind of a bow, of course. And if he hit that dime only on the edge he would set down and cryâand curse. But weâll play Robin Hoodâitâs nobby fun. Iâll learn you.â
âIâm agreed.â
So they played Robin Hood all the afternoon, now and then casting a yearning eye down upon the haunted house and passing a remark about the morrowâs prospects and possibilities there. As the sun began to sink into the west they took their way homeward athwart the long shadows of the trees and soon were buried from sight in the forests of Cardiff Hill.
On Saturday, shortly after noon, the boys were at the dead tree again. They had a smoke and a chat in the shade, and then dug a little in their last hole, not with great hope, but merely because Tom said there were so many cases where people had given up a treasure after getting down within six inches of it, and then somebody else had come along and turned it up with a single thrust of a shovel. The thing failed this time, however, so the boys shouldered their tools and went away feeling that they had not trifled with fortune, but had fulfilled all the requirements that belong to the business of treasure-hunting.
When they reached the haunted house there was something so weird and grisly about the dead silence that reigned there under the baking sun, and something so depressing about the loneliness and desolation of the place, that they were afraid, for a moment, to venture in. Then they crept to the door and took a trembling peep. They saw a weedgrown, floorless room, unplastered, an ancient fireplace, vacant windows, a ruinous staircase; and here, there, and everywhere hung ragged and abandoned cobwebs. They presently entered, softly, with quickened pulses, talking in whispers, ears alert to catch the slightest sound, and muscles tense and ready for instant retreat.
In a little while familiarity modified their fears and they gave the place a critical and interested examination, rather admiring their own boldness, and wondering at it, too. Next they wanted to look upstairs. This was something like cutting off retreat, but they got to daring each other, and of course there could be but one resultâthey threw their tools into a corner and made the ascent. Up there were the same signs of decay. In one corner they found a closet that promised mystery, but the promise was a fraudâthere was nothing in it. Their courage was up now and well in hand. They were about to go down and begin work whenâ
âSh!â said Tom.
âWhat is it?â whispered Huck, blanching with fright.
âSh!⊠There!⊠Hear it?â
âYes!⊠Oh, my! Letâs run!â
âKeep still! Donât you budge! Theyâre coming right toward the door.â
The boys stretched themselves upon the floor with their eyes to knotholes in the planking, and lay waiting, in a misery of fear.
âTheyâve stoppedâŠ. NoâcomingâŠ. Here they are. Donât whisper another word, Huck. My goodness, I wish I was out of this!â
Two men entered. Each boy said to himself: âThereâs the old deaf and dumb Spaniard thatâs been about town once or twice latelyânever saw tâother man before.â
âTâotherâ was a ragged, unkempt creature, with nothing very pleasant in his face. The Spaniard was wrapped in a serape; he had bushy white whiskers; long white hair flowed from under his sombrero, and he wore green goggles. When they came in, âtâotherâ was talking in a low voice; they sat down on the ground, facing the door, with their backs to the wall, and the speaker continued his remarks. His manner became less guarded and his words more distinct as he proceeded:
âNo,â said he, âIâve thought it all over, and I donât like it. Itâs dangerous.â
âDangerous!â grunted the âdeaf and dumbâ Spaniardâto the vast surprise of the boys. âMilksop!â
This voice made the boys gasp and quake. It was Joeâs! There was silence for some time. Then Joe said:
âWhatâs any more dangerous than that job up yonderâbut nothingâs come of it.â
âThatâs different. Away up the river so, and not another house about. âTwonât ever be known that we tried, anyway, long as we didnât succeed.â
âWell, whatâs more dangerous than coming here in the daytime!âanybody would suspicion us that saw us.â
âI know that. But there warnât any other place as handy after that fool of a job. I want to quit this shanty. I wanted to yesterday, only it warnât any use trying to stir out of here, with those infernal boys playing over there on the hill right in full view.â
âThose infernal boysâ quaked again under the inspiration of this remark, and thought how lucky it was that they had remembered it was Friday and concluded to wait a day. They wished in their hearts they had waited a year.
The two men got out some food and made a luncheon. After a long and thoughtful silence, Joe said:
âLook here, ladâyou go back up the river where you belong. Wait there till you hear from me. Iâll take the chances on dropping into this town just once more, for a look. Weâll do that âdangerousâ job after Iâve spied around a little and think things look well for it. Then for Texas! Weâll leg it together!â
This was satisfactory. Both men presently fell to yawning, and Joe said:
âIâm dead for sleep! Itâs your turn to watch.â
He curled down in the weeds and soon began to snore. His comrade stirred him once or twice and he became quiet. Presently the watcher began to nod; his head drooped lower and lower, both men began to snore now.
The boys drew a long, grateful breath. Tom whispered:
âNowâs our chanceâcome!â
Huck said:
âI canâtâIâd die if they was to wake.â
Tom urgedâHuck held back. At last Tom rose slowly and softly, and started alone. But the first step he made wrung such a hideous creak from the crazy floor that he sank down almost dead with fright. He never made a second attempt. The boys lay there counting the dragging moments till it seemed to them that time must be done and eternity growing gray; and then they were grateful to note that at last the sun was setting.
Now one snore ceased. Joe sat up, stared aroundâsmiled grimly upon his comrade, whose head was drooping upon his kneesâstirred him up with his foot and said:
âHere! Youâre a watchman, ainât you! All right, thoughânothingâs happened.â
âMy! have I been asleep?â
âOh, partly, partly. Nearly time for us to be moving, pard. Whatâll we do with what little swag weâve got left?â
âI donât knowâleave it here as weâve always done, I reckon. No use to take it away till we start south. Six hundred and fifty in silverâs something to carry.â
âWellâall rightâit wonât matter to come here once more.â
âNoâbut Iâd say come in the night as we used to doâitâs better.â
âYes: but look here; it may be a good while before I get the right chance at that job; accidents might happen; âtainât in such a very good place; weâll just regularly bury itâand bury it deep.â
âGood idea,â said the comrade, who walked across the room, knelt down, raised one of the rearward hearth-stones and took out a bag that jingled pleasantly. He subtracted from it twenty or thirty dollars for himself and as much for Joe, and passed the bag to the latter, who was on his knees in the corner, now, digging with his bowie-knife.
The boys forgot all their fears, all their miseries in an instant. With gloating eyes they watched every movement. Luck!âthe splendor of it was beyond all imagination! Six hundred dollars was money enough to make half a dozen boys rich! Here was treasure-hunting under the happiest auspicesâthere would not be any bothersome uncertainty as to where to dig. They nudged each other every momentâeloquent nudges and easily understood, for they simply meantââOh, but ainât you glad now weâre here!â
Joeâs knife struck upon something.
âHello!â said he.
âWhat is it?â said his comrade.
âHalf-rotten plankâno, itâs a box, I believe. Hereâbear a hand and weâll see what itâs here for. Never mind, Iâve broke a hole.â
He reached his hand in and drew it outâ
âMan, itâs money!â
The two men examined the handful of coins. They were gold. The boys above were as excited as themselves, and as delighted.
Joeâs comrade said:
âWeâll make quick work of this. Thereâs an old rusty pick over amongst the weeds in the corner the other side of the fireplaceâI saw it a minute ago.â
He ran and brought the boysâ pick and shovel. Joe took the pick, looked it over critically, shook his head, muttered something to himself, and then began to use it. The box was soon unearthed. It was not very large; it was iron bound and had been very strong before the slow years had injured it. The men contemplated the treasure awhile in blissful silence.
âPard, thereâs thousands of dollars here,â said Joe.

ââTwas always said that Murrelâs gang used to be around here one summer,â the stranger observed.
âI know it,â said Joe; âand this looks like it, I should say.â
âNow you wonât need to do that job.â
The criminal frowned. Said he:
âYou donât know me. Least you donât know all about that thing. âTainât robbery altogetherâitâs revenge!â and a wicked light flamed in his eyes. âIâll need your help in it. When itâs finishedâthen Texas. Go home to your Nance and your kids, and stand by till you hear from me.â
âWellâif you say so; whatâll we do with thisâbury it again?â
âYes. [Ravishing delight overhead.] No! by the great Sachem, no! [Profound distress overhead.] Iâd nearly forgot. That pick had fresh earth on it! [The boys were sick with terror in a moment.] What business has a pick and a shovel here? What business with fresh earth on them? Who brought them hereâand where are they gone? Have you heard anybody?âseen anybody? What! bury it again and leave them to come and see the ground disturbed? Not exactlyânot exactly. Weâll take it to my den.â
âWhy, of course! Might have thought of that before. You mean Number One?â
âNoâNumber Twoâunder the cross. The other place is badâtoo common.â
âAll right. Itâs nearly dark enough to start.â
Joe got up and went about from window to window cautiously peeping out. Presently he said:
âWho could have brought those tools here? Do you reckon they can be upstairs?â
The boysâ breath forsook them. Joe put his hand on his knife, halted a moment, undecided, and then turned toward the stairway. The boys thought of the closet, but their strength was gone. The steps came creaking up the stairsâthe intolerable distress of the situation woke the stricken resolution of the ladsâthey were about to spring for the closet, when there was a crash of rotten timbers and Joe landed on the ground amid the debris of the ruined stairway. He gathered himself up cursing, and his comrade said:
âNow whatâs the use of all that? If itâs anybody, and theyâre up there, let them stay thereâwho cares? If they want to jump down, now, and get into trouble, who objects? It will be dark in fifteen minutesâand then let them follow us if they want to. Iâm willing. In my opinion, whoever hove those things in here caught a sight of us and took us for ghosts or devils or something. Iâll bet theyâre running yet.â

Joe grumbled awhile; then he agreed with his friend that what daylight was left ought to be economized in getting things ready for leaving. Shortly afterward they slipped out of the house in the deepening twilight, and moved toward the river with their precious box.
Tom and Huck rose up, weak but vastly relieved, and stared after them through the chinks between the logs of the house. Follow? Not they. They were content to reach ground again without broken necks, and take the townward track over the hill. They did not talk much. They were too much absorbed in hating themselvesâhating the ill luck that made them take the spade and the pick there. But for that, Joe never would have suspected. He would have hidden the silver with the gold to wait there till his ârevengeâ was satisfied, and then he would have had the misfortune to find that money turn up missing. Bitter, bitter luck that the tools were ever brought there!
They resolved to keep a lookout for that Spaniard when he should come to town spying out for chances to do his revengeful job, and follow him to âNumber Two,â wherever that might be. Then a ghastly thought occurred to Tom.
âRevenge? What if he means us, Huck!â
âOh, donât!â said Huck, nearly fainting.
They talked it all over, and as they entered town they agreed to believe that he might possibly mean somebody elseâat least that he might at least mean nobody but Tom, since only Tom had testified.
Very, very small comfort it was to Tom to be alone in danger! Company would be a palpable improvement, he thought.
Chapter 27
The adventure of the day mightily tormented Tomâs dreams that night. Four times he had his hands on that rich treasure and four times it wasted to nothingness in his fingers as sleep forsook him and wakefulness brought back the hard reality of his misfortune. As he lay in the early morning recalling the incidents of his great adventure, he noticed that they seemed curiously subdued and far awayâsomewhat as if they had happened in another world, or in a time long gone by. Then it occurred to him that the great adventure itself must be a dream! There was one very strong argument in favor of this ideaânamely, that the quantity of coin he had seen was too vast to be real. He had never seen as much as fifty dollars in one mass before, and he was like all boys of his age and station in life, in that he imagined that all references to âhundredsâ and âthousandsâ were mere fanciful forms of speech, and that no such sums really existed in the world. He never had supposed for a moment that so large a sum as a hundred dollars was to be found in actual money in any oneâs possession. If his notions of hidden treasure had been analyzed, they would have been found to consist of a handful of real dimes and a bushel of vague, splendid, ungraspable dollars.
But the incidents of his adventure grew sensibly sharper and clearer under the attrition of thinking them over, and so he presently found himself leaning to the impression that the thing might not have been a dream, after all. This uncertainty must be swept away. He would snatch a hurried breakfast and go and find Huck. Huck was sitting on the gunwale of a flatboat, listlessly dangling his feet in the water and looking very melancholy. Tom concluded to let Huck lead up to the subject. If he did not do it, then the adventure would be proved to have been only a dream.
âHello, Huck!â
âHello, yourself.â
Silence, for a minute.
âTom, if weâd âaâ left the blame tools at the dead tree, weâd âaâ got the money. Oh, ainât it awful!â
ââTainât a dream, then, âtainât a dream! Somehow I most wish it was. Dogâd if I donât, Huck.â
âWhat ainât a dream?â
âOh, that thing yesterday. I been half thinking it was.â

âDream! If them stairs hadnât broke down youâd âaâ seen how much dream it was! Iâve had dreams enough all nightâwith that patch-eyed Spanish devil going for me all through âemârot him!â
âNo, not rot him. Find him! Track the money!â
âTom, weâll never find him. A feller donât have only one chance for such a pileâand that oneâs lost. Iâd feel mighty shaky if I was to see him, anyway.â
âWell, soâd I; but Iâd like to see him, anywayâand track him outâto his Number Two.â
âNumber Twoâyes, thatâs it. I been thinking âbout that. But I canât make nothing out of it. What do you reckon it is?â
âI dono. Itâs too deep. Say, Huckâmaybe itâs the number of a house!â
âGoody!⊠No, Tom, that ainât it. If it is, it ainât in this one-horse town. They ainât no numbers here.â
âWell, thatâs so. Lemme think a minute. Hereâitâs the number of a roomâin a tavern, you know!â
âOh, thatâs the trick! They ainât only two taverns. We can find out quick.â
âYou stay here, Huck, till I come.â
Tom was off at once. He did not care to have Huckâs company in public places. He was gone half an hour. He found that in the best tavern, No. 2 had long been occupied by a young lawyer, and was still so occupied. In the less ostentatious house, No. 2 was a mystery. The tavern-keeperâs young son said it was kept locked all the time, and he never saw anybody go into it or come out of it except at night; he did not know any particular reason for this state of things; had had some little curiosity, but it was rather feeble; had made the most of the mystery by entertaining himself with the idea that that room was âhaântedâ; had noticed that there was a light in there the night before.
âThatâs what Iâve found out, Huck. I reckon thatâs the very No. 2 weâre after.â
âI reckon it is, Tom. Now what you going to do?â
âLemme think.â
Tom thought a long time. Then he said:
âIâll tell you. The back door of that No. 2 is the door that comes out into that little close alley between the tavern and the old rattle trap of a brick store. Now you get hold of all the doorkeys you can find, and Iâll nip all of auntieâs, and the first dark night weâll go there and try âem. And mind you, keep a lookout for Joe, because he said he was going to drop into town and spy around once more for a chance to get his revenge. If you see him, you just follow him; and if he donât go to that No. 2, that ainât the place.â
âLordy, I donât want to foller him by myself!â
âWhy, itâll be night, sure. He mightnât ever see youâand if he did, maybe heâd never think anything.â
âWell, if itâs pretty dark I reckon Iâll track him. I donoâI dono. Iâll try.â
âYou bet Iâll follow him, if itâs dark, Huck. Why, he might âaâ found out he couldnât get his revenge, and be going right after that money.â
âItâs so, Tom, itâs so. Iâll foller him; I will, by jingoes!â
âNow youâre talking! Donât you ever weaken, Huck, and I wonât.â

Chapter 28
That night Tom and Huck were ready for their adventure. They hung about the neighborhood of the tavern until after nine, one watching the alley at a distance and the other the tavern door. Nobody entered the alley or left it; nobody resembling the Spaniard entered or left the tavern door. The night promised to be a fair one; so Tom went home with the understanding that if a considerable degree of darkness came on, Huck was to come and âmaow,â whereupon he would slip out and try the keys. But the night remained clear, and Huck closed his watch and retired to bed in an empty sugar hogshead about twelve.

Tuesday the boys had the same ill luck. Also Wednesday. But Thursday night promised better. Tom slipped out in good season with his auntâs old tin lantern, and a large towel to blindfold it with. He hid the lantern in Huckâs sugar hogshead and the watch began. An hour before midnight the tavern closed up and its lights (the only ones thereabouts) were put out. No Spaniard had been seen. Nobody had entered or left the alley. Everything was auspicious. The blackness of darkness reigned, the perfect stillness was interrupted only by occasional mutterings of distant thunder.
Tom got his lantern, lit it in the hogshead, wrapped it closely in the towel, and the two adventurers crept in the gloom toward the tavern. Huck stood sentry and Tom felt his way into the alley. Then there was a season of waiting anxiety that weighed upon Huckâs spirits like a mountain. He began to wish he could see a flash from the lanternâit would frighten him, but it would at least tell him that Tom was alive yet. It seemed hours since Tom had disappeared. Surely he must have fainted; maybe he was dead; maybe his heart had burst under terror and excitement. In his uneasiness Huck found himself drawing closer and closer to the alley; fearing all sorts of dreadful things, and momentarily expecting some catastrophe to happen that would take away his breath. There was not much to take away, for he seemed only able to inhale it by thimblefuls, and his heart would soon wear itself out, the way it was beating. Suddenly there was a flash of light and Tom came tearing by him: âRun!â said he; ârun, for your life!â
He neednât have repeated it; once was enough; Huck was making thirty or forty miles an hour before the repetition was uttered. The boys never stopped till they reached the shed of a deserted slaughter-house at the lower end of the village. Just as they got within its shelter the storm burst and the rain poured down. As soon as Tom got his breath he said:
âHuck, it was awful! I tried two of the keys, just as soft as I could; but they seemed to make such a power of racket that I couldnât hardly get my breath I was so scared. They wouldnât turn in the lock, either. Well, without noticing what I was doing, I took hold of the knob, and open comes the door! It warnât locked! I hopped in, and shook off the towel, and, Great Caesarâs Ghost!â

âWhat!âwhatâd you see, Tom?â
âHuck, I most stepped onto Joeâs hand!â
âNo!â
âYes! He was lying there, sound asleep on the floor, with his old patch on his eye and his arms spread out.â
âLordy, what did you do? Did he wake up?â
âNo, never budged. Drunk, I reckon. I just grabbed that towel and started!â
âIâd never âaâ thought of the towel, I bet!â
âWell, I would. My aunt would make me mighty sick if I lost it.â
âSay, Tom, did you see that box?â
âHuck, I didnât wait to look around. I didnât see the box, I didnât see the cross. I didnât see anything but a bottle and a tin cup on the floor by Joe; yes, I saw two barrels and lots more bottles in the room. Donât you see, now, whatâs the matter with that haânted room?â
âHow?â
âWhy, itâs haânted with whiskey! Maybe all the Temperance Taverns have got a haânted room, hey, Huck?â
âWell, I reckon maybe thatâs so. Whoâd âaâ thought such a thing? But say, Tom, nowâs a mighty good time to get that box, if Joeâs drunk.â
âIt is, that! You try it!â
Huck shuddered.
âWell, noâI reckon not.â
âAnd I reckon not, Huck. Only one bottle alongside of Joe ainât enough. If thereâd been three, heâd be drunk enough and Iâd do it.â
There was a long pause for reflection, and then Tom said:
âLookyhere, Huck, less not try that thing any more till we know Joeâs not in there. Itâs too scary. Now, if we watch every night, weâll be dead sure to see him go out, some time or other, and then weâll snatch that box quickerân lightning.â
âWell, Iâm agreed. Iâll watch the whole night long, and Iâll do it every night, too, if youâll do the other part of the job.â
âAll right, I will. All you got to do is to trot up Hooper Street a block and maowâand if Iâm asleep, you throw some gravel at the window and thatâll fetch me.â
âAgreed, and good as wheat!â
âNow, Huck, the stormâs over, and Iâll go home. Itâll begin to be daylight in a couple of hours. You go back and watch that long, will you?â
âI said I would, Tom, and I will. Iâll haânt that tavern every night for a year! Iâll sleep all day and Iâll stand watch all night.â
âThatâs all right. Now, where you going to sleep?â
âIn Ben Rogersâ hayloft. He lets me, and so does his papâs helper man, Uncle Jake. I tote water for Uncle Jake whenever he wants me to, and any time I ask him he gives me a little something to eat if he can spare it. Thatâs a mighty good man, Tom. He likes me, becuz I donât ever act as if I was above him. Sometime Iâve set right down and eat with him. But you neednât tell that. A bodyâs got to do things when heâs awful hungry he wouldnât want to do as a steady thing.â
âWell, if I donât want you in the daytime, Iâll let you sleep. I wonât come bothering around. Any time you see somethingâs up, in the night, just skip right around and maow.â

Chapter 29
The first thing Tom heard on Friday morning was a glad piece of newsâJudge Thatcherâs family had come back to town the night before. Both Joe and the treasure sunk into secondary importance for a moment, and Becky took the chief place in the boyâs interest. He saw her and they had an exhausting good time playing âhispyâ and âgully-keeperâ with a crowd of their schoolmates. The day was completed and crowned in a peculiarly satisfactory way: Becky teased her mother to appoint the next day for the long-promised and long-delayed picnic, and she consented. The childâs delight was boundless; and Tomâs not more moderate. The invitations were sent out before sunset, and straightway the young folks of the village were thrown into a fever of preparation and pleasurable anticipation. Tomâs excitement enabled him to keep awake until a pretty late hour, and he had good hopes of hearing Huckâs âmaow,â and of having his treasure to astonish Becky and the picnickers with, next day; but he was disappointed. No signal came that night.
Morning came, eventually, and by ten or eleven oâclock a giddy and rollicking company were gathered at Judge Thatcherâs, and everything was ready for a start. It was not the custom for elderly people to mar the picnics with their presence. The children were considered safe enough under the wings of a few young ladies of eighteen and a few young gentlemen of twenty-three or thereabouts. The old steam ferry-boat was chartered for the occasion; presently the gay throng filed up the main street laden with provision-baskets. Sid was sick and had to miss the fun; Mary remained at home to entertain him. The last thing Mrs. Thatcher said to Becky, was:
âYouâll not get back till late. Perhaps youâd better stay all night with some of the girls that live near the ferry-landing, child.â
âThen Iâll stay with Susy Harper, mamma.â
âVery well. And mind and behave yourself and donât be any trouble.â
Presently, as they tripped along, Tom said to Becky:
âSayâIâll tell you what weâll do. âStead of going to Joe Harperâs weâll climb right up the hill and stop at the Widow Douglasâ. Sheâll have ice-cream! She has it most every dayâdead loads of it. And sheâll be awful glad to have us.â
âOh, that will be fun!â
Then Becky reflected a moment and said:
âBut what will mamma say?â
âHowâll she ever know?â
The girl turned the idea over in her mind, and said reluctantly:
âI reckon itâs wrongâbutââ
âBut shucks! Your mother wonât know, and so whatâs the harm? All she wants is that youâll be safe; and I bet you sheâd âaâ said go there if sheâd âaâ thought of it. I know she would!â
The Widow Douglasâ splendid hospitality was a tempting bait. It and Tomâs persuasions presently carried the day. So it was decided to say nothing to anybody about the nightâs programme. Presently it occurred to Tom that maybe Huck might come this very night and give the signal. The thought took a deal of the spirit out of his anticipations. Still he could not bear to give up the fun at Widow Douglasâ. And why should he give it up, he reasonedâthe signal did not come the night before, so why should it be any more likely to come tonight? The sure fun of the evening outweighed the uncertain treasure; and, boy-like, he determined to yield to the stronger inclination and not allow himself to think of the box of money another time that day.
Three miles below town the ferryboat stopped at the mouth of a woody hollow and tied up. The crowd swarmed ashore and soon the forest distances and craggy heights echoed far and near with shoutings and laughter. All the different ways of getting hot and tired were gone through with, and by-and-by the rovers straggled back to camp fortified with responsible appetites, and then the destruction of the good things began. After the feast there was a refreshing season of rest and chat in the shade of spreading oaks. By-and-by somebody shouted:
âWhoâs ready for the cave?â
Everybody was. Bundles of candles were procured, and straightway there was a general scamper up the hill. The mouth of the cave was up the hillsideâan opening shaped like a letter A. Its massive oaken door stood unbarred. Within was a small chamber, chilly as an icehouse, and walled by Nature with solid limestone that was dewy with a cold sweat. It was romantic and mysterious to stand here in the deep gloom and look out upon the green valley shining in the sun. But the impressiveness of the situation quickly wore off, and the romping began again. The moment a candle was lighted there was a general rush upon the owner of it; a struggle and a gallant defence followed, but the candle was soon knocked down or blown out, and then there was a glad clamor of laughter and a new chase. But all things have an end. By-and-by the procession went filing down the steep descent of the main avenue, the flickering rank of lights dimly revealing the lofty walls of rock almost to their point of junction sixty feet overhead. This main avenue was not more than eight or ten feet wide. Every few steps other lofty and still narrower crevices branched from it on either handâfor McDougalâs cave was but a vast labyrinth of crooked aisles that ran into each other and out again and led nowhere. It was said that one might wander days and nights together through its intricate tangle of rifts and chasms, and never find the end of the cave; and that he might go down, and down, and still down, into the earth, and it was just the sameâlabyrinth under labyrinth, and no end to any of them. No man âknewâ the cave. That was an impossible thing. Most of the young men knew a portion of it, and it was not customary to venture much beyond this known portion. Tom Sawyer knew as much of the cave as any one.

The procession moved along the main avenue some three-quarters of a mile, and then groups and couples began to slip aside into branch avenues, fly along the dismal corridors, and take each other by surprise at points where the corridors joined again. Parties were able to elude each other for the space of half an hour without going beyond the âknownâ ground.
By-and-by, one group after another came straggling back to the mouth of the cave, panting, hilarious, smeared from head to foot with tallow drippings, daubed with clay, and entirely delighted with the success of the day. Then they were astonished to find that they had been taking no note of time and that night was about at hand. The clanging bell had been calling for half an hour. However, this sort of close to the dayâs adventures was romantic and therefore satisfactory. When the ferryboat with her wild freight pushed into the stream, nobody cared sixpence for the wasted time but the captain of the craft.

Huck was already upon his watch when the ferryboatâs lights went glinting past the wharf. He heard no noise on board, for the young people were as subdued and still as people usually are who are nearly tired to death. He wondered what boat it was, and why she did not stop at the wharfâand then he dropped her out of his mind and put his attention upon his business. The night was growing cloudy and dark. Ten oâclock came, and the noise of vehicles ceased, scattered lights began to wink out, all straggling foot-passengers disappeared, the village betook itself to its slumbers and left the small watcher alone with the silence and the ghosts. Eleven oâclock came, and the tavern lights were put out; darkness everywhere, now. Huck waited what seemed a weary long time, but nothing happened. His faith was weakening. Was there any use? Was there really any use? Why not give it up and turn in?
A noise fell upon his ear. He was all attention in an instant. The alley door closed softly. He sprang to the corner of the brick store. The next moment two men brushed by him, and one seemed to have something under his arm. It must be that box! So they were going to remove the treasure. Why call Tom now? It would be absurdâthe men would get away with the box and never be found again. No, he would stick to their wake and follow them; he would trust to the darkness for security from discovery. So communing with himself, Huck stepped out and glided along behind the men, cat-like, with bare feet, allowing them to keep just far enough ahead not to be invisible.
They moved up the river street three blocks, then turned to the left up a crossstreet. They went straight ahead, then, until they came to the path that led up Cardiff Hill; this they took. They passed by the old Welshmanâs house, halfway up the hill, without hesitating, and still climbed upward. Good, thought Huck, they will bury it in the old quarry. But they never stopped at the quarry. They passed on, up the summit. They plunged into the narrow path between the tall sumach bushes, and were at once hidden in the gloom. Huck closed up and shortened his distance, now, for they would never be able to see him. He trotted along awhile; then slackened his pace, fearing he was gaining too fast; moved on a piece, then stopped altogether; listened; no sound; none, save that he seemed to hear the beating of his own heart. The hooting of an owl came over the hillâominous sound! But no footsteps. Heavens, was everything lost! He was about to spring with winged feet, when a man cleared his throat not four feet from him! Huckâs heart shot into his throat, but he swallowed it again; and then he stood there shaking as if a dozen agues had taken charge of him at once, and so weak that he thought he must surely fall to the ground. He knew where he was. He knew he was within five steps of the stile leading into Widow Douglasâ grounds. Very well, he thought, let them bury it there; it wonât be hard to find.
Now there was a voiceâa very low voiceâJoeâs:
âDamn her, maybe sheâs got companyâthereâs lights, late as it is.â
âI canât see any.â
This was that strangerâs voiceâthe stranger of the haunted house. A deadly chill went to Huckâs heartâthis, then, was the ârevengeâ job! His thought was, to fly. Then he remembered that the Widow Douglas had been kind to him more than once, and maybe these men were going to murder her. He wished he dared venture to warn her; but he knew he didnât dareâthey might come and catch him. He thought all this and more in the moment that elapsed between the strangerâs remark and Joeâs nextâwhich wasâ
âBecause the bush is in your way. Nowâthis wayânow you see, donât you?â
âYes. Well, there is company there, I reckon. Better give it up.â
âGive it up, and I just leaving this country forever! Give it up and maybe never have another chance. I tell you again, as Iâve told you before, I donât care for her swagâyou may have it. But her husband was rough on meâmany times he was rough on meâand mainly he was the justice of the peace that jugged me for a vagrant. And that ainât all. It ainât a millionth part of it! He had me horsewhipped!âhorsewhipped in front of the jail!âwith all the town looking on! Horsewhipped!âdo you understand? He took advantage of me and died. But Iâll take it out of her.â
âOh, donât kill her! Donât do that!â
âKill? Who said anything about killing? I would kill him if he was here; but not her. When you want to get revenge on a woman you donât kill herâbosh! you go for her looks. You slit her nostrilsâyou notch her ears like a sow!â
âBy God, thatâsââ
âKeep your opinion to yourself! It will be safest for you. Iâll tie her to the bed. If she bleeds to death, is that my fault? Iâll not cry, if she does. My friend, youâll help me in this thingâfor my sakeâthatâs why youâre hereâI mightnât be able alone. If you flinch, Iâll kill you. Do you understand that? And if I have to kill you, Iâll kill herâand then I reckon nobodyâll ever know much about who done this business.â
âWell, if itâs got to be done, letâs get at it. The quicker the betterâIâm all in a shiver.â
âDo it now? And company there? Look hereâIâll get suspicious of you, first thing you know. Noâweâll wait till the lights are outâthereâs no hurry.â
Huck felt that a silence was going to ensueâa thing still more awful than any amount of murderous talk; so he held his breath and stepped gingerly back; planted his foot carefully and firmly, after balancing, one-legged, in a precarious way and almost toppling over, first on one side and then on the other. He took another step back, with the same elaboration and the same risks; then another and another, andâa twig snapped under his foot! His breath stopped and he listened. There was no soundâthe stillness was perfect. His gratitude was measureless. Now he turned in his tracks, between the walls of sumach bushesâturned himself as carefully as if he were a shipâand then stepped quickly but cautiously along. When he emerged at the quarry he felt secure, and so he picked up his nimble heels and flew. Down, down he sped, till he reached the Welshmanâs. He banged at the door, and presently the heads of the old man and his two stalwart sons were thrust from windows.

âWhatâs the row there? Whoâs banging? What do you want?â
âLet me inâquick! Iâll tell everything.â
âWhy, who are you?â
âHuckleberry Finnâquick, let me in!â
âHuckleberry Finn, indeed! It ainât a name to open many doors, I judge! But let him in, lads, and letâs see whatâs the trouble.â
âPlease donât ever tell I told you,â were Huckâs first words when he got in. âPlease donâtâIâd be killed, sureâbut the widowâs been good friends to me sometimes, and I want to tellâI will tell if youâll promise you wonât ever say it was me.â
âBy George, he has got something to tell, or he wouldnât act so!â exclaimed the old man; âout with it and nobody hereâll ever tell, lad.â
Three minutes later the old man and his sons, well armed, were up the hill, and just entering the sumach path on tiptoe, their weapons in their hands. Huck accompanied them no further. He hid behind a great bowlder and fell to listening. There was a lagging, anxious silence, and then all of a sudden there was an explosion of firearms and a cry.
Huck waited for no particulars. He sprang away and sped down the hill as fast as his legs could carry him.

Chapter 30
As the earliest suspicion of dawn appeared on Sunday morning, Huck came groping up the hill and rapped gently at the old Welshmanâs door. The inmates were asleep, but it was a sleep that was set on a hair-trigger, on account of the exciting episode of the night. A call came from a window:
âWhoâs there!â
Huckâs scared voice answered in a low tone:
âPlease let me in! Itâs only Huck Finn!â
âItâs a name that can open this door night or day, lad!âand welcome!â
These were strange words to the vagabond boyâs ears, and the pleasantest he had ever heard. He could not recollect that the closing word had ever been applied in his case before. The door was quickly unlocked, and he entered. Huck was given a seat and the old man and his brace of tall sons speedily dressed themselves.
âNow, my boy, I hope youâre good and hungry, because breakfast will be ready as soon as the sunâs up, and weâll have a piping hot one, tooâmake yourself easy about that! I and the boys hoped youâd turn up and stop here last night.â
âI was awful scared,â said Huck, âand I run. I took out when the pistols went off, and I didnât stop for three mile. Iâve come now becuz I wanted to know about it, you know; and I come before daylight becuz I didnât want to run across them devils, even if they was dead.â
âWell, poor chap, you do look as if youâd had a hard night of itâbut thereâs a bed here for you when youâve had your breakfast. No, they ainât dead, ladâwe are sorry enough for that. You see we knew right where to put our hands on them, by your description; so we crept along on tiptoe till we got within fifteen feet of themâdark as a cellar that sumach path wasâand just then I found I was going to sneeze. It was the meanest kind of luck! I tried to keep it back, but no useââtwas bound to come, and it did come! I was in the lead with my pistol raised, and when the sneeze started those scoundrels a-rustling to get out of the path, I sung out, âFire boys!â and blazed away at the place where the rustling was. So did the boys. But they were off in a jiffy, those villains, and we after them, down through the woods. I judge we never touched them. They fired a shot apiece as they started, but their bullets whizzed by and didnât do us any harm. As soon as we lost the sound of their feet we quit chasing, and went down and stirred up the constables. They got a posse together, and went off to guard the river bank, and as soon as it is light the sheriff and a gang are going to beat up the woods. My boys will be with them presently. I wish we had some sort of description of those rascalsââtwould help a good deal. But you couldnât see what they were like, in the dark, lad, I suppose?â

âOh yes; I saw them downtown and follered them.â
âSplendid! Describe themâdescribe them, my boy!â
âOneâs the old deaf and dumb Spaniard thatâs ben around here once or twice, and tâotherâs a mean-looking, raggedââ
âThatâs enough, lad, we know the men! Happened on them in the woods back of the widowâs one day, and they slunk away. Off with you, boys, and tell the sheriffâget your breakfast tomorrow morning!â
The Welshmanâs sons departed at once. As they were leaving the room Huck sprang up and exclaimed:
âOh, please donât tell anybody it was me that blowed on them! Oh, please!â
âAll right if you say it, Huck, but you ought to have the credit of what you did.â
âOh no, no! Please donât tell!â
When the young men were gone, the old Welshman said:
âThey wonât tellâand I wonât. But why donât you want it known?â
Huck would not explain, further than to say that he already knew too much about one of those men and would not have the man know that he knew anything against him for the whole worldâhe would be killed for knowing it, sure.
The old man promised secrecy once more, and said:
âHow did you come to follow these fellows, lad? Were they looking suspicious?â
Huck was silent while he framed a duly cautious reply. Then he said:
âWell, you see, Iâm a kind of a hard lot,âleast everybody says so, and I donât see nothing agin itâand sometimes I canât sleep much, on account of thinking about it and sort of trying to strike out a new way of doing. That was the way of it last night. I couldnât sleep, and so I come along upstreet âbout midnight, a-turning it all over, and when I got to that old shackly brick store by the Temperance Tavern, I backed up agin the wall to have another think. Well, just then along comes these two chaps slipping along close by me, with something under their arm, and I reckoned theyâd stole it. One was a-smoking, and tâother one wanted a light; so they stopped right before me and the cigars lit up their faces and I see that the big one was the deaf and dumb Spaniard, by his white whiskers and the patch on his eye, and tâother one was a rusty, ragged-looking devil.â
âCould you see the rags by the light of the cigars?â
This staggered Huck for a moment. Then he said:
âWell, I donât knowâbut somehow it seems as if I did.â

âThen they went on, and youââ
âFollered âemâyes. That was it. I wanted to see what was upâthey sneaked along so. I dogged âem to the widderâs stile, and stood in the dark and heard the ragged one beg for the widder, and the Spaniard swear heâd spile her looks just as I told you and your twoââ
âWhat! The deaf and dumb man said all that!â
Huck had made another terrible mistake! He was trying his best to keep the old man from getting the faintest hint of who the Spaniard might be, and yet his tongue seemed determined to get him into trouble in spite of all he could do. He made several efforts to creep out of his scrape, but the old manâs eye was upon him and he made blunder after blunder. Presently the Welshman said:
âMy boy, donât be afraid of me. I wouldnât hurt a hair of your head for all the world. NoâIâd protect youâIâd protect you. This Spaniard is not deaf and dumb; youâve let that slip without intending it; you canât cover that up now. You know something about that Spaniard that you want to keep dark. Now trust meâtell me what it is, and trust meâI wonât betray you.â
Huck looked into the old manâs honest eyes a moment, then bent over and whispered in his ear:
ââTainât a Spaniardâitâs Joe!â
The Welshman almost jumped out of his chair. In a moment he said:
âItâs all plain enough, now. When you talked about notching ears and slitting noses I judged that that was your own embellishment, because white men donât take that sort of revenge. But a criminal! Thatâs a different matter altogether.â
During breakfast the talk went on, and in the course of it the old man said that the last thing which he and his sons had done, before going to bed, was to get a lantern and examine the stile and its vicinity for marks of blood. They found none, but captured a bulky bundle ofâ
âOf what?â
If the words had been lightning they could not have leaped with a more stunning suddenness from Huckâs blanched lips. His eyes were staring wide, now, and his breath suspendedâwaiting for the answer. The Welshman startedâstared in returnâthree secondsâfive secondsâtenâthen replied:
âOf burglarâs tools. Why, whatâs the matter with you?â
Huck sank back, panting gently, but deeply, unutterably grateful. The Welshman eyed him gravely, curiouslyâand presently said:
âYes, burglarâs tools. That appears to relieve you a good deal. But what did give you that turn? What were you expecting weâd found?â
Huck was in a close placeâthe inquiring eye was upon himâhe would have given anything for material for a plausible answerânothing suggested itselfâthe inquiring eye was boring deeper and deeperâa senseless reply offeredâthere was no time to weigh it, so at a venture he uttered itâfeebly:
âSunday-school books, maybe.â
Poor Huck was too distressed to smile, but the old man laughed loud and joyously, shook up the details of his anatomy from head to foot, and ended by saying that such a laugh was money in a-manâs pocket, because it cut down the doctorâs bill like everything. Then he added:
âPoor old chap, youâre white and jadedâyou ainât well a bitâno wonder youâre a little flighty and off your balance. But youâll come out of it. Rest and sleep will fetch you out all right, I hope.â
Huck was irritated to think he had been such a goose and betrayed such a suspicious excitement, for he had dropped the idea that the parcel brought from the tavern was the treasure, as soon as he had heard the talk at the widowâs stile. He had only thought it was not the treasure, howeverâhe had not known that it wasnâtâand so the suggestion of a captured bundle was too much for his self-possession. But on the whole he felt glad the little episode had happened, for now he knew beyond all question that that bundle was not the bundle, and so his mind was at rest and exceedingly comfortable. In fact, everything seemed to be drifting just in the right direction, now; the treasure must be still in No. 2, the men would be captured and jailed that day, and he and Tom could seize the gold that night without any trouble or any fear of interruption.
Just as breakfast was completed there was a knock at the door. Huck jumped for a hiding-place, for he had no mind to be connected even remotely with the late event. The Welshman admitted several ladies and gentlemen, among them the Widow Douglas, and noticed that groups of citizens were climbing up the hillâto stare at the stile. So the news had spread. The Welshman had to tell the story of the night to the visitors. The widowâs gratitude for her preservation was outspoken.
âDonât say a word about it, madam. Thereâs another that youâre more beholden to than you are to me and my boys, maybe, but he donât allow me to tell his name. We wouldnât have been there but for him.â
Of course this excited a curiosity so vast that it almost belittled the main matterâbut the Welshman allowed it to eat into the vitals of his visitors, and through them be transmitted to the whole town, for he refused to part with his secret. When all else had been learned, the widow said:
âI went to sleep reading in bed and slept straight through all that noise. Why didnât you come and wake me?â
âWe judged it warnât worth while. Those fellows warnât likely to come againâthey hadnât any tools left to work with, and what was the use of waking you up and scaring you to death? My three men stood guard at your house all the rest of the night. Theyâve just come back.â
More visitors came, and the story had to be told and retold for a couple of hours more.
There was no Sabbath-school during day-school vacation, but everybody was early at church. The stirring event was well canvassed. News came that not a sign of the two villains had been yet discovered. When the sermon was finished, Judge Thatcherâs wife dropped alongside of Mrs. Harper as she moved down the aisle with the crowd and said:
âIs my Becky going to sleep all day? I just expected she would be tired to death.â
âYour Becky?â
âYes,â with a startled lookââdidnât she stay with you last night?â

âWhy, no.â
Mrs. Thatcher turned pale, and sank into a pew, just as Aunt Polly, talking briskly with a friend, passed by. Aunt Polly said:
âGoodmorning, Mrs. Thatcher. Goodmorning, Mrs. Harper. Iâve got a boy thatâs turned up missing. I reckon my Tom stayed at your house last nightâone of you. And now heâs afraid to come to church. Iâve got to settle with him.â
Mrs. Thatcher shook her head feebly and turned paler than ever.
âHe didnât stay with us,â said Mrs. Harper, beginning to look uneasy. A marked anxiety came into Aunt Pollyâs face.
âJoe Harper, have you seen my Tom this morning?â
âNoâm.â
âWhen did you see him last?â
Joe tried to remember, but was not sure he could say. The people had stopped moving out of church. Whispers passed along, and a boding uneasiness took possession of every countenance. Children were anxiously questioned, and young teachers. They all said they had not noticed whether Tom and Becky were on board the ferryboat on the homeward trip; it was dark; no one thought of inquiring if any one was missing. One young man finally blurted out his fear that they were still in the cave! Mrs. Thatcher swooned away. Aunt Polly fell to crying and wringing her hands.
The alarm swept from lip to lip, from group to group, from street to street, and within five minutes the bells were wildly clanging and the whole town was up! The Cardiff Hill episode sank into instant insignificance, the burglars were forgotten, horses were saddled, skiffs were manned, the ferryboat ordered out, and before the horror was half an hour old, two hundred men were pouring down highroad and river toward the cave.

All the long afternoon the village seemed empty and dead. Many women visited Aunt Polly and Mrs. Thatcher and tried to comfort them. They cried with them, too, and that was still better than words. All the tedious night the town waited for news; but when the morning dawned at last, all the word that came was, âSend more candlesâand send food.â Mrs. Thatcher was almost crazed; and Aunt Polly, also. Judge Thatcher sent messages of hope and encouragement from the cave, but they conveyed no real cheer.
The old Welshman came home toward daylight, spattered with candle-grease, smeared with clay, and almost worn out. He found Huck still in the bed that had been provided for him, and delirious with fever. The physicians were all at the cave, so the Widow Douglas came and took charge of the patient. She said she would do her best by him, because, whether he was good, bad, or indifferent, he was the Lordâs, and nothing that was the Lordâs was a thing to be neglected. The Welshman said Huck had good spots in him, and the widow said:
âYou can depend on it. Thatâs the Lordâs mark. He donât leave it off. He never does. Puts it somewhere on every creature that comes from his hands.â
Early in the forenoon parties of jaded men began to straggle into the village, but the strongest of the citizens continued searching. All the news that could be gained was that remotenesses of the cavern were being ransacked that had never been visited before; that every corner and crevice was going to be thoroughly searched; that wherever one wandered through the maze of passages, lights were to be seen flitting hither and thither in the distance, and shoutings and pistol-shots sent their hollow reverberations to the ear down the sombre aisles. In one place, far from the section usually traversed by tourists, the names âBECKY & TOMâ had been found traced upon the rocky wall with candle-smoke, and near at hand a grease-soiled bit of ribbon. Mrs. Thatcher recognized the ribbon and cried over it. She said it was the last relic she should ever have of her child; and that no other memorial of her could ever be so precious, because this one parted latest from the living body before the awful death came. Some said that now and then, in the cave, a far-away speck of light would glimmer, and then a glorious shout would burst forth and a score of men go trooping down the echoing aisleâand then a sickening disappointment always followed; the children were not there; it was only a searcherâs light.

Three dreadful days and nights dragged their tedious hours along, and the village sank into a hopeless stupor. No one had heart for anything. The accidental discovery, just made, that the proprietor of the Temperance Tavern kept liquor on his premises, scarcely fluttered the public pulse, tremendous as the fact was. In a lucid interval, Huck feebly led up to the subject of taverns, and finally askedâdimly dreading the worstâif anything had been discovered at the Temperance Tavern since he had been ill.
âYes,â said the widow.
Huck started up in bed, wildeyed:
âWhat? What was it?â
âLiquor!âand the place has been shut up. Lie down, childâwhat a turn you did give me!â
âOnly tell me just one thingâonly just oneâplease! Was it Tom Sawyer that found it?â

The widow burst into tears. âHush, hush, child, hush! Iâve told you before, you must not talk. You are very, very sick!â
Then nothing but liquor had been found; there would have been a great powwow if it had been the gold. So the treasure was gone foreverâgone forever! But what could she be crying about? Curious that she should cry.
These thoughts worked their dim way through Huckâs mind, and under the weariness they gave him he fell asleep. The widow said to herself:
âThereâheâs asleep, poor wreck. Tom Sawyer find it! Pity but somebody could find Tom Sawyer! Ah, there ainât many left, now, thatâs got hope enough, or strength enough, either, to go on searching.â
Chapter 31
Now to return to Tom and Beckyâs share in the picnic. They tripped along the murky aisles with the rest of the company, visiting the familiar wonders of the caveâwonders dubbed with rather over-descriptive names, such as âThe Drawing-Room,â âThe Cathedral,â âAladdinâs Palace,â and so on. Presently the hide-and-seek frolicking began, and Tom and Becky engaged in it with zeal until the exertion began to grow a trifle wearisome; then they wandered down a sinuous avenue holding their candles aloft and reading the tangled webwork of names, dates, postoffice addresses, and mottoes with which the rocky walls had been frescoed (in candle-smoke). Still drifting along and talking, they scarcely noticed that they were now in a part of the cave whose walls were not frescoed. They smoked their own names under an overhanging shelf and moved on. Presently they came to a place where a little stream of water, trickling over a ledge and carrying a limestone sediment with it, had, in the slow-dragging ages, formed a laced and ruffled Niagara in gleaming and imperishable stone. Tom squeezed his small body behind it in order to illuminate it for Beckyâs gratification. He found that it curtained a sort of steep natural stairway which was enclosed between narrow walls, and at once the ambition to be a discoverer seized him.

Becky responded to his call, and they made a smoke-mark for future guidance, and started upon their quest. They wound this way and that, far down into the secret depths of the cave, made another mark, and branched off in search of novelties to tell the upper world about. In one place they found a spacious cavern, from whose ceiling depended a multitude of shining stalactites of the length and circumference of a manâs leg; they walked all about it, wondering and admiring, and presently left it by one of the numerous passages that opened into it. This shortly brought them to a bewitching spring, whose basin was incrusted with a frostwork of glittering crystals; it was in the midst of a cavern whose walls were supported by many fantastic pillars which had been formed by the joining of great stalactites and stalagmites together, the result of the ceaseless water-drip of centuries. Under the roof vast knots of bats had packed themselves together, thousands in a bunch; the lights disturbed the creatures and they came flocking down by hundreds, squeaking and darting furiously at the candles. Tom knew their ways and the danger of this sort of conduct. He seized Beckyâs hand and hurried her into the first corridor that offered; and none too soon, for a bat struck Beckyâs light out with its wing while she was passing out of the cavern. The bats chased the children a good distance; but the fugitives plunged into every new passage that offered, and at last got rid of the perilous things. Tom found a subterranean lake, shortly, which stretched its dim length away until its shape was lost in the shadows. He wanted to explore its borders, but concluded that it would be best to sit down and rest awhile, first. Now, for the first time, the deep stillness of the place laid a clammy hand upon the spirits of the children. Becky said:
âWhy, I didnât notice, but it seems ever so long since I heard any of the others.â

âCome to think, Becky, we are away down below themâand I donât know how far away north, or south, or east, or whichever it is. We couldnât hear them here.â
Becky grew apprehensive.
âI wonder how long weâve been down here, Tom? We better start back.â
âYes, I reckon we better. Pâraps we better.â
âCan you find the way, Tom? Itâs all a mixed-up crookedness to me.â
âI reckon I could find itâbut then the bats. If they put our candles out it will be an awful fix. Letâs try some other way, so as not to go through there.â
âWell. But I hope we wonât get lost. It would be so awful!â and the girl shuddered at the thought of the dreadful possibilities.
They started through a corridor, and traversed it in silence a long way, glancing at each new opening, to see if there was anything familiar about the look of it; but they were all strange. Every time Tom made an examination, Becky would watch his face for an encouraging sign, and he would say cheerily:
âOh, itâs all right. This ainât the one, but weâll come to it right away!â
But he felt less and less hopeful with each failure, and presently began to turn off into diverging avenues at sheer random, in desperate hope of finding the one that was wanted. He still said it was âall right,â but there was such a leaden dread at his heart that the words had lost their ring and sounded just as if he had said, âAll is lost!â Becky clung to his side in an anguish of fear, and tried hard to keep back the tears, but they would come. At last she said:
âOh, Tom, never mind the bats, letâs go back that way! We seem to get worse and worse off all the time.â
âListen!â said he.
Profound silence; silence so deep that even their breathings were conspicuous in the hush. Tom shouted. The call went echoing down the empty aisles and died out in the distance in a faint sound that resembled a ripple of mocking laughter.
âOh, donât do it again, Tom, it is too horrid,â said Becky.
âIt is horrid, but I better, Becky; they might hear us, you know,â and he shouted again.
The âmightâ was even a chillier horror than the ghostly laughter, it so confessed a perishing hope. The children stood still and listened; but there was no result. Tom turned upon the back track at once, and hurried his steps. It was but a little while before a certain indecision in his manner revealed another fearful fact to Beckyâhe could not find his way back!
âOh, Tom, you didnât make any marks!â
âBecky, I was such a fool! Such a fool! I never thought we might want to come back! NoâI canât find the way. Itâs all mixed up.â
âTom, Tom, weâre lost! weâre lost! We never can get out of this awful place! Oh, why did we ever leave the others!â

She sank to the ground and burst into such a frenzy of crying that Tom was appalled with the idea that she might die, or lose her reason. He sat down by her and put his arms around her; she buried her face in his bosom, she clung to him, she poured out her terrors, her unavailing regrets, and the far echoes turned them all to jeering laughter. Tom begged her to pluck up hope again, and she said she could not. He fell to blaming and abusing himself for getting her into this miserable situation; this had a better effect. She said she would try to hope again, she would get up and follow wherever he might lead if only he would not talk like that any more. For he was no more to blame than she, she said.
So they moved on againâaimlesslyâsimply at randomâall they could do was to move, keep moving. For a little while, hope made a show of revivingânot with any reason to back it, but only because it is its nature to revive when the spring has not been taken out of it by age and familiarity with failure.
By-and-by Tom took Beckyâs candle and blew it out. This economy meant so much! Words were not needed. Becky understood, and her hope died again. She knew that Tom had a whole candle and three or four pieces in his pocketsâyet he must economize.
By-and-by, fatigue began to assert its claims; the children tried to pay attention, for it was dreadful to think of sitting down when time was grown to be so precious, moving, in some direction, in any direction, was at least progress and might bear fruit; but to sit down was to invite death and shorten its pursuit.
At last Beckyâs frail limbs refused to carry her farther. She sat down. Tom rested with her, and they talked of home, and the friends there, and the comfortable beds and, above all, the light! Becky cried, and Tom tried to think of some way of comforting her, but all his encouragements were grown thread-bare with use, and sounded like sarcasms. Fatigue bore so heavily upon Becky that she drowsed off to sleep. Tom was grateful. He sat looking into her drawn face and saw it grow smooth and natural under the influence of pleasant dreams; and by-and-by a smile dawned and rested there. The peaceful face reflected somewhat of peace and healing into his own spirit, and his thoughts wandered away to bygone times and dreamy memories. While he was deep in his musings, Becky woke up with a breezy little laughâbut it was stricken dead upon her lips, and a groan followed it.
âOh, how could I sleep! I wish I never, never had waked! No! No, I donât, Tom! Donât look so! I wonât say it again.â
âIâm glad youâve slept, Becky; youâll feel rested, now, and weâll find the way out.â
âWe can try, Tom; but Iâve seen such a beautiful country in my dream. I reckon we are going there.â
âMaybe not, maybe not. Cheer up, Becky, and letâs go on trying.â
They rose up and wandered along, hand in hand and hopeless. They tried to estimate how long they had been in the cave, but all they knew was that it seemed days and weeks, and yet it was plain that this could not be, for their candles were not gone yet. A long time after thisâthey could not tell how longâTom said they must go softly and listen for dripping waterâthey must find a spring. They found one presently, and Tom said it was time to rest again. Both were cruelly tired, yet Becky said she thought she could go a little farther. She was surprised to hear Tom dissent. She could not understand it. They sat down, and Tom fastened his candle to the wall in front of them with some clay. Thought was soon busy; nothing was said for some time. Then Becky broke the silence:
âTom, I am so hungry!â
Tom took something out of his pocket.

âDo you remember this?â said he.
Becky almost smiled.
âItâs our wedding-cake, Tom.â
âYesâI wish it was as big as a barrel, for itâs all weâve got.â
âI saved it from the picnic for us to dream on, Tom, the way grownup people do with wedding-cakeâbut itâll be ourââ
She dropped the sentence where it was. Tom divided the cake and Becky ate with good appetite, while Tom nibbled at his moiety. There was abundance of cold water to finish the feast with. By-and-by Becky suggested that they move on again. Tom was silent a moment. Then he said:
âBecky, can you bear it if I tell you something?â
Beckyâs face paled, but she thought she could.
âWell, then, Becky, we must stay here, where thereâs water to drink. That little piece is our last candle!â
Becky gave loose to tears and wailings. Tom did what he could to comfort her, but with little effect. At length Becky said:
âTom!â
âWell, Becky?â
âTheyâll miss us and hunt for us!â
âYes, they will! Certainly they will!â
âMaybe theyâre hunting for us now, Tom.â
âWhy, I reckon maybe they are. I hope they are.â
âWhen would they miss us, Tom?â
âWhen they get back to the boat, I reckon.â
âTom, it might be dark thenâwould they notice we hadnât come?â
âI donât know. But anyway, your mother would miss you as soon as they got home.â
A frightened look in Beckyâs face brought Tom to his senses and he saw that he had made a blunder. Becky was not to have gone home that night! The children became silent and thoughtful. In a moment a new burst of grief from Becky showed Tom that the thing in his mind had struck hers alsoâthat the Sabbath morning might be half spent before Mrs. Thatcher discovered that Becky was not at Mrs. Harperâs.
The children fastened their eyes upon their bit of candle and watched it melt slowly and pitilessly away; saw the half inch of wick stand alone at last; saw the feeble flame rise and fall, climb the thin column of smoke, linger at its top a moment, and thenâthe horror of utter darkness reigned!
How long afterward it was that Becky came to a slow consciousness that she was crying in Tomâs arms, neither could tell. All that they knew was, that after what seemed a mighty stretch of time, both awoke out of a dead stupor of sleep and resumed their miseries once more. Tom said it might be Sunday, nowâmaybe Monday. He tried to get Becky to talk, but her sorrows were too oppressive, all her hopes were gone. Tom said that they must have been missed long ago, and no doubt the search was going on. He would shout and maybe some one would come. He tried it; but in the darkness the distant echoes sounded so hideously that he tried it no more.
The hours wasted away, and hunger came to torment the captives again. A portion of Tomâs half of the cake was left; they divided and ate it. But they seemed hungrier than before. The poor morsel of food only whetted desire.
By-and-by Tom said:
âSH! Did you hear that?â
Both held their breath and listened. There was a sound like the faintest, far-off shout. Instantly Tom answered it, and leading Becky by the hand, started groping down the corridor in its direction. Presently he listened again; again the sound was heard, and apparently a little nearer.
âItâs them!â said Tom; âtheyâre coming! Come along, Beckyâweâre all right now!â
The joy of the prisoners was almost overwhelming. Their speed was slow, however, because pitfalls were somewhat common, and had to be guarded against. They shortly came to one and had to stop. It might be three feet deep, it might be a hundredâthere was no passing it at any rate. Tom got down on his breast and reached as far down as he could. No bottom. They must stay there and wait until the searchers came. They listened; evidently the distant shoutings were growing more distant! a moment or two more and they had gone altogether. The heart-sinking misery of it! Tom whooped until he was hoarse, but it was of no use. He talked hopefully to Becky; but an age of anxious waiting passed and no sounds came again.
The children groped their way back to the spring. The weary time dragged on; they slept again, and awoke famished and woe-stricken. Tom believed it must be Tuesday by this time.
Now an idea struck him. There were some side passages near at hand. It would be better to explore some of these than bear the weight of the heavy time in idleness. He took a kite-line from his pocket, tied it to a projection, and he and Becky started, Tom in the lead, unwinding the line as he groped along. At the end of twenty steps the corridor ended in a âjumping-off place.â Tom got down on his knees and felt below, and then as far around the corner as he could reach with his hands conveniently; he made an effort to stretch yet a little farther to the right, and at that moment, not twenty yards away, a human hand, holding a candle, appeared from behind a rock! Tom lifted up a glorious shout, and instantly that hand was followed by the body it belonged toâJoeâs! Tom was paralyzed; he could not move. He was vastly gratified the next moment, to see the âSpaniardâ take to his heels and get himself out of sight. Tom wondered that Joe had not recognized his voice and come over and killed him for testifying in court. But the echoes must have disguised the voice. Without doubt, that was it, he reasoned. Tomâs fright weakened every muscle in his body. He said to himself that if he had strength enough to get back to the spring he would stay there, and nothing should tempt him to run the risk of meeting Joe again. He was careful to keep from Becky what it was he had seen. He told her he had only shouted âfor luck.â

But hunger and wretchedness rise superior to fears in the long run. Another tedious wait at the spring and another long sleep brought changes. The children awoke tortured with a raging hunger. Tom believed that it must be Wednesday or Thursday or even Friday or Saturday, now, and that the search had been given over. He proposed to explore another passage. He felt willing to risk Joe and all other terrors. But Becky was very weak. She had sunk into a dreary apathy and would not be roused. She said she would wait, now, where she was, and dieâit would not be long. She told Tom to go with the kite-line and explore if he chose; but she implored him to come back every little while and speak to her; and she made him promise that when the awful time came, he would stay by her and hold her hand until all was over.
Tom kissed her, with a choking sensation in his throat, and made a show of being confident of finding the searchers or an escape from the cave; then he took the kite-line in his hand and went groping down one of the passages on his hands and knees, distressed with hunger and sick with bodings of coming doom.
Chapter 32
Tuesday afternoon came, and waned to the twilight. The village of St. Petersburg still mourned. The lost children had not been found. Public prayers had been offered up for them, and many and many a private prayer that had the petitionerâs whole heart in it; but still no good news came from the cave. The majority of the searchers had given up the quest and gone back to their daily avocations, saying that it was plain the children could never be found. Mrs. Thatcher was very ill, and a great part of the time delirious. People said it was heartbreaking to hear her call her child, and raise her head and listen a whole minute at a time, then lay it wearily down again with a moan. Aunt Polly had drooped into a settled melancholy, and her gray hair had grown almost white. The village went to its rest on Tuesday night, sad and forlorn.
Away in the middle of the night a wild peal burst from the village bells, and in a moment the streets were swarming with frantic half-clad people, who shouted, âTurn out! turn out! theyâre found! theyâre found!â Tin pans and horns were added to the din, the population massed itself and moved toward the river, met the children coming in an open carriage drawn by shouting citizens, thronged around it, joined its homeward march, and swept magnificently up the main street roaring huzzah after huzzah!

The village was illuminated; nobody went to bed again; it was the greatest night the little town had ever seen. During the first half-hour a procession of villagers filed through Judge Thatcherâs house, seized the saved ones and kissed them, squeezed Mrs. Thatcherâs hand, tried to speak but couldnâtâand drifted out raining tears all over the place.
Aunt Pollyâs happiness was complete, and Mrs. Thatcherâs nearly so. It would be complete, however, as soon as the messenger dispatched with the great news to the cave should get the word to her husband. Tom lay upon a sofa with an eager auditory about him and told the history of the wonderful adventure, putting in many striking additions to adorn it withal; and closed with a description of how he left Becky and went on an exploring expedition; how he followed two avenues as far as his kite-line would reach; how he followed a third to the fullest stretch of the kite-line, and was about to turn back when he glimpsed a far-off speck that looked like daylight; dropped the line and groped toward it, pushed his head and shoulders through a small hole, and saw the broad Mississippi rolling by!

And if it had only happened to be night he would not have seen that speck of daylight and would not have explored that passage any more! He told how he went back for Becky and broke the good news and she told him not to fret her with such stuff, for she was tired, and knew she was going to die, and wanted to. He described how he labored with her and convinced her; and how she almost died for joy when she had groped to where she actually saw the blue speck of daylight; how he pushed his way out at the hole and then helped her out; how they sat there and cried for gladness; how some men came along in a skiff and Tom hailed them and told them their situation and their famished condition; how the men didnât believe the wild tale at first, âbecause,â said they, âyou are five miles down the river below the valley the cave is inââthen took them aboard, rowed to a house, gave them supper, made them rest till two or three hours after dark and then brought them home.
Before day-dawn, Judge Thatcher and the handful of searchers with him were tracked out, in the cave, by the twine clews they had strung behind them, and informed of the great news.
Three days and nights of toil and hunger in the cave were not to be shaken off at once, as Tom and Becky soon discovered. They were bedridden all of Wednesday and Thursday, and seemed to grow more and more tired and worn, all the time. Tom got about, a little, on Thursday, was downtown Friday, and nearly as whole as ever Saturday; but Becky did not leave her room until Sunday, and then she looked as if she had passed through a wasting illness.
Tom learned of Huckâs sickness and went to see him on Friday, but could not be admitted to the bedroom; neither could he on Saturday or Sunday. He was admitted daily after that, but was warned to keep still about his adventure and introduce no exciting topic. The Widow Douglas stayed by to see that he obeyed. At home Tom learned of the Cardiff Hill event; also that the âragged manâsâ body had eventually been found in the river near the ferry-landing; he had been drowned while trying to escape, perhaps.
About a fortnight after Tomâs rescue from the cave, he started off to visit Huck, who had grown plenty strong enough, now, to hear exciting talk, and Tom had some that would interest him, he thought. Judge Thatcherâs house was on Tomâs way, and he stopped to see Becky. The Judge and some friends set Tom to talking, and some one asked him ironically if he wouldnât like to go to the cave again. Tom said he thought he wouldnât mind it. The Judge said:
âWell, there are others just like you, Tom, Iâve not the least doubt. But we have taken care of that. Nobody will get lost in that cave any more.â
âWhy?â
âBecause I had its big door sheathed with boiler iron two weeks ago, and triple-lockedâand Iâve got the keys.â
Tom turned as white as a sheet.
âWhatâs the matter, boy! Here, run, somebody! Fetch a glass of water!â
The water was brought and thrown into Tomâs face.
âAh, now youâre all right. What was the matter with you, Tom?â
âOh, Judge, Joeâs in the cave!â

Chapter 33
Within a few minutes the news had spread, and a dozen skiff-loads of men were on their way to McDougalâs cave, and the ferryboat, well filled with passengers, soon followed. Tom Sawyer was in the skiff that bore Judge Thatcher.
When the cave door was unlocked, a sorrowful sight presented itself in the dim twilight of the place. Joe lay stretched upon the ground, dead, with his face close to the crack of the door, as if his longing eyes had been fixed, to the latest moment, upon the light and the cheer of the free world outside. Tom was touched, for he knew by his own experience how this wretch had suffered. His pity was moved, but nevertheless he felt an abounding sense of relief and security, now, which revealed to him in a degree which he had not fully appreciated before how vast a weight of dread had been lying upon him since the day he lifted his voice against this bloody-minded outcast.

Joeâs bowie-knife lay close by, its blade broken in two. The great foundation-beam of the door had been chipped and hacked through, with tedious labor; useless labor, too, it was, for the native rock formed a sill outside it, and upon that stubborn material the knife had wrought no effect; the only damage done was to the knife itself. But if there had been no stony obstruction there the labor would have been useless still, for if the beam had been wholly cut away Joe could not have squeezed his body under the door, and he knew it. So he had only hacked that place in order to be doing somethingâin order to pass the weary timeâin order to employ his tortured faculties. Ordinarily one could find half a dozen bits of candle stuck around in the crevices of this vestibule, left there by tourists; but there were none now. The prisoner had searched them out and eaten them. He had also contrived to catch a few bats, and these, also, he had eaten, leaving only their claws. The poor unfortunate had starved to death. In one place, near at hand, a stalagmite had been slowly growing up from the ground for ages, builded by the water-drip from a stalactite overhead. The captive had broken off the stalagmite, and upon the stump had placed a stone, wherein he had scooped a shallow hollow to catch the precious drop that fell once in every three minutes with the dreary regularity of a clock-tickâa dessertspoonful once in four and twenty hours. That drop was falling when the Pyramids were new; when Troy fell; when the foundations of Rome were laid; when Christ was crucified; when the Conqueror created the British empire; when Columbus sailed; when the massacre at Lexington was ânews.â

It is falling now; it will still be falling when all these things shall have sunk down the afternoon of history, and the twilight of tradition, and been swallowed up in the thick night of oblivion. Has everything a purpose and a mission? Did this drop fall patiently during five thousand years to be ready for this flitting human insectâs need? and has it another important object to accomplish ten thousand years to come? No matter. It is many and many a year since the hapless half-breed scooped out the stone to catch the priceless drops, but to this day the tourist stares longest at that pathetic stone and that slow-dropping water when he comes to see the wonders of McDougalâs cave. Joeâs cup stands first in the list of the cavernâs marvels; even âAladdinâs Palaceâ cannot rival it.
Joe was buried near the mouth of the cave; and people flocked there in boats and wagons from the towns and from all the farms and hamlets for seven miles around; they brought their children, and all sorts of provisions, and confessed that they had had almost as satisfactory a time at the funeral as they could have had at the hanging.

This funeral stopped the further growth of one thingâthe petition to the governor for Joeâs pardon. The petition had been largely signed; many tearful and eloquent meetings had been held, and a committee of sappy women been appointed to go in deep mourning and wail around the governor, and implore him to be a merciful ass and trample his duty under foot. Joe was believed to have killed five citizens of the village, but what of that? If he had been Satan himself there would have been plenty of weaklings ready to scribble their names to a pardon-petition, and drip a tear on it from their permanently impaired and leaky water-works.
The morning after the funeral Tom took Huck to a private place to have an important talk. Huck had learned all about Tomâs adventure from the Welshman and the Widow Douglas, by this time, but Tom said he reckoned there was one thing they had not told him; that thing was what he wanted to talk about now. Huckâs face saddened. He said:
âI know what it is. You got into No. 2 and never found anything but whiskey. Nobody told me it was you; but I just knowed it must âaâ ben you, soon as I heard âbout that whiskey business; and I knowed you hadnât got the money becuz youâd âaâ got at me some way or other and told me even if you was mum to everybody else. Tom, somethingâs always told me weâd never get holt of that swag.â
âWhy, Huck, I never told on that tavern-keeper. You know his tavern was all right the Saturday I went to the picnic. Donât you remember you was to watch there that night?â
âOh yes! Why, it seems âbout a year ago. It was that very night that I follered Joe to the widderâs.â
âYou followed him?â
âYesâbut you keep mum. I reckon Joeâs left friends behind him, and I donât want âem souring on me and doing me mean tricks. If it hadnât ben for me heâd be down in Texas now, all right.â
Then Huck told his entire adventure in confidence to Tom, who had only heard of the Welshmanâs part of it before.
âWell,â said Huck, presently, coming back to the main question, âwhoever nipped the whiskey in No. 2, nipped the money, too, I reckonâanyways itâs a goner for us, Tom.â
âHuck, that money wasnât ever in No. 2!â
âWhat!â Huck searched his comradeâs face keenly. âTom, have you got on the track of that money again?â
âHuck, itâs in the cave!â
Huckâs eyes blazed.
âSay it again, Tom.â
âThe moneyâs in the cave!â
âTomâhonest, nowâis it fun, or earnest?â
âEarnest, Huckâjust as earnest as ever I was in my life. Will you go in there with me and help get it out?â
âI bet I will! I will if itâs where we can blaze our way to it and not get lost.â
âHuck, we can do that without the least little bit of trouble in the world.â
âGood as wheat! What makes you think the moneyâsââ
âHuck, you just wait till we get in there. If we donât find it Iâll agree to give you my drum and every thing Iâve got in the world. I will, by jings.â
âAll rightâitâs a whiz. When do you say?â
âRight now, if you say it. Are you strong enough?â
âIs it far in the cave? I ben on my pins a little, three or four days, now, but I canât walk moreân a mile, Tomâleast I donât think I could.â
âItâs about five mile into there the way anybody but me would go, Huck, but thereâs a mighty short cut that they donât anybody but me know about. Huck, Iâll take you right to it in a skiff. Iâll float the skiff down there, and Iâll pull it back again all by myself. You neednât ever turn your hand over.â
âLess start right off, Tom.â
âAll right. We want some bread and meat, and our pipes, and a little bag or two, and two or three kite-strings, and some of these new-fangled things they call lucifer matches. I tell you, manyâs the time I wished I had some when I was in there before.â
A trifle after noon the boys borrowed a small skiff from a citizen who was absent, and got under way at once. When they were several miles below âCave Hollow,â Tom said:
âNow you see this bluff here looks all alike all the way down from the cave hollowâno houses, no wood-yards, bushes all alike. But do you see that white place up yonder where thereâs been a landslide? Well, thatâs one of my marks. Weâll get ashore, now.â

They landed.
âNow, Huck, where weâre a-standing you could touch that hole I got out of with a fishing-pole. See if you can find it.â
Huck searched all the place about, and found nothing. Tom proudly marched into a thick clump of sumach bushes and said:
âHere you are! Look at it, Huck; itâs the snuggest hole in this country. You just keep mum about it. All along Iâve been wanting to be a robber, but I knew Iâd got to have a thing like this, and where to run across it was the bother. Weâve got it now, and weâll keep it quiet, only weâll let Joe Harper and Ben Rogers inâbecause of course thereâs got to be a Gang, or else there wouldnât be any style about it. Tom Sawyerâs Gangâit sounds splendid, donât it, Huck?â
âWell, it just does, Tom. And whoâll we rob?â
âOh, most anybody. Waylay peopleâthatâs mostly the way.â
âAnd kill them?â
âNo, not always. Hive them in the cave till they raise a ransom.â
âWhatâs a ransom?â
âMoney. You make them raise all they can, offân their friends; and after youâve kept them a year, if it ainât raised then you kill them. Thatâs the general way. Only you donât kill the women. You shut up the women, but you donât kill them. Theyâre always beautiful and rich, and awfully scared. You take their watches and things, but you always take your hat off and talk polite. They ainât anybody as polite as robbersâyouâll see that in any book. Well, the women get to loving you, and after theyâve been in the cave a week or two weeks they stop crying and after that you couldnât get them to leave. If you drove them out theyâd turn right around and come back. Itâs so in all the books.â
âWhy, itâs real bully, Tom. I believe itâs betterân to be a pirate.â
âYes, itâs better in some ways, because itâs close to home and circuses and all that.â
By this time everything was ready and the boys entered the hole, Tom in the lead. They toiled their way to the farther end of the tunnel, then made their spliced kite-strings fast and moved on. A few steps brought them to the spring, and Tom felt a shudder quiver all through him. He showed Huck the fragment of candle-wick perched on a lump of clay against the wall, and described how he and Becky had watched the flame struggle and expire.
The boys began to quiet down to whispers, now, for the stillness and gloom of the place oppressed their spirits. They went on, and presently entered and followed Tomâs other corridor until they reached the âjumping-off place.â The candles revealed the fact that it was not really a precipice, but only a steep clay hill twenty or thirty feet high. Tom whispered:
âNow Iâll show you something, Huck.â
He held his candle aloft and said:
âLook as far around the corner as you can. Do you see that? Thereâon the big rock over yonderâdone with candle-smoke.â
âTom, itâs a cross!â
âNow whereâs your Number Two? âunder the cross,â hey? Right yonderâs where I saw Joe poke up his candle, Huck!â
Huck stared at the mystic sign awhile, and then said with a shaky voice:
âTom, less git out of here!â
âWhat! and leave the treasure?â
âYesâleave it. Joeâs ghost is round about there, certain.â
âNo it ainât, Huck, no it ainât. It would haânt the place where he diedâaway out at the mouth of the caveâfive mile from here.â
âNo, Tom, it wouldnât. It would hang round the money. I know the ways of ghosts, and so do you.â
Tom began to fear that Huck was right. Misgivings gathered in his mind. But presently an idea occurred to himâ
âLookyhere, Huck, what fools weâre making of ourselves! Joeâs ghost ainât a going to come around where thereâs a cross!â
The point was well taken. It had its effect.
âTom, I didnât think of that. But thatâs so. Itâs luck for us, that cross is. I reckon weâll climb down there and have a hunt for that box.â
Tom went first, cutting rude steps in the clay hill as he descended. Huck followed. Four avenues opened out of the small cavern which the great rock stood in. The boys examined three of them with no result. They found a small recess in the one nearest the base of the rock, with a pallet of blankets spread down in it; also an old suspender, some bacon rind, and the well-gnawed bones of two or three fowls. But there was no moneybox. The lads searched and researched this place, but in vain. Tom said:
âHe said under the cross. Well, this comes nearest to being under the cross. It canât be under the rock itself, because that sets solid on the ground.â
They searched everywhere once more, and then sat down discouraged. Huck could suggest nothing. By-and-by Tom said:
âLookyhere, Huck, thereâs footprints and some candle-grease on the clay about one side of this rock, but not on the other sides. Now, whatâs that for? I bet you the money is under the rock. Iâm going to dig in the clay.â
âThat ainât no bad notion, Tom!â said Huck with animation.
Tomâs âreal Barlowâ was out at once, and he had not dug four inches before he struck wood.
âHey, Huck!âyou hear that?â
Huck began to dig and scratch now. Some boards were soon uncovered and removed. They had concealed a natural chasm which led under the rock. Tom got into this and held his candle as far under the rock as he could, but said he could not see to the end of the rift. He proposed to explore. He stooped and passed under; the narrow way descended gradually. He followed its winding course, first to the right, then to the left, Huck at his heels. Tom turned a short curve, by-and-by, and exclaimed:
âMy goodness, Huck, lookyhere!â
It was the treasure-box, sure enough, occupying a snug little cavern, along with an empty powder-keg, a couple of guns in leather cases, two or three pairs of old moccasins, a leather belt, and some other rubbish well soaked with the water-drip.
âGot it at last!â said Huck, ploughing among the tarnished coins with his hand. âMy, but weâre rich, Tom!â

âHuck, I always reckoned weâd get it. Itâs just too good to believe, but we have got it, sure! Sayâletâs not fool around here. Letâs snake it out. Lemme see if I can lift the box.â
It weighed about fifty pounds. Tom could lift it, after an awkward fashion, but could not carry it conveniently.
âI thought so,â he said; âThey carried it like it was heavy, that day at the haânted house. I noticed that. I reckon I was right to think of fetching the little bags along.â
The money was soon in the bags and the boys took it up to the cross rock.
âNow less fetch the guns and things,â said Huck.
âNo, Huckâleave them there. Theyâre just the tricks to have when we go to robbing. Weâll keep them there all the time, and weâll hold our parties there, too. Itâs an awful snug place for parties.â
âWhat parties?â
âI dono. But robbers always have parties, and of course weâve got to have them, too. Come along, Huck, weâve been in here a long time. Itâs getting late, I reckon. Iâm hungry, too. Weâll eat and smoke when we get to the skiff.â
They presently emerged into the clump of sumach bushes, looked warily out, found the coast clear, and were soon lunching and smoking in the skiff. As the sun dipped toward the horizon they pushed out and got under way. Tom skimmed up the shore through the long twilight, chatting cheerily with Huck, and landed shortly after dark.
âNow, Huck,â said Tom, âweâll hide the money in the loft of the widowâs woodshed, and Iâll come up in the morning and weâll count it and divide, and then weâll hunt up a place out in the woods for it where it will be safe. Just you lay quiet here and watch the stuff till I run and hook Benny Taylorâs little wagon; I wonât be gone a minute.â
He disappeared, and presently returned with the wagon, put the two small sacks into it, threw some old rags on top of them, and started off, dragging his cargo behind him. When the boys reached the Welshmanâs house, they stopped to rest. Just as they were about to move on, the Welshman stepped out and said:
âHallo, whoâs that?â
âHuck and Tom Sawyer.â
âGood! Come along with me, boys, you are keeping everybody waiting. Hereâhurry up, trot aheadâIâll haul the wagon for you. Why, itâs not as light as it might be. Got bricks in it?âor old metal?â
âOld metal,â said Tom.
âI judged so; the boys in this town will take more trouble and fool away more time hunting up six bitsâ worth of old iron to sell to the foundry than they would to make twice the money at regular work. But thatâs human natureâhurry along, hurry along!â
The boys wanted to know what the hurry was about.
âNever mind; youâll see, when we get to the Widow Douglasâ.â
Huck said with some apprehensionâfor he was long used to being falsely accused:
âMr. Jones, we havenât been doing nothing.â
The Welshman laughed.
âWell, I donât know, Huck, my boy. I donât know about that. Ainât you and the widow good friends?â
âYes. Well, sheâs ben good friends to me, anyway.â
âAll right, then. What do you want to be afraid for?â
This question was not entirely answered in Huckâs slow mind before he found himself pushed, along with Tom, into Mrs. Douglasâ drawing-room. Mr. Jones left the wagon near the door and followed.
The place was grandly lighted, and everybody that was of any consequence in the village was there. The Thatchers were there, the Harpers, the Rogerses, Aunt Polly, Sid, Mary, the minister, the editor, and a great many more, and all dressed in their best. The widow received the boys as heartily as any one could well receive two such looking beings. They were covered with clay and candle-grease. Aunt Polly blushed crimson with humiliation, and frowned and shook her head at Tom. Nobody suffered half as much as the two boys did, however. Mr. Jones said:
âTom wasnât at home, yet, so I gave him up; but I stumbled on him and Huck right at my door, and so I just brought them along in a hurry.â
âAnd you did just right,â said the widow. âCome with me, boys.â
She took them to a bedchamber and said:
âNow wash and dress yourselves. Here are two new suits of clothesâshirts, socks, everything complete. Theyâre Huckâsâno, no thanks, HuckâMr. Jones bought one and I the other. But theyâll fit both of you. Get into them. Weâll waitâcome down when you are slicked up enough.â
Then she left.

Chapter 34
Huck said: âTom, we can slope, if we can find a rope. The window ainât high from the ground.â
âShucks! what do you want to slope for?â
âWell, I ainât used to that kind of a crowd. I canât stand it. I ainât going down there, Tom.â
âOh, bother! It ainât anything. I donât mind it a bit. Iâll take care of you.â
Sid appeared.
âTom,â said he, âauntie has been waiting for you all the afternoon. Mary got your Sunday clothes ready, and everybodyâs been fretting about you. Sayâainât this grease and clay, on your clothes?â
âNow, Mr. Siddy, you jist âtend to your own business. Whatâs all this blowout about, anyway?â
âItâs one of the widowâs parties that sheâs always having. This time itâs for the Welshman and his sons, on account of that scrape they helped her out of the other night. And sayâI can tell you something, if you want to know.â
âWell, what?â
âWhy, old Mr. Jones is going to try to spring something on the people here tonight, but I overheard him tell auntie today about it, as a secret, but I reckon itâs not much of a secret now. Everybody knowsâthe widow, too, for all she tries to let on she donât. Mr. Jones was bound Huck should be hereâcouldnât get along with his grand secret without Huck, you know!â
âSecret about what, Sid?â
âAbout Huck tracking the robbers to the widowâs. I reckon Mr. Jones was going to make a grand time over his surprise, but I bet you it will drop pretty flat.â
Sid chuckled in a very contented and satisfied way.
âSid, was it you that told?â
âOh, never mind who it was. Somebody toldâthatâs enough.â
âSid, thereâs only one person in this town mean enough to do that, and thatâs you. If you had been in Huckâs place youâd âaâ sneaked down the hill and never told anybody on the robbers. You canât do any but mean things, and you canât bear to see anybody praised for doing good ones. Thereâno thanks, as the widow saysââand Tom cuffed Sidâs ears and helped him to the door with several kicks. âNow go and tell auntie if you dareâand tomorrow youâll catch it!â
Some minutes later the widowâs guests were at the supper-table, and a dozen children were propped up at little side-tables in the same room, after the fashion of that country and that day. At the proper time Mr. Jones made his little speech, in which he thanked the widow for the honor she was doing himself and his sons, but said that there was another person whose modestyâ
And so forth and so on. He sprung his secret about Huckâs share in the adventure in the finest dramatic manner he was master of, but the surprise it occasioned was largely counterfeit and not as clamorous and effusive as it might have been under happier circumstances. However, the widow made a pretty fair show of astonishment, and heaped so many compliments and so much gratitude upon Huck that he almost forgot the nearly intolerable discomfort of his new clothes in the entirely intolerable discomfort of being set up as a target for everybodyâs gaze and everybodyâs laudations.
The widow said she meant to give Huck a home under her roof and have him educated; and that when she could spare the money she would start him in business in a modest way. Tomâs chance was come. He said:
âHuck donât need it. Huckâs rich.â
Nothing but a heavy strain upon the good manners of the company kept back the due and proper complimentary laugh at this pleasant joke. But the silence was a little awkward. Tom broke it:
âHuckâs got money. Maybe you donât believe it, but heâs got lots of it. Oh, you neednât smileâI reckon I can show you. You just wait a minute.â
Tom ran out of doors. The company looked at each other with a perplexed interestâand inquiringly at Huck, who was tongue-tied.
âSid, what ails Tom?â said Aunt Polly. âHeâwell, there ainât ever any making of that boy out. I neverââ
Tom entered, struggling with the weight of his sacks, and Aunt Polly did not finish her sentence. Tom poured the mass of yellow coin upon the table and said:
âThereâwhat did I tell you? Half of itâs Huckâs and half of itâs mine!â

The spectacle took the general breath away. All gazed, nobody spoke for a moment. Then there was a unanimous call for an explanation. Tom said he could furnish it, and he did. The tale was long, but brimful of interest. There was scarcely an interruption from any one to break the charm of its flow. When he had finished, Mr. Jones said:
âI thought I had fixed up a little surprise for this occasion, but it donât amount to anything now. This one makes it sing mighty small, Iâm willing to allow.â
The money was counted. The sum amounted to a little over twelve thousand dollars. It was more than any one present had ever seen at one time before, though several persons were there who were worth considerably more than that in property.

Chapter 35
The reader may rest satisfied that Tomâs and Huckâs windfall made a mighty stir in the poor little village of St. Petersburg. So vast a sum, all in actual cash, seemed next to incredible. It was talked about, gloated over, glorified, until the reason of many of the citizens tottered under the strain of the unhealthy excitement. Every âhauntedâ house in St. Petersburg and the neighboring villages was dissected, plank by plank, and its foundations dug up and ransacked for hidden treasureâand not by boys, but menâpretty grave, unromantic men, too, some of them. Wherever Tom and Huck appeared they were courted, admired, stared at. The boys were not able to remember that their remarks had possessed weight before; but now their sayings were treasured and repeated; everything they did seemed somehow to be regarded as remarkable; they had evidently lost the power of doing and saying commonplace things; moreover, their past history was raked up and discovered to bear marks of conspicuous originality. The village paper published biographical sketches of the boys.
The Widow Douglas put Huckâs money out at six per cent., and Judge Thatcher did the same with Tomâs at Aunt Pollyâs request. Each lad had an income, now, that was simply prodigiousâa dollar for every weekday in the year and half of the Sundays. It was just what the minister gotâno, it was what he was promisedâhe generally couldnât collect it. A dollar and a quarter a week would board, lodge, and school a boy in those old simple daysâand clothe him and wash him, too, for that matter.
Judge Thatcher had conceived a great opinion of Tom. He said that no commonplace boy would ever have got his daughter out of the cave. When Becky told her father, in strict confidence, how Tom had taken her whipping at school, the Judge was visibly moved; and when she pleaded grace for the mighty lie which Tom had told in order to shift that whipping from her shoulders to his own, the Judge said with a fine outburst that it was a noble, a generous, a magnanimous lieâa lie that was worthy to hold up its head and march down through history breast to breast with George Washingtonâs lauded Truth about the hatchet! Becky thought her father had never looked so tall and so superb as when he walked the floor and stamped his foot and said that. She went straight off and told Tom about it.
Judge Thatcher hoped to see Tom a great lawyer or a great soldier some day. He said he meant to look to it that Tom should be admitted to the National Military Academy and afterward trained in the best law school in the country, in order that he might be ready for either career or both.
Huck Finnâs wealth and the fact that he was now under the Widow Douglasâ protection introduced him into societyâno, dragged him into it, hurled him into itâand his sufferings were almost more than he could bear. The widowâs servants kept him clean and neat, combed and brushed, and they bedded him nightly in unsympathetic sheets that had not one little spot or stain which he could press to his heart and know for a friend. He had to eat with a knife and fork; he had to use napkin, cup, and plate; he had to learn his book, he had to go to church; he had to talk so properly that speech was become insipid in his mouth; whithersoever he turned, the bars and shackles of civilization shut him in and bound him hand and foot.
He bravely bore his miseries three weeks, and then one day turned up missing. For forty-eight hours the widow hunted for him everywhere in great distress. The public were profoundly concerned; they searched high and low, they dragged the river for his body. Early the third morning Tom Sawyer wisely went poking among some old empty hogsheads down behind the abandoned slaughter-house, and in one of them he found the refugee. Huck had slept there; he had just breakfasted upon some stolen odds and ends of food, and was lying off, now, in comfort, with his pipe. He was unkempt, uncombed, and clad in the same old ruin of rags that had made him picturesque in the days when he was free and happy. Tom routed him out, told him the trouble he had been causing, and urged him to go home. Huckâs face lost its tranquil content, and took a melancholy cast. He said:
âDonât talk about it, Tom. Iâve tried it, and it donât work; it donât work, Tom. It ainât for me; I ainât used to it. The widderâs good to me, and friendly; but I canât stand them ways. She makes me get up just at the same time every morning; she makes me wash, they comb me all to thunder; she wonât let me sleep in the woodshed; I got to wear them blamed clothes that just smothers me, Tom; they donât seem to any air git through âem, somehow; and theyâre so rotten nice that I canât set down, nor lay down, nor roll around anywherâs; I hainât slid on a cellar-door forâwell, it âpears to be years; I got to go to church and sweat and sweatâI hate them ornery sermons! I canât ketch a fly in there, I canât chaw. I got to wear shoes all Sunday. The widder eats by a bell; she goes to bed by a bell; she gits up by a bellâeverythingâs so awful regâlar a body canât stand it.â

âWell, everybody does that way, Huck.â
âTom, it donât make no difference. I ainât everybody, and I canât stand it. Itâs awful to be tied up so. And grub comes too easyâI donât take no interest in vittles, that way. I got to ask to go a-fishing; I got to ask to go in a-swimmingâdernâd if I hainât got to ask to do everything. Well, Iâd got to talk so nice it wasnât no comfortâIâd got to go up in the attic and rip out awhile, every day, to git a taste in my mouth, or Iâd a died, Tom. The widder wouldnât let me smoke; she wouldnât let me yell, she wouldnât let me gape, nor stretch, nor scratch, before folksââ [Then with a spasm of special irritation and injury]ââAnd dad fetch it, she prayed all the time! I never see such a woman! I had to shove, TomâI just had to. And besides, that schoolâs going to open, and Iâd a had to go to itâwell, I wouldnât stand that, Tom. Looky-here, Tom, being rich ainât what itâs cracked up to be. Itâs just worry and worry, and sweat and sweat, and a-wishing you was dead all the time. Now these clothes suits me, and this barâl suits me, and I ainât ever going to shake âem any more. Tom, I wouldnât ever got into all this trouble if it hadnât âaâ ben for that money; now you just take my sheer of it along with yourân, and gimme a ten-center sometimesânot many times, becuz I donât give a dern for a thing âthout itâs tollable hard to gitâand you go and beg off for me with the widder.â
âOh, Huck, you know I canât do that. âTainât fair; and besides if youâll try this thing just a while longer youâll come to like it.â
âLike it! Yesâthe way Iâd like a hot stove if I was to set on it long enough. No, Tom, I wonât be rich, and I wonât live in them cussed smothery houses. I like the woods, and the river, and hogsheads, and Iâll stick to âem, too. Blame it all! just as weâd got guns, and a cave, and all just fixed to rob, here this dern foolishness has got to come up and spile it all!â
Tom saw his opportunityâ
âLookyhere, Huck, being rich ainât going to keep me back from turning robber.â
âNo! Oh, good-licks; are you in real dead-wood earnest, Tom?â
âJust as dead earnest as Iâm sitting here. But Huck, we canât let you into the gang if you ainât respectable, you know.â
Huckâs joy was quenched.
âCanât let me in, Tom? Didnât you let me go for a pirate?â
âYes, but thatâs different. A robber is more high-toned than what a pirate isâas a general thing. In most countries theyâre awful high up in the nobilityâdukes and such.â

âNow, Tom, hainât you always ben friendly to me? You wouldnât shet me out, would you, Tom? You wouldnât do that, now, would you, Tom?â
âHuck, I wouldnât want to, and I donât want toâbut what would people say? Why, theyâd say, âMph! Tom Sawyerâs Gang! pretty low characters in it!â Theyâd mean you, Huck. You wouldnât like that, and I wouldnât.â
Huck was silent for some time, engaged in a mental struggle. Finally he said:
âWell, Iâll go back to the widder for a month and tackle it and see if I can come to stand it, if youâll let me bâlong to the gang, Tom.â
âAll right, Huck, itâs a whiz! Come along, old chap, and Iâll ask the widow to let up on you a little, Huck.â
âWill you, Tomânow will you? Thatâs good. If sheâll let up on some of the roughest things, Iâll smoke private and cuss private, and crowd through or bust. When you going to start the gang and turn robbers?â
âOh, right off. Weâll get the boys together and have the initiation tonight, maybe.â
âHave the which?â
âHave the initiation.â
âWhatâs that?â
âItâs to swear to stand by one another, and never tell the gangâs secrets, even if youâre chopped all to flinders, and kill anybody and all his family that hurts one of the gang.â
âThatâs gayâthatâs mighty gay, Tom, I tell you.â
âWell, I bet it is. And all that swearingâs got to be done at midnight, in the lonesomest, awfulest place you can findâa haânted house is the best, but theyâre all ripped up now.â
âWell, midnightâs good, anyway, Tom.â
âYes, so it is. And youâve got to swear on a coffin, and sign it with blood.â
âNow, thatâs something like! Why, itâs a million times bullier than pirating. Iâll stick to the widder till I rot, Tom; and if I git to be a regâlar ripper of a robber, and everybody talking âbout it, I reckon sheâll be proud she snaked me in out of the wet.â

CONCLUSION
So endeth this chronicle. It being strictly a history of a boy, it must stop here; the story could not go much further without becoming the history of a man. When one writes a novel about grown people, he knows exactly where to stopâthat is, with a marriage; but when he writes of juveniles, he must stop where he best can.
Most of the characters that perform in this book still live, and are prosperous and happy. Some day it may seem worth while to take up the story of the younger ones again and see what sort of men and women they turned out to be; therefore it will be wisest not to reveal any of that part of their lives at present.