Chapter 37 of the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain Chapter 37 That was all fixed. So then we went away and went to the rubbish pile in the backyard where they keep the old boots and rags and pieces of bottles and wore out thin things and all such truck and scratched around and found an old thin wash pan and stopped up the holes as well as we could to bake the pie in and took it down cellar and stole it full of floor and started for breakfast and found a couple of shingles nails that Tom said would be handy for a prisoner to scrabble his name and sorrows on the dungeon walls with and dropped one of them in aunt Sally's apron pocket which was hanging on a chair and the other we stuck in the band of Uncle Silas hat which was on the burrow because we had the children say their Pa and Ma was going to the runaway niggas house this morning and then went to breakfast and Tom dropped the pewter spoon in Uncle Silas coat pocket and aunt Sally wasn't come yet so we had to wait a little while and when she come she was hot and red and cross and couldn't hardly wait for the blessing and then she went to sluising out coffee with one hand and cracking the handiest child's head with her thimble with the other and says I've hunted high and I've hunted low and it does beat all what has become of your other shit my hat fell down amongst my lungs and levers and things and a hard piece of corn crust started down my throat after it and got met on the road with a cough and was shot across the table and took one of the children in the eye and called him up like a fishing worm and let a cry out of him the size of a war whoop and Tom he turned kind of blue around the girls and it all amounted to a considerable state of things for about a quarter of a minute or as much as that and I would have sold out for half price if there was a bidder but after that we was alright again it was the sudden surprise of it that knocked us so kind of cold Uncle Sylas he says it's most uncommon curious I can't understand it I know perfectly well I took it off because you had got one on just listen at that man I know you took it off and know it by a better way than your old gathering memory too because it was on the closed line yesterday I see it there myself but it's gone that's the long and short of it and you just have to change to a red flannel one till I can get time to make a new one and it'll be the third I've made in two years it just keeps a body on the jump to keep you in shits and whatever you do manage to do with them is all is more I can make out anybody would think you would learn to take some sort of care of them at your time of life I know it sally and I do try all I can but it oughtn't to be altogether my fault because you know I don't see them nor have nothing to do with them except when they're on me and I don't believe I've ever lost one of them off of me well it ain't your fault if you haven't Sylas but I don't need if you could I reckon and the shed ain't all that's gone nor the that's a spoon gone and that ain't all there was ten and now there's only nine the calf got the shed I reckon but the calf never took the spoon that's certain why? what else is gone sally there's six candles gone that's what the rats could have got the candles and I reckon they did I wonder they don't work off with the whole place the way you're always going to stop their holes and don't do it and if they weren't fools they'll sleep in your air Sylas you'd never find it out you can't lay this spoon on the rats and that I know well sally I'm in fault and I acknowledge it I've been remiss but I won't let tomorrow go by without stopping up them holes oh I wouldn't hurry next day will do what, come the thumbpole and the child snatches her claws out of the sugar bowl without fooling around any just then the nigi women steps on to the wastage outline says Jesus, a sheath gone A sheet gone? Well for the land's sake. I'll stop up them hoes today, says Uncle Silas, looking sorrowful.  Suppose the rest took the sheet? Where's the gun, Lizzie? Clap to goodness, I ain't no notion Miss Sally. She was on the close line yesterday, but she done gone. She ain't done no more now. I reckon the world is coming to an end. I never see the beat of it in all my born days. A sheet, and a sheet, and a spoon, and six can, or Mrs., comes a young yellow wench. There's a brass candlestick missing. Clear up from here, you hussy. I'll take a skillet to you. Well, she was just a violin. I begun to lay for a chance. I reckoned I would sneak out and go for the woods till the weather moderated. She kept a region right along, running her insurrection all by herself. And everybody else mighty meek and quiet. And at last Uncle Silas, looking kind of foolish, fishes up that spoon out of his pocket.  And as for me, I wished I was in Jerusalem or somewhere. But not long, because she says, it's just as I expected. So you had it in your pocket all the time. And like has not, you've got the other things there too. How'd they get there? I really don't know sadly he says, kind of apologizing. Or you know I would tell. I was studying over my text in Act 17 before breakfast. And I reckoned I put it in there. Not noticing. Meaning to put my testament in. And he must be so, because my testament ain't in. But I'll go and see. And if the testament is where I had it, I'll know I didn't put it in. And that will show that I leave the testament down and took up the spoon.  Go long now. The whole kid I'm building of you. And don't come nigh me again till I've got back my peace of mind. Had I heard her if she'd have said it to herself. Let alone speaking it out. And had I got up and obeyed her if I'd been dead. As we was passing through the setting room, the old man, he took up his hat and the shingle nail fell out on the floor. And he just merely picked it up and laid it on the mantel shelf. And never said nothing. And went out. Tom see him do it and remembered about the spoon. And says, Well, it ain't no use to send things by him no more. He ain't reliable. Then he says, But he done us a good turn with the spoon anyway. Without knowing it. And so we'll go and do him one without him knowing it.  There was a noble good lot of them down seller. And it took us a whole hour. But we done the job tight and good and ship ship. Then we had steps on the stairs and blowed out a light and heat. And here comes the old man with a candle in one hand and a bundle of stuff in the other. Looking as absent minded as ye before last he went and mooning around first to one rat hole and then another till he'd been to them all. Then he stood about five minutes picking talud drip off his candle and thinking Then he turns off slow and dreamy towards the stairs saying Well, for the life of me I can't remember when I done it. I could have shown her now that I weren't to blame on account of the rats. But never mind. Let it go. I reckon it wouldn't do no good.  He was a mighty nice old man and always is. Tom was a good deal bothered about what to do for a spoon. But he said we'd got to have it. So he took a think. When he had siphoned it out he told me how we was to do. Then we went and waited around the spoon baskets till we see Aunt Sally coming. And then Tom went to counten the spoons and laying them out to one side. And I slid one of them up my sleeve and Tom says Aunt Sally, there aren't but nine spoons yet. She says Go long to your play and don't bother me. I know better. I counted them myself. Well, I've counted them twice auntie and I can't make but nine. She looked out of all patience. But of course she come to count. Anybody would. I declared to Gracious there I ain't but nine she says. Why? What in the world plague take the things? I'll count them again. So I slipped back the one I had. And when she got done counting she says Hang the troublesome rubbish. There's ten now. And she looked huffy and bothered both. But Tom says Why auntie, I don't think there's ten. You numbskull didn't you see me counting? I know but well I'm counting them again. So I smooched one and they come out nine same as the other time. Well, she was in a tearing way just a trembling all over. She was so mad but she counted and counted till she got that addled. She starts to count in the basket for a spoon sometimes. And so three times they come out right and three times they come out wrong. Then she grabbed up the basket and just landed across the house and knocked the cat girlie west. And she said clear out and let her have some peace. And if we come bothering around her again betwixt that and dinner she'll skin us. So we had the odd spoon and dropped it in her apron pocket whilst she was giving us her sailing orders. And Jim got it all right along with her shingle meal before noon. We was very well satisfied with this business and Tom allowed it was what twice the trouble it took because he said now she couldn't ever count them spoons twice alike again to save her life and wouldn't believe she'd counted them right if she did and said that after she'd about counted her head off for the next three days he judged she would give it up and offer to kill anybody that wanted her to ever count them anymore. So we put the sheets back on the line that night and stole one out of her closet and kept on putting it back and stealing it again for a couple of days till she didn't know how many sheets she had anymore and she didn't care and weren't going to bullying the rest of her soul about it and wouldn't count them again not to save her life she'd rather die first. So we was all right now as to the sheets and the spoon and the candles by the help of the calf and the rats and the mixed up counting and as to the candlestick it weren't no consequence it would blow over by and by but that pie was a job we had no end of trouble with that pie we fixed it up a way down in the woods cooked it there and we got it done at last and very satisfactory too but not all in one day and we had to use up three wash pans full of flour before we got through and we got burned pretty much all over in places and eyes put out with the smoke because you see we didn't want nothing but a crust and we couldn't prop it upright and she would always cave in but of course we thought of the right way at last which was to cook the ladder two in the pie so then we laid in with Jim the second night and tore up the sheets all in little strings and twisted them together before daylight we had a lovely rope that you could a hunger person with we let on it took nine months to make it and in the fall noon we took it down to the woods but it wouldn't go into the pie being made of a whole sheet that way there was rope enough for 40 pies if we'd have wanted them we left over for a soup or sausage or anything you choose we could have had a whole dinner but we didn't need it all we needed was just enough for the pie and so we throwed the rest away we didn't cook none of the pies in the wash pan afraid the solder would melt but uncle Sylas he had a noble brass warming pan which he thought considered love because it belongs to one of his ascenders with a long wooden handle that come over from England with William the Conqueror in the Mayflower or one of them early ships and was hit the way up garret with a lot of other old pots that was valuable not on account of being any account because they weren't but on account of them being relics you know and we sneaked her out privates and took her down there but she failed on the first pies because we didn't know how but she come up smiling on the last one we took and lined her with dough and set her in the course and loaded her up with rag rope put on a dough roof and shut down the lid and put hot embers on top and stood up five foot with the long handle cool and comfortable and in 15 minutes she turned out a pie but the person that eat it would want to fetch a couple of cargs of toothpicks along for if that rope ladder wouldn't crap him down to business I don't know nothing what I'm talking about and lay him in enough stomach ache to last him till next time too not didn't look when we put the witch pie in Jim's pan and we put the three tin plates in the bottom of the pan under the foots and so Jim got everything alright and as soon as he was by himself he busted into the pie and hit the rope ladder inside of his straw tick and scratched some marks on the tin plates and threw it out of the window hole end of chapter 37 Chapter 38 of the Adventures of Huckleberry Fane by Mark Twain This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org The Adventures of Huckleberry Fane by Mark Twain Chapter 38 Making them pants was a distressed tough job and so was the sore and Jim allowed the inscription was going to be the toughest of all that's the one which the prisoner has to scrabble on the wall but he had to have it Tom said he'd got to There weren't no case of a state prisoner not scrabbling his inscription to leave behind and his coat of arms Look at Lady Jen Gray he says Look at Guilford Dudley Look at old Norton Ballant Why Hawk? Suppose it is considerable trouble What are you going to do? How are you going to get around it? Jim's got to do his inscription and coat of arms They all do Jim says Why Ma Storm? I ain't got no coat of arm I ain't got nothing but this year old shirt and he knows I get to keep the journal on that Oh you don't understand Jim A coat of arms is very different Well I says Jim's right anyway when he says he ain't got no coat of arms because he ain't I reckon I know that Tom says but you bet he'll have won before he goes out of this because he's going out right and there ain't going to be no flaws in his record So why is me and Jim fouled away at the pants on a brick bat apiece Jim are making his out of the brass and I making mine out of the spoon Tom set to walk to think out the coat of arms By and by he said he struck so many good ones he didn't hardly know which to take but there was one he reckoned he'd decided on He says On this country we'll have a Bend OR in the Dexter base a Salter Mure M-U-R-R-E-Y in the first with a dog count charts for common charge and under his foot a chain embattled for slavery with a chevron vat V-E-R-T in a chief engrailed and three inverted lines on the field azure A-Z-U-R-E with the number of points rampant on a dancing indented crest a runaway nigger Sebo S-A-B-L-E with his bundle over his shoulder on a bar sinister and a couple of goals for supporters which is you and me Moto Magyore Freta Minore Oto got it out of a book means the more haste the less speed gee Wilkins I says but what does the rest of it mean we ain't got no time to bother over that he says we got to digging like all get out well anyway I says what some of it what's a first a first a first is you don't need to know what the first is I'll show him how to make it when he gets to it shock storm I says I think you might tell a person what's a bar sinister oh I don't know but he's got to have it all the nobility does that was just his way if he didn't sweet him to explain a thing to you he wouldn't do it you might pump a team a week it wouldn't make no difference he got all that coat of arms business fixed so now he started in to finish up the rest of that part of the work which was to plan out a month full inscription said Jim got to have one like they all done he made up a lot and wrote them out on a paper and read them off so one here a captive heart busted two here a poor prisoner for soup by the world and friends fretted his sorrowful life three here a lonely heart broke and a one spirit went to its rest after 37 years of solitary captivity four here homeless and friendless after 37 years of beta captivity perished a noble stranger natural son of Louis the 14th Tom's voice trembled while he was reading them and he most broke down when he got done he couldn't know way make up his mind which one for Jim to scrabble on to the war there was also good but at last he allowed he would let him scrabble them all on Jim said it would take him a year to scrabble such a lot of truck on to the logs with a nail and he didn't know how to make letters besides but Tom said he would block them out for him and then he wouldn't have nothing to do but just follow the lines then pretty soon he says come to think the logs aren't going to do they don't have log walls in the dungeon we got to do the inscriptions into a rock we'll fetch a rock Jim said the rock was worse than the logs he said it would take him such a piece of long time to dig them into the rock he wouldn't ever get out but Tom said he would let me help him do it then he took a look to see how me and Jim was getting along with the pens it was most pesky he just had work and slow and didn't give my hands no show to get well of the source and we didn't seem to make no headway hardly so Tom says I know how to fix it we got to have a rock for the coat of arms and mournful inscriptions and we can kill two birds with that same rock there's a gaudy big grindstone down at the mill and we'll smooch it and carve the things on it and file out the pens and the saw on it too it weren't no slouch of an idea and it weren't no slouch of a grandstone nutter but we allowed we would tackle it it weren't quite midnight yet so we cleared out for the mill leaving Jim at work we smooched the grindstone and set out to roll her home but it was a most nation tough job sometimes do what we could we couldn't keep her from falling over and she come mighty near mashing us every time Tom said she was going to get one of us sure before we got through we got her halfway we was plumb played out and most drowned with sweat we see it weren't no use we get to go and fetch Jim so he raised up his bed and slid the chain off the bed leg and wrapped it round and round his neck and we crawled out through a hole and down there and Jim and me laid into that grindstone and Tom suprintended he could out suprintend any boy I ever see he knowed how to do everything our hole was pretty big but it weren't big enough to get the grindstone through but Jim he took the pick and soon made it big enough then Tom marked out them things on it with the nail and set Jim to walk on them the nail for a chisel and an iron bolt from the rubbish in the limb too for a hammer and told him to walk till the rest of his candle quit on him and then he could go to bed and hide the grindstone under his straw stick and slip on it then we helped him fix his chain back on the bed leg and was ready for bed ourselves but Tom thought of something and says you got any spiders in here Jim no sir thanks to goodness I hide my stone alright we'll get you some but bless you honey I don't want none as a fader of them I just as soon have rattlesnakes around Tom thought a minute or two and says it's a good idea and I reckon it's been done it must have been done it stands to reason yes it's a prime good idea where could you keep it keep what my stone why a rattlesnake do goodness gracious alive my stone why if there was a rattlesnake to come in here I'll take on burst right out of that log wall I would with my head why Jim you wouldn't be afraid of it after a little you could tame it tame it yes easy enough every animal is grateful for kindness and petting and they wouldn't think of hurting a person that pets them any book will tell you that you try that's all I ask just try for two or three days why you can get him so in a little while that he will love you and sleep with you and won't stay away from you a minute and will let you wrap him round your neck and put his head in your mouth please master don't talk so I can't stand it he let me shove his head in my mouth for a favor ain't it I lay he'd wait with a powerful long time for I to ask him in more than that I don't want him to sleep with me Jim don't act so foolish a prisoner's got to have some kind of a dumb pet and if a rattlesnake ain't ever been tried why there's more glory to be gained in your being the first to ever try it in any other way you could ever think of to save your life why master I don't want no such glory snake take and bite Jim's chain off then where is the glory no sir I don't want no such doings blame it can't you try I only want you to try you needn't keep it up if you don't work but the trouble all then all done if the snake bite me while I'm trying him master I's willing to tackle most anything that ain't unreasonable but if you and Oak fetches a rattlesnake in here for me to tame I's going to leave that's sure let it go if you're so bullheaded about it we can get you some rattlesnakes and you can tie some buttons on their tails and let on their rattlesnakes and I reckon that will have to do I can stand them master but blame me if I couldn't get along without them I tell you that I never know before to a so much bother and trouble to be a prisoner well it always is when it's done right you got any rats around here no sir I ain't seen none well we'll get you some rats why master I don't want no rats there's the baddest and blame the creatures to stop a body and rustle run over them and bite his feet when he's trying to sleep I ever seen no sir give me the guttersnakes if I got to have them but don't give me no rats and I ain't got no use from but Jim you got to have them they all do so don't make no more fuss about it prisoners ain't ever without rats there ain't no instance of it and they train them and pet them and lend them tricks and they get to be as sociable as flies but you got to play music to them you got anything to play music on I ain't got nothing but a coas comb and a piece of paper and a juice harp but I reckon they wouldn't take no stock in a juice harp yes they would they don't care what kind of music this a juice harp's plenty good enough for a rat all animals like music in a prison they don't on it specially painful music you can't get no other kind out of a juice harp it always interest them they come out to see what's the matter with you yes you are alright you are fixed very well you want to sit on your bed night before you go to sleep and early in the mornings and play your juice harp play the last link is broken that's the thing that will scoop a rat quicker than anything else and when you've played about 2 minutes you will see all the rats and the snakes and spiders and things begin to feel worried about you and come and they will just fairly swam over you and have a noble good time yes they will a record master but what kind of time is Jim having blessed if I can see the point but I'll do it if I got to I reckon I better keep the animal satisfied and not have no trouble in the house Tom waited to think it over and see if there wasn't nothing else and pretty soon he says oh there's one thing I forgot could you raise a flower here do you reckon I don't know but maybe I could master but it's tolerable dark in here and I ain't got no use for no flower no how and should be a powerful sight or trouble well you try it anyway some other prisoners has done it one of them be cut tail looking mollon stalks could grow in here master I reckon but she wouldn't be what have the trouble she'd cause don't you believe it we'll fetch you a little one and you plant it in the corner over there and raise it and don't call it mollon call it pitchola that's its right name when it's in the prison and you want to water it with your tears why I got plenty spring water master you don't want spring water you want to water it with your tears it's the way they always do why master I lay I can raise one of them mollon stalks twist with the spring water that's another master starting one with tears that ain't the idea you got to do it with tears she would die on my hands master she surely will cause I don't scarcely ever cry so Tom was stumped but he studied it over and then said Jim would have to worry along the best he could with an onion he promised he would go to the nigger cabins and drop one private in Jim's coffee pot in the morning Jim said he would just as soon have to back her in his coffee and found so much fault with it and with the work and bother of raising the mollon and Jews happened the rats and petting and fluttering of the snakes and spiders and things on top of all the other work he had to do on pens and inscriptions and journals and things which made it more trouble and worry and responsibility to be a prisoner than anything he ever undertook that Tom most lost all patience with him and said he was just loaded down with more Godia chances than a prisoner ever had in the world to make a name for himself and yet he didn't know enough to appreciate them and there was just about wasted on him so Jim he was sorry and said he wouldn't behave so no more and then me and Tom shoved for bed End of Chapter 38 Chapter 39 The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Cameron Conaway The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain Chapter 39 In the morning we went up to the village and bought a wire rat trap and fetched it down and unstopped the best rat hole and in about an hour we had 15 of the bulliest kind of ones and then we took it and put it in a safe place under Aunt Sally's bed but while we was gone for spiders little Thomas Franklin, Benjamin Jefferson, Alexander Phelps found it there and opened the door of it to see if the rats would come out and they did and Aunt Sally she come in and when we got back she was standing on top of the bed raising cane and the rats was doing what they could to keep off the dull times for her so she took and dusted us both with the hickory and we was as much as two hours catching another 15 or 16 draped that meddlesome cub and they weren't as likely as neither because the first hole was the pig of the flock I never see a likelier lot of rats than what that first hole was we got a splendid stalk of sordid spiders and bugs and frogs and caterpillars and one thing or another and we like to have got a hornet's nest but we didn't the family was at home we didn't give it right up but stayed with them as long as we could because we allowed we tire them out or they'd got to tire us out and they'd done it then we got out of the campaign and rubbed on the places and was pretty near alright again but couldn't set down convenient and so we went for the snakes we had a couple dozen garters and house snakes and put them in a bag and put it in our room and by that time it was supper time and a rattling good honest days work and hungry oh no I reckon not and there weren't a blessed snake up there when we went back we didn't half-tie the sack and they worked out somehow and left but it didn't matter much because they was still on the premises somewhere so we judged we could get some of them again no there weren't no real scarcity of snakes about the house for a considerable spell you'd see them dripping from the rafters and places every now and then and they generally landed in your plate or down the back of your neck and most of the time where you didn't want them well they was handsome and striped and there weren't no harm and a million of them that never made no difference to aunt Sally she despised snakes and she couldn't stand them no way you could fix it and every time one of them flopped down on her didn't make new difference what she was doing she would just lay that work down and lie out I never see such a woman and you could hear her whoop to Jericho you couldn't get her to take a hold of one of them with the tongs and if she turned over and found one in bed she would scramble out and lift a how that you would think the house was a fire she disturbed the old man so that he said he could most wish there hadn't ever been no snakes created why after every last snake had been gone clear out of the house for as much as a week aunt Sally weren't over it yet she weren't near over it when she was sitting thinking about something you could touch her on the back of her neck with a feather and she would jump right out of her stockings it was very curious but Tom said all women was just so he said they was made that way for some reason or other we got a licking every time one of our snakes come in her way and she allowed these lickens weren't nothing to what she would do if we ever loaded up the place again with them I didn't mind the lickens because they didn't amount to nothing but I minded the trouble we had to lay in another lot but we got them laid in and all the other things and you never see a cabin as blithesome as Jim's was when they'd all swarm out for music and go for them Jim didn't like the spiders and the spiders didn't like Jim and so they'd lay for him and make it mighty warm for him and he said that between the rats and the snakes and the grindstone there weren't no room and bed for him scarcely and when there was a body couldn't sleep it was so lively it was always lively he said because they never all slept at one time but took turn about so when the snakes was asleep the rats was on deck and when the rats turned in the snakes come on watch so he always had one gang under him in his way and another gang having a circus over him and if he got up to hunt a new place the spiders would take a chance at him as he crossed over he said if he ever got out this time he wouldn't ever be a prisoner again not for salary well by the end of three weeks everything was in pretty good shape the shirt was sent in early in a pie and every time a rat bit Jim he would get up and write a little when his journal wilts the ink was fresh the pens was made the inscriptions and so on was all carved on the grindstone the bed leg was solid in two and we had it up the sawdust and it give us a most amazing stomach ache we reckoned we was all going to die but didn't it was the most undigestible sawdust I ever see and Tom said the same but as I was saying we got all the work done now at last and we was all pretty much fagged out too but mainly Jim the old man had wrote a couple of times to the plantation below Orleans to come and get their runaway nigger but hadn't got no answer because there weren't no such plantation so he allowed he would advertise Jim in the St. Louis and New Orleans papers and when he mentioned the St. Louis ones it gave me the cold shivers and I see we hadn't no time to lose and Tom said now for the anonymous letters what's them I says warnings to the people that something is up sometimes it's done one way sometimes another there's always somebody spying around that gives notice to the governor of the castle when Louis XVI was going to light out of the toleries a servant girl done it it's a very good way and so is the anonymous letters we'll use them both and it's usual for the prisoner's mother with him and she stays in and he slides out in her clothes we'll do that too but look you here Tom what do we want to warn anybody for that something's up let them find it out for themselves it's their lookout yes I know but you can't depend on them it's the way they've acted from the very start left us to do everything they're so confiding and mullet headed they don't take notice of nothing at all so if we don't give them notice there won't be nobody nor nothing to interfere with us after all our hard work and trouble this escape will go off perfectly flat won't amount to nothing won't be nothing to it well as for me Tom that's the way I'd like shocks he says and looks disgusted so I says but I ain't going to make no complaint anyway that suits you suits me what you gonna do about the servant girl you'll be hurt you slide in in the middle of the night and hope that y'all are girls frock why Tom that'll make trouble next morning of course she probably ain't got any but that one I know but you don't want it but 15 minutes to carry the anonymous letter and shove it under the front door alright then I'll do it but I can carry it just as handy in my own togs you wouldn't look like a servant girl then would you no but there won't be nobody to see what I look like anyway that ain't got nothing to do with it the thing for us to do is just to do our duty and not worry about whether anybody sees us do it or not ain't you got no principle at all alright I ain't saying nothing I'm the servant girl who's Jim's mother I'm his mother I'll hook a gown from Aunt Sally well then you'll have to stay in the cabin when me and Jim leaves not much I'll stuff Jim's clothes full of straw and lay it on his bed to represent his mother in disguise and Jim will take the nigger woman's gown off of me and wear it and we'll all evade together when a prisoner of style escapes it's called an evasion it's always called so when a king escapes for instance and the same with the king's son it don't make no difference whether he's a natural one or an unnatural one so Tom he wrote the non-misletter and I smouched the yalla wrenches frock that night and put it on and shoved it under the front door the way Tom told me to it said beware trouble is brewing keep a sharp look out unknown friend next night we stuck a picture which Tom drawed in blood of a skull and crossbones on the front door and next night another one of a coffin on the back door I never see a family in such a sweat they couldn't have been worse scared if the place had been full of ghosts laying for them behind everything and under the beds and shivering through the air if a door banged Aunt Sally she jumped and said ouch if anything fell she jumped and said ouch if you happen to touch her when she weren't noticing she done the same she couldn't face no way and be satisfied because she allowed there was something behind her every time so she was always whirling around and saying ouch before she got two thirds around she'd whirl back again and say it again and she was afraid to go to bed but she doesn't set up so the thing was working very well Tom said he said he never see a thing work more satisfactorily he said it showed it was done right so he said now for the grand bulge very next morning at the streak of dawn we got another letter ready and was wondering what we better do with it because we heard them say at supper they was going to have a nigger on watch at both doors all night Tom he went down the lightning rod to spy around and the nigger at the back door was asleep and he stuck it in the back of his neck and come back this letter said don't betray me I wish to be your friend there is a desperate gang of cutthroats from over in the indian territory going to steal your runaway nigger tonight and they have been trying to scare you so as you will stay in the house and not bother them I am one of the gang but have got religion and wish to quit it and lead an honest life again and will betray the hellish design they will sneak down from the northers along the fence at midnight exact with a false key and go in the niggers cabin to get them I am to be off a piece and blow a tin horn if I see any danger but instead of that I will ball like a sheep soon as they get in and not blow at all then whilst they are getting his chains loose you slip there and lock them in and you can kill them at your leisure don't do anything but just the way I am telling you if you do they will suspicion something and raise whoop jamboree who I do not wish any reward but to know I have done the right thing unknown friend end of chapter 39 chapter 40 of the adventures of Hockaberry thing this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org the adventures of Hockaberry thing by Mark Twain chapter 40 we was feeling pretty good after breakfast and took my canoe and went over the river of fishing with a lunch and had a good time and took a look at the raft and found her alright and got home late to supper and found them in such a sweat and worry they didn't know which end they were standing on and made us go right off to bed the minute we was done supper and wouldn't tell us what the trouble was and never let on a word about the new letter but didn't need to because we knowed as much about it as anybody did and as soon as we was half upstairs and our back was turned we slid for the cellar cupboard and loaded up a good lunch and took it up to our room and went to bed and got up about half past eleven and Tom put on and Sally's dress that is tall and was going to start with the lunch but says where's the butter I laid out a hunk of it I says on a piece of corn pond well you left it laid out then it ain't here we can get along without it I says we can get along with it too he says just you slide down cellar and fetch it and then mostly right down the lightning road and come along I'll go and stuff the straw into James Glutz to represent his mother in the skies and be ready to bar like a sheep and shove as soon as you get there so out he went and down cellar went I the hunk of butter big as a person's fist was where I had left it so I took up the slab of corn pond with it on and blowed out my light and started upstairs very stealthy and got up to the main floor alright but here comes and Sally with a candle and I clapped the truck in my heart and clapped my heart on my head the next second she see me and she says you been down cellar yes ma'am what you been doing down there nothing nothing no ma'am well then what possessed you to go down there this time of night I don't know ma'am you don't know don't answer me that way Tom I want to know what you been doing down there I hence be doing a single thing and Sally I hope to gracious if I have I reckoned she would let me go now and as a general thing she would but I suppose there was so many strange things going on she was just in a sweat about every little thing that weren't yet straight so she says very decided you just match into that setting room and stay there till I come you been up to something you know business to and I lay I'll find out what it is before I'm done with you so she went away as I opened the door and walked into the setting room ma'am but there was a crowd there 15 farmers and every one of them had a gun I was most powerful sick and slunk to a chair and set down they were setting around some of them talking a little in a low voice and all of them fidgety and uneasy but trying to look like they weren't but I know they was because they was always taking off their hats and putting them on and scratching their heads and changing their seats and fumbling with their buttons I weren't easy myself but I didn't take my hat off all the same I did wish and Sally would come and get done with me and lick me if she wanted to and let me get away and tell Tom how we'd overdone this thing and what a thundering honest nest we'd got ourselves into so we could stop fooling around straight off and clear out with Jim before these rips got out of patience and come for us at last she come and begun to ask me questions but I couldn't answer them straight I didn't know which end of me was up because these men was in such a fidget noun that some was wanting to start right now and lay for them desparados and saying it weren't but a few minutes to midnight and others was trying to get them to hold on and wait for the ship signal and here was aunt pegging away at the questions and me are shaking all over and ready to sink down in my tracks I was that scared and the place getting hotter and hotter and the butter beginning to melt and run down my neck and behind my ears I'm pretty soon when one of them says I'm forgoing and getting in the cabin first and right now and catching them when they come I'm most dropped and a streak of butter come at trickling down my forehead and and sadly she see it and turns white as a sheet and says for the land sake what is the matter with the child he's got the brain fever as sure as you're born and they're oozing out and everybody runs to sea and she snatches off my heart and out comes the bread and what was left of the butter and she grabbed me and hugged me and says oh what a tone you did give me and how glad and grateful I am it ain't no worse for locks against us and it never rains but it pours and when I see that truck I thought we'd lost you for I know'd by the color and all it was just like your brains would be if dear dear why wouldn't you tell me that was what you'd been down there for I wouldn't have cared now clear out to bed and don't let me see no more of you till morning I was upstairs in a second and down the lightning rod in another one and shining through the dark for the link too I couldn't hardly get my words out I was so anxious but I told Tom as quick as I could we must jump for it now and not a minute to lose the house full of men yonder with guns his eyes just blazed and he says no is that so ain't it bully why hawk if it was to do over again I bet I could fetch 200 if we could put it off till hurry hurry I says where's Jim right at your elbow if you reach out your arm you can touch him he's dressed and everything's ready now we'll slide out and give the ship signal but then we heard the tramp of men coming to the door and had them begin to fumble with the padlock and had a man say I told you would be too soon they haven't come the door is locked here I'll lock some of you into the cabin and you leave for them in the dark and kill them when they come and the rest scatter around a piece and listen if you can hear them coming so in they come but couldn't see us in the dark and must throw the nurse whilst we was hustling to get under the bed but we got under all right and out through the hole swift but soft Jim first me next and Tom last which was according to Tom's orders now we was in the lean too and had trampings close by outside so we crept to the door and Tom stopped us there and put his eye to the crack but couldn't make out nothing it was so dark and whispered and said he would listen for the steps to get further and when he nudged us Jim must glide out first and him last so he set his ear to the crack and listened and listened and listened and the steps are scraping around out there all the time and at last he nudged us and we slid out and stooped down not breathing and not making the least noise and slipped stealthy towards the fence in Injun file and got to eat all right and me and Jim overeat but Tom's British catched fast on his splinter on the top rail and then he hear the steps coming so he had to pull loose which snaps the splinter and made a noise and as he dropped in our tracks and started somebody sinks out who's that answer or I'll shoot but we didn't answer we just unfurled our heels and shoved then there was a rush and a bang bang bang and the bullets fairly whizzed around us we heard them sing out here they are they've broke for the river after them boys and Tom lose the dogs so here they come full tilt we could hear them because they were boots and yelled but we didn't wear no boots and didn't yell we was in the path to the mill and when they got pretty close on to us we dodged into the bush and let them go by and then dropped in behind them they had all the dogs shut up so they wouldn't scare of the robbers but by this time somebody had let them lose and here they come making power war enough for a million but there was our dogs so we stopped in our tracks till they catched up and when they see it weren't nobody but us and no excitement to offer them they only just said howdy and throw right ahead towards the shouting and clattering and then we upstream again and whist along after them till we was nearly to the mill and then struck up through the bush to where my canoe was tied and hopped in and pulled for their life towards the middle of the river but didn't make no more noise than we was obliged to then we struck out easy and comfortable for the island where my raft was and we could hear them yelling and backing at each other all up and down the bank till we were so far away the sounds got dim and died out and when we stepped onto the raft I says now old Jim you're a free man again and I bet you won't ever be a slave no more and the mighty good job it was to hook it was planned beautiful and it was done beautiful and there ain't nobody can get up a plan that's more mixed up and splendid than what that one was we was all glad as we could be but Tom was the gladdest of all because he had a bullet in the calf of his leg when me and Jim heard that we didn't feel so brash as what we did before it was hurting him considerable and bleeding so we laid him in the wigwam and tore up one of the duke's shirts for to bandage him but he says gimme the rags I can do it myself don't stop now don't fool around here and the evasion booming along so handsome man the sweeps and set her loose boys we done it elegant did we did I wish we had the handling of Louis there wouldn't have been no son of Saint Louis ascent to heaven wrote down in his biography no sir with a whooped him over the border that's what we would have done with him and done it just as slick as nothing at all too man the sweeps man the sweeps but me and Jim was consulting and thinking and after with 30 minutes I says say is Jim so he says well then this is the way it looked to me Hock if it was him that us being sought free and one of the boys was to get shot would he say go on and save me meaning me but a doctor tried to save this one is that like mass Tom Sawyer would he say that you bet he wouldn't well then is Jim going to say it no sir I don't budge a step out on this place about a doctor not if it's 40 years I know he was white inside and I reckon he would say what he did say so it was all right now and I told Tom I was going for a doctor he raised considerable row about it but me and Jim stuck to it and wouldn't budge so he was for crawling out and setting the raft loose himself but we wouldn't let him then he gave us a piece of his mind but he didn't do no good so when he sees me getting the cane ready he says well then if you are bound to go I'll tell you the way to do when you get to the village shot the door and blindfold the doctor tight and fast and make him swear to be silent as the grave and put a purse full of gold in his hand and then take and lead him all around the black the back alleys and everywhere in the dark and then fetch him here in the canoe in a round about way amongst the islands and search him and take his chalk away from him and don't give it back to him till you get him back to the village or else he will chalk this raft so he can find it again it's the way they all do so I said I would and left and Jim was to hide in the woods when he see the doctor coming till he was gone again end of chapter 40 chapter 41 of the adventures of Huckleberry fame by Mark Twain this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org the adventures of Huckleberry fame by Mark Twain chapter 41 the doctor was an old man a very nice kind looking old man when I got him up I told him me and my brother was over on Spanish island hunting yesterday afternoon and camped on a piece of raft we found and about midnight he must have kicked his gun in his dreams but it went off and shot him in the leg and we wanted him to go over there and fix it and not say nothing about it nor let anybody know because we wanted to come home this evening and surprise the folks who is your folks he says the Phelps is down yonder oh he says and after a minute he says how do you say he got shot he had a dream I says and he shot him singular dream he says so he lit up his lantern and got his saddle back and we started but when he sees the canoe he didn't like the look of her said she was big enough for one but didn't look pretty safe for two I says oh you needn't be afraid sir she carried the three of us is enough three why me and Sid and the guns that's what I mean oh he says but he put his foot on the gunnel and rocked her and shook his head and said he reckoned he'd look around for a bigger one but there was all locked and chained so he took my canoe and said for me to wait till he come back or I could hunt around further or maybe I better go down home and get them ready for the surprise if I wanted to but I said I didn't so I told him just how to find a raft and then he started I struck an idea pretty soon I says to myself suppose he can't fix that leg just in three shakes of his ship still as the saying is supposing it takes him three or four days what are we going to do lay around here till he lets the cat out of the bag no sir I know what I'll do I'll wait and when he comes back if he says he's got to go anymore I'll get down there too if I swim and we'll take and tie him and keep him and shove out down the river and when Tom's done with him we'll give him what it's worth or all we got and then let him get ashore so then I crept into a lumber pile to get some sleep and next time I wake up the sound was way up over my head I shut out and went for the doctor's house but they told me he'd gone away in the night sometime or other and weren't back yet well things sigh that looks powerful bad for Tom and I'll dig out for the island right off so away I shoved and turned the corner and nearly rammed my head into Uncle Sylas Tomok he says why Tom? where you been all this time you rascal I can't be now where's I says only just hunting for the runaway nigger me and Sid why? wherever did you go he says your aunt's been mighty uneasy she needn't I says because we was alright we followed the men and the dogs but they outrun us and we lost them but we thought we had them on the water so we got a canoe and took out after them and crossed over but couldn't find nothing of them so we cruised along up shore till we got kind of tired and beat out and tied up the canoe and went to sleep and never waked up till about an hour ago then we paddled over here to hear the news and Sid's at the post office to see what he can hear and I'm branching out to get something to eat for us and then we're going home so then we went to the post office to get Sid but just as I suspectioned he weren't there so the old man he got a letter out of the office and we waited a while longer but Sid didn't come so the old man said come along let Sid foot it home or canoe it when he got done fooling around but we would ride I couldn't get him to let me stay and wait for Sid and he said there weren't no using it and I must come along and let Aunt Sally see we was alright when we got home Aunt Sally was that glad to see me she laughed and cried both and hugged me and gave me one of them leakings of iron that don't amount to shocks and said she'd serve Sid the same when he come and the place was plum full of farmers and farmers wives to dinner and such another clock a body never had old Mrs. Hutchkes was the worst her tongue was outgoing all the time well sister Phelps I've ransacked that air cabin over and I believe the nigger was crazy didn't I? I say he's crazy dams the very words I said you all hand me he's crazy everything shows it look at that grindstone want to tell me any creatures in his right mind is going to scrabble all them crazy things onto a grindstone here sit and sit a person busted his hat and here so and so pegged along for 37 years and all that natural son of Louis somebody and such everlasting rubbish he's plum crazy it's what I say is in the first place it's what I say is in the middle and it's what I say last and all the time the nigger's crazy and look at that air ladder made at a rags sister Hutchkes says old Mrs. Damrell what in the name of goodness could he ever want of the very words I was saying no longer ago than this minute to sister Otterback and she tell you so herself she look at that air rag ladder and yes look at it what could he have wanted of it she sister Hutchkes she she but how in the nation did they get that grindstone in there anyway and who dug that air hole and who my very words bread pen rod I was saying past that air saucer or my lassies won't he I was saying to sister Don Lap just this minute how did they get that grindstone in there without help mind you without help that's what this don't tell me says I there was help and there was a plenty of help too there's been a dozen are helping the nigger and like a lace and like a skin every last nigger on this place but I'd find out who done it and moreover a dozen says you 40 couldn't have done everything that's been done look at them case knife saws and things how tedious they've been made look at that bag leg sawed off with them a week's work for six men look at that nigger made out straw on the bed and look at you may well see it Braheitower is just as I was saying to Brahebs his own self what do you think of it sister Hutchkes think of what Brahef says I think of that bed leg sawed off that way think of it says I I lay it never saw itself off says I somebody saw it says I that's my opinion take it or leave it it may be no count says I but such as it is it's my opinion says I and if anybody can start a better one says I let him do it says I that's all I says to sister Dunlap why dog my cats there must have been a house full of niggers in there every night for four weeks to add on all that work sister Febs look at that shit every night for four weeks to add on all that work sister Febs look at that shit every last inch of it covered over with secret African writing done with blood must have been a raft and it rides along all the time at most why I'd give two dollars to have it read to me and as for the niggers that wrote it I know I'll take and lash them till people to help him brother maples well I reckon you'd think so if you'd been in this house for a while back why they stole everything they could lay their hands on and we are watching all the time mind you they stole that shit right off the line and as for that shit they made the rag ladder out of they ain't no telling how many times they didn't steal that and floor and candles and candlesticks and spoons and the old woman pan and most a thousand things that I just remember now and my new calico dress and me and Silas and my seed and Tom on the constant watch day and night as I was telling you and not a one of us could catch hide nor air nor sight nor sound of them and here at the last minute low and behold you they slice right in under our noses and fools us and not only fools us but the engine territory robbers too and actually gets away with that nigger safe and sound and that with 16 men and 22 dogs right on their very heels at that very time I tell you it just bangs anything I ever heard of why spirits couldn't have done better and be no smarter and I reckon they must have been spirits because you know our dogs and they ain't no better well them dogs never even got the track of them once you explain that to me if you can any of you well it does beat laws alive and never so help me I wouldn't have be house thieves as well as goodness gracious six I've been a fear to live in such a place afraid to live why I was that scared I doesn't hardly go to bed or get up or lay down or sit down sister richway why they still the very why goodness six you can guess what kind of a fluster I was in by the time midnight come last night I hope to gracious if I weren't afraid they would still some of the family I was just to that pass I didn't have no reasoning faculties no more it looks foolish enough now in the daytime but I say to myself there's my poor two boys asleep way upstairs in that lonesome room and I declare to goodness I was that uneasy that I cracked up there and locked them in I did and anybody would because you know when you get scared that way and he keeps running on and getting worse and worse all the time and your wits gets to addling and you get to doing all sorts of wild things and by and by you think to yourself supposing I was a boy and was a way up there and the door ain't locked and you she stopped looking kinda wondering and then she turned her head around slow and when her eye lit on me I got up and took a walk says I to myself I can explain better how we come to not be in that room this morning if I go out to one side and study over it a little so I done it but I doesn't go far or she doesn't for me and when it was late in the day the people all went and then I come in and told her the noise and shooting waked up me and seed and the door was locked and we wanted to see the fun so we went down the lightning road and both of us got hurt a little and we didn't never want to try that no more and then I went on and told her all what I told Uncle Sylas before and then she said she'd forgive us and maybe it was alright enough anyway and about what a body might expect of boys for all boys was a pretty harm scarum lot as far as she could see and so as long as no harm hadn't come of it she judged she better put in her time being grateful we was alive and well and she had us still instead of fretting over what was past and done so then she kissed me and patted me on the head and dropped into a kind of brown study and pretty soon jumps up and says why Lord Zah-messy it's most night and seed not come yet it has become of that boy I see my chance so I skip supper and says I run right up to town and get him I says no you won't she says you stay right where you are once enough to be lost at the time if you ain't here to supper your uncle will go well he wasn't there to supper so right after supper uncle went he come back about 10 a little bit uneasy hadn't run across Tom's track and Sally was a good deal uneasy but uncle Silas he said there weren't no occasion to be boys will be boys he said and you see this one turn up in the morning all sound and right so she had to be satisfied but she said she'll set up for him a while anyway and keep a light burning so he could see it and then when I went up to bed she come up with me and fetched a candle and talked me in and murdered me so good I felt mean and like I couldn't look her in the face and she sat down on the bed and talked with me a long time and said what his splendid boy said was and didn't seem to want to ever stop talking about him and kept asking me every now and then if I reckoned he could get lost or hurt or maybe drowned and might be lying at this minute somewhere suffering or dead and she not by him to help him and so the tears would drip down silent and I would tell her that seed was alright and would be home in the morning sure and she would squeeze my hand or maybe kiss me and tell me to say it again and keep on saying it because he done her good and she was in so much trouble and when she was going away she looked down in my eyes so steady and gentle and says the door ain't going to be locked Tom and there's the window and the road but you'll be good won't you and you won't go for my sake Lord knows I wanted to go bad enough to see about Tom and was all intending to go but after that I wouldn't have went not for kingdoms because she was on my mind and Tom was on my mind so I slept very restless and twice I went down the road away in the night and slept around front and see her sitting there by her candle in the window with her eyes towards the road and the tears in them and I wished I could do something for her but I couldn't and I need to swear that I would never do nothing to grieve her anymore and the third time I wake up at dawn and sleep down and she was there yet and her candle was most out and her old gray head was resting on her hand and she was asleep End of chapter 41 Chapter 42 The Adventures of Huckleberry Fane This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org The Adventures of Huckleberry Fane by Mark Twain Chapter 42 The old man was up again before breakfast but couldn't get no truck of tom and both of them sat at the table thinking and not saying nothing and looking one for and their coffee getting cold and not eating anything and by and by the old man says Did I give you the letter? What letter? The one I got yesterday out of the post office No, you didn't give me no letter Well, I must have forgot it So he remerged his pockets and then went off somewhere where he had laid it down and fetched it and give it to her She says Why? It's from St. Petersburg It's from Sis I allowed another walk would do me good but I couldn't stare but before she could break it open she dropped it and run for she see something and so did I It was Tom Sawyer on the mattress and that old doctor and Jim in her calico dress with his hands tied before behind him and a lot of people I hid the letter behind the first thing that come handy and rushed She flung herself at Tom crying and says Oh, he's dead, he's dead I know he's dead and Tom, he turned his head a little and muttered something or other which showed he weren't in his right mind Then she flung up her hands and says He's alive Thank God and that's enough and she snatched a kiss of him and flew for the house to get the bed ready and scattering orders right and left at the sniggers and everybody else as fast as her hands could go as fast as her tongue could go every jump of the way I followed the men to see what they was going to do with Jim and the old doctor and Uncle Silas followed after Tom into the house The men was very huffy and some of them wanted to hang Jim for an example to all the other niggers around there so they wouldn't be trying to run away like Jim done and making such a raft of trouble and keeping a whole family scared most to death for days and nights but the others said don't do it it wouldn't answer at all he ain't a nigger and his owner would turn up and make us pay for him sure so that cooled them down a little because the people that's always the most anxious for to hang a nigger and he ain't done just right he's always the very ones that ain't the most anxious to pay for him when they've got their satisfaction out of him they cost Jim considerable though and give him a cough or two side the head once in a while but Jim never said nothing and he never let on to know me and they took him to the same cabin and put his own clothes on him and chained him again and not to know bed leg this time but to a big staple drove into the bottom log and chained his hands too and both legs and said he weren't to have nothing but bread and water to eat after this till his owner come or he was sold at auction because he didn't come in a certain length of time and filled up a hole and said a couple of farmers with guns must stand watch around about the cabin every night and a bull dog tied to the door in the daytime and about this time they was through with the job and was tapering off with a kind of general goodbye cussing and then the old doctor comes and takes a look and says don't be no rougher on him than you are obliged to because he ain't a bad nigger when I got to where I found the boy I see I couldn't cut the bullet out without some help and he weren't in no condition for me to leave to go and get help and he got a little worse and a little worse and after a long time he went out of his head and wouldn't let me come and nigh him anymore and said if I chalked his raft he'd kill me and no end of wild foolishness like that and I see I couldn't do anything at all with him so I says I got to have help somehow and the minute I says it out crossed this nigger from somewhere and says he'll help and he done it too and done it very well of course I judged he must be a runaway nigger and there I was and there I had to stick right all the rest of the day and night it was a fix I tell you I had a couple of patience with the chills and of course I'd have liked to run up to town and see them but I didn't because the nigger might get away and then I'll be to blame and yet never a skiff come close enough for me to hail so there I had to stick plumb until daylight this morning and I never see a nigger that was a better north of Faithfula and yet he was risking his freedom to do it and was all tired out too and I see plain enough he'd been worked man had lately I liked the nigger for that I tell you gentlemen a nigger like that is worth a thousand dollars and kind treatment too I had everything I needed and the boy was doing as well as there he would have done at home better maybe because he was so quiet but there I was with both of them on my hands and there I had to stick till about dawn this morning then some men in a skiff come by and as good luck would have it the nigger was sitting by the pallet with his head propped on his knees sound asleep so I motioned them in quiet and they slipped up on him and grabbed him and tied him before he knowed what he was about and we never had no trouble and the boy being in a kind of flighty sleep too we muffled the oars and hitched the raft on and told her over very nice and quiet and the nigger never made the least row nor say the word from the start he ain't no bad nigger gentlemen that's what I think about him somebody says well it sounds very good doctor I'm obliged to say then the others softened up a little too and I was mighty thankful to that old doctor for doing Jim that good turn and I was glad it was according to my judgment of him too because I thought he had a good heart in him and was a good man the first time I see him then they all agreed that Jim had acted very well and was deserving to have some notice took of it and reward so every one of them promised right out and hearty that they wouldn't curse him no more then they come out and locked him up I hoped they was going to say he could have one or two of the chains to cuff because they was rotten heavy or could have meat and greens with his bread and water but they didn't think of it and I reckoned it weren't best for me to mixing but I judged I would get the doctor's yarn to answer the somehow or other as soon as I'd got through the breakers that was laying just ahead of me explanations I mean of how I forgot to mention about seed being shot when I was telling how him and me put in that drafted night paddling around hunting the runaway nigger but I had plenty time and Sally she stuck to the sick room all day and all night and every time I see Uncle Sada's morning around I dodged him next morning I heard Tom was a good deal better and they said and Sally was going to get a nap so I slipped to the sick room and if I found him awake I reckoned we could put up a yarn for the family that would wash but he was sleeping and sleeping very peaceful too and pale not fire faced the way he was when he come so I sat down and laid for him to wake in about half an hour and Sally comes gliding in and there I was up a stump again and he motioned me to be still and sat down by me and begun to whisper and said we could all be joyful now because all the symptoms was first rate and he'd been sleeping like that forever so long and looking better and peacefuler all the time and 10 to 1 he would wake up in his right mind so we sat there watching and by he stares a bit and opened his eyes very natural and takes a look and says hello why? I'm at home how's that? where's the raft? it's alright I says and Jim the same I says but couldn't say it pretty brush but he never noticed but says good splendid now we're alright and safe did you tell auntie? I was going to say yes but she chipped in and says about what said why? about the way the whole thing was done what whole thing? why the whole thing? how we set the runner windiger free me and Tom good land set the run what is the child talking about dare dare out of his head again no I ain't out of my head I know all what I'm talking about we did set him free me and Tom we laid out to do it and we done it and we done it elegant too he'd got a start and she never checked him up just set and stared and stared and let him clip along and I see it won't no use for me to put in why auntie? it cost us a power of work weeks of it hours and hours every night whilst he was all asleep and we had to steal candles and the sheet and the shirt and your dress and spoons and templates and case knives and the warming pan and the grindstone and floor and just no end of things and you can't think what work it was to make the saws and pens and inscriptions and one thing or another and you can't think half the fun it was and we had to make up the pictures of coffins and things and none must let us from the robbers and get up and down the lightning road and dig the hole into the cabin and made the rope ladder and send it in cooked up in a pie and send them spoons and things to work with in your apron pocket message 6 and load up the cabin with rats and snakes and so on and then you kept Tom here so long with the butter in his heart that you come near spilling the whole business because the men come before we was out of the cabin and we had to rush and they heard us and let's drive at us and I got my share and we dodged out of the path and let them go by and when the dogs come they weren't interested in us but went for the most noise and we got our canoe and made for the raft and was all safe and Jim was a free man and we done it all by ourselves and wasn't it bully aunty well I never had the likes of it all in my born days so it was you you little rapscallions that's been making all this trouble and turned everybody's wits clean inside out and scared us all almost to death have as good a notion as ever I had in my life to take it out on you this very minute to think here I've been night after night I worry you just get well once you young scamp and I'll lay out and the old Harry out on both of you but Tom he was so proud and joyful he just couldn't hold in and his tongue just went it she are chipping in and spitting fire all along and both of them going at it at once like a cat convention well you get all the enjoyment you can out of it now mind I tell you if I catch you meddling with him again meddling with who Tom says dropping a smile and looking surprised with who why the runaway nigger of course who do you reckon Tom looks at me very grave and says Tom didn't you just tell me he was alright hasn't he got away him says and salad the runaway nigger did he hasn't they've got him back safe and sound and he's in that cabin again on bread and water and loaded down with chains till he's claimed or sold Tom rose up square in bed with his eye hot and his nostrils opening and shutting like gills and sinks out to me behind no right to shut him up show and don't you lose a minute turn him lose he ain't no slave he's as free as any creature that works this yet what does the child mean I mean every word I say and Sally and if somebody don't go I'll go I've known him all his life and so has Tom there old Miss Watson died two months ago and she was ashamed she ever was going to sell him down the river and said so and she set him free in her will then why on earth did you want to set him free for say he was already free well that is a question I must say and just like women why I wanted the adventure of it and I waded neck deep in blood too goodness alive and poorly if she wasn't standing right there just inside the door looking as sweet and contented as an angel half full of pie I wish I may never and Sally jumped for her and almost hugged the head off of her and cried over her and I found a good enough place for me under the bed for it was getting pretty salty for us seems to me and I peeped out and in a little while Tom's and Polly shook herself loose and stood there looking across at Tom over her spectacles kind of grinding him into the earth you know and then she says yes you better turn your head away I would if I was you Tom oh dairy me says and Sally is he changed so why that ain't Tom it's seed Tom's Tom's why where is Tom he was here a minute ago you mean where's Hock Finn that's what you mean I reckon I ain't raised such a scamp as my Tom all these years not to know him when I see him that would be a pretty how did you come out from under the bed Hock Finn so I done it but not feeling brash and Sally she was one of the mixed upset says looking persons I ever see except one and that was Uncle Silas when he come in and they told it all to him it kind of made him drunk as you may say and he didn't know nothing at all the rest of the day and preached a prayer meeting someone that night that gave him a rattling reputation because the oldest man in the world couldn't understood it so Tom's and Polly she told all about who I was and what and I had to up and tell how I was in such a tight place when Mrs. Phelps took me for Tom Sawyer she chipped in and says oh go on and call me and Sally I'm used to it now and times no need to change that when and Sally took me for Tom Sawyer I had to stand it there weren't no other way and I knowed he wouldn't mind because it would have been not for him being a mystery and he'd make an adventure out of it and be perfectly satisfied and so he turned out and he let on to be seed and made things as soft as he could for me and his aunt Polly she said Tom was right about old Miss Watson setting Jim free in her wheel and so sure enough Tom Sawyer had gone and took all that trouble and bother to set a free nigger free and I couldn't ever understand before until that minute and that talk how he could help a body set a nigger free with his bringing up well and Polly she said that when and Sally wrote to her that Tom and seed had come alright and safe she says to herself look at that now I might have expected it letting him go off that way without anybody to watch him so now I got to go and traps all the way down the river 1100 mile and find out what that creatures up to this time as long as I couldn't seem to get any answer out of you about it why I never had nothing from you says and Sally well I wonder why I wrote you twice to ask you what you could mean by seed being here well I never got them sis and Polly she turns around slow and severe and says you Tom well what he says kind of petition don't you what me you impudent thing hand out them letters what letters them letters I'd be bound if I have to take a hold of you they're in the trunk they're now and they're just the same as they was when I got them out of the office I hadn't looked into them I hadn't touched them but I know they'd make trouble and I thought if you went in no hurry add well you do need skinning there ain't no mistake about it and I wrote another one to tell you I was coming and I suppose he know it come yesterday I hadn't read it yet but it's alright I've got that one I wanted to offer to bet two dollars she hadn't but I reckoned maybe it was just as safe to not to so I never said anything