"Tom!"

No answer.

"What's gone with that boy, I wonder? You
Tom!"

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 "style," not service she 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:

"Well, I lay if I get hold of you I'll --"

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.

"I never did see the beat of that boy!"

She went to the open door and stood in it
and looked out among the tomato vines and
"jimpson" weeds that constituted the
garden. No Tom. So she lifted up her voice
at an angle calculated for distance and
shouted:

"Y-o-u-u Tom!"

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.

"There! I might 'a' thought of that closet.

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 it's so. He'll
play hookey this evening [*], and I'll just be
obleeged to make him work, to-morrow, to
punish him. It's 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 I've got to do some
of my duty by him, or I'll be the ruination of
the child."

Tom did play hookey, and he had a very
good time. He got back home barely in
season to help Jim, the small colored boy,
saw next-day's wood and split the kindlings
before supper at least he was there in time
to tell his adventures to Jim while Jim did
three-fourths of the work. Tom's 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, troublesome
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 deep for 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:

"Tom, it was middling warm in school,
warn't it?"

"Yes'm."

"Powerful warm, warn't it?"

miscarried, and half glad that Tom had
stumbled into obedient conduct for once.

But Sidney said:

"Well, now, if I didn't think you sewed his
collar with white thread, but it's black."

"Why, I did sew it with white! Tom!"

But Tom did not wait for the rest. As he went
out at the door he said:

"Siddy, I'll lick you for that."

In a safe place Tom examined two large
needles which were thrust into the lapels of
his jacket, and had thread bound about
them one needle carried white thread and
the other black. He said:

"She'd never noticed if it hadn't been for
Sid. Confound it! sometimes she sews it
with white, and sometimes she sews it with
black. I wish to geeminy she'd stick to one
or t'other I can't keep the run of 'em. But I
bet you I'll lam Sid for that. I'll learn him!"

He was not the Model Boy of the village. He
knew the model boy very well though and
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 man's are to a man, but
because a new and powerful interest bore
them down and drove them out of his mind
for the time just as men's misfortunes are
forgotten in the excitement of new
enterprises. This new interest was a valued
novelty in whistling, which he had just
acquired from a negro, 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

"No you can't."

"I can."

"You can't."

"Can!"

"Can't!"

An uncomfortable pause. Then Tom said:

"What's your name?"

"'Tisn't any of your business, maybe."

"Well I 'low I'll make it my business."

"Well why don't you?"

"If you say much, I will."

"Much much much. There now."

"Oh, you think you're mighty smart, don't
you? I could lick you with one hand tied
behind me, if I wanted to."

"Well why don't you do it? You say you can
do it."

"Well I will, if you fool with me."

"Oh yes I've seen whole families in the
same fix."

"Smarty! You think you're some, now, don't
you? Oh, what a hat!"

"You can lump that hat if you don't like it. I
dare you to knock it off and anybody that'll
take a dare will suck eggs."

"You're a liar!"

"You're another."

"What do I care for your big brother? I've got
a brother that's bigger than he is and what's
more, he can throw him over that fence,
too." [Both brothers were imaginary.]

"That's a lie."

"Your saying so don't make it so."

Tom drew a line in the dust with his big toe,
and said:

"I dare you to step over that, and I'll lick you
till you can't stand up. Anybody that'll take a
dare will steal sheep."

The new boy stepped over promptly, and
said:

"Now you said you'd do it, now let's see you
do it."

"Don't you crowd me now; you better look
out."

"Well, you said you'd do it why don't you do
it?"

"By jingo! for two cents I will do it."

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 other's hair and clothes, punched and
scratched each other's 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.
"Holler 'nuff!" said he.

The boy only struggled to free himself. He
was crying mainly from rage.

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
Tom's eyes, before, but now it did not strike
him so. He remembered that there was
company at the pump. White, mulatto, and
negro 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 hour and even then somebody generally
had to go after him. Tom said:

"Say, Jim, I'll fetch the water if you'll
whitewash some."

Jim shook his head and said:

"Can't, Mars Tom. Ole missis, she tole me I
got to go an' git dis water an' not stop
foolin' roun' wid anybody. She say she
spec' Mars Tom gwine to ax me to
whitewash, an' so she tole me go 'long an'
'tend to my own business she 'lowed she'd

work the very thought of it burnt him like fire.
He got out his worldly wealth and examined
it bits 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 presently
the very boy, of all boys, whose ridicule he
had been dreading. Ben's gait was the hop-
skip-and-jump proof 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
circumstance for 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:

"Stop her, sir! Ting-a-ling-ling!" The
headway ran almost out, and he drew up
slowly toward the sidewalk.

"Ship up to back! Ting-a-ling-ling!" His
arms straightened and stiffened down his
sides.

"Set her back on the stabboard! Ting-a-
ling-ling! Chow! ch-chow-wow! Chow!"
His right hand, meantime, describing
stately circles for it was representing a forty-

"Why, ain't that work?"

Tom resumed his whitewashing, and
answered carelessly:

"Well, maybe it is, and maybe it ain't. All I
know, is, it suits Tom Sawyer."

"Oh come, now, you don't mean to let on
that you like it?"

The brush continued to move.

"Like it? Well, I don't see why I oughtn't to
like it. Does a boy get a chance to
whitewash a fence every day?"

That put the thing in a new light. Ben
stopped nibbling his apple. Tom swept his
brush daintily back and forth stepped back
to note the effect added a touch here and
there criticised the effect again Ben
watching every move and getting more and
more interested, more and more absorbed.
Presently he said:

"Say, Tom, let me whitewash a little."

Tom considered, was about to consent; but
he altered his mind:

"No no I reckon it wouldn't hardly do, Ben.
You see, Aunt Polly's awful particular about
this fence right here on the street, you know
but if it was the back fence I wouldn't mind
and she wouldn't. Yes, she's awful
particular about this fence; it's got to be
done very careful; I reckon there ain't one
boy in a thousand, maybe two thousand,
that can do it the way it's got to be done."

"No is that so? Oh come, now lemme just
try. Only just a little I'd let you, if you was me,
Tom."

"Ben, I'd like to, honest injun; but Aunt Polly

while plenty of company and the fence had
three coats of whitewash on it! If he hadn't
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
it namely, 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 III

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 knitting for she had no company but the
cat, and it was asleep in her lap. Her

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
aunt's cowstable. He presently got safely
beyond the reach of capture and
punishment, and hastened toward the
public square of the village, where two
"military" 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 person that being
better suited to the still smaller fry but sat
together on an eminence and conducted the
field operations by orders delivered through
aides-de-camp. Tom's 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
garden a 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

he could button the flower inside his jacket,
next his heart or 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, "showing off," 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 "what had got into
the child." 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
aunt's very nose, and got his knuckles
rapped for it. He said:

"Aunt, you don't whack Sid when he takes
it."

"Well, Sid don't torment a body the way you
do. You'd be always into that sugar if I
warn't watching you."

Presently she stepped into the kitchen, and
Sid, happy in his immunity, reached for the
sugar-bowl a sort of glorying over Tom
which was wellnigh unbearable. But Sid's
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
"catch it." 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

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 o'clock he came
along the deserted street to where the
Adored Unknown lived; he paused a

Chapter IV

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 "get his verses." 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:

"Blessed are the a a --"

"Poor"

"Yes poor; blessed are the poor a a --"

"In spirit --"

"In spirit; blessed are the poor in spirit, for
they they --"

"Theirs --"

"For theirs. Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed
are they that mourn, for they they --"

"Sh --"

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:

"Now ain't you ashamed, Tom. You mustn't
be so bad. Water won't hurt you."

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, without distinction of color, 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 years they were simply
called his "other clothes" and so by that we
know the size of his wardrobe. The girl "put

"Piece of lickrish and a fish-hook."

"Less see 'em."

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 boy's 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 "Ouch!"
and got a new reprimand from his teacher.
Tom's whole class were of a pattern
restless, 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 reward in
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
Dore Bible? And yet Mary had acquired two
Bibles in this way it was the patient work of
two years and 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

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:

"Now, 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. There
that is it. That is the way good little boys and
girls should do. I see one little girl who is
looking out of the window I am afraid she
thinks I am out there somewhere perhaps
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." 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. Walters' 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 rare the entrance of visitors: lawyer
Thatcher, accompanied by a very feeble
and aged man; a fine, portly, middle-aged

don't you wish you was Jeff?"

Mr. Walters fell to "showing off," 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 "showed
off" running 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
"showed off" bending 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 "showed off" with small scoldings
and other little displays of authority and fine
attention to discipline and 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 "showed
off" in various ways, and the little boys
"showed off" 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 grandeur for he was
"showing off," too.

There was only one thing wanting to make
Mr. Walters' 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 enough he 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

tongue was tied, his breath would hardly
come, his heart quaked partly 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
Tom's head and called him a fine little man,
and asked him what his name was. The boy
stammered, gasped, and got it out:

"Tom."

"Oh, no, not Tom it is --"

"Thomas."

"Ah, that's it. I thought there was more to it,
maybe. That's very well. But you've another
one I daresay, and you'll tell it to me, won't
you?"

"Tell the gentleman your other name,
Thomas," said Walters, "and say sir. You
mustn't forget your manners."

"Thomas Sawyer sir."

"That's it! That's a good boy. Fine boy.
Fine, manly little fellow. Two thousand
verses is a great many very, 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; it's what makes great
men and good men; you'll be a great man
and a good man yourself, some day,
Thomas, and then you'll look back and say,
It's all owing to the precious Sunday-school
privileges of my boyhood it's all owing to my
dear teachers that taught me to learn it's all
owing to the good superintendent, who
encouraged me, and watched over me, and
gave me a beautiful Bible a splendid
elegant Bible to keep and have it all for my
own, always it's all owing to right bringing
up! That is what you will say, Thomas and

the aged and needy postmaster, who had
seen better days; the mayor and his wife for
they had a mayor there, among other
unnecessaries; the justice of the peace; the
widow Douglass, 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 body for 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 "thrown up to them" so much.
His white handkerchief was hanging out of
his pocket behind, as usual on Sundays
accidentally. 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

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 it if he
even did that much. He was restive all
through it; he kept tally of the details of the
prayer, unconsciously for he was not
listening, but he knew the ground of old, and
the clergyman's regular route over it and
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 Tom's hands itched to grab for it
they did not dare he 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
"Amen" was out the fly was a prisoner of
war. His aunt detected the act and made
him let it go.

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 poodle's 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 handkerchiefs,
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
master's lap; he flung it out of the window,
and the voice of distress quickly thinned

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 "starter," 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, "Sid, Sid!"
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:

"Tom! Say, Tom!" [No response.] "Here,
Tom! Tom! What is the matter, Tom?" And
he shook him and looked in his face
anxiously.

"Rubbage! I don't believe it!"

But she fled up-stairs, 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:

"You, Tom! Tom, what's the matter with
you?"

"Oh, auntie, I'm --"

"What's the matter with you what is the
matter with you, child?"

"Oh, auntie, my sore toe's mortified!"

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:

"Tom, what a turn you did give me. Now you
shut up that nonsense and climb out of this."

The groans ceased and the pain vanished
from the toe. The boy felt a little foolish, and
he said:

"Aunt Polly, it seemed mortified, and it hurt
so I never minded my tooth at all."

"Your tooth, indeed! What's the matter with
your tooth?"

"One of them's loose, and it aches perfectly
awful."

"There, there, now, don't begin that
groaning again. Open your mouth. Well your
tooth is loose, but you're not going to die
about that. Mary, get me a silk thread, and a
chunk of fire out of the kitchen."

Tom said:

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:

"Hello, Huckleberry!"

"Hello yourself, and see how you like it."

"What's that you got?"

"Dead cat."

"Lemme see him, Huck. My, he's pretty stiff.
Where'd you get him ?"

"In the daytime?"

"Certainly."

"With his face to the stump?"

"Yes. Least I reckon so."

"Did he say anything?"

"I don't reckon he did. I don't know."

"Aha! Talk about trying to cure warts with
spunk-water such a blame fool way as that!
Why, that ain't a-going to do any good. You
got to go all by yourself, to the middle of the
woods, where you know there's a spunk-
water stump, and just as it's midnight you
back up against the stump and jam your
hand in and say:


'Barley-corn, barley-corn, injun-meal
shorts,
Spunk-water, spunk-water, swaller these
warts,'

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 charm's busted."

"Well, that sounds like a good way; but that
ain't the way Bob Tanner done."

"No, sir, you can bet he didn't, becuz he's
the wartiest boy in this town; and he
wouldn't have a wart on him if he'd knowed
how to work spunk-water. I've took off
thousands of warts off of my hands that
way, Huck. I play with frogs so much that I've
always got considerable many warts.
Sometimes I take 'em off with a bean."

"Yes, bean's good. I've done that."

very night he rolled off'n a shed wher' he
was a layin drunk, and broke his arm."

"Why, that's awful. How did he know she
was a-witching him?"

"Lord, pap can tell, easy. Pap says when
they keep looking at you right stiddy, they're
a-witching you. Specially if they mumble.
Becuz when they mumble they're saying the
Lord's Prayer backards."

"Say, Hucky, when you going to try the cat?"

"To-night. I reckon they'll come after old
Hoss Williams to-night."

"But they buried him Saturday. Didn't they
get him Saturday night?"

"Why, how you talk! How could their charms
work till midnight? and then it's Sunday.
Devils don't slosh around much of a
Sunday, I don't reckon."

"I never thought of that. That's so. Lemme
go with you?"

"Of course if you ain't afeard."

"Afeard! 'Tain't likely. Will you meow?"

"Yes and you meow back, if you get a
chance. Last time, you kep' me a-meowing
around till old Hays went to throwing rocks
at me and says 'Dern that cat!' and so I hove
a brick through his window but don't you
tell."

"I won't. I couldn't meow that night, becuz
auntie was watching me, but I'll meow this
time. Say what's that?"

"Nothing but a tick."

"Where'd you get him?"

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.

"Thomas Sawyer!"

Tom knew that when his name was
pronounced in full, it meant trouble.

"Sir!"

"Come up here. Now, sir, why are you late
again, as usual?"

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 girls' side
of the school-house. He instantly said:

"I stopped to talk with Huckleberry Finn!"

The master's 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:

"You you did what?"

"Stopped to talk with Huckleberry Finn."

There was no mistaking the words.

"Thomas Sawyer, this is the most
astounding confession I have ever listened
to. No mere ferule will answer for this
offence. Take off your jacket."

The master's arm performed until it was
tired and the stock of switches notably
diminished. Then the order followed:

"Now, sir, go and sit with the girls! And let
this be a warning to you."

gazed a moment, then whispered:

"It's nice make a man."

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:

"It's a beautiful man now make me coming
along."

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:

"It's ever so nice I wish I could draw."

"It's easy," whispered Tom, "I'll learn you."

"Oh, will you? When?"

"At noon. Do you go home to dinner?"

"I'll stay if you will."

"Good that's a whack. What's your name?"

"Becky Thatcher. What's yours? Oh, I know.
It's Thomas Sawyer."

"That's the name they lick me by. I'm Tom
when I'm good. You call me Tom, will you?"

"Yes."

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:

"Oh, it ain't anything."

"Yes it is."

baby words, till he brought up at the foot and
yielded up the pewter medal which he had
worn with ostentation for months.

Chapter VII

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. Tom's 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.

Tom's 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

"You shall he's on my side of the line."

"Look here, Joe Harper, whose is that tick?"

"I don't care whose tick he is he's on my
side of the line, and you sha'n't touch him."

"Well, I'll just bet I will, though. He's my tick
and I'll do what I blame please with him, or
die!"

A tremendous whack came down on Tom's
shoulders, and its duplicate on Joe's; 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:

"Put on your bonnet and let on you're going
home; and when you get to the corner, give
the rest of 'em the slip, and turn down
through the lane and come back. I'll go the
other way and come it over 'em the same
way."

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:

"Do you love rats?"

"Like? Why it ain't like anything. You only just
tell a boy you won't ever have anybody but
him, ever ever ever, and then you kiss and
that's all. Anybody can do it."

"Kiss? What do you kiss for?"

"Why, that, you know, is to well, they always
do that."

"Everybody?"

"Why, yes, everybody that's in love with each
other. Do you remember what I wrote on the
slate?"

"Ye yes."

"What was it?"

"I sha'n't tell you."

"Shall I tell you?"

"Ye yes but some other time."

"No, now."

"No, not now to-morrow."

"Oh, no, now. Please, Becky I'll whisper it,
I'll whisper it ever so easy."

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:

"Now you whisper it to me just the same."

She resisted, for a while, and then said:

"You turn your face away so you can't see,
and then I will. But you mustn't ever tell
anybody Will you, Tom? Now you won't, will

The big eyes told Tom his blunder and he
stopped, confused.

"Oh, Tom! Then I ain't the first you've ever
been engaged to!"

The child began to cry. Tom said:

"Oh, don't cry, Becky, I don't care for her
any more."

"Yes, you do, Tom you know you do."

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.
Tom's heart smote him. He went to her and
stood a moment, not knowing exactly how
to proceed. Then he said hesitatingly:

"Becky, I I don't care for anybody but you."

No reply but sobs.

"Becky" pleadingly. "Becky, won't you say
something?"

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:

The boy's 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 dog like a very dog. She would
be sorry some day maybe 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
away ever so far away, into unknown
countries beyond the seas and 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. No better 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

"Well, that beats anything!"

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. Tom's
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
called

"Doodle-bug, doodle-bug, tell me what I
want to know! Doodle-bug, doodle-bug,
tell me what I want to know!"

The sand began to work, and presently a
small black bug appeared for a second and
then darted under again in a fright.

"He dasn't tell! So it was a witch that done it.
I just knowed it."

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

"Who art thou that dares to hold such
language?"

"I, indeed! I am Robin Hood, as thy caitiff
carcase soon shall know."

"Then art thou indeed that famous outlaw?
Right gladly will I dispute with thee the
passes of the merry wood. Have at thee!"

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, "two up and two down."
Presently Tom said:

"Now, if you've got the hang, go it lively!"

So they "went it lively," panting and
perspiring with the work. By and by Tom
shouted:

"Fall! fall! Why don't you fall?"

"I sha'n't! Why don't you fall yourself? You're
getting the worst of it."

"Why, that ain't anything. I can't fall; that ain't
the way it is in the book. The book says,
'Then with one back-handed stroke he slew
poor Guy of Guisborne.' You're to turn
around and let me hit you in the back."

There was no getting around the authorities,
so Joe turned, received the whack and fell.

"Now," said Joe, getting up, "you got to let
me kill you. That's fair."

"Why, I can't do that, it ain't in the book."

"Well, it's blamed mean that's all."

"Well, say, Joe, you can be Friar Tuck or
Much the miller's son, and lam me with a
quarter-staff; or I'll be the Sheriff of

chamber. And now the tiresome chirping of
a cricket that no human ingenuity could
locate, began. Next the ghastly ticking of a
deathwatch in the wall at the bed's head
made Tom shudder it meant that
somebody's 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 "Scat! you devil!" and
the crash of an empty bottle against the
back of his aunt's 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 "ell" on all
fours. He "meow'd" 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. "Sacred to the memory of" 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

"A body can't be too partic'lar how they talk
'bout these-yer dead people, Tom."

This was a damper, and conversation died
again.

Presently Tom seized his comrade's arm
and said:

"Sh!"

"What is it, Tom?" And the two clung
together with beating hearts.

"Sh! There 'tis again! Didn't you hear it?"

"I --"

"There! Now you hear it."

"Lord, Tom, they're coming! They're
coming, sure. What'll we do?"

"I dono. Think they'll see us?"

"Oh, Tom, they can see in the dark, same as
cats. I wisht I hadn't come."

"Oh, don't be afeard. I don't believe they'll
bother us. We ain't doing any harm. If we
keep perfectly still, maybe they won't notice
us at all."

"I'll try to, Tom, but, Lord, I'm all of a shiver."

"Listen!"

The boys bent their heads together and
scarcely breathed. A muffled sound of
voices floated up from the far end of the
graveyard.

"Look! See there!" whispered Tom. "What is
it?"

"It's devil-fire. Oh, Tom, this is awful."

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.

"Hurry, men!" he said, in a low voice; "the
moon might come out at any moment."

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:

"Now the cussed thing's ready, Sawbones,
and you'll just out with another five, or here
she stays."

"That's the talk!" said Injun Joe.

"Look here, what does this mean?" said the
doctor. "You required your pay in advance,
and I've paid you."

"Yes, and you done more than that," said
Injun Joe, approaching the doctor, who was
now standing. "Five years ago you drove
me away from your father's kitchen one
night, when I come to ask for something to
eat, and you said I warn't there for any
good; and when I swore I'd get even with

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 Joe's.

"Lord, how is this, Joe?" he said.

"It's a dirty business," said Joe, without
moving.

"What did you do it for?"

"I! I never done it!"

"Look here! That kind of talk won't wash."

Potter trembled and grew white.

"I thought I'd got sober. I'd no business to
drink to-night. But it's in my head yet
worse'n when we started here. I'm all in a
muddle; can't recollect anything of it, hardly.
Tell me, Joe honest, now, old feller did I do
it? Joe, I never meant to 'pon my soul and
honor, I never meant to, Joe. Tell me how it
was, Joe. Oh, it's awful and him so young
and promising."

"Why, 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 clip and here you've laid, as
dead as a wedge til now."

"Oh, I didn't 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. I've fought, but never with
weepons. They'll all say that. Joe, don't tell!
Say you won't tell, Joe that's a good feller. I
always liked you, Joe, and stood up for you,
too. Don't you remember? You won't tell,

cottages that lay near the village, the
barking of the aroused watch-dogs
seemed to give wings to their feet.

"If we can only get to the old tannery before
we break down!" whispered Tom, in short
catches between breaths. "I can't stand it
much longer."

Huckleberry's 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:

"Huckleberry, what do you reckon'll come of
this?"

"If Doctor Robinson dies, I reckon hanging'll
come of it."

"Do you though?"

"Why, I know it, Tom."

Tom thought a while, then he said:

"Who'll tell? We?"

"What are you talking about? S'pose
something happened and Injun Joe didn't
hang? Why, he'd kill us some time or other,
just as dead sure as we're a laying here."

"That's just what I was thinking to myself,
Huck."

"If anybody tells, let Muff Potter do it, if he's
fool enough. He's generally drunk enough."

Tom said nothing went on thinking.
Presently he whispered:

Tom's 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 moonlight, took a little
fragment of "red keel" 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.


"Huck 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.

Huckleberry was filled with admiration of
Tom's 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:

"Hold on! Don't do that. A pin's brass. It
might have verdigrease on it."

"What's verdigrease?"

"It's p'ison. That's what it is. You just swaller
some of it once you'll see."

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

The dog howled again. The boys' hearts
sank once more.

"Oh, my! that ain't no Bull Harbison!"
whispered Huckleberry. "Do, Tom!"

Tom, quaking with fear, yielded, and put his
eye to the crack. His whisper was hardly
audible when he said:

"Oh, Huck, it's a stray dog!"

"Quick, Tom, quick! Who does he mean?"

"Huck, he must mean us both we're right
together."

"Oh, Tom, I reckon we're goners. I reckon
there ain't no mistake 'bout where I'll go to. I
been so wicked."

"Dad fetch it! This comes of playing hookey
and doing everything a feller's told not to do.
I might a been good, like Sid, if I'd a tried
but no, I wouldn't, of course. But if ever I get
off this time, I lay I'll just waller in Sunday-
schools!" And Tom began to snuffle a little.

"You bad!" and Huckleberry began to snuffle
too. "Consound it, Tom Sawyer, you're just
old pie, 'longside o' what I am. Oh, lordy,
lordy, lordy, I wisht I only had half your
chance."

Tom choked off and whispered:

"Look, Hucky, look! He's got his back to
us!"

Hucky looked, with joy in his heart.

"Well, he has, by jingoes! Did he before?"

"Yes, he did. But I, like a fool, never thought.
Oh, this is bully, you know. Now who can he
mean?"

"Oh, geeminy, it's him!" exclaimed both
boys, in a breath.

"Say, Tom they say a stray dog come
howling around Johnny Miller's house, 'bout
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 ain't anybody dead there yet."

"Well, I know that. And suppose there ain't.
Didn't Gracie Miller fall in the kitchen fire
and burn herself terrible the very next
Saturday?"

"Yes, but she ain't dead. And what's more,
she's getting better, too."

"All right, you wait and see. She's a goner,
just as dead sure as Muff Potter's a goner.
That's what the niggers say, and they know
all about these kind of things, Huck."

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 called
persecuted 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
culprit's heart. He sat down and tried to
seem gay, but it was up-hill work; it roused

Close upon the hour of noon the whole
village was suddenly electrified with the
ghastly news. No need of the as yet
undreamed-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 Potter
so the story ran. And it was said that a
belated citizen had come upon Potter
washing himself in the "branch" about one
or two o'clock in the morning, and that
Potter had at once sneaked off suspicious
circumstances, especially the washing
which was not a habit with Potter. It was
also said that the town had been ransacked
for this "murderer" (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 "was
confident" that he would be captured before
night.

All the town was drifting toward the
graveyard. Tom's 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 Huckleberry's. 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.

Injun Joe, and exclaimed:

"Oh, Injun Joe, you promised me you'd
never --"

"Is that your knife?" 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:

"Something told me 't if I didn't come back
and get --" He shuddered; then waved his
nerveless hand with a vanquished gesture
and said, "Tell 'em, Joe, tell 'em it ain't any
use any more."

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 God's 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 prisoner's 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.

"Why didn't you leave? What did you want to
come here for?" somebody said.

"I couldn't help it I couldn't help it," Potter
moaned. "I wanted to run away, but I
couldn't seem to come anywhere but here."
And he fell to sobbing again.

Injun 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

happened, now, but luckily the concern
passed out of Aunt Polly's face and she
came to Tom's relief without knowing it.
She said:

"Sho! It's that dreadful murder. I dream
about it most every night myself.
Sometimes I dream it's me that done it."

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. Tom's distress of mind wore
off gradually and the toothache grew
irksome and was discarded. If Sid really
managed to make anything out of Tom's
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 witness and 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
Tom's 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
"murderer" as he could get hold of. The jail

subscriber for all the "Health" periodicals
and phrenological frauds; and the solemn
ignorance they were inflated with was
breath to her nostrils. All the "rot" 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
one's 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
"hell following after." 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
Tom's low condition was a windfall to her.
She had him out at daylight every morning,
stood him up in the woodshed 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
"the yellow stains of it came through his
pores" as 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
jug's, and filled him up every day with
quack cure-alls.

Peter was sure.

"Now you've asked for it, and I'll give it to
you, because there ain't anything mean
about me; but if you find you don't like it, you
mustn't blame anybody but your own self."

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.

"Tom, what on earth ails that cat?"

"I don't know, aunt," gasped the boy.

"Why, I never see anything like it. What did
make him act so?"

"Deed I don't know, Aunt Polly; cats always
act so when they're having a good time."

"They do, do they?" There was something in
the tone that made Tom apprehensive.

"Yes'm. That is, I believe they do."

"You do?"

"Yes'm."

needn't take any more medicine."

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
looking down the road. Presently Jeff
Thatcher hove in sight, and Tom's face
lighted; he gazed a moment, and then
turned sorrowfully away. When Jeff arrived,
Tom accosted him; and "led up" 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 Tom's heart gave
a great bound. The next instant he was out,
and "going on" like an Indian; yelling,
laughing, chasing boys, jumping over the
fence at risk of life and limb, throwing
handsprings, standing on his head doing 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 boy's 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 Becky's nose,
almost upsetting her and she turned, with
her nose in the air, and he heard her say:
"Mf! some people think they're mighty smart
always showing off!"

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 Jackson's 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 hour which 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 way as
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 "hear

cured leaf tobacco, and had also brought a
few corn-cobs to make pipes with. But
none of the pirates smoked or "chewed" 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, "Hist!"
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 "the foe" stirred, to
"let him have it to the hilt," because "dead
men tell no tales." 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:

"Luff, and bring her to the wind!"

"Aye-aye, sir!"

"Steady, steady-y-y-y!"

"Steady it is, sir!"

"Let her go off a point!"

"Point it is, sir!"

As the boys steadily and monotonously
drove the raft toward mid-stream it was no
doubt understood that these orders were
given only for "style," and were not intended
to mean anything in particular.

island. But they discovered the danger in
time, and made shift to avert it. About two
o'clock 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 raft's 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 "pone" 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 camp-fire.

"Ain't it gay?" said Joe.

"It's nuts!" said Tom. "What would the boys
say if they could see us?"

"Say? Well, they'd just die to be here hey,
Hucky!"

"I reckon so," said Huckleberry; "anyways,
I'm suited. I don't want nothing better'n this. I

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 smoke he 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:

"What does pirates have to do?"

Tom said:

"Oh, they have just a bully time take ships
and burn them, and get the money and bury
it in awful places in their island where
there's ghosts and things to watch it, and kill
everybody in the ships make 'em walk a
plank."

"And they carry the women to the island,"
said Joe; "they don't kill the women."

"No," assented Tom, "they don't kill the
women they're too noble. And the women's
always beautiful, too.

"And don't they wear the bulliest clothes! Oh
no! All gold and silver and di'monds," said
Joe, with enthusiasm.

"Who?" said Huck.

"Why, the pirates."

Huck scanned his own clothing forlornly.

"I reckon I ain't dressed fitten for a pirate,"
said he, with a regretful pathos in his voice;
"but I ain't got none but these."

But the other boys told him the fine clothes
would come fast enough, after they should
have begun their adventures. They made

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
Nature's 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 "sniffing
around," then proceeding again for 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
Tom's leg and began a journey over him,
his whole heart was glad for that meant that
he was going to have a new suit of clothes
without 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

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 catfish provisions 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

water. The little steam ferryboat 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 ferryboat's
side, and as it expanded and rose in a lazy
cloud, that same dull throb of sound was
borne to the listeners again.

"I know now!" exclaimed Tom; "somebody's
drownded!"

"That's it!" said Huck; "they 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 'em and set 'em afloat, and
wherever there's anybody that's drownded,
they'll float right there and stop."

"Yes, I've heard about that," said Joe. "I
wonder what makes the bread do that."

"Oh, it ain't the bread, so much," said Tom;
"I reckon it's mostly what they say over it
before they start it out."

"But they don't say anything over it," said
Huck. "I've seen 'em and they don't."

"Well, that's funny," said Tom. "But maybe
they say it to themselves. Of course they do.
Anybody might know that."

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.

By and by Joe timidly ventured upon a
roundabout "feeler" as to how the others
might look upon a return to civilization not
right now, but

Tom withered him with derision! Huck,
being uncommitted as yet, joined in with
Tom, and the waverer quickly "explained,"
and was glad to get out of the scrape with
as little taint of chicken-hearted
homesickness 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 camp-fire.
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 "red keel"; one he rolled up
and put in his jacket pocket, and the other
he put in Joe's hat and removed it to a little
distance from the owner. And he also put
into the hat certain schoolboy treasures of
almost inestimable value among them a
lump of chalk, an India-rubber ball, three
fishhooks, and one of that kind of marbles
known as a "sure 'nough crystal." 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 XV

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 half-way over; the current would

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.

"What makes the candle blow so?" said Aunt
Polly. Tom hurried up. "Why, that door's
open, I believe. Why, of course it is. No end
of strange things now. Go 'long and shut it,
Sid."

Tom disappeared under the bed just in
time. He lay and "breathed" himself for a
time, and then crept to where he could
almost touch his aunt's foot.

"But as I was saying," said Aunt Polly, "he
warn't bad, so to say only mischeevous.
Only just giddy, and harum-scarum, you
know. He warn't any more responsible than
a colt. He never meant any harm, and he
was the best-hearted boy that ever was"
and she began to cry.

"It was just so with my Joe always full of his
devilment, and up to every kind of mischief,
but he was just as unselfish and kind as he
could be and 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!" And Mrs. Harper
sobbed as if her heart would break.

"I hope Tom's better off where he is," said
Sid, "but if he'd been better in some ways --
"

"Sid!" Tom felt the glare of the old lady's
eye, though he could not see it. "Not a word
against my Tom, now that he's gone! God'll
take care of him never you trouble yourself,
sir! Oh, Mrs. Harper, I don't know how to
give him up! I don't know how to give him
up! He was such a comfort to me, although

toward noon the raft had been found,
lodged against the Missouri shore some
five or six miles below the village and 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 midchannel, 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 good-night
and turned to go. Then with a mutual
impulse the two bereaved women flung
themselves into each other's arms and had
a good, consoling cry, and then parted. Aunt
Polly was tender far beyond her wont, in her
good-night 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

breakfast."

"Which he is!" 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 XVI

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 other's 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

not broken up soon, he would have to bring
it out. He said, with a great show of
cheerfulness:

"I bet there's been pirates on this island
before, boys. We'll explore it again. They've
hid treasures here somewhere. How'd you
feel to light on a rotten chest full of gold and
silver hey?"

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:

"Oh, boys, let's give it up. I want to go home.
It's so lonesome."

"Oh no, Joe, you'll feel better by and by,"
said Tom. "Just think of the fishing that's
here."

"I don't care for fishing. I want to go home."

"But, Joe, there ain't such another
swimming-place anywhere."

"Swimming's no good. I don't seem to care
for it, somehow, when there ain't anybody
to say I sha'n't go in. I mean to go home."

"Oh, shucks! Baby! You want to see your
mother, I reckon."

"Yes, I do want to see my mother and you
would, too, if you had one. I ain't any more
baby than you are." And Joe snuffled a little.

"Well, we'll let the cry-baby go home to his
mother, won't we, Huck? Poor thing does it
want to see its mother? And so it shall. You
like it here, don't you, Huck? We'll stay,
won't we?"

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:

"Wait! Wait! I want to tell you something!"

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 "point" he
was driving at, and then they set up a war-
whoop of applause and said it was
"splendid!" and said if he had told them at
first, they wouldn't 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 Tom's 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 grape-vine, and they "bit"
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:

"Why, it's just as easy! If I'd a knowed this

"'Deed it would, Joe. Say I wish the boys
could see us now."

"So do I."

"Say boys, don't say anything about it, and
some time when they're around, I'll come up
to you and say, 'Joe, got a pipe? I want a
smoke.' And you'll say, kind of careless
like, as if it warn't anything, you'll say, 'Yes,
I got my old pipe, and another one, but my
tobacker ain't very good.' And I'll say, 'Oh,
that's all right, if it's strong enough.' And
then you'll out with the pipes, and we'll light
up just as ca'm, and then just see 'em
look!"

"By jings, that'll be gay, Tom! I wish it was
Now!"

"So do I! And when we tell 'em we learned
when we was off pirating, won't they wish
they'd been along?"

"Oh, I reckon not! I'll just bet they will!"

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 boys' 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.
Joe's pipe dropped from his nerveless
fingers. Tom's followed. Both fountains
were going furiously and both pumps
bailing with might and main. Joe said
feebly:

"I've lost my knife. I reckon I better go and
find it."

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 tree-tops right over the boys' heads.
They clung together in terror, in the thick
gloom that followed. A few big rain-drops
fell pattering upon the leaves.

"Quick! boys, go for the tent!" 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 thunder-blasts
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 others' hands and fled, with many
tumblings and bruises, to the shelter of a
great oak that stood upon the river-bank.
Now the battle was at its highest. Under the
ceaseless conflagration of lightning that
flamed in the skies, everything below stood
out in clean-cut and shadowless
distinctness: the bending trees, the billowy
river, white with foam, the driving spray of

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 zebras all of them
chiefs, of course and 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 war-whoops, 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 supper-
time, hungry and happy; but now a difficulty
arose hostile 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

Presently she stopped, and said to herself:

"It was right here. Oh, if it was to do over
again, I wouldn't say that I wouldn't say it for
the whole world. But he's gone now; I'll
never, never, never see him any more."

This thought broke her down, and she
wandered away, with tears rolling down her
cheeks. Then quite a group of boys and girls
playmates of Tom's and Joe's came 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!) and each speaker pointed out the
exact spot where the lost lads stood at the
time, and then added something like "and I
was a-standing just so just as I am now,
and as if you was him I was as close as that
and he smiled, just this way and then
something seemed to go all over me, like
awful, you know and I never thought what it
meant, of course, but I can see now!"

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:

"Well, Tom Sawyer he licked me once."

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

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 minister's,
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:

"Aunt Polly, it ain't fair. Somebody's got to
be glad to see Huck."

"And so they shall. I'm glad to see him, poor
motherless thing!" 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: "Praise God from whom all
blessings flow Sing! and put your hearts in

go to your funeral, you could have come
over and give me a hint some way that you
warn't dead, but only run off."

"Yes, you could have done that, Tom," said
Mary; "and I believe you would if you had
thought of it."

"Would you, Tom?" said Aunt Polly, her face
lighting wistfully. "Say, now, would you, if
you'd thought of it?"

"I well, I don't know. 'Twould 'a' spoiled
everything."

"Tom, I hoped you loved me that much," said
Aunt Polly, with a grieved tone that
discomforted the boy. "It would have been
something if you'd cared enough to think of
it, even if you didn't do it."

"Now, auntie, that ain't any harm," pleaded
Mary; "it's only Tom's giddy way he is
always in such a rush that he never thinks of
anything."

"More's the pity. Sid would have thought.
And Sid would have come and done it, too.
Tom, you'll look back, some day, when it's
too late, and wish you'd cared a little more
for me when it would have cost you so little."

"Now, auntie, you know I do care for you,"
said Tom.

"I'd know it better if you acted more like it."

"I wish now I'd thought," said Tom, with a
repentant tone; "but I dreamt about you,
anyway. That's something, ain't it?"

"It ain't much a cat does that much but it's
better than nothing. What did you dream?"

"Why, Wednesday night I dreamt that you
was sitting over there by the bed, and Sid

"Well? Well? What did I make him do, Tom?
What did I make him do?"

"You made him you Oh, you made him shut
it."

"Well, for the land's sake! I never heard the
beat of that in all my days! Don't tell me
there ain't anything in dreams, any more.
Sereny Harper shall know of this before I'm
an hour older. I'd like to see her get around
this with her rubbage 'bout superstition. Go
on, Tom!"

"Oh, it's all getting just as bright as day,
now. Next you said I warn't bad, only
mischeevous and harum-scarum, and not
any more responsible than than I think it was
a colt, or something."

"And so it was! Well, goodness gracious!
Go on, Tom!"

"And then you began to cry."

"So I did. So I did. Not the first time, neither.
And then --"

"Then Mrs. Harper she began to cry, and
said Joe was just the same, and she
wished she hadn't whipped him for taking
cream when she'd throwed it out her own
self --"

"Tom! The sperrit was upon you! You was a
prophesying that's what you was doing!
Land alive, go on, Tom!"

"Then Sid he said he said --"

"I don't think I said anything," said Sid.

"Yes you did, Sid," said Mary.

"Shut your heads and let Tom go on! What
did he say, Tom?"

dream," Sid soliloquized just audibly.

"Shut up, Sid! A body does just the same in
a dream as he'd do if he was awake.
Here's a big Milum apple I've been saving
for you, Tom, if you was ever found again
now go 'long to school. I'm thankful to the
good God and Father of us all I've got you
back, that's long-suffering and merciful to
them that believe on Him and keep His
word, though goodness knows I'm unworthy
of it, but if only the worthy ones got His
blessings and had His hand to help them
over the rough places, there's few enough
would smile here or ever enter into His rest
when the long night comes. Go 'long Sid,
Mary, Tom take yourselves off you've
hendered me long enough."

The children left for school, and the old lady
to call on Mrs. Harper and vanquish her
realism with Tom's marvellous dream. Sid
had better judgment than to utter the thought
that was in his mind as he left the house. It
was this: "Pretty thin as long a dream as
that, without any mistakes in it!"

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 suntanned skin of his, and his
glittering notoriety; and Tom would not have
parted with either for a circus.

"Why, Mary Austin! you bad girl, why didn't
you come to Sunday-school?"

"I did come didn't you see me?"

"Why, no! Did you? Where did you sit?"

"I was in Miss Peters' class, where I always
go. I saw you."

"Did you? Why, it's funny I didn't see you. I
wanted to tell you about the picnic."

"Oh, that's jolly. Who's going to give it?"

"My ma's going to let me have one."

"Oh, goody; I hope she'll let me come."

"Well, she will. The picnic's for me. She'll let
anybody come that I want, and I want you."

"That's ever so nice. When is it going to be?"

"By and by. Maybe about vacation."

"Oh, won't it be fun! You going to have all the
girls and boys?"

"Yes, every one that's friends to me or
wants to be"; 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 "all to flinders" while he
was "standing within three feet of it."

"Oh, may I come?" said Grace Miller.

"Yes."

"And me?" said Sally Rogers.

"Yes."

"And me, too?" said Susy Harper. "And

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.

Amy's happy prattle became intolerable.
Tom hinted at things he had to attend to;
things that must be done; and time was
fleeting. But in vain the girl chirped on. Tom
thought, "Oh, hang her, ain't I ever going to
get rid of her?" At last he must be attending
to those things and she said artlessly that
she would be "around" when school let out.
And he hastened away, hating her for it.

"Any other boy!" Tom thought, grating his
teeth. "Any 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 I'll lick you again! You just wait
till I catch you out! I'll just take and --"

And he went through the motions of
thrashing an imaginary boy pummelling the
air, and kicking and gouging. "Oh, you do,
do you? You holler 'nough, do you? Now,
then, let that learn you!" And so the
imaginary flogging was finished to his
satisfaction.

Tom fled home at noon. His conscience
could not endure any more of Amy's 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 absent-
mindedness followed, and then
melancholy; two or three times she pricked
up her ear at a footstep, but it was a false

Chapter XIX

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:

"Tom, I've a notion to skin you alive!"

"Auntie, what have I done?"

"Well, you've done enough. Here I go over to
Sereny Harper, like an old softy, expecting
I'm going to make her believe all that
rubbage about that dream, when lo and
behold you she'd found out from Joe that
you was over here and heard all the talk we
had that night. Tom, I don't 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."

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:

"Auntie, I wish I hadn't done it but I didn't
think."

"Oh, child, you never think. You never think
of anything but your own selfishness. You
could think to come all the way over here
from Jackson's Island in the night to laugh at
our troubles, and you could think to fool me
with a lie about a dream; but you couldn't
ever think to pity us and save us from
sorrow."

"Auntie, I know now it was mean, but I didn't
mean to be mean. I didn't, honest. And
besides, I didn't come over here to laugh at

"Why, yes, I did."

"Are you sure you did, Tom?"

"Why, yes, I did, auntie certain sure."

"What did you kiss me for, Tom?"

"Because I loved you so, and you laid there
moaning and I was so sorry."

The words sounded like truth. The old lady
could not hide a tremor in her voice when
she said:

"Kiss me again, Tom! and be off with you to
school, now, and don't bother me any
more."

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:

"No, I don't dare. Poor boy, I reckon he's
lied about it but it's a blessed, blessed lie,
there's such a comfort come from it. I hope
the Lord I know the Lord will forgive him,
because it was such good-heartedness in
him to tell it. But I don't want to find out it's a
lie. I won't look."

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: "It's a good lie it's a good lie I won't
let it grieve me." So she sought the jacket
pocket. A moment later she was reading
Tom's piece of bark through flowing tears
and saying: "I could forgive the boy, now, if
he'd committed a million sins!"

Chapter XX

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 title-page Professor
Somebody's Anatomy carried no
information to her mind; so she began to
turn the leaves. She came at once upon a
handsomely engraved and colored
frontispiece a 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.

"Tom Sawyer, you are just as mean as you
can be, to sneak up on a person and look at
what they're looking at."

"How could I know you was looking at
anything?"

"You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Tom
Sawyer; you know you're going to tell on
me, and oh, what shall I do, what shall I do!
I'll be whipped, and I never was whipped in
school."

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 still because, said she to
herself, "he'll tell about me tearing the
picture sure. I wouldn't say a word, not to
save his life!"

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 bout he
had denied it for form's 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. Quick something
must be done! done in a flash, too! But the
very imminence of the emergency
paralyzed his invention. Good! he had an
inspiration! He would run and snatch the
book, spring through the door and fly. But