adventure and introduce no exciting topic. The Widow Douglas stayed by to
see that he obeyed. At home Tom learned of the Cardiff Hill event; also
that the "ragged man's" body had eventually been found in the river near
the ferrylanding; he had been drowned while trying to escape, perhaps.
About a fortnight after Tom's rescue from the cave, he started off to
visit Huck, who had grown plenty strong enough, now, to hear exciting
talk, and Tom had some that would interest him, he thought. Judge
Thatcher's house was on Tom's way, and he stopped to see Becky. The Judge
and some friends set Tom to talking, and some one asked him ironically if
he wouldn't like to go to the cave again. Tom said he thought he wouldn't
mind it. The Judge said:
"Well, there are others just like you, Tom, I've not the least doubt.
But we have taken care of that. Nobody will get lost in that cave any
more."
"Why?"
"Because I had its big door sheathed with boiler iron two weeks ago,
and triple-locked-and I've got the keys."
Tom turned as white as a sheet.
"What's the matter, boy! Here, run, somebody! Fetch a glass of water!"
The water was brought and thrown into Tom's face.
"Ah, now you're all right. What was the matter with you, Tom?"
"Oh, Judge, Injun Joe's in the cave!"
Within a few minutes the news had spread, and a dozen skiff-loads of
men were on their way to McDougal's cave, and the ferryboat, well filled
with passengers, soon followed. Tom Sawyer was in the skiff that bore
Judge Thatcher.
When the cave door was unlocked, a sorrowful sight presented itself in
the dim twilight of the place. Injun Joe lay stretched upon the ground,
dead, with his face close to the crack of the door, as if his longing eyes
had been fixed, to the latest moment, upon the light and the cheer of the
free world outside. Tom was touched, for he knew by his own experience how
this wretch had suffered. His pity was moved, but nevertheless he felt an
abounding sense of relief and security, now, which revealed to him in a
degree which he had not fully appreciated before how vast a weight of
dread had been lying upon him since the day he lifted his voice against
this bloody-minded outcast.
Injun Joe's bowie-knife lay close by, its blade broken in two. The
great foundation-beam of the door had been chipped and hacked through,
with tedious labor; useless labor, too, it was, for the native rock formed
a sill outside it, and upon that stubborn material the knife had wrought
no effect; the only damage done was to the knife itself. But if there had
been no stony obstruction there the labor would have been useless still,
for if the beam had been wholly cut away Injun Joe could not have squeezed
his body under the door, and he knew it. So he had only hacked that place
in order to be doing something-in order to pass the weary time-in order to
employ his tortured faculties. Ordinarily one could find half a dozen bits
of candle stuck around in the crevices of this vestibule, left there by
tourists; but there were none now. The prisoner had searched them out and
eaten them. He had also contrived to catch a few bats, and these, also, he
had eaten, leaving only their claws. The poor unfortunate had starved to
death. In one place, near at hand, a stalagmite had been slowly growing up
from the ground for ages, builded by the water-drip from a stalactite
overhead. The captive had broken off the stalagmite, and upon the stump
had placed a stone, wherein he had scooped a shallow hollow to catch the
precious drop that fell once in every three minutes with the dreary
regularity of a clock-tick-a dessertspoonful once in four and twenty
hours. That drop was falling when the Pyramids were new; when Troy fell;
when the foundations of Rome were laid when Christ was crucified; when the
Conqueror created the British empire; when Columbus sailed; when the
massacre at Lexington was "news." It is falling now; it will still be
falling when all these things shall have sunk down the afternoon of
history, and the twilight of tradition, and been swallowed up in the thick
night of oblivion. Has everything a purpose and a mission? Did this drop
fall patiently during five thousand years to be ready for this flitting
human insect's need? and has it another important object to accomplish ten
thousand years to come? No matter. It is many and many a year since the
hapless half-breed scooped out the stone to catch the priceless drops, but
to this day the tourist stares longest at that pathetic stone and that
slow-dropping water when he comes to see the wonders of McDougal's cave.
Injun Joe's cup stands first in the list of the cavern's marvels; even
"Aladdin's Palace" cannot rival it.
Injun Joe was buried near the mouth of the cave; and people flocked
there in boats and wagons from the towns and from all the farms and
hamlets for seven miles around; they brought their children, and all sorts
of provisions, and confessed that they had had almost as satisfactory a
time at the funeral as they could have had at the hanging.
This funeral stopped the further growth of one thing-the petition to
the governor for Injun Joe's pardon. The petition had been largely signed;
many tearful and eloquent meetings had been held, and a committee of sappy
women been appointed to go in deep mourning and wail around the governor,
and implore him to be a merciful ass and trample his duty under foot.
Injun Joe was believed to have killed five citizens of the village, but
what of that? If he had been Satan himself there would have been plenty of
weaklings ready to scribble their names to a pardon-petition, and drip a
tear on it from their permanently impaired and leaky water-works.
The morning after the funeral Tom took Huck to a private place to have
an important talk. Huck had learned all about Tom's adventure from the
Welshman and the Widow Douglas, by this time, but Tom said he reckoned
there was one thing they had not told him; that thing was what he wanted
to talk about now. Huck's face saddened. He said:
"I know what it is. You got into No. 2 and never found anything but
whiskey. Nobody told me it was you; but I just knowed it must 'a' ben you,
soon as I heard 'bout that whiskey business; and I knowed you hadn't got
the money becuz you'd 'a' got at me some way or other and told me even if
you was mum to everybody else. Tom, something's always told me we'd never
get holt of that swag."
"Why, Huck, I never told on that tavern-keeper. YOU know his tavern was
all right the Saturday I went to the picnic. Don't you remember you was to
watch there that night?"
"Oh yes! Why, it seems 'bout a year ago. It was that very night that I
follered Injun Joe to the widder's."
"YOU followed him?"
"Yes-but you keep mum. I reckon Injun Joe's left friends behind him,
and I don't want 'em souring on me and doing me mean tricks. If it hadn't
ben for me he'd be down in Texas now, all right."
Then Huck told his entire adventure in confidence to Tom, who had only
heard of the Welshman's part of it before.
"Well," said Huck, presently, coming back to the main question,
"whoever nipped the whiskey in No. 2, nipped the money, too, I
reckon-anyways it's a goner for us, Tom."
"Huck, that money wasn't ever in No. 2!"
"What!" Huck searched his comrade's face keenly. "Tom, have you got on
the track of that money again?"
"Huck, it's in the cave!"
Huck's eyes blazed.
"Say it again, Tom."
"The money's in the cave!"
"Tom-honest injun, now-is it fun, or earnest?"
"Earnest, Huck-just as earnest as ever I was in my life. Will you go in
there with me and help get it out?"
"I bet I will! I will if it's where we can blaze our way to it and not
get lost."
"Huck, we can do that without the least little bit of trouble in the
world."
"Good as wheat! What makes you think the money's-"
"Huck, you just wait till we get in there. If we don't find it I'll
agree to give you my drum and every thing I've got in the world. I will,
by jings."
"All right-it's a whiz. When do you say?"
"Right now, if you say it. Are you strong enough?"
"Is it far in the cave? I ben on my pins a little, three or four days,
now, but I can't walk more'n a mile, Tom-least I don't think I could."
"It's about five mile into there the way anybody but me would go, Huck,
but there's a mighty short cut that they don't anybody but me know about.
Huck, I'll take you right to it in a skiff. I'll float the skiff down
there, and I'll pull it back again all by myself. You needn't ever turn
your hand over."
"Less start right off, Tom."
"All right. We want some bread and meat, and our pipes, and a little
bag or two, and two or three kite-strings, and some of these new-fangled
things they call lucifer matches. I tell you, many's the time I wished I
had some when I was in there before."
A trifle after noon the boys borrowed a small skiff from a citizen who
was absent, and got under way at once. When they were several miles below
"Cave Hollow," Tom said:
"Now you see this bluff here looks all alike all the way down from the
cave hollow-no houses, no woodyards, bushes all alike. But do you see that
white place up yonder where there's been a landslide? Well, that's one of
my marks. We'll get ashore, now."
They landed.
"Now, Huck, where we're a-standing you could touch that hole I got out
of with a fishing-pole. See if you can find it."
Huck searched all the place about, and found nothing. Tom proudly
marched into a thick clump of sumach bushes and said:
"Here you are! Look at it, Huck; it's the snuggest hole in this
country. You just keep mum about it. All along I've been wanting to be a
robber, but I knew I'd got to have a thing like this, and where to run
across it was the bother. We've got it now, and we'll keep it quiet, only
we'll let Joe Harper and Ben Rogers in-because of course there's got to be
a Gang, or else there wouldn't be any style about it. Tom Sawyer's Gang-it
sounds splendid, don't it, Huck?"
"Well, it just does, Tom. And who'll we rob?"
"Oh, most anybody. Waylay people-that's mostly the way."
"And kill them?"
"No, not always. Hive them in the cave till they raise a ransom."
"What's a ransom?"
"Money. You make them raise all they can, off'n their friends; and
after you've kept them a year, if it ain't raised then you kill them.
That's the general way. Only you don't kill the women. You shut up the
women, but you don't kill them. They're always beautiful and rich, and
awfully scared. You take their watches and things, but you always take
your hat off and talk polite. They ain't anybody as polite as
robbers-you'll see that in any book. Well, the women get to loving you,
and after they've been in the cave a week or two weeks they stop crying
and after that you couldn't get them to leave. If you drove them out
they'd turn right around and come back. It's so in all the books."
"Why, it's real bully, Tom. I believe it's better'n to be a pirate."
"Yes, it's better in some ways, because it's close to home and circuses
and all that."
By this time everything was ready and the boys entered the hole, Tom in
the lead. They toiled their way to the farther end of the tunnel, then
made their spliced kite-strings fast and moved on. A few steps brought
them to the spring, and Tom felt a shudder quiver all through him. He
showed Huck the fragment of candle-wick perched on a lump of clay against
the wall, and described how he and Becky had watched the flame struggle
and expire.
The boys began to quiet down to whispers, now, for the stillness and
gloom of the place oppressed their spirits. They went on, and presently
entered and followed Tom's other corridor until they reached the
"jumping-off place." The candles revealed the fact that it was not really
a precipice, but only a steep clay hill twenty or thirty feet high. Tom
whispered:
"Now I'll show you something, Huck."
He held his candle aloft and said:
"Look as far around the corner as you can. Do you see that? There-on
the big rock over yonder-done with candle-smoke."
"Tom, it's a CROSS!"
"NOW where's your Number Two? 'UNDER THE CROSS,' hey? Right yonder's
where I saw Injun Joe poke up his candle, Huck!"
Huck stared at the mystic sign awhile, and then said with a shaky voice:
"Tom, less git out of here!"
"What! and leave the treasure?"
"Yes-leave it. Injun Joe's ghost is round about there, certain."
"No it ain't, Huck, no it ain't. It would ha'nt the place where he
died-away out at the mouth of the cave-five mile from here."
"No, Tom, it wouldn't. It would hang round the money. I know the ways
of ghosts, and so do you."
Tom began to fear that Huck was right. Misgivings gathered in his mind.
But presently an idea occurred to him-
"Lookyhere, Huck, what fools we're making of ourselves! Injun Joe's
ghost ain't a going to come around where there's a cross!"
The point was well taken. It had its effect.
"Tom, I didn't think of that. But that's so. It's luck for us, that
cross is. I reckon we'll climb down there and have a hunt for that box."
Tom went first, cutting rude steps in the clay hill as he descended.
Huck followed. Four avenues opened out of the small cavern which the great
rock stood in. The boys examined three of them with no result. They found
a small recess in the one nearest the base of the rock, with a pallet of
blankets spread down in it; also an old suspender, some bacon rind, and
the well-gnawed bones of two or three fowls. But there was no money-box.
The lads searched and researched this place, but in vain. Tom said:
"He said UNDER the cross. Well, this comes nearest to being under the
cross. It can't be under the rock itself, because that sets solid on the
ground."
They searched everywhere once more, and then sat down discouraged. Huck
could suggest nothing. By-and-by Tom said:
"Lookyhere, Huck, there's footprints and some candle-grease on the clay
about one side of this rock, but not on the other sides. Now, what's that
for? I bet you the money IS under the rock. I'm going to dig in the clay."
"That ain't no bad notion, Tom!" said Huck with animation.
Tom's "real Barlow" was out at once, and he had not dug four inches
before he struck wood.
"Hey, Huck!-you hear that?"
Huck began to dig and scratch now. Some boards were soon uncovered and
removed. They had concealed a natural chasm which led under the rock. Tom
got into this and held his candle as far under the rock as he could, but
said he could not see to the end of the rift. He proposed to explore. He
stooped and passed under; the narrow way descended gradually. He followed
its winding course, first to the right, then to the left, Huck at his
heels. Tom turned a short curve, by-and-by, and exclaimed:
"My goodness, Huck, lookyhere!"
It was the treasure-box, sure enough, occupying a snug little cavern,
along with an empty powder-keg, a couple of guns in leather cases, two or
three pairs of old moccasins, a leather belt, and some other rubbish well
soaked with the water-drip.
"Got it at last!" said Huck, ploughing among the tarnished coins with
his hand. "My, but we're rich, Tom!"
"Huck, I always reckoned we'd get it. It's just too good to believe,
but we HAVE got it, sure! Say-let's not fool around here. Let's snake it
out. Lemme see if I can lift the box."
It weighed about fifty pounds. Tom could lift it, after an awkward
fashion, but could not carry it conveniently.
"I thought so," he said; "THEY carried it like it was heavy, that day
at the ha'nted house. I noticed that. I reckon I was right to think of
fetching the little bags along."
The money was soon in the bags and the boys took it up to the cross
rock.
"Now less fetch the guns and things," said Huck.
"No, Huck-leave them there. They're just the tricks to have when we go
to robbing. We'll keep them there all the time, and we'll hold our orgies
there, too. It's an awful snug place for orgies."
"What orgies?"
"I dono. But robbers always have orgies, and of course we've got to
have them, too. Come along, Huck, we've been in here a long time. It's
getting late, I reckon. I'm hungry, too. We'll eat and smoke when we get
to the skiff."
They presently emerged into the clump of sumach bushes, looked warily
out, found the coast clear, and were soon lunching and smoking in the
skiff. As the sun dipped toward the horizon they pushed out and got under
way. Tom skimmed up the shore through the long twilight, chatting cheerily
with Huck, and landed shortly after dark.
"Now, Huck," said Tom, "we'll hide the money in the loft of the widow's
woodshed, and I'll come up in the morning and we'll count it and divide,
and then we'll hunt up a place out in the woods for it where it will be
safe. Just you lay quiet here and watch the stuff till I run and hook
Benny Taylor's little wagon; I won't be gone a minute."
He disappeared, and presently returned with the wagon, put the two
small sacks into it, threw some old rags on top of them, and started off,
dragging his cargo behind him. When the boys reached the Welshman's house,
they stopped to rest. Just as they were about to move on, the Welshman
stepped out and said:
"Hallo, who's that?"
"Huck and Tom Sawyer."
"Good! Come along with me, boys, you are keeping everybody waiting.
Here-hurry up, trot ahead-I'll haul the wagon for you. Why, it's not as
light as it might be. Got bricks in it?-or old metal?"
"Old metal," said Tom.
"I judged so; the boys in this town will take more trouble and fool
away more time hunting up six bits' worth of old iron to sell to the
foundry than they would to make twice the money at regular work. But
that's human nature-hurry along, hurry along!"
The boys wanted to know what the hurry was about.
"Never mind; you'll see, when we get to the Widow Douglas'."
Huck said with some apprehension-for he was long used to being falsely
accused:
"Mr. Jones, we haven't been doing nothing."
The Welshman laughed.
"Well, I don't know, Huck, my boy. I don't know about that. Ain't you
and the widow good friends?"
"Yes. Well, she's ben good friends to me, anyway."
"All right, then. What do you want to be afraid for?"
This question was not entirely answered in Huck's slow mind before he
found himself pushed, along with Tom, into Mrs. Douglas' drawing-room. Mr.
Jones left the wagon near the door and followed.
The place was grandly lighted, and everybody that was of any
consequence in the village was there. The Thatchers were there, the
Harpers, the Rogerses, Aunt Polly, Sid, Mary, the minister, the editor,
and a great many more, and all dressed in their best. The widow received
the boys as heartily as any one could well receive two such looking
beings. They were covered with clay and candle-grease. Aunt Polly blushed
crimson with humiliation, and frowned and shook her head at Tom. Nobody
suffered half as much as the two boys did, however. Mr. Jones said:
"Tom wasn't at home, yet, so I gave him up; but I stumbled on him and
Huck right at my door, and so I just brought them along in a hurry."
"And you did just right," said the widow. "Come with me, boys."
She took them to a bedchamber and said:
"Now wash and dress yourselves. Here are two new suits of
clothes-shirts, socks, everything complete. They're Huck's-no, no thanks,
Huck-Mr. Jones bought one and I the other. But they'll fit both of you.
Get into them. We'll wait-come down when you are slicked up enough."
Then she left.
Huck said: "Tom, we can slope, if we can find a rope. The window ain't
high from the ground."
"Shucks! what do you want to slope for?"
"Well, I ain't used to that kind of a crowd. I can't stand it. I ain't
going down there, Tom."
"Oh, bother! It ain't anything. I don't mind it a bit. I'll take care
of you."
Sid appeared.
"Tom," said he, "auntie has been waiting for you all the afternoon.
Mary got your Sunday clothes ready, and everybody's been fretting about
you. Say-ain't this grease and clay, on your clothes?"
"Now, Mr. Siddy, you jist 'tend to your own business. What's all this
blow-out about, anyway?"
"It's one of the widow's parties that she's always having. This time
it's for the Welshman and his sons, on account of that scrape they helped
her out of the other night. And say-I can tell you something, if you want
to know."
"Well, what?"
"Why, old Mr. Jones is going to try to spring something on the people
here to-night, but I overheard him tell auntie to-day about it, as a
secret, but I reckon it's not much of a secret now. Everybody knows-the
widow, too, for all she tries to let on she don't. Mr. Jones was bound
Huck should be here-couldn't get along with his grand secret without Huck,
you know!"
"Secret about what, Sid?"
"About Huck tracking the robbers to the widow's. I reckon Mr. Jones was
going to make a grand time over his surprise, but I bet you it will drop
pretty flat."
Sid chuckled in a very contented and satisfied way.
"Sid, was it you that told?"
"Oh, never mind who it was. SOMEBODY told-that's enough."
"Sid, there's only one person in this town mean enough to do that, and
that's you. If you had been in Huck's place you'd 'a' sneaked down the
hill and never told anybody on the robbers. You can't do any but mean
things, and you can't bear to see anybody praised for doing good ones.
There-no thanks, as the widow says"-and Tom cuffed Sid's ears and helped
him to the door with several kicks. "Now go and tell auntie if you
dare-and to-morrow you'll catch it!"
Some minutes later the widow's guests were at the supper-table, and a
dozen children were propped up at little side-tables in the same room,
after the fashion of that country and that day. At the proper time Mr.
Jones made his little speech, in which he thanked the widow for the honor
she was doing himself and his sons, but said that there was another person
whose modesty-
And so forth and so on. He sprung his secret about Huck's share in the
adventure in the finest dramatic manner he was master of, but the surprise
it occasioned was largely counterfeit and not as clamorous and effusive as
it might have been under happier circumstances. However, the widow made a
pretty fair show of astonishment, and heaped so many compliments and so
much gratitude upon Huck that he almost forgot the nearly intolerable
discomfort of his new clothes in the entirely intolerable discomfort of
being set up as a target for everybody's gaze and everybody's laudations.
The widow said she meant to give Huck a home under her roof and have
him educated; and that when she could spare the money she would start him
in business in a modest way. Tom's chance was come. He said:
"Huck don't need it. Huck's rich."
Nothing but a heavy strain upon the good manners of the company kept
back the due and proper complimentary laugh at this pleasant joke. But the
silence was a little awkward. Tom broke it:
"Huck's got money. Maybe you don't believe it, but he's got lots of it.
Oh, you needn't smile-I reckon I can show you. You just wait a minute."
Tom ran out of doors. The company looked at each other with a perplexed
interest-and inquiringly at Huck, who was tongue-tied.
"Sid, what ails Tom?" said Aunt Polly. "He-well, there ain't ever any
making of that boy out. I never-"
Tom entered, struggling with the weight of his sacks, and Aunt Polly
did not finish her sentence. Tom poured the mass of yellow coin upon the
table and said:
"There-what did I tell you? Half of it's Huck's and half of it's mine!"
The spectacle took the general breath away. All gazed, nobody spoke for
a moment. Then there was a unanimous call for an explanation. Tom said he
could furnish it, and he did. The tale was long, but brimful of interest.
There was scarcely an interruption from any one to break the charm of its
flow. When he had finished, Mr. Jones said:
"I thought I had fixed up a little surprise for this occasion, but it
don't amount to anything now. This one makes it sing mighty small, I'm
willing to allow."
The money was counted. The sum amounted to a little over twelve
thousand dollars. It was more than any one present had ever seen at one
time before, though several persons were there who were worth considerably
more than that in property.
The reader may rest satisfied that Tom's and Huck's windfall made a
mighty stir in the poor little village of St. Petersburg. So vast a sum,
all in actual cash, seemed next to incredible. It was talked about,
gloated over, glorified, until the reason of many of the citizens tottered
under the strain of the unhealthy excitement. Every "haunted" house in St.
Petersburg and the neighboring villages was dissected, plank by plank, and
its foundations dug up and ransacked for hidden treasure-and not by boys,
but men-pretty grave, unromantic men, too, some of them. Wherever Tom and
Huck appeared they were courted, admired, stared at. The boys were not
able to remember that their remarks had possessed weight before; but now
their sayings were treasured and repeated; everything they did seemed
somehow to be regarded as remarkable; they had evidently lost the power of
doing and saying commonplace things; moreover, their past history was
raked up and discovered to bear marks of conspicuous originality. The
village paper published biographical sketches of the boys.
The Widow Douglas put Huck's money out at six per cent., and Judge
Thatcher did the same with Tom's at Aunt Polly's request. Each lad had an
income, now, that was simply prodigious-a dollar for every week-day in the
year and half of the Sundays. It was just what the minister got-no, it was
what he was promised-he generally couldn't collect it. A dollar and a
quarter a week would board, lodge, and school a boy in those old simple
days-and clothe him and wash him, too, for that matter.
Judge Thatcher had conceived a great opinion of Tom. He said that no
commonplace boy would ever have got his daughter out of the cave. When
Becky told her father, in strict confidence, how Tom had taken her
whipping at school, the Judge was visibly moved; and when she pleaded
grace for the mighty lie which Tom had told in order to shift that
whipping from her shoulders to his own, the Judge said with a fine
outburst that it was a noble, a generous, a magnanimous lie-a lie that was
worthy to hold up its head and march down through history breast to breast
with George Washington's lauded Truth about the hatchet! Becky thought her
father had never looked so tall and so superb as when he walked the floor
and stamped his foot and said that. She went straight off and told Tom
about it.
Judge Thatcher hoped to see Tom a great lawyer or a great soldier some
day. He said he meant to look to it that Tom should be admitted to the
National Military Academy and afterward trained in the best law school in
the country, in order that he might be ready for either career or both.
Huck Finn's wealth and the fact that he was now under the Widow
Douglas' protection introduced him into society-no, dragged him into it,
hurled him into it-and his sufferings were almost more than he could bear.
The widow's servants kept him clean and neat, combed and brushed, and they
bedded him nightly in unsympathetic sheets that had not one little spot or
stain which he could press to his heart and know for a friend. He had to
eat with a knife and fork; he had to use napkin, cup, and plate; he had to
learn his book, he had to go to church; he had to talk so properly that
speech was become insipid in his mouth; whithersoever he turned, the bars
and shackles of civilization shut him in and bound him hand and foot.
He bravely bore his miseries three weeks, and then one day turned up
missing. For forty-eight hours the widow hunted for him everywhere in
great distress. The public were profoundly concerned; they searched high
and low, they dragged the river for his body. Early the third morning Tom
Sawyer wisely went poking among some old empty hogsheads down behind the
abandoned slaughter-house, and in one of them he found the refugee. Huck
had slept there; he had just breakfasted upon some stolen odds and ends of
food, and was lying off, now, in comfort, with his pipe. He was unkempt,
uncombed, and clad in the same old ruin of rags that had made him
picturesque in the days when he was free and happy. Tom routed him out,
told him the trouble he had been causing, and urged him to go home. Huck's
face lost its tranquil content, and took a melancholy cast. He said:
"Don't talk about it, Tom. I've tried it, and it don't work; it don't
work, Tom. It ain't for me; I ain't used to it. The widder's good to me,
and friendly; but I can't stand them ways. She makes me get up just at the
same time every morning; she makes me wash, they comb me all to thunder;
she won't let me sleep in the woodshed; I got to wear them blamed clothes
that just smothers me, Tom; they don't seem to any air git through 'em,
somehow; and they're so rotten nice that I can't set down, nor lay down,
nor roll around anywher's; I hain't slid on a cellar-door for-well, it
'pears to be years; I got to go to church and sweat and sweat-I hate them
ornery sermons! I can't ketch a fly in there, I can't chaw. I got to wear
shoes all Sunday. The widder eats by a bell; she goes to bed by a bell;
she gits up by a bell-everything's so awful reg'lar a body can't stand
it."
"Well, everybody does that way, Huck."
"Tom, it don't make no difference. I ain't everybody, and I can't STAND
it. It's awful to be tied up so. And grub comes too easy-I don't take no
interest in vittles, that way. I got to ask to go a-fishing; I got to ask
to go in a-swimming-dern'd if I hain't got to ask to do everything. Well,
I'd got to talk so nice it wasn't no comfort-I'd got to go up in the attic
and rip out awhile, every day, to git a taste in my mouth, or I'd a died,
Tom. The widder wouldn't let me smoke; she wouldn't let me yell, she
wouldn't let me gape, nor stretch, nor scratch, before folks-" [Then with
a spasm of special irritation and injury]-"And dad fetch it, she prayed
all the time! I never see such a woman! I HAD to shove, Tom-I just had to.
And besides, that school's going to open, and I'd a had to go to it-well,
I wouldn't stand THAT, Tom. Lookyhere, Tom, being rich ain't what it's
cracked up to be. It's just worry and worry, and sweat and sweat, and
a-wishing you was dead all the time. Now these clothes suits me, and this
bar'l suits me, and I ain't ever going to shake 'em any more. Tom, I
wouldn't ever got into all this trouble if it hadn't 'a' ben for that
money; now you just take my sheer of it along with your'n, and gimme a
ten-center sometimes-not many times, becuz I don't give a dern for a thing
'thout it's tollable hard to git-and you go and beg off for me with the
widder."
"Oh, Huck, you know I can't do that. 'Tain't fair; and besides if
you'll try this thing just a while longer you'll come to like it."
"Like it! Yes-the way I'd like a hot stove if I was to set on it long
enough. No, Tom, I won't be rich, and I won't live in them cussed smothery
houses. I like the woods, and the river, and hogsheads, and I'll stick to
'em, too. Blame it all! just as we'd got guns, and a cave, and all just
fixed to rob, here this dern foolishness has got to come up and spile it
all!"
Tom saw his opportunity-
"Lookyhere, Huck, being rich ain't going to keep me back from turning
robber."
"No! Oh, good-licks; are you in real dead-wood earnest, Tom?"
"Just as dead earnest as I'm sitting here. But Huck, we can't let you
into the gang if you ain't respectable, you know."
Huck's joy was quenched.
"Can't let me in, Tom? Didn't you let me go for a pirate?"
"Yes, but that's different. A robber is more hightoned than what a
pirate is-as a general thing. In most countries they're awful high up in
the nobility-dukes and such."
"Now, Tom, hain't you always ben friendly to me? You wouldn't shet me
out, would you, Tom? You wouldn't do that, now, WOULD you, Tom?"
"Huck, I wouldn't want to, and I DON'T want to-but what would people
say? Why, they'd say, 'Mph! Tom Sawyer's Gang! pretty low characters in
it!' They'd mean you, Huck. You wouldn't like that, and I wouldn't."
Huck was silent for some time, engaged in a mental struggle. Finally he
said:
"Well, I'll go back to the widder for a month and tackle it and see if
I can come to stand it, if you'll let me b'long to the gang, Tom."
"All right, Huck, it's a whiz! Come along, old chap, and I'll ask the
widow to let up on you a little, Huck."
"Will you, Tom-now will you? That's good. If she'll let up on some of
the roughest things, I'll smoke private and cuss private, and crowd
through or bust. When you going to start the gang and turn robbers?"
"Oh, right off. We'll get the boys together and have the initiation
to-night, maybe."
"Have the which?"
"Have the initiation."
"What's that?"
"It's to swear to stand by one another, and never tell the gang's
secrets, even if you're chopped all to flinders, and kill anybody and all
his family that hurts one of the gang."
"That's gay-that's mighty gay, Tom, I tell you."
"Well, I bet it is. And all that swearing's got to be done at midnight,
in the lonesomest, awfulest place you can find-a ha'nted house is the
best, but they're all ripped up now."
"Well, midnight's good, anyway, Tom."
"Yes, so it is. And you've got to swear on a coffin, and sign it with
blood."
"Now, that's something LIKE! Why, it's a million times bullier than
pirating. I'll stick to the widder till I rot, Tom; and if I git to be a
reg'lar ripper of a robber, and everybody talking 'bout it, I reckon
she'll be proud she snaked me in out of the wet."
So endeth this chronicle. It being strictly a history of a BOY, it must
stop here; the story could not go much further without becoming the
history of a MAN. When one writes a novel about grown people, he knows
exactly where to stop-that is, with a marriage; but when he writes of
juveniles, he must stop where he best can.
Most of the characters that perform in this book still live, and are
prosperous and happy. Some day it may seem worth while to take up the
story of the younger ones again and see what sort of men and women they
turned out to be; therefore it will be wisest not to reveal any of that
part of their lives at present.
see that he obeyed. At home Tom learned of the Cardiff Hill event; also
that the "ragged man's" body had eventually been found in the river near
the ferrylanding; he had been drowned while trying to escape, perhaps.
About a fortnight after Tom's rescue from the cave, he started off to
visit Huck, who had grown plenty strong enough, now, to hear exciting
talk, and Tom had some that would interest him, he thought. Judge
Thatcher's house was on Tom's way, and he stopped to see Becky. The Judge
and some friends set Tom to talking, and some one asked him ironically if
he wouldn't like to go to the cave again. Tom said he thought he wouldn't
mind it. The Judge said:
"Well, there are others just like you, Tom, I've not the least doubt.
But we have taken care of that. Nobody will get lost in that cave any
more."
"Why?"
"Because I had its big door sheathed with boiler iron two weeks ago,
and triple-locked-and I've got the keys."
Tom turned as white as a sheet.
"What's the matter, boy! Here, run, somebody! Fetch a glass of water!"
The water was brought and thrown into Tom's face.
"Ah, now you're all right. What was the matter with you, Tom?"
"Oh, Judge, Injun Joe's in the cave!"
Within a few minutes the news had spread, and a dozen skiff-loads of
men were on their way to McDougal's cave, and the ferryboat, well filled
with passengers, soon followed. Tom Sawyer was in the skiff that bore
Judge Thatcher.
When the cave door was unlocked, a sorrowful sight presented itself in
the dim twilight of the place. Injun Joe lay stretched upon the ground,
dead, with his face close to the crack of the door, as if his longing eyes
had been fixed, to the latest moment, upon the light and the cheer of the
free world outside. Tom was touched, for he knew by his own experience how
this wretch had suffered. His pity was moved, but nevertheless he felt an
abounding sense of relief and security, now, which revealed to him in a
degree which he had not fully appreciated before how vast a weight of
dread had been lying upon him since the day he lifted his voice against
this bloody-minded outcast.
Injun Joe's bowie-knife lay close by, its blade broken in two. The
great foundation-beam of the door had been chipped and hacked through,
with tedious labor; useless labor, too, it was, for the native rock formed
a sill outside it, and upon that stubborn material the knife had wrought
no effect; the only damage done was to the knife itself. But if there had
been no stony obstruction there the labor would have been useless still,
for if the beam had been wholly cut away Injun Joe could not have squeezed
his body under the door, and he knew it. So he had only hacked that place
in order to be doing something-in order to pass the weary time-in order to
employ his tortured faculties. Ordinarily one could find half a dozen bits
of candle stuck around in the crevices of this vestibule, left there by
tourists; but there were none now. The prisoner had searched them out and
eaten them. He had also contrived to catch a few bats, and these, also, he
had eaten, leaving only their claws. The poor unfortunate had starved to
death. In one place, near at hand, a stalagmite had been slowly growing up
from the ground for ages, builded by the water-drip from a stalactite
overhead. The captive had broken off the stalagmite, and upon the stump
had placed a stone, wherein he had scooped a shallow hollow to catch the
precious drop that fell once in every three minutes with the dreary
regularity of a clock-tick-a dessertspoonful once in four and twenty
hours. That drop was falling when the Pyramids were new; when Troy fell;
when the foundations of Rome were laid when Christ was crucified; when the
Conqueror created the British empire; when Columbus sailed; when the
massacre at Lexington was "news." It is falling now; it will still be
falling when all these things shall have sunk down the afternoon of
history, and the twilight of tradition, and been swallowed up in the thick
night of oblivion. Has everything a purpose and a mission? Did this drop
fall patiently during five thousand years to be ready for this flitting
human insect's need? and has it another important object to accomplish ten
thousand years to come? No matter. It is many and many a year since the
hapless half-breed scooped out the stone to catch the priceless drops, but
to this day the tourist stares longest at that pathetic stone and that
slow-dropping water when he comes to see the wonders of McDougal's cave.
Injun Joe's cup stands first in the list of the cavern's marvels; even
"Aladdin's Palace" cannot rival it.
Injun Joe was buried near the mouth of the cave; and people flocked
there in boats and wagons from the towns and from all the farms and
hamlets for seven miles around; they brought their children, and all sorts
of provisions, and confessed that they had had almost as satisfactory a
time at the funeral as they could have had at the hanging.
This funeral stopped the further growth of one thing-the petition to
the governor for Injun Joe's pardon. The petition had been largely signed;
many tearful and eloquent meetings had been held, and a committee of sappy
women been appointed to go in deep mourning and wail around the governor,
and implore him to be a merciful ass and trample his duty under foot.
Injun Joe was believed to have killed five citizens of the village, but
what of that? If he had been Satan himself there would have been plenty of
weaklings ready to scribble their names to a pardon-petition, and drip a
tear on it from their permanently impaired and leaky water-works.
The morning after the funeral Tom took Huck to a private place to have
an important talk. Huck had learned all about Tom's adventure from the
Welshman and the Widow Douglas, by this time, but Tom said he reckoned
there was one thing they had not told him; that thing was what he wanted
to talk about now. Huck's face saddened. He said:
"I know what it is. You got into No. 2 and never found anything but
whiskey. Nobody told me it was you; but I just knowed it must 'a' ben you,
soon as I heard 'bout that whiskey business; and I knowed you hadn't got
the money becuz you'd 'a' got at me some way or other and told me even if
you was mum to everybody else. Tom, something's always told me we'd never
get holt of that swag."
"Why, Huck, I never told on that tavern-keeper. YOU know his tavern was
all right the Saturday I went to the picnic. Don't you remember you was to
watch there that night?"
"Oh yes! Why, it seems 'bout a year ago. It was that very night that I
follered Injun Joe to the widder's."
"YOU followed him?"
"Yes-but you keep mum. I reckon Injun Joe's left friends behind him,
and I don't want 'em souring on me and doing me mean tricks. If it hadn't
ben for me he'd be down in Texas now, all right."
Then Huck told his entire adventure in confidence to Tom, who had only
heard of the Welshman's part of it before.
"Well," said Huck, presently, coming back to the main question,
"whoever nipped the whiskey in No. 2, nipped the money, too, I
reckon-anyways it's a goner for us, Tom."
"Huck, that money wasn't ever in No. 2!"
"What!" Huck searched his comrade's face keenly. "Tom, have you got on
the track of that money again?"
"Huck, it's in the cave!"
Huck's eyes blazed.
"Say it again, Tom."
"The money's in the cave!"
"Tom-honest injun, now-is it fun, or earnest?"
"Earnest, Huck-just as earnest as ever I was in my life. Will you go in
there with me and help get it out?"
"I bet I will! I will if it's where we can blaze our way to it and not
get lost."
"Huck, we can do that without the least little bit of trouble in the
world."
"Good as wheat! What makes you think the money's-"
"Huck, you just wait till we get in there. If we don't find it I'll
agree to give you my drum and every thing I've got in the world. I will,
by jings."
"All right-it's a whiz. When do you say?"
"Right now, if you say it. Are you strong enough?"
"Is it far in the cave? I ben on my pins a little, three or four days,
now, but I can't walk more'n a mile, Tom-least I don't think I could."
"It's about five mile into there the way anybody but me would go, Huck,
but there's a mighty short cut that they don't anybody but me know about.
Huck, I'll take you right to it in a skiff. I'll float the skiff down
there, and I'll pull it back again all by myself. You needn't ever turn
your hand over."
"Less start right off, Tom."
"All right. We want some bread and meat, and our pipes, and a little
bag or two, and two or three kite-strings, and some of these new-fangled
things they call lucifer matches. I tell you, many's the time I wished I
had some when I was in there before."
A trifle after noon the boys borrowed a small skiff from a citizen who
was absent, and got under way at once. When they were several miles below
"Cave Hollow," Tom said:
"Now you see this bluff here looks all alike all the way down from the
cave hollow-no houses, no woodyards, bushes all alike. But do you see that
white place up yonder where there's been a landslide? Well, that's one of
my marks. We'll get ashore, now."
They landed.
"Now, Huck, where we're a-standing you could touch that hole I got out
of with a fishing-pole. See if you can find it."
Huck searched all the place about, and found nothing. Tom proudly
marched into a thick clump of sumach bushes and said:
"Here you are! Look at it, Huck; it's the snuggest hole in this
country. You just keep mum about it. All along I've been wanting to be a
robber, but I knew I'd got to have a thing like this, and where to run
across it was the bother. We've got it now, and we'll keep it quiet, only
we'll let Joe Harper and Ben Rogers in-because of course there's got to be
a Gang, or else there wouldn't be any style about it. Tom Sawyer's Gang-it
sounds splendid, don't it, Huck?"
"Well, it just does, Tom. And who'll we rob?"
"Oh, most anybody. Waylay people-that's mostly the way."
"And kill them?"
"No, not always. Hive them in the cave till they raise a ransom."
"What's a ransom?"
"Money. You make them raise all they can, off'n their friends; and
after you've kept them a year, if it ain't raised then you kill them.
That's the general way. Only you don't kill the women. You shut up the
women, but you don't kill them. They're always beautiful and rich, and
awfully scared. You take their watches and things, but you always take
your hat off and talk polite. They ain't anybody as polite as
robbers-you'll see that in any book. Well, the women get to loving you,
and after they've been in the cave a week or two weeks they stop crying
and after that you couldn't get them to leave. If you drove them out
they'd turn right around and come back. It's so in all the books."
"Why, it's real bully, Tom. I believe it's better'n to be a pirate."
"Yes, it's better in some ways, because it's close to home and circuses
and all that."
By this time everything was ready and the boys entered the hole, Tom in
the lead. They toiled their way to the farther end of the tunnel, then
made their spliced kite-strings fast and moved on. A few steps brought
them to the spring, and Tom felt a shudder quiver all through him. He
showed Huck the fragment of candle-wick perched on a lump of clay against
the wall, and described how he and Becky had watched the flame struggle
and expire.
The boys began to quiet down to whispers, now, for the stillness and
gloom of the place oppressed their spirits. They went on, and presently
entered and followed Tom's other corridor until they reached the
"jumping-off place." The candles revealed the fact that it was not really
a precipice, but only a steep clay hill twenty or thirty feet high. Tom
whispered:
"Now I'll show you something, Huck."
He held his candle aloft and said:
"Look as far around the corner as you can. Do you see that? There-on
the big rock over yonder-done with candle-smoke."
"Tom, it's a CROSS!"
"NOW where's your Number Two? 'UNDER THE CROSS,' hey? Right yonder's
where I saw Injun Joe poke up his candle, Huck!"
Huck stared at the mystic sign awhile, and then said with a shaky voice:
"Tom, less git out of here!"
"What! and leave the treasure?"
"Yes-leave it. Injun Joe's ghost is round about there, certain."
"No it ain't, Huck, no it ain't. It would ha'nt the place where he
died-away out at the mouth of the cave-five mile from here."
"No, Tom, it wouldn't. It would hang round the money. I know the ways
of ghosts, and so do you."
Tom began to fear that Huck was right. Misgivings gathered in his mind.
But presently an idea occurred to him-
"Lookyhere, Huck, what fools we're making of ourselves! Injun Joe's
ghost ain't a going to come around where there's a cross!"
The point was well taken. It had its effect.
"Tom, I didn't think of that. But that's so. It's luck for us, that
cross is. I reckon we'll climb down there and have a hunt for that box."
Tom went first, cutting rude steps in the clay hill as he descended.
Huck followed. Four avenues opened out of the small cavern which the great
rock stood in. The boys examined three of them with no result. They found
a small recess in the one nearest the base of the rock, with a pallet of
blankets spread down in it; also an old suspender, some bacon rind, and
the well-gnawed bones of two or three fowls. But there was no money-box.
The lads searched and researched this place, but in vain. Tom said:
"He said UNDER the cross. Well, this comes nearest to being under the
cross. It can't be under the rock itself, because that sets solid on the
ground."
They searched everywhere once more, and then sat down discouraged. Huck
could suggest nothing. By-and-by Tom said:
"Lookyhere, Huck, there's footprints and some candle-grease on the clay
about one side of this rock, but not on the other sides. Now, what's that
for? I bet you the money IS under the rock. I'm going to dig in the clay."
"That ain't no bad notion, Tom!" said Huck with animation.
Tom's "real Barlow" was out at once, and he had not dug four inches
before he struck wood.
"Hey, Huck!-you hear that?"
Huck began to dig and scratch now. Some boards were soon uncovered and
removed. They had concealed a natural chasm which led under the rock. Tom
got into this and held his candle as far under the rock as he could, but
said he could not see to the end of the rift. He proposed to explore. He
stooped and passed under; the narrow way descended gradually. He followed
its winding course, first to the right, then to the left, Huck at his
heels. Tom turned a short curve, by-and-by, and exclaimed:
"My goodness, Huck, lookyhere!"
It was the treasure-box, sure enough, occupying a snug little cavern,
along with an empty powder-keg, a couple of guns in leather cases, two or
three pairs of old moccasins, a leather belt, and some other rubbish well
soaked with the water-drip.
"Got it at last!" said Huck, ploughing among the tarnished coins with
his hand. "My, but we're rich, Tom!"
"Huck, I always reckoned we'd get it. It's just too good to believe,
but we HAVE got it, sure! Say-let's not fool around here. Let's snake it
out. Lemme see if I can lift the box."
It weighed about fifty pounds. Tom could lift it, after an awkward
fashion, but could not carry it conveniently.
"I thought so," he said; "THEY carried it like it was heavy, that day
at the ha'nted house. I noticed that. I reckon I was right to think of
fetching the little bags along."
The money was soon in the bags and the boys took it up to the cross
rock.
"Now less fetch the guns and things," said Huck.
"No, Huck-leave them there. They're just the tricks to have when we go
to robbing. We'll keep them there all the time, and we'll hold our orgies
there, too. It's an awful snug place for orgies."
"What orgies?"
"I dono. But robbers always have orgies, and of course we've got to
have them, too. Come along, Huck, we've been in here a long time. It's
getting late, I reckon. I'm hungry, too. We'll eat and smoke when we get
to the skiff."
They presently emerged into the clump of sumach bushes, looked warily
out, found the coast clear, and were soon lunching and smoking in the
skiff. As the sun dipped toward the horizon they pushed out and got under
way. Tom skimmed up the shore through the long twilight, chatting cheerily
with Huck, and landed shortly after dark.
"Now, Huck," said Tom, "we'll hide the money in the loft of the widow's
woodshed, and I'll come up in the morning and we'll count it and divide,
and then we'll hunt up a place out in the woods for it where it will be
safe. Just you lay quiet here and watch the stuff till I run and hook
Benny Taylor's little wagon; I won't be gone a minute."
He disappeared, and presently returned with the wagon, put the two
small sacks into it, threw some old rags on top of them, and started off,
dragging his cargo behind him. When the boys reached the Welshman's house,
they stopped to rest. Just as they were about to move on, the Welshman
stepped out and said:
"Hallo, who's that?"
"Huck and Tom Sawyer."
"Good! Come along with me, boys, you are keeping everybody waiting.
Here-hurry up, trot ahead-I'll haul the wagon for you. Why, it's not as
light as it might be. Got bricks in it?-or old metal?"
"Old metal," said Tom.
"I judged so; the boys in this town will take more trouble and fool
away more time hunting up six bits' worth of old iron to sell to the
foundry than they would to make twice the money at regular work. But
that's human nature-hurry along, hurry along!"
The boys wanted to know what the hurry was about.
"Never mind; you'll see, when we get to the Widow Douglas'."
Huck said with some apprehension-for he was long used to being falsely
accused:
"Mr. Jones, we haven't been doing nothing."
The Welshman laughed.
"Well, I don't know, Huck, my boy. I don't know about that. Ain't you
and the widow good friends?"
"Yes. Well, she's ben good friends to me, anyway."
"All right, then. What do you want to be afraid for?"
This question was not entirely answered in Huck's slow mind before he
found himself pushed, along with Tom, into Mrs. Douglas' drawing-room. Mr.
Jones left the wagon near the door and followed.
The place was grandly lighted, and everybody that was of any
consequence in the village was there. The Thatchers were there, the
Harpers, the Rogerses, Aunt Polly, Sid, Mary, the minister, the editor,
and a great many more, and all dressed in their best. The widow received
the boys as heartily as any one could well receive two such looking
beings. They were covered with clay and candle-grease. Aunt Polly blushed
crimson with humiliation, and frowned and shook her head at Tom. Nobody
suffered half as much as the two boys did, however. Mr. Jones said:
"Tom wasn't at home, yet, so I gave him up; but I stumbled on him and
Huck right at my door, and so I just brought them along in a hurry."
"And you did just right," said the widow. "Come with me, boys."
She took them to a bedchamber and said:
"Now wash and dress yourselves. Here are two new suits of
clothes-shirts, socks, everything complete. They're Huck's-no, no thanks,
Huck-Mr. Jones bought one and I the other. But they'll fit both of you.
Get into them. We'll wait-come down when you are slicked up enough."
Then she left.
Huck said: "Tom, we can slope, if we can find a rope. The window ain't
high from the ground."
"Shucks! what do you want to slope for?"
"Well, I ain't used to that kind of a crowd. I can't stand it. I ain't
going down there, Tom."
"Oh, bother! It ain't anything. I don't mind it a bit. I'll take care
of you."
Sid appeared.
"Tom," said he, "auntie has been waiting for you all the afternoon.
Mary got your Sunday clothes ready, and everybody's been fretting about
you. Say-ain't this grease and clay, on your clothes?"
"Now, Mr. Siddy, you jist 'tend to your own business. What's all this
blow-out about, anyway?"
"It's one of the widow's parties that she's always having. This time
it's for the Welshman and his sons, on account of that scrape they helped
her out of the other night. And say-I can tell you something, if you want
to know."
"Well, what?"
"Why, old Mr. Jones is going to try to spring something on the people
here to-night, but I overheard him tell auntie to-day about it, as a
secret, but I reckon it's not much of a secret now. Everybody knows-the
widow, too, for all she tries to let on she don't. Mr. Jones was bound
Huck should be here-couldn't get along with his grand secret without Huck,
you know!"
"Secret about what, Sid?"
"About Huck tracking the robbers to the widow's. I reckon Mr. Jones was
going to make a grand time over his surprise, but I bet you it will drop
pretty flat."
Sid chuckled in a very contented and satisfied way.
"Sid, was it you that told?"
"Oh, never mind who it was. SOMEBODY told-that's enough."
"Sid, there's only one person in this town mean enough to do that, and
that's you. If you had been in Huck's place you'd 'a' sneaked down the
hill and never told anybody on the robbers. You can't do any but mean
things, and you can't bear to see anybody praised for doing good ones.
There-no thanks, as the widow says"-and Tom cuffed Sid's ears and helped
him to the door with several kicks. "Now go and tell auntie if you
dare-and to-morrow you'll catch it!"
Some minutes later the widow's guests were at the supper-table, and a
dozen children were propped up at little side-tables in the same room,
after the fashion of that country and that day. At the proper time Mr.
Jones made his little speech, in which he thanked the widow for the honor
she was doing himself and his sons, but said that there was another person
whose modesty-
And so forth and so on. He sprung his secret about Huck's share in the
adventure in the finest dramatic manner he was master of, but the surprise
it occasioned was largely counterfeit and not as clamorous and effusive as
it might have been under happier circumstances. However, the widow made a
pretty fair show of astonishment, and heaped so many compliments and so
much gratitude upon Huck that he almost forgot the nearly intolerable
discomfort of his new clothes in the entirely intolerable discomfort of
being set up as a target for everybody's gaze and everybody's laudations.
The widow said she meant to give Huck a home under her roof and have
him educated; and that when she could spare the money she would start him
in business in a modest way. Tom's chance was come. He said:
"Huck don't need it. Huck's rich."
Nothing but a heavy strain upon the good manners of the company kept
back the due and proper complimentary laugh at this pleasant joke. But the
silence was a little awkward. Tom broke it:
"Huck's got money. Maybe you don't believe it, but he's got lots of it.
Oh, you needn't smile-I reckon I can show you. You just wait a minute."
Tom ran out of doors. The company looked at each other with a perplexed
interest-and inquiringly at Huck, who was tongue-tied.
"Sid, what ails Tom?" said Aunt Polly. "He-well, there ain't ever any
making of that boy out. I never-"
Tom entered, struggling with the weight of his sacks, and Aunt Polly
did not finish her sentence. Tom poured the mass of yellow coin upon the
table and said:
"There-what did I tell you? Half of it's Huck's and half of it's mine!"
The spectacle took the general breath away. All gazed, nobody spoke for
a moment. Then there was a unanimous call for an explanation. Tom said he
could furnish it, and he did. The tale was long, but brimful of interest.
There was scarcely an interruption from any one to break the charm of its
flow. When he had finished, Mr. Jones said:
"I thought I had fixed up a little surprise for this occasion, but it
don't amount to anything now. This one makes it sing mighty small, I'm
willing to allow."
The money was counted. The sum amounted to a little over twelve
thousand dollars. It was more than any one present had ever seen at one
time before, though several persons were there who were worth considerably
more than that in property.
The reader may rest satisfied that Tom's and Huck's windfall made a
mighty stir in the poor little village of St. Petersburg. So vast a sum,
all in actual cash, seemed next to incredible. It was talked about,
gloated over, glorified, until the reason of many of the citizens tottered
under the strain of the unhealthy excitement. Every "haunted" house in St.
Petersburg and the neighboring villages was dissected, plank by plank, and
its foundations dug up and ransacked for hidden treasure-and not by boys,
but men-pretty grave, unromantic men, too, some of them. Wherever Tom and
Huck appeared they were courted, admired, stared at. The boys were not
able to remember that their remarks had possessed weight before; but now
their sayings were treasured and repeated; everything they did seemed
somehow to be regarded as remarkable; they had evidently lost the power of
doing and saying commonplace things; moreover, their past history was
raked up and discovered to bear marks of conspicuous originality. The
village paper published biographical sketches of the boys.
The Widow Douglas put Huck's money out at six per cent., and Judge
Thatcher did the same with Tom's at Aunt Polly's request. Each lad had an
income, now, that was simply prodigious-a dollar for every week-day in the
year and half of the Sundays. It was just what the minister got-no, it was
what he was promised-he generally couldn't collect it. A dollar and a
quarter a week would board, lodge, and school a boy in those old simple
days-and clothe him and wash him, too, for that matter.
Judge Thatcher had conceived a great opinion of Tom. He said that no
commonplace boy would ever have got his daughter out of the cave. When
Becky told her father, in strict confidence, how Tom had taken her
whipping at school, the Judge was visibly moved; and when she pleaded
grace for the mighty lie which Tom had told in order to shift that
whipping from her shoulders to his own, the Judge said with a fine
outburst that it was a noble, a generous, a magnanimous lie-a lie that was
worthy to hold up its head and march down through history breast to breast
with George Washington's lauded Truth about the hatchet! Becky thought her
father had never looked so tall and so superb as when he walked the floor
and stamped his foot and said that. She went straight off and told Tom
about it.
Judge Thatcher hoped to see Tom a great lawyer or a great soldier some
day. He said he meant to look to it that Tom should be admitted to the
National Military Academy and afterward trained in the best law school in
the country, in order that he might be ready for either career or both.
Huck Finn's wealth and the fact that he was now under the Widow
Douglas' protection introduced him into society-no, dragged him into it,
hurled him into it-and his sufferings were almost more than he could bear.
The widow's servants kept him clean and neat, combed and brushed, and they
bedded him nightly in unsympathetic sheets that had not one little spot or
stain which he could press to his heart and know for a friend. He had to
eat with a knife and fork; he had to use napkin, cup, and plate; he had to
learn his book, he had to go to church; he had to talk so properly that
speech was become insipid in his mouth; whithersoever he turned, the bars
and shackles of civilization shut him in and bound him hand and foot.
He bravely bore his miseries three weeks, and then one day turned up
missing. For forty-eight hours the widow hunted for him everywhere in
great distress. The public were profoundly concerned; they searched high
and low, they dragged the river for his body. Early the third morning Tom
Sawyer wisely went poking among some old empty hogsheads down behind the
abandoned slaughter-house, and in one of them he found the refugee. Huck
had slept there; he had just breakfasted upon some stolen odds and ends of
food, and was lying off, now, in comfort, with his pipe. He was unkempt,
uncombed, and clad in the same old ruin of rags that had made him
picturesque in the days when he was free and happy. Tom routed him out,
told him the trouble he had been causing, and urged him to go home. Huck's
face lost its tranquil content, and took a melancholy cast. He said:
"Don't talk about it, Tom. I've tried it, and it don't work; it don't
work, Tom. It ain't for me; I ain't used to it. The widder's good to me,
and friendly; but I can't stand them ways. She makes me get up just at the
same time every morning; she makes me wash, they comb me all to thunder;
she won't let me sleep in the woodshed; I got to wear them blamed clothes
that just smothers me, Tom; they don't seem to any air git through 'em,
somehow; and they're so rotten nice that I can't set down, nor lay down,
nor roll around anywher's; I hain't slid on a cellar-door for-well, it
'pears to be years; I got to go to church and sweat and sweat-I hate them
ornery sermons! I can't ketch a fly in there, I can't chaw. I got to wear
shoes all Sunday. The widder eats by a bell; she goes to bed by a bell;
she gits up by a bell-everything's so awful reg'lar a body can't stand
it."
"Well, everybody does that way, Huck."
"Tom, it don't make no difference. I ain't everybody, and I can't STAND
it. It's awful to be tied up so. And grub comes too easy-I don't take no
interest in vittles, that way. I got to ask to go a-fishing; I got to ask
to go in a-swimming-dern'd if I hain't got to ask to do everything. Well,
I'd got to talk so nice it wasn't no comfort-I'd got to go up in the attic
and rip out awhile, every day, to git a taste in my mouth, or I'd a died,
Tom. The widder wouldn't let me smoke; she wouldn't let me yell, she
wouldn't let me gape, nor stretch, nor scratch, before folks-" [Then with
a spasm of special irritation and injury]-"And dad fetch it, she prayed
all the time! I never see such a woman! I HAD to shove, Tom-I just had to.
And besides, that school's going to open, and I'd a had to go to it-well,
I wouldn't stand THAT, Tom. Lookyhere, Tom, being rich ain't what it's
cracked up to be. It's just worry and worry, and sweat and sweat, and
a-wishing you was dead all the time. Now these clothes suits me, and this
bar'l suits me, and I ain't ever going to shake 'em any more. Tom, I
wouldn't ever got into all this trouble if it hadn't 'a' ben for that
money; now you just take my sheer of it along with your'n, and gimme a
ten-center sometimes-not many times, becuz I don't give a dern for a thing
'thout it's tollable hard to git-and you go and beg off for me with the
widder."
"Oh, Huck, you know I can't do that. 'Tain't fair; and besides if
you'll try this thing just a while longer you'll come to like it."
"Like it! Yes-the way I'd like a hot stove if I was to set on it long
enough. No, Tom, I won't be rich, and I won't live in them cussed smothery
houses. I like the woods, and the river, and hogsheads, and I'll stick to
'em, too. Blame it all! just as we'd got guns, and a cave, and all just
fixed to rob, here this dern foolishness has got to come up and spile it
all!"
Tom saw his opportunity-
"Lookyhere, Huck, being rich ain't going to keep me back from turning
robber."
"No! Oh, good-licks; are you in real dead-wood earnest, Tom?"
"Just as dead earnest as I'm sitting here. But Huck, we can't let you
into the gang if you ain't respectable, you know."
Huck's joy was quenched.
"Can't let me in, Tom? Didn't you let me go for a pirate?"
"Yes, but that's different. A robber is more hightoned than what a
pirate is-as a general thing. In most countries they're awful high up in
the nobility-dukes and such."
"Now, Tom, hain't you always ben friendly to me? You wouldn't shet me
out, would you, Tom? You wouldn't do that, now, WOULD you, Tom?"
"Huck, I wouldn't want to, and I DON'T want to-but what would people
say? Why, they'd say, 'Mph! Tom Sawyer's Gang! pretty low characters in
it!' They'd mean you, Huck. You wouldn't like that, and I wouldn't."
Huck was silent for some time, engaged in a mental struggle. Finally he
said:
"Well, I'll go back to the widder for a month and tackle it and see if
I can come to stand it, if you'll let me b'long to the gang, Tom."
"All right, Huck, it's a whiz! Come along, old chap, and I'll ask the
widow to let up on you a little, Huck."
"Will you, Tom-now will you? That's good. If she'll let up on some of
the roughest things, I'll smoke private and cuss private, and crowd
through or bust. When you going to start the gang and turn robbers?"
"Oh, right off. We'll get the boys together and have the initiation
to-night, maybe."
"Have the which?"
"Have the initiation."
"What's that?"
"It's to swear to stand by one another, and never tell the gang's
secrets, even if you're chopped all to flinders, and kill anybody and all
his family that hurts one of the gang."
"That's gay-that's mighty gay, Tom, I tell you."
"Well, I bet it is. And all that swearing's got to be done at midnight,
in the lonesomest, awfulest place you can find-a ha'nted house is the
best, but they're all ripped up now."
"Well, midnight's good, anyway, Tom."
"Yes, so it is. And you've got to swear on a coffin, and sign it with
blood."
"Now, that's something LIKE! Why, it's a million times bullier than
pirating. I'll stick to the widder till I rot, Tom; and if I git to be a
reg'lar ripper of a robber, and everybody talking 'bout it, I reckon
she'll be proud she snaked me in out of the wet."
So endeth this chronicle. It being strictly a history of a BOY, it must
stop here; the story could not go much further without becoming the
history of a MAN. When one writes a novel about grown people, he knows
exactly where to stop-that is, with a marriage; but when he writes of
juveniles, he must stop where he best can.
Most of the characters that perform in this book still live, and are
prosperous and happy. Some day it may seem worth while to take up the
story of the younger ones again and see what sort of men and women they
turned out to be; therefore it will be wisest not to reveal any of that
part of their lives at present.