Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer among the Indians

by Twain, Mark

  “Fool yourself!—they couldn’t see me; and couldn’t if it had been light—our old counterfeiter-chest was in the way. And I didn’t see them, either, but I’ve heard them talk. I was ’most as close to them as I am to you, now. If I had had a walking stick I could a punched them with it. But I wouldn’t.”

  “Well, then, you’ve got some sense left, but not enough to hurt, Tom Sawyer. What did they say?”

  “Talked about the scrimmage.”

  “Like enough—but what did they say?”

  “Lots.”

  Then he said he was too tired to walk down to town, and no hurry anyway—we must jump in the river and float down on our backs—which was satisfactry to me; but I knowed I had got all I was going to get about that talk for just now. Them old roosters had laid another mystery, and he warn’t ready to have it hatched out yet.

  Just where the Branch goes into the river we struck a mortal piece of good luck. Some person had come ashore and left his skiff pulled up, with the oars in the rollocks, and warn’t anywhere in sight; so we borrowed it, Tom saying something grateful about Providence, and we got in and pulled out a good piece and laid down in her and lit the pipes and let her float. It was very comfortable after all the hard work we’d been through. By and by Tom says—

  “It warn’t in the plan, but of course it’s there for the best.”

  “What ain’t in the plan?”

  “The murder. It’s a kind of a pity, becuz there warn’t any real harm in Bat Bradish, but as long as it had to be somebody I reckon it’s as well it’s him, and it does give this conspiracy a noble lift, now don’t it, Huck? We’d be mean not to be grateful. And more trustful than ever, too. Why, Huck, a body wouldn’t think it, but a person can see, now, that a conspiracy that is conducted right is just as good as a revolution. Just as good and ain’t half the trouble.”

  “Looks so to me, Tom.”

  “Huck, it’s just like a revolution in some ways—a person that hadn’t had any experience couldn’t tell it from a revolution. You see, it starts in for one thing, and comes out another; starts in in a little small way to worry a village, and murders a nigger-trader. Yes, sir, it’s got all the marks of a revolution; and the way it’s prospering along now, I believe it could be nursed up and turned into a revolution. All it wants now is capital, and something to revolute about.”

  Well, he was started, and so I let him alone. It was the best way. He would think it out, and gild it up, and put the ruffles on it, and I could lay still and rest, and that suited me.

  Just as we struck into town and went ashore by the Cold Spring where the flour mill is, here comes Higgins’s Bill, the one-legged nigger, hopping along on his crutch, very much excited and all out of breath and says—

  “Marse Tom, ole Jim want you en Huck to come to de jail quick as you kin—dey’s got him, en jammed him in, seh.”

  “What for?”

  “Killin’ ole Bat Bradish.”

  I says—

  “Great jeeminy!”

  But Tom’s face lit up pious and happy—it made me shiver to see it; and he give Bill a dime, and says, quite ca’m—

  “All right; run along; we are a coming.” Bill cleared out and we hurried up, and Tom says, kind of grateful, “Ain’t it beautiful, the way it’s developing out?—we couldn’t ever thought of that, and it’s the splendidest design yet. Now you’ll be trustful, I reckon, and quit fretting and losing confidence.”

  “Tom Sawyer,” I says, “what in the nation is there splendid about it?” I was mad, and grieved, and most crying. “There’s our old Jim, the best friend we ever had, and the best hearted, and the whitest man inside that ever walked, and now he’s going to get hung for a murder he never done, I just know he never done it, and whose fault is it but this blame conspiracy, I wish it was in—”

  “Shut up!” he says, “you can’t tell a blessing from a bat in the eye, I never see such an idiot—always flying at everything Providence does, you ought to be ashamed of yourself. Who’s running this conspiracy?—you? Blame it, you are hendering it every way you can think of. Old Jim get hung? Who’s going to let him get hung, you tadpole?”

  “Well, but—”

  “Hush up! there ain’t any well about it. It’s going to come out all right, and the grandest thing that ever was, and just oceans of glory for us all—and here you are finding fault with your blessings, you catfish. Old Jim get hung! He’s going to be a hero, that’s what he’s going to be. Yes, and a brass band and a torchlight procession on top of it, or I ain’t no detective.”

  It made me feel good and satisfied again, I couldn’t help it. It was always just so. He had so much confidence it was catching, and a person always had to knock under and come to his notions.

  We had our passes, and was officials, so we shouldered through the crowd at the jail door and the sheriff let us in, though he wouldn’t let anybody else. Tom told me private not to know anything, and he wasn’t going to know anything himself—he would do the talking for us both, to the sheriff. He done it. The sheriff didn’t get anything out of him. Old Jim was scared most to death, and was sure he was going to be hung; but Tom was ca’m, and told him he needn’t worry, it warn’t going to happen; and so it warn’t ten minutes till Jim was ca’m, too, and all cheered up and comfortable. Tom told Jim the officers wouldn’t ask him any questions, and if visitors got in and asked him questions he must say he couldn’t answer anybody but his lawyer. Then Jim went ahead and told us his tale.

  He didn’t find aunt Polly at home, of course she was out getting her share of the scare; so he was after us pretty soon, and hurried up, reckoning he could catch up with us, but we went the long way by the river road and he went the short one over Cardiff Hill; so it wasn’t light, yet, when he got to Bat’s place, and he stumbled over Bat and fell on him; and just as he was getting up a couple of men come running, and grabbed him, and it was Buck Fisher and old Cap. Haines, and they said they had heard the murdersome row and was glad they catched him in the act. He was going to explain, but they shut him up and wouldn’t let him say a word—said a nigger’s word warn’t any account anyway. They felt of Bat’s heart and said he was dead, then they took Jim back over the hill and down to the jail, and spread the news, and then the town was that beside itself it didn’t know what to do. Tom studied a while, and says, kind of thoughtful—

  “It could be better. Still, it ain’t bad, the way it is.”

  “Good lan’, Mars Tom, how you’s a talkin’! Here I is, wid de man’s blood all over me, en you—”

  “That’s all right, as far as it goes—a good point, a very good point; but it don’t go far enough.”

  “How does you mean, Marse Tom?”

  “By itself it ain’t any evidence of a motive. What we want’s, a motive.”

  “What’s a motive, Marse Tom?”

  “A reason for killing the man.”

  “My goodness, Marse Tom, I never killed him.”

  “I know. That’s the weak place. It’s easy to show that you probably killed him, and of course that is pretty good, but it can’t hang a man—a white one, anyway. It would be ever so much stronger if you had a motive to kill him, you see.”

  “Marse Tom, is I in my right mine, or is it you? Blame my cats if I kin understan’.”

  “Why, plague take it, it’s plain enough. Look at it. I’m going to save you—that’s all right, and perfectly easy. But where’s the glory of saving a person merely just from jail. To save him from the gallows is the thing. It’s got to be murder in the first degree—you get the idea? You’ve got to have a motive for killing the man—then we’re all right! Jim, if you can think up a rattling good motive, I can get you put up for murder in the first degree just as easy as turning your hand over.”

  He was all excitement and hope, but Jim—why, Jim could hardly get out his words he was that astonished and scared.

  “Why, Marse Tom—why, bless yo’ heart, honey, I ain’t in no sweat to hunt up dish-yer—”

&nb
sp; “Hold still, I tell you, and think of a motive! I could have thought up a dozen while you are fooling away all this time. Look here, did Bat Bradish like you?—did you like Bat?”

  That seemed to jostle Jim. Tom saw it, and followed it right up. Jim dodged this and that and t’other way, but it didn’t do any good, Tom chased him up and found out it was Bradish that was at the bottom of it the time old Miss Watson come so near selling Jim down the river and Jim heard about it and run away and me and him floated down to Arkansaw on the raft. It was Bradish that persuaded her to sell Jim and give him the job of doing it for her. So at last Tom says—

  “That’s enough. That’s a motive. We are all right, now, it’s murder in the first degree, and we’ll have a grand time out of it and when we get through you’ll be a hero, Jim. I wouldn’t take a thousand dollars for your chances.”

  But Jim didn’t like it a bit, and said he would sell out for ten cents, and glad to. Tom was very well satisfied, now, and said we would tell the district attorney—which is the lawyer for the prostitution—all about the motive, and then things would go right along. Then he arranged with the sheriff for Jim to have pipes and good vittles and everything he wanted, and said good-bye to Jim, promising we would come every day and amuse him some more. Then we left.

  Chapter 7

  THE TOWN was booming. Everybody was raging about the murder, and didn’t doubt but Jim was in with the Sons of Freedom and been paid by the gang to murder the nigger-trader, and there’d be more—every man that owned niggers was in danger of his life; it was only just the beginning, the place was going to swim in blood, you’ll see. That is what they said. It was foolish talk, that talk about Jim, becuz he had always been a good nigger, and everybody knowed it; but you see he was a free nigger this last year and more, and that made everybody down on him, of course, and made them forget all about his good character. It’s just the way with people. And the way they was taking on about Bat Bradish you would a thought they had lost a angel; they couldn’t seem to get over grieving about him and telling one another no end of sweet little beautiful things he had done, one time or another, which they had forgot till now; and it warn’t no trouble, nuther, becuz they hadn’t ever happened. Yesterday there wouldn’t anybody say a good word for the nigger-trader nor care a dern about him, becuz everybody despised nigger-traders, of course; but to-day, why, they couldn’t seem to get over the loss of him, nohow. Well, it’s people’s way; they’re mostly puddnheads—looks so to me.

  Of course they was going to lynch Jim, everybody said it; and they just packed all the streets around the jail, and talked excited, and couldn’t hardly wait to commence. But Cap’n Ben Haskins, sheriff, was inside, and the mob that started in there without an invite would have a sickly time, and knowed it; and Colonel Elder was outside, and that warn’t healthy for a mob, and they knowed it. So me and Tom went along; we warn’t worried about Jim. Tom let the motive leak out where it would get to the attorney for the prostitution; then we got in the back way at his aunt Polly’s and got something to eat and didn’t have any trouble becuz she was out enjoying the excitements and hunting for Tom; and from there we went up in the woods on the hill to get some sleep where we wouldn’t be in the way, and Tom made his plans.

  He said we would ’tend the inquest to-day, and be on hand at the Grand Jury to-morrow, but our evidence wouldn’t go for anything against Cap. Haines’s and Buck Fisher’s, and Jim would be brought in for first degree all right. His trial would come off in about a month. It would take that long for the pal’s leg to get so he could walk on it. Then we must have it fixed so that when the trial was just going against Jim we could snatch the two frauds into court and clear Jim and make a noble sensation, and Jim would be a hero and we would all be heroes.

  I didn’t like it; I was scared of it; it was too risky; something might happen; any little hitch, and Jim’s a goner! A nigger don’t stand any show. I said we ought to tell the sheriff and let him go and get the men now—and jail them, and then we’d have them when we wanted them.

  But Tom wouldn’t listen to it for a minute. There warn’t anything stunning about it. He wanted to get the men into the court without them suspicioning anything—and then make the grand pow-wow, the way he done in Arkansaw. That Arkansaw business had just pisoned him, I could see it plain; he wouldn’t ever be satisfied to do things in a plain common way again.

  Well, we couldn’t keep awake any longer, so we reckoned we would sleep an hour, and then step down to the inquest. And of course when we woke it was too late. When we got down there it was over, and everybody gone—corpse and all. But it warn’t much matter, we could go to the Grand Jury to-morrow.

  Why, we had slept away past the middle of the afternoon and it was coming on sundown. Time to go home for supper; but Tom said no, he wanted to make sure of his men; so we would wait till night and he would step to the hanted house and listen again. I was very willing for him to do it, it would make me feel easier; so we struck down the Branch and slid past, and down to the river and up it a quarter of a mile under the bluff and went in swimming and stayed in till an hour after dark, then come back and Tom crope through the weeds to the house, and I waited.

  I waited and waited, and it was awful lonesome and still and creepy there in the dark, and the hanted house so close. It wasn’t actually very long, but it seemed so, you know. At last Tom come a tearing through the weeds and says—

  “Oh, poor Jim, poor Jim, he’ll be hung—they’re gone!”

  I just fell flat, where I was. Everything was swimming, it seemed to me I was going to faint. Then I let go and cried, I couldn’t help it and didn’t want to. And Tom was crying, too, and said—

  “What did I ever do it for?—Huck what did I do it for! I had them safe, and I could a saved Jim spite of anything anybody could do, if I only hadn’t been a fool. Oh, Huck you wanted me to tell the sheriff, and I was an idiot and wouldn’t listen, and now they’ve got away and we’ll never see them again, and nothing can save Jim, and it’s all my fault, I wish I was dead.”

  He took it so hard, and said so many hard things about himself that I hadn’t the heart to say any myself, though I was going to, and had them on my tongue’s end, but you know how it is, that way. I begun to try to comfort him, but he couldn’t bear it, and said call him names, call him the roughest ones I knowed, it was the only thing could do him any good; and then he broke out and abused himself for taking for granted the man’s leg was broke, and maybe it was only sprained—of course it was only sprained, it was perfectly plain, now. Then he had a sudden idea, and said—

  “Come!”

  So we went tearing down the road for town; said maybe the men would make for the next town below, and we would catch the steamboat and beat them. As we passed the Cold Spring the boat went by; when we got to the wharf she was pulling in the stage, but we jumped for it and made it. People yelled at us to know where we was bound for, but we never took any notice, and went up on the harricane roof and away aft, and set down in the sparks to watch for the canoe, and forgot all about the Grand Jury, but Tom said it wasn’t any matter, nothing could save Jim but to find the men.

  Tom couldn’t talk straight and connected, he was gone clean off of his head by the disastersomeness of what was come to Jim on accounts of him letting the men get away; and pretty soon he seen, himself, that his mind was upside down, becuz he says—

  “Huck, I’m so miserable it has knocked all the judgment out of me. Don’t you know there ain’t any sense in us being on this boat?”

  “Why, Tom?”

  “Becuz it’s in the plan I made on the broken-leg theory, and the leg ain’t broke. The man don’t have to hunt a doctor, and he can go wherever he wants to. And they have gone to Illinois and the everlasting woods—it’s the rightest place and the safest for them. Huck, they went the minute it was dark, and if we had went in swimming at the mouth of the Branch ’stead of a quarter of a mile above, we’d a seen them. I wish we was back to town, I’d give a million
dollars. We would get on their trail and tree them in their camp quick and easy, because the pal’s leg is hurt and he can’t go a yard without help. Huck, we’ve got to get back there the minute we can—what a fool I’ve been to forget that broken-leg theory and come on this boat.”

  Well, I could see it now, myself; I didn’t think of it before. But I didn’t say anything mean; his mind warn’t to blame for getting out of true, when you come to think. Anybody’s would. I was starting in to encourage him up, but he busted out bitter and aggravated, and says—

  “The luck has turned against us, there ain’t any getting around it—look at this!”

  It was rain. I was sorry enough for him to cry.

  “It’s going to wipe out the trail.” He begun to get perfectly desprate, and said if any harm come to Jim he would square up the best he could—he would blow his brains out, he wouldn’t miss them.

  I couldn’t bear to see him in so much trouble, so I tried to soothe him up, and told him we couldn’t know where the men went to, becuz we didn’t know the men, and so how could we know how they would act? Mightn’t they belong to Burrell’s Gang?

  “Yes—prob’ly do. What of it?”

  “Wouldn’t they be safe if they was with the Gang?”

  “Perfectly. Go on.”

  “Fox island is their den, ain’t it?”

  “Yes.”

  “How far from here?”

  “Hundred and seventy mile.”

  “They can make it in four nights in a canoe and lay up and hide daytimes, and so how do we know they ain’t making for home?”

  “Lemme hug you, Huck! There’s one level head left, anyway. If we can head them off before they get there, and have a sheriff with us—Huck, if they are ahead of us we’ll catch up on them inside of an hour and make this boat chase them down. I bet you we’re all right, Huck. Rush! Go down on the foc’sle and watch; I’ll go in the pilot house and watch. If you see them, give three whoops as loud as you can, and I’ll have the pilot all ready and anxious for business. Rush!”