“Boys, the answer has come to me as if from above. I met a sailor up on the Yuba and he worked on whalers before he jumped ship in Frisco. He told me the beautifulest place he ever seen is one of them islands out in the middle of the Pacific by name of Oahu. He says the sun shines all year and them brown-skinned native women is real friendly, and all you got to do when you’re hungry is climb a tree and get yourself one of them big nuts to eat, which comes provided with a drink inside of it too, so when you drunk the drink you kind of eat the bottle. A body can’t ask for no more’n that I reckon.”
“Has dey got sher’ffs an’ such?” asks Jim.
“Not by what this sailor told. He says there’s a town called Honnylulu that’s wide open. That’s what he called it, wide open, but you don’t have to live in no town if you ain’t got a mind to. You can have a grass shack right by the shore and get lullabyed to sleep by the waves.”
It sounded mighty fine to me, and Jim agreed. Says I:
“Why don’t you come too, Thaddeus? You ain’t never been on no sea trip, same as us, so it’ll be real adventuresome.”
“Not me,” he says. “I got no urge for it. I figure there’s still room enough here to find me a quiet spot without I got to cross no ocean. What I aim to do is go south away from the cold and see that valley full of tall trees I told you about.”
“You reckoned they was the tallest in the world.”
“Well I warn’t stretchin’ the facts none, I can tell you. The only thing taller than them trees is the sky. When I see them one more time I’m headin’ for a piece of country I can get some quiet in, someplace between here and Texas, I ain’t exactly sure whereabouts yet. It’s got to be someplace real lonesome so’s I don’t get no disturbance from no one. I seen enough of people in my time to know most of ’em ain’t worth a pinch of dog turd. You two ain’t included in that, but most is, and now we got the rest of our lives figured out neat there ain’t nothin’ I want more’n to sleep. I come a long ways today.”
Thaddeus got the bed seeing as he’s our guest. We was all considerable drunk by then. Thaddeus give out more words today than he give all the way from St. Joe to Fort Kearney, which is the proof that liquor loosens tongues. We bedded down but I’m too drunk and excited to sleep, with all kinds of pictures in my head keeping my eyes wide, big oceans and ships and islands with bottlenuts in the trees and me and Jim in a grass shack by the sea, fishing and smoking the way we like to do. It’s a shame we got to leave our cabin after all the work we put into it, but with the bulldog sniffing closer day by day we got to move, and San Francisco is where it all begins. Says I in a whisper:
“Thaddeus, are you asleep?”
“Nope,” he says. “I’m in the saddle still. Danged if I can get used to this here bed. Care to trade for some floor? I’d be a sight more comfortable down there.”
We traded over and I say:
“Thaddeus, what happened to Grace after Sacramento?”
“I ain’t sure. I seen her just one time down by the river lookin’ at them ships tied up there, but after that she never showed again. You sweet on her still?”
“I warn’t ever sweet on her, just grateful is all. She’s the one that got me free that time and I hope she ain’t fell on no hard times.”
“Women like her, they’re like cats. You drop ’em in any kind of place without a nickel or a friend and they’ll land feet first. You ain’t got no need to worry, not for a gal that’s got her looks. She’s likely married off by now to some miner that made a strike.”
“You reckon she’d marry a rich man?”
“It’s a sure bet. It ain’t just on account of she’s pretty, it’s a need she’s got inside of her to be belle of the ball. A need like that’s just got to be satisfied, and the only way to do it is marry money. I ain’t sure where that gal come from, but I got a strong hunch she aims to put it behind her. You can’t see no valley floor from the mountaintop, which is where she aims to be. If I was you I’d put her out of my mind.”
“She ain’t in my mind, honest.”
“No? Well it must of been Jim that wanted to know what become of her. I swear he sounded just like you. Now let a man rest.”
He started in to snore pretty soon after and I followed on and dreamed the night away, bad dreams about the bulldog sinking his teeth in my leg and Pap groveling on the ground saying he never wanted to kill no one, but he’ll surely give it a try next time he sees me or else see ghosts as long as I’m alive to put him in mind of what he done.
It was reliefsome to get shook awake next morning. We never wasted no time, just had a bite to eat and saddled up the horses and loaded the saddlebags with our gold and put our supplies in sacks. Then I went over to the other claim and give my goodbyes to the men there. One of them says:
“But why leave now? There’s bound to be more gold on your claim.”
“We ain’t felt the same about it since Mr. Jennings died. I reckon we’ll head north and try the Feather River or the Yuba. We can’t take the wheelbarrow or cradle so you’re welcome to them, and the cabin too if you got a mind to separate and have two claims between you.”
“That’s right generous,” he says, and the others agreed and never let me go till they give me a good few ounces of gold for payment. They promised they’d tend Obadiah’s grave too. I never liked to lie to them that way, but if the bulldog asks them where we went they’ll lay a false trail for us without even knowing it.
After a final goodbye I went back to our cabin. Jim and Thaddeus buried our picks and shovels and pans, which we would of took with us if we was truly headed for the northern diggings, then we mounted up and rode away. We lived three months and more on that claim and it gave me the miseries to leave, but a wanted man ain’t got no choice. We got all the gold we needed and there’s more adventure to come, so I never looked back. It would of been wasted time anyway on account of the mist, real thick again the way it is most mornings nowadays. We rode slow but steady along the creek to where it joins the river and then along to the store and saloon, which has got such a collection of wood buildings roundabout they finally called it a town, Forty-Rod by name, the kind of whiskey they mostly drink hereabouts. Thaddeus says whenever a place gets populated and permanent enough to get made into a town and give a name it’s time to move on, definite.
30
Downriver—Merry Christmas—A Close Shave—Fond Farewells—The Price of Pies—Welcome to San Francisco
We reached the lower diggings along the American on Christmas Day. There warn’t no mining getting done at all, just celebrating, which means a whole heap of drinking. There was drunks everywhere you looked, rolling around in the mud and loving it. Music got played and men stood around big fires singing till their throats was sore, which give them a reason for drinking more till they fell down in the mud along with the rest. I seen a piss pot get emptied out of a cabin, just throwed straight out the door all over a drunk that’s sat there, but it warn’t deliberate.
We seen our first Chinaman too, little and brown-skinned, not yeller like they say, and he’s got baggy pants and a baggy jacket that looks like it’s made out of a bed quilt, and a little cap without no brim or peak on his head with a long braid of hair coming out from under it and down his back. He’s kind of trotting along the main street with his arms stuck up inside his sleeves and looking down at the ground so’s he don’t step on no drunks or fall in a mudhole and drown, and when he went past a saloon one of the men inside with a stovepipe hat and a bottle in his hand hollers:
“Hey, you! Chinky-chink!”
The Chinaman never stopped or turned his head and Stovepipe got all fired up over it.
“You!” he hollers. “You! Chinaman! You pay heed when you’re spoke to!”
But he never wanted to and trotted faster, which got Stovepipe mad and he run after him and grabbed him by the pigtail and jerked hard.
“Wait on there, Chinaman,” he says. “I got a question for you. What’s a heathen Chinee do on Christ
mas Day? Answer me that.”
The Chinaman just stood there looking at the ground, like he’s waiting for Stovepipe to get bored and go away, but he warn’t about to now he sees there’s a bunch of men gathered around to see what he does next. He says:
“I’ll tell you what a Chinaman does on Christmas Day. Nothin’. That’s what he does, except for smokin’ opium and climbin’ on his little yeller Chinawoman. I ask you, is it Christian?” he says to the crowd, and they hollered back that it ain’t.
“Well, then,” he says, “I reckon we oughter show this here Chinaman how he oughter be acting on a holy day like today is, ain’t that so?”
They all reckoned it was, and Stovepipe pulled the Chinaman in close and says:
“First off, you got to get on your knees and pray to God and apologize for gettin’ born a yeller Chinee and not a Christian white man. Down on your knees, you heathen yeller dog.”
And he pushed him down hard in the mud. The Chinaman must of figured he done enough polite listening to words he don’t even understand and tried to get up again, but Stovepipe shoved him back down and says:
“Now you got to put your hands together and pray, like this, see?”
He showed how to do it but the Chinaman never done it, and Stovepipe got hold of his pigtail again and wrapped it two times around his neck and hauled hard from behind with his knee in the Chinaman’s back. He kind of gurgled and put his hands up to his throat and Stovepipe says:
“That’s it, that’s where they go, only flat together.”
He eased off the pressure a little and the crowd all laughed. They showed the Chinaman what he’s supposed to be doing, and he finally seen the light and joined his hands in prayer.
“There now,” says Stovepipe. “You should of done it when I wanted. Now you got to hand over a Christmas present. That’s what us Christians do this time of year. I reckon this hunk of rope’ll do fine.”
And he got out his knife and lopped off the Chinaman’s pigtail and held it up so’s everyone can see, and they all cheered. The Chinaman give a screech and yelled a lot of Chinaman talk and Stovepipe give him a shove that sent him face down in the mud with his rear end in the air, which Stovepipe reckoned is an invitation so he kicked it hard and now all of the Chinaman is in the mud. Everyone figured it’s mighty funny and slapped each other on the back, only one man done it too hard and give his neighbor a slap that would of made a humpback stand up straight and got a punch in the jaw by way of thank you. Soon as the rest seen them start to fight they done the same, not wanting to feel left out. There must of been fifty men fighting, and the Chinaman seen his chance and run off, but was knocked down a couple more times before he got clear.
“Peace on Earth,” says Thaddeus to no one in particular, and we rode on.
When we got to Sacramento late next day the town was filled with men just arrived and raring to get to the diggings, and more that just come from there, some with gold but mostly without. The streets was crowded sidewalk to sidewalk, same as when we come through the first time. We never stayed longer than it took to pass through and get onto the road that follows the Sacramento River down to San Francisco Bay. We had to ride in single file along the edge of the road on account of all the thousands headed upriver, anxious to try their hand at mining. I reckon if the gold holds out California is bound to get overcrowded in a year or so. There was camps all along the road when it got dark and only the eagerest ones kept on marching. Mighty cold and miserable they was too, rained on from dusk till dawn, and next day it rained some more. We seen a man selling rain slickers from the back of a wagon and got one each, and soon as we paid out the money it quit raining. Thaddeus says it’s worth it to get a dry spell and be able to breathe air and not water for a change.
From Sacramento to the bay is only a two-day ride, and on the second night along the road we stopped at a camp to get warm over a fire. The men there seen us come off the road from the north and wanted to know how things is at the diggings and which places is richest. Thaddeus done the talking and give them a true picture of how hard work is what they can count on a whole lot more than luck, which warn’t what they wanted to hear at all. He says:
“Boys, I could spin you a yarn about gold mountains with rivers of gold dust pouring out of them, but it ain’t the way I seen things. You can’t hardly pan color out of the creeks no more, it’s all been took before you got here. The kind of gold you can still get is under the ground and in the hillsides, but you got to dig plenty for it. I ain’t saying it ain’t possible to find some, but it don’t happen every day, so don’t go expectin’ too much and you won’t be disappointed.”
“How’d you make your strike?” asks a man.
“Me? I dug and dug down into the ground, and every shovel load I dug I figured to find gold in, but there never was none. I dug and dug and when I got around five mile down I reckoned I’m in the wrong place, so I clumb up the shaft toward the little-bitty piece of sunlight at the top. I started climbing on a Tuesday and on Sunday I got there. Well, after all that sweat and strain for nothin’ you can guess the amount of disgustment I had inside of me, so I killed a grizzly bear for supper and after I finished pickin’ my teeth with his claws I figured I may as well pack my tent and go look for gold somewheres else. I yanked on the tent pegs to get them up, only I been so long under the ground them pegs has sprouted roots, real deep ones, and I had to chop them out with a pick, and when I got a few yards down I seen the roots is all clustered around a pocket of gold, and that’s how I made my strike. There’s some that’s called me a liar for that story, but they warn’t gentlemen like you boys.”
They appreciated the story but still never believed him about the hard work, and he started on another tale so tall you would of needed a ladder to get over it, and when he finished he started another, the one about Jim Bridger and the Injun’s leg. I already heard it before so Jim and me took a stroll around the camp from fire to fire, and when we got near the edge Jim points and says:
“Looky dere, Huck. I ain’t de onlies’ nigger in Californy.”
I looked and there’s six niggers sat by a fire with one white man, and we got curious and went over. They was just as surprised to see Jim, and the white man says:
“You and me got the right idea, boy. Digging ain’t white man’s work, so bring the niggers in, that’s the smart thing to do. You just got the one?”
“He’s a free nigger,” says I.
“A what? Where the hell are you from, boy, one of them abolitionist states? Don’t you know niggers can’t do nothing without they got a white man to tell them? What the hell use is a free nigger? These here six is all slaves the way God intended, and I aim to put ’em to good use. I laid out plenty for ’em and by God I’ll get it back ten times over.”
“Dis here ain’t no slave state,” says Jim.
“What’s that?… Did you say something, nigger?”
“I’se sayin’ dere ain’t no slaves in Californy.”
The man’s cheeks blowed out and he stared Jim up and down and says:
“No nigger talks to a white man like that, not where I come from.…”
“You ain’t there no more,” says I, wishing Jim had of stayed quiet, but it’s too late now and you can’t let a friend get in trouble without giving no help. The man’s real angry now and says:
“And little piss-ants like you don’t give no lip to their elders neither.”
Getting called names made me kind of reckless, which I ain’t as a rule, and I got my dander up.
“And out here fatbelly gnat-brains like you ain’t worth a hair off a dead dog’s ballbag,” says I.
He got on his feet all shaking with angriness, and Jim says to the niggers:
“Ain’t nothin’ to stop you walkin’ away lessen you likes bein’ slaves. If’n you digs up gold you ain’t goin’ to get none of it, jest food, das all he goin’ to give you, an’ a mean kickin’ if’n you don’ fin’ none.
They all looked at each other and
at the man, and he says:
“Don’t none of you listen to no abolitionist talk or I’ll take the hide off you. I paid good money in Louisiana and you niggers are mine by law. I got the paper that says so.”
They never opened their mouths, just looked real uncomfortable.
“He ain’t own no slaves out here,” says Jim to them. “Ain’t nothin’ stoppin you from doin’ jest what you want.”
“One more word out of you, nigger, and I ain’t answerable,” says the man, and pulled a pistol from his belt. He’s good and mad and it’s a real dangersome situation. I got my Hawken with me out of habit but it ain’t cocked, and it’s too heavy to swing around on him while he’s got that pistol pointed. I ain’t even rightly sure a bill of sale from Louisiana ain’t legal in California or not, and I seen the niggers is too scared to do nothing anyhow. I reckon being a slave must squeeze all the spirit and fire out of you and leave you fearful of any different kind of life if slavery is all you ever knowed from getting birthed onwards.
“Leave it, Jim” says I. “It ain’t no good to argue.”
“It ain’t right,” he says. “He ain’t allowed no slaves out here.”
“Maybe so, and if it’s true he’ll get told by others and be obliged to set them free.”
“Ain’t no white man goin’ to care if’n dis one totin’ slaves,” says Jim. “Ain’t no white man goin’ to care nothin’ ’bout no niggers nohow. Niggers an’ Injuns an’ Chinamen ain’t nothin’ to no white man, jest trash, an’ it ain’t ever goin’ to be no diff’rent, not lessen you niggers light out for de hills de firs’ chance you gets. Ain’t no use you fixin’ to stay aroun’ no gold diggin’s lessen you’s white. You jest get stomped on.”
“How come you never done it?” asks one of the niggers, and the man give him a sharp look for speaking out.
“On accounter I got me a frien’ das white, das how come I got by,” says Jim. “Das de onlies’ reason I ain’t got stepped on an’ squash’ by no whites. You ain’t got no white frien’s, jest dis here master, so if’n you runs off you better watch out.”
The Further Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Page 47
