CHAPTER 1
You donât know about me, without you have read a book by the name of The Adventures of Sawyer, but that ainât no matter. That book was made by Mr Mark Twain, and he told the truth, mainly. There was things which he stretched, but mainly he told the truth. That is nothing. I never seen anybody but lied, one time or another, without it was Aunt Polly, or the widow, or maybe Mary. Aunt PollyâTomâs Aunt Polly, she isâand Mary, and the Widow Douglas, is all told about in that bookâwhich is mostly a true book; with some stretchers, as I said before.
Now the way that the book winds up, is this: Tom and me found the money that the robbers hid in the cave, and it made us rich. We got six thousand dollars apieceâall gold. It was an awful sight of money when it was piled up. Well, Judge Thatcher, he took it and put it out at interest, and it fetched us a dollar a day apiece, all the year roundâmore than a body could tell what to do with. The Widow Douglas, she took me for her son, and allowed she would civilize me; but it was rough living in the house all the time, considering how dismal regular and decent the widow was in all her ways; and so when I couldnât stand it no longer, I lit out. I got into my old rags and my sugar-hogshead again, and was free and satisfied. But Tom Sawyer he hunted me up and said he was going to start a band of robbers, and I might join if I would go back to the widow and be respectable. So I went back.
The widow she cried over me, and called me a poor lost lamb, and she called me a lot of other names, too, but she never meant no harm by it. She put me in them new clothes again, and I couldnât do nothing but sweat and sweat, and feel all cramped up. Well, then, the old thing commenced again. The widow rung a bell for supper, and you had to come to time. When you got to the table you couldnât go right to eating, but you had to wait for the widow to tuck down her head and grumble a little over the victuals, though there warnât really anything the matter with them. That is, nothing only everything was cooked by itself. In a barrel of odds and ends it is different; things get mixed up, and the juice kind of swaps around, and the things go better.
After supper she got out her book and learned me about Moses and the âBulrushersâ; and I was in a sweat to find out all about him; but by and by she let it out that Moses had been dead a considerable long time; so then I didnât care no more about him; because I donât take no stock in dead people.
Pretty soon I wanted to smoke, and asked the widow to let me. But she wouldnât. She said it was a mean practice and wasnât clean, and I must try to not do it any more. That is just the way with some people. They get down on a thing when they donât know nothing about it. Here she was a-bothering about Moses, which was no kin to her, and no use to anybody, being gone, you see, yet finding a power of fault with me for doing a thing that had some good in it. And she took snuff too; of course that was all right, because she done it herself.
Her sister, Miss Watson, a tolerable slim old maid, with goggles on, had just come to live with her, and took a set at me now, with a spelling book. She worked me middling hard for about an hour, and then the widow made her ease up. I couldnât stood it much longer. Then for an hour it was deadly dull, and I was fidgety. Miss Watson would say, âDonât put your feet up there, Huckleberryâ; and âdonât scrunch up like that, Huckleberryâset up straightâ; and pretty soon she would say, âDonât gap and stretch like that, Huckleberryâwhy donât you try to behave?â Then she told me all about the bad place, and I said I wished I was there. She got mad, then, but I didnât mean no harm. All I wanted was to go somewheres; all I wanted was a change, I warnât particular. She said it was wicked to say what I said; said she wouldnât say it for the whole world; she was going to live so as to go to the good place. Well, I couldnât see no advantage in going where she was going, so I made up my mind I wouldnât try for it. But I never said so, because it would only make trouble, and wouldnât do no good.
Now she had got a start, and she went on and told me all about the good place. She said all a body would have to do there was to go around all day long with a harp and sing for ever and ever. So I didnât think much of it. But I never said so. I asked her if she reckoned Tom Sawyer would go there, and she said, not by a considerable sight. I was glad about that, because I wanted him and me to be together.
Miss Watson she kept pecking at me, and it got tiresome and lonesome. By and by they fetched the niggers in and had prayers, and then everybody was off to bed. I went up to my room with a piece of candle and put it on the table. Then I set down in a chair by the window and tried to think of something cheerful, but it warnât no use. I felt so lonesome I most wished I was dead. The stars was shining, and the leaves rustled in the woods ever so mournful; and I heard an owl, away off, who-whooing about somebody that was dead, and a whippowill and a dog crying about somebody that was going to die; and the wind was trying to whisper something to me and I couldnât make out what it was, and so it made the cold shivers run over me. Then away out in the woods I heard that kind of a sound that a ghost makes when it wants to tell about something thatâs on its mind and canât make itself understood, and so canât rest easy in its grave and has to go about that way every night grieving. I got so downhearted and scared, I did wish I had some company. Pretty soon a spider went crawling up my shoulder, and I flipped it off and it lit in the candle; and before I could budge it was all shrivelled up. I didnât need anybody to tell me that that was an awful bad sign and would fetch me some bad luck, so I was scared and most shook the clothes off of me. I got up and turned around in my tracks three times and crossed my breast every time; and then I tied up a little lock of my hair with a thread to keep witches away. But I hadnât no confidence. You do that when youâve lost a horse-shoe that youâve found, instead of nailing it up over the door, but I hadnât ever heard anybody say it was any way to keep off bad luck when youâd killed a spider.
I set down again, a-shaking all over, and got out my pipe for a smoke; for the house was all as still as death, now, and so the widow wouldnât know. Well, after a long time I heard the clock away off in the town go boomâboomâboomâtwelve licksâand all still againâstiller than ever. Pretty soon I heard a twig snap, down in the dark amongst the treesâsomething was a-stirring. I set still and listened. Directly I could just barely hear a âme-yow! me-yow!â down there. That was good! Says I, âme-yow! me-yow!â as soft as I could, and then I put out the light and scrambled out of the window on to the shed. Then I slipped down to the ground and crawled in amongst the trees, and sure enough there was Tom Sawyer waiting for me.
CHAPTER 2
We went tiptoeing along a path amongst the trees back towards the end of the widowâs garden, stooping down so as the branches wouldnât scrape our heads. When we was passing by the kitchen I fell over a root and made a noise. We scrouched down and laid still. Miss Watsonâs big nigger, named Jim, was setting in the kitchen door; we could see him pretty clear, because there was a light behind him. He got up and stretched his neck out about a minute, listening. Then he says:
âWho dah?â
He listened some more; then he come tiptoeing down and stood right between us; we could a touched him, nearly. Well, likely it was minutes and minutes that there warnât a sound, and we all there so close together. There was a place on my ankle that got to itching; but I dasnât scratch it; and then my ear begun to itch; and next my back, right between my shoulders. Seemed like Iâd die if I couldnât scratch. Well, Iâve noticed that thing plenty of times since. If you are with the quality, or at a funeral, or trying to go to sleep when you ainât sleepyâif you are anywheres where it wonât do for you to scratch, why you will itch all over in upwards of a thousand places. Pretty soon Jim says:
âSayâwho is you? Whar is you? Dog my cats of I didnâ hear sumfân. Well, I knows what Iâs gwyne to do. Iâs gwyne to set down here and listen tell I hears it agin.â
So he sat down on the ground betwixt me and Tom. He leaned his back up against a tree, and stretched his legs out till one of them most touched one of mine. My nose begun to itch. It itched till the tears come into my eyes. But I dasnât scratch. Then it begun to itch on the inside. Next I got to itching underneath. I didnât know how I was going to set still. This miserableness went on as much as six or seven minutes; but it seemed a sight longer than that. I was itching in eleven different places now. I reckoned I couldnât stand it more ân a minute longer, but I set my teeth hard and got ready to try. Just then Jim begun to breathe heavy; next he begun to snoreâand then I was pretty soon comfortable again.
Tom he made a sign to meâkind of a little noise with his mouthâand we went creeping away on our hands and knees. When we was ten foot off, Tom whispered to me and wanted to tie Jim to the tree for fun; but I said no; he might wake and make a disturbance, and then theyâd find out I warnât in. Then Tom said he hadnât got candles enough, and he would slip in the kitchen and get some more. I didnât want him to try. I said Jim might wake up and come. But Tom wanted to resk it; so we slid in there and got three candles, and Tom laid five cents on the table for pay. Then we got out, and I was in a sweat to get away; but nothing would do Tom but he must crawl to where Jim was, on his hands and knees, and play something on him. I waited, and it seemed a good while, everything was so still and lonesome.
As soon as Tom was back, we cut along the path, around the garden fence, and by and by fetched up on the steep top of the hill the other side of the house. Tom said he slipped Jimâs hat off of his head and hung it on a limb right over him, and Jim stirred a little, but he didnât wake. Afterwards Jim said the witches bewitched him and put him in a trance, and rode him all over the State, and then set him under the trees again and hung his hat on a limb to show who done it. And next time Jim told it he said they rode him down to New Orleans; and after that, every time he told it he spread it more and more, till by and by he said they rode him all over the world, and tired him most to death, and his back was all over saddle-boils. Jim was monstrous proud about it, and he got so he wouldnât hardly notice the other niggers. Niggers would come miles to hear Jim tell about it, and he was more looked up to than any nigger in that country. Strange niggers would stand with their mouths open and look him all over, same as if he was a wonder. Niggers is always talking about witches in the dark by the kitchen fire; but whenever one was talking and letting on to know all about such things, Jim would happen in and say, âHm! What you know âbout witches?â and that nigger was corked up and had to take a back seat. Jim always kept that five-center piece around his neck with a string, and said it was a charm the devil give to him with his own hands and told him he could cure anybody with it and fetch witches whenever he wanted to, just by saying something to it; but he never told what it was he said to it. Niggers would come from all around there and give Jim anything they had, just for a sight of that five-center piece; but they wouldnât touch it, because the devil had had his hands on it. Jim was most ruined, for a servant, because he got so stuck up on account of having seen the devil and been rode by witches.
Well, when Tom and me got to the edge of the hill-top, we looked away down into the village and could see three or four lights twinkling, where there was sick, folks, maybe; and the stars over us was sparkling ever so fine; and down by the village was the river, a whole mile broad, and awful still and grand. We went down the hill and found Jo Harper, and Ben Rogers, and two or three more of the boys, hid in the old tanyard. So we unhitched a skiff and pulled down the river two mile and a half, to the big scar on the hillside, and went ashore.
We went to a clump of bushes, and Tom made everybody swear to keep the secret, and then showed them a hole in the hill, right in the thickest part of the bushes. Then we lit the candles and crawled in on our hands and knees. We went about two hundred yards, and then the cave opened up. Tom poked about amongst the passages and pretty soon ducked under a wall where you wouldnât a noticed that there was a hole. We went along a narrow place and got into a kind of room, all damp and sweaty and cold, and there we stopped. Tom says:
âNow weâll start this band of robbers and call it Tom Sawyerâs Gang. Everybody that wants to join has got to take an oath, and write his name in blood.â
Everybody was willing. So Tom got out a sheet of paper that he had wrote the oath on, and read it. It swore every boy to stick to the band, and never tell any of the secrets: and if anybody done anything to any boy in the band, whichever boy was ordered to kill that person and his family must do it, and he mustnât eat and he mustnât sleep till he had killed them and hacked a cross in their breasts, which was the sign of the band. And nobody that didnât belong to the band could use that mark, and if he did he must be sued; and if he done it again he must be killed. And if anybody that belonged to the band told the secrets, he must have his throat cut, and then have his carcass burnt up and the ashes scattered all around, and his name blotted off of the list with blood and never mentioned again by the gang, but have a curse put on it and be forgot, for ever.
Everybody said it was a real beautiful oath, and asked Tom if he got it out of his own head. He said, some of it, but the rest was out of pirate books, and robber books, and every gang that was high-toned had it.
Some thought it would be good to kill the families of boys that told the secrets. Torn said it was a good idea, so he took a pencil and wrote it in. Then Ben Rogers says:
âHereâs Huck Finn, he hainât got no familyâwhat you going to do âbout him?â
âWell, hainât he got a father?â says Tom Sawyer.
âYes, heâs got a father, but you canât never find him, these days. He used to lay drunk with the hogs in the tanyard, but he hainât been seen in these parts for a year or more.â
They talked it over, and they was going to rule me out, because they said every boy must have a family or somebody to kill, or else it wouldnât be fair and square for the others. Well, nobody could think of anything to doâeverybody was stumped, and set still. I was most ready to cry; but all at once I thought of a way, and so I offered them Miss Watsonâthey could kill her. Everybody said:
âOh, sheâll do, sheâll do. Thatâs all right. Huck can come in.â
Then they all stuck a pin in their fingers to get blood to sign with, and I made my mark on the paper.
âNow,â says Ben Rogers, âwhatâs the line of business of this Gang?â
âNothing only robbery and murder,â Tom said.
âBut who are we going to rob? housesâor cattleâorââ
âStuff! stealing cattle and such things ainât robbery, itâs burglary,â says Tom Sawyer. âWe ainât burglars. That ainât no sort of style. We are highwaymen. We stop stages and carriages on the road, with masks on, and kill the people and take their, watches and moneyâ.
âMust we always kill the people?â
âOh, certainly. Itâs best. Some authorities think different, but mostly, itâs considered best to kill them. Except some that you bring to the cave here and keep them till theyâre ransomed.â
âRansomed? Whatâs that?â
âI donât know. But thatâs what they do. Iâve seen it in books; and so of course thatâs what weâve got to do.â
âBut how can we do it if we donât know what it is?â
âWhy blame it all, weâve got to do it. Donât I tell you itâs in the books? Do you want to go to doing different from whatâs in the books, and get things all muddled up?â
âOh, thatâs all very fine to say, Tom Sawyer, but how in the nation are these fellows going to be ransomed if we donât know how to do it to them? thatâs the thing I want to get at. Now what do you reckon it is?â
âWell, I donât know. But perâaps if we keep them till theyâre ransomed, it means that we keep them till theyâre dead.â
âNow, thatâs something like. Thatâll answer. Why couldnât you said that before? Weâll keep them till theyâre ransomed to deathâand a bothersome lot theyâll be, too, eating up everything and always trying to get loose.â
âHow you talk, Ben Rogers. How can they get loose when thereâs a guard over them, ready to shoot them down if they move a peg?â
âA guard. Well, that is good. So somebodyâs got to set up all night and never get any sleep, just so as to watch them. I think thatâs foolishness. Why canât a body take a club and ransom them as soon as they get here?â
âBecause it ainât in the books soâthatâs why. Now, Ben Rogers, do you want to do things regular, or donât you?âthatâs the idea. Donât you reckon that the people that made the books knows whatâs the correct thing to do? Do you reckon you can learn âem anything? Not by a good deal. No, sir, weâll just go on and ransom them in the regular wayâ.
âAll right. I donât mind; but I say itâs a fool way, anyhow. Sayâdo we kill the women, too?â
âWell, Ben Rogers, if I was as, ignorant as you I wouldnât let on. Kill the women? Noânobody ever saw anything in the books like that. You fetch them to the cave, and youâre always as polite as pie to them; and by and by they fall in love with you and never want to go home any more.â
âWell, if thatâs the way, Iâm agreed, but I donât take n...