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HUCKLEBERRY FINN, By Mark Twain, Part 6.
The Project Gutenberg EBook Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain, Part 6.
#93 in our series by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)[Chapters 26-30]
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Title: Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Part 6.[Chapters 26-30]
Author: Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)
Release Date: December 2004 [EBook #7105]
[This file was first posted on March 10, 2003]
Edition: 10
Language: English
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HUCK FINN, BY TWAIN, PART 6.***
This file was produced by David Widger, [widger@cecomet.net]
ADVENTURES
OF
HUCKLEBERRY FINN
(Tom Sawyer's Comrade)
By Mark Twain
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XXVI.
A Pious King.—The King's Clergy.—She Asked His
Pardon.—Hiding in the
Room.—Huck Takes the Money.
CHAPTER XXVII.
The Funeral.—Satisfying Curiosity.—Suspicious of
Huck,—Quick Sales and
Small.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
The Trip to England.—"The Brute!"—Mary Jane Decides
to Leave.—Huck
Parting with Mary Jane.—Mumps.—The Opposition
Line.
CHAPTER XXIX.
Contested Relationship.—The King Explains the Loss.—A
Question of
Handwriting.—Digging up the Corpse.—Huck Escapes.
CHAPTER XXX.
The King Went for Him.—A Royal Row.—Powerful
Mellow.
ILLUSTRATIONS.
The Cubby
Supper with the Hare-Lip
Honest Injun
The Duke looks under the Bed
Huck takes the Money
A Crack in the Dining-room Door
The Undertaker
"He had a Rat!"
"Was you in my Room?"
Jawing
In Trouble
Indignation
How to Find Them
He Wrote
Hannah with the Mumps
The Auction
The True Brothers
The Doctor leads Huck
The Duke Wrote
"Gentlemen, Gentlemen!"
"Jim Lit Out"
The King shakes Huck
The Duke went for Him
EXPLANATORY
IN this book a number of dialects are used, to wit: ?the
Missouri negro dialect; the extremest form of the backwoods
Southwestern dialect; the ordinary "Pike County" dialect; and
four modified varieties of this last. The shadings have not been
done in a haphazard fashion, or by guesswork; but painstakingly,
and with the trustworthy guidance and support of personal
familiarity with these several forms of speech.
I make this explanation for the reason that without it many
readers would suppose that all these characters were trying to
talk alike and not succeeding.
THE AUTHOR.
HUCKLEBERRY FINN
Scene: ?The Mississippi Valley Time: ?Forty to fifty years
ago
CHAPTER XXVI.
WELL, when they was all gone the king he asks Mary Jane how
they was off for spare rooms, and she said she had one spare
room, which would do for Uncle William, and she'd give her own
room to Uncle Harvey, which was a little bigger, and she would
turn into the room with her sisters and sleep on a cot; and up
garret was a little cubby, with a pallet in it. The king said the
cubby would do for his valley—meaning me.
So Mary Jane took us up, and she showed them their rooms,
which was plain but nice. ?She said she'd have her frocks and a
lot of other traps took out of her room if they was in Uncle
Harvey's way, but he said they warn't. ?The frocks was hung along
the wall, and before them was a curtain made out of calico that
hung down to the floor. ?There was an old hair trunk in one
corner, and a guitar-box in another, and all sorts of little
knickknacks and jimcracks around, like girls brisken up a room
with. ?The king said it was all the more homely and more
pleasanter for these fixings, and so don't disturb them. ?The
duke's room was pretty small, but plenty good enough, and so was
my cubby.
That night they had a big supper, and all them men and women
was there, and I stood behind the king and the duke's chairs and
waited on them, and the niggers waited on the rest. ?Mary Jane
she set at the head of the table, with Susan alongside of her,
and said how bad the biscuits was, and how mean the preserves
was, and how ornery and tough the fried chickens was—and
all that kind of rot, the way women always do for to force out
compliments; and the people all knowed everything was tiptop, and
said so—said "How DO you get biscuits to brown so nice?"
and "Where, for the land's sake, DID you get these amaz'n
pickles?" and all that kind of humbug talky-talk, just the way
people always does at a supper, you know.
And when it was all done me and the hare-lip had supper in the
kitchen off of the leavings, whilst the others was helping the
niggers clean up the things. ?The hare-lip she got to pumping me
about England, and blest if I didn't think the ice was getting
mighty thin sometimes. ?She says:
"Did you ever see the king?"
"Who? ?William Fourth? ?Well, I bet I have—he goes to
our church." ?I knowed he was dead years ago, but I never let on.
?So when I says he goes to our church, she says:
"What—regular?"
"Yes—regular. ?His pew's right over opposite
ourn—on t'other side the pulpit."
"I thought he lived in London?"
"Well, he does. ?Where WOULD he live?"
"But I thought YOU lived in Sheffield?"
I see I was up a stump. ?I had to let on to get choked with a
chicken bone, so as to get time to think how to get down again.
?Then I says:
"I mean he goes to our church regular when he's in Sheffield.
?That's only in the summer time, when he comes there to take the
sea baths."
"Why, how you talk—Sheffield ain't on the sea."
"Well, who said it was?"
"Why, you did."
"I DIDN'T nuther."
"You did!"
"I didn't."
"You did."
"I never said nothing of the kind."
"Well, what DID you say, then?"
"Said he come to take the sea BATHS—that's what I
said."
"Well, then, how's he going to take the sea baths if it ain't
on the sea?"
"Looky here," I says; "did you ever see any
Congress-water?"
"Yes."
"Well, did you have to go to Congress to get it?"
"Why, no."
"Well, neither does William Fourth have to go to the sea to
get a sea bath."
"How does he get it, then?"
"Gets it the way people down here gets Congress-water—in
barrels. ?There in the palace at Sheffield they've got furnaces,
and he wants his water hot. ?They can't bile that amount of water
away off there at the sea. They haven't got no conveniences for
it."
"Oh, I see, now. ?You might a said that in the first place and
saved time."
When she said that I see I was out of the woods again, and so
I was comfortable and glad. ?Next, she says:
"Do you go to church, too?"
"Yes—regular."
"Where do you set?"
"Why, in our pew."
"WHOSE pew?"
"Why, OURN—your Uncle Harvey's."
"His'n? ?What does HE want with a pew?"
"Wants it to set in. ?What did you RECKON he wanted with
it?"
"Why, I thought he'd be in the pulpit."
Rot him, I forgot he was a preacher. ?I see I was up a stump
again, so I played another chicken bone and got another think.
?Then I says:
"Blame it, do you suppose there ain't but one preacher to a
church?"
"Why, what do they want with more?"
"What!—to preach before a king? ?I never did see such a
girl as you. They don't have no less than seventeen."
"Seventeen! ?My land! ?Why, I wouldn't set out such a string
as that, not if I NEVER got to glory. ?It must take 'em a
week."
"Shucks, they don't ALL of 'em preach the same day—only
ONE of 'em."
"Well, then, what does the rest of 'em do?"
"Oh, nothing much. ?Loll around, pass the plate—and one
thing or another. ?But mainly they don't do nothing."
"Well, then, what are they FOR?"
"Why, they're for STYLE. ?Don't you know nothing?"
"Well, I don't WANT to know no such foolishness as that. ?How
is servants treated in England? ?Do they treat 'em better 'n we
treat our niggers?"
"NO! ?A servant ain't nobody there. ?They treat them worse
than dogs."
"Don't they give 'em holidays, the way we do, Christmas and
New Year's week, and Fourth of July?"
"Oh, just listen! ?A body could tell YOU hain't ever been to
England by that. ?Why, Hare-l—why, Joanna, they never see a
holiday from year's end to year's end; never go to the circus,
nor theater, nor nigger shows, nor nowheres."
"Nor church?"
"Nor church."
"But YOU always went to church."
Well, I was gone up again. ?I forgot I was the old man's
servant. ?But next minute I whirled in on a kind of an
explanation how a valley was different from a common servant and
HAD to go to church whether he wanted to or not, and set with the
family, on account of its being the law. ?But I didn't do it
pretty good, and when I got done I see she warn't satisfied. ?She
says:
"Honest injun, now, hain't you been telling me a lot of
lies?"
"Honest injun," says I.
"None of it at all?"
"None of it at all. ?Not a lie in it," says I.
"Lay your hand on this book and say it."
I see it warn't nothing but a dictionary, so I laid my hand on
it and said it. ?So then she looked a little better satisfied,
and says:
"Well, then, I'll believe some of it; but I hope to gracious
if I'll believe the rest."
"What is it you won't believe, Joe?" says Mary Jane, stepping
in with Susan behind her. ?"It ain't right nor kind for you to
talk so to him, and him a stranger and so far from his people.
?How would you like to be treated so?"
"That's always your way, Maim—always sailing in to help
somebody before they're hurt. ?I hain't done nothing to him.
?He's told some stretchers, I reckon, and I said I wouldn't
swallow it all; and that's every bit and grain I DID say. ?I
reckon he can stand a little thing like that, can't he?"
"I don't care whether 'twas little or whether 'twas big; he's
here in our house and a stranger, and it wasn't good of you to
say it. ?If you was in his place it would make you feel ashamed;
and so you oughtn't to say a thing to another person that will
make THEM feel ashamed."
"Why, Maim, he said—"
"It don't make no difference what he SAID—that ain't the
thing. ?The thing is for you to treat him KIND, and not be saying
things to make him remember he ain't in his own country and
amongst his own folks."
I says to myself, THIS is a girl that I'm letting that old
reptle rob her of her money!
Then Susan SHE waltzed in; and if you'll believe me, she did
give Hare-lip hark from the tomb!
Says I to myself, and this is ANOTHER one that I'm letting him
rob her of her money!
Then Mary Jane she took another inning, and went in sweet and
lovely again—which was her way; but when she got done there
warn't hardly anything left o' poor Hare-lip. ?So she
hollered.
"All right, then," says the other girls; "you just ask his
pardon."
She done it, too; and she done it beautiful. ?She done it so
beautiful it was good to hear; and I wished I could tell her a
thousand lies, so she could do it again.
I says to myself, this is ANOTHER one that I'm letting him rob
her of her money. ?And when she got through they all jest laid
theirselves out to make me feel at home and know I was amongst
friends. ?I felt so ornery and low down and mean that I says to
myself, my mind's made up; I'll hive that money for them or
bust.
So then I lit out—for bed, I said, meaning some time or
another. ?When I got by myself I went to thinking the thing over.
?I says to myself, shall I go to that doctor, private, and blow
on these frauds? ?No—that won't do. He might tell who told
him; then the king and the duke would make it warm for me. ?Shall
I go, private, and tell Mary Jane? ?No—I dasn't do it. Her
face would give them a hint, sure; they've got the money, and
they'd slide right out and get away with it. ?If she was to fetch
in help I'd get mixed up in the business before it was done with,
I judge. ?No; there ain't no good way but one. ?I got to steal
that money, somehow; and I got to steal it some way that they
won't suspicion that I done it. They've got a good thing here,
and they ain't a-going to leave till they've played this family
and this town for all they're worth, so I'll find a chance time
enough. I'll steal it and hide it; and by and by, when I'm away
down the river, I'll write a letter and tell Mary Jane where it's
hid. ?But I better hive it tonight if I can, because the doctor
maybe hasn't let up as much as he lets on he has; he might scare
them out of here yet.
So, thinks I, I'll go and search them rooms. ?Upstairs the
hall was dark, but I found the duke's room, and started to paw
around it with my hands; but I recollected it wouldn't be much
like the king to let anybody else take care of that money but his
own self; so then I went to his room and begun to paw around
there. ?But I see I couldn't do nothing without a candle, and I
dasn't light one, of course. ?So I judged I'd got to do the other
thing—lay for them and eavesdrop. ?About that time I hears
their footsteps coming, and was going to skip under the bed; I
reached for it, but it wasn't where I thought it would be; but I
touched the curtain that hid Mary Jane's frocks, so I jumped in
behind that and snuggled in amongst the gowns, and stood there
perfectly still.
They come in and shut the door; and the first thing the duke
done was to get down and look under the bed. ?Then I was glad I
hadn't found the bed when I wanted it. ?And yet, you know, it's
kind of natural to hide under the bed when you are up to anything
private. ?They sets down then, and the king says:
"Well, what is it? ?And cut it middlin' short, because it's
better for us to be down there a-whoopin' up the mournin' than up
here givin' 'em a chance to talk us over."
"Well, this is it, Capet. ?I ain't easy; I ain't comfortable.
?That doctor lays on my mind. ?I wanted to know your plans. ?I've
got a notion, and I think it's a sound one."
"What is it, duke?"
"That we better glide out of this before three in the morning,
and clip it down the river with what we've got. ?Specially,
seeing we got it so easy—GIVEN back to us, flung at our
heads, as you may say, when of course we allowed to have to steal
it back. ?I'm for knocking off and lighting out."
That made me feel pretty bad. ?About an hour or two ago it
would a been a little different, but now it made me feel bad and
disappointed, The king rips out and says:
"What! ?And not sell out the rest o' the property? ?March off
like a passel of fools and leave eight or nine thous'n' dollars'
worth o' property layin' around jest sufferin' to be scooped
in?—and all good, salable stuff, too."
The duke he grumbled; said the bag of gold was enough, and he
didn't want to go no deeper—didn't want to rob a lot of
orphans of EVERYTHING they had.
"Why, how you talk!" says the king. ?"We sha'n't rob 'em of
nothing at all but jest this money. ?The people that BUYS the
property is the suff'rers; because as soon 's it's found out 'at
we didn't own it—which won't be long after we've
slid—the sale won't be valid, and it 'll all go back to the
estate. ?These yer orphans 'll git their house back agin, and
that's enough for THEM; they're young and spry, and k'n easy earn
a livin'. ?THEY ain't a-goin to suffer. ?Why, jest
think—there's thous'n's and thous'n's that ain't nigh so
well off. ?Bless you, THEY ain't got noth'n' to complain of."
Well, the king he talked him blind; so at last he give in, and
said all right, but said he believed it was blamed foolishness to
stay, and that doctor hanging over them. ?But the king says:
"Cuss the doctor! ?What do we k'yer for HIM? ?Hain't we got
all the fools in town on our side? ?And ain't that a big enough
majority in any town?"
So they got ready to go down stairs again. ?The duke says:
"I don't think we put that money in a good place."
That cheered me up. ?I'd begun to think I warn't going to get
a hint of no kind to help me. ?The king says:
"Why?"
"Because Mary Jane 'll be in mourning from this out; and first
you know the nigger that does up the rooms will get an order to
box these duds up and put 'em away; and do you reckon a nigger
can run across money and not borrow some of it?"
"Your head's level agin, duke," says the king; and he comes
a-fumbling under the curtain two or three foot from where I was.
?I stuck tight to the wall and kept mighty still, though quivery;
and I wondered what them fellows would say to me if they catched
me; and I tried to think what I'd better do if they did catch me.
?But the king he got the bag before I could think more than about
a half a thought, and he never suspicioned I was around. ?They
took and shoved the bag through a rip in the straw tick that was
under the feather-bed, and crammed it in a foot or two amongst
the straw and said it was all right now, because a nigger only
makes up the feather-bed, and don't turn over the straw tick only
about twice a year, and so it warn't in no danger of getting
stole now.
But I knowed better. ?I had it out of there before they was
half-way down stairs. ?I groped along up to my cubby, and hid it
there till I could get a chance to do better. ?I judged I better
hide it outside of the house somewheres, because if they missed
it they would give the house a good ransacking: ?I knowed that
very well. ?Then I turned in, with my clothes all on; but I
couldn't a gone to sleep if I'd a wanted to, I was in such a
sweat to get through with the business. ?By and by I heard the
king and the duke come up; so I rolled off my pallet and laid
with my chin at the top of my ladder, and waited to see if
anything was going to happen. ?But nothing did.
So I held on till all the late sounds had quit and the early
ones hadn't begun yet; and then I slipped down the ladder.
CHAPTER XXVII.
I CREPT to their doors and listened; they was snoring. ?So I
tiptoed along, and got down stairs all right. ?There warn't a
sound anywheres. ?I peeped through a crack of the dining-room
door, and see the men that was watching the corpse all sound
asleep on their chairs. ?The door was open into the parlor, where
the corpse was laying, and there was a candle in both rooms. I
passed along, and the parlor door was open; but I see there
warn't nobody in there but the remainders of Peter; so I shoved
on by; but the front door was locked, and the key wasn't there.
?Just then I heard somebody coming down the stairs, back behind
me. ?I run in the parlor and took a swift look around, and the
only place I see to hide the bag was in the coffin. ?The lid was
shoved along about a foot, showing the dead man's face down in
there, with a wet cloth over it, and his shroud on. ?I tucked the
money-bag in under the lid, just down beyond where his hands was
crossed, which made me creep, they was so cold, and then I run
back across the room and in behind the door.
The person coming was Mary Jane. ?She went to the coffin, very
soft, and kneeled down and looked in; then she put up her
handkerchief, and I see she begun to cry, though I couldn't hear
her, and her back was to me. ?I slid out, and as I passed the
dining-room I thought I'd make sure them watchers hadn't seen me;
so I looked through the crack, and everything was all right.
?They hadn't stirred.
I slipped up to bed, feeling ruther blue, on accounts of the
thing playing out that way after I had took so much trouble and
run so much resk about it. ?Says I, if it could stay where it is,
all right; because when we get down the river a hundred mile or
two I could write back to Mary Jane, and she could dig him up
again and get it; but that ain't the thing that's going to
happen; the thing that's going to happen is, the money 'll be
found when they come to screw on the lid. ?Then the king 'll get
it again, and it 'll be a long day before he gives anybody
another chance to smouch it from him. Of course I WANTED to slide
down and get it out of there, but I dasn't try it. ?Every minute
it was getting earlier now, and pretty soon some of them watchers
would begin to stir, and I might get catched—catched with
six thousand dollars in my hands that nobody hadn't hired me to
take care of. ?I don't wish to be mixed up in no such business as
that, I says to myself.
When I got down stairs in the morning the parlor was shut up,
and the watchers was gone. ?There warn't nobody around but the
family and the widow Bartley and our tribe. ?I watched their
faces to see if anything had been happening, but I couldn't
tell.
Towards the middle of the day the undertaker come with his
man, and they set the coffin in the middle of the room on a
couple of chairs, and then set all our chairs in rows, and
borrowed more from the neighbors till the hall and the parlor and
the dining-room was full. ?I see the coffin lid was the way it
was before, but I dasn't go to look in under it, with folks
around.
Then the people begun to flock in, and the beats and the girls
took seats in the front row at the head of the coffin, and for a
half an hour the people filed around slow, in single rank, and
looked down at the dead man's face a minute, and some dropped in
a tear, and it was all very still and solemn, only the girls and
the beats holding handkerchiefs to their eyes and keeping their
heads bent, and sobbing a little. ?There warn't no other sound
but the scraping of the feet on the floor and blowing
noses—because people always blows them more at a funeral
than they do at other places except church.
When the place was packed full the undertaker he slid around
in his black gloves with his softy soothering ways, putting on
the last touches, and getting people and things all ship-shape
and comfortable, and making no more sound than a cat. ?He never
spoke; he moved people around, he squeezed in late ones, he
opened up passageways, and done it with nods, and signs with his
hands. ?Then he took his place over against the wall. He was the softest,
glidingest, stealthiest man I ever see;
and there warn't no more smile to him than there is to a ham.
They had borrowed a melodeum—a sick one; and when
everything was ready a young woman set down and worked it, and it
was pretty skreeky and colicky, and everybody joined in and sung,
and Peter was the only one that had a good thing, according to my
notion. ?Then the Reverend Hobson opened up, slow and solemn, and
begun to talk; and straight off the most outrageous row busted
out in the cellar a body ever heard; it was only one dog, but he
made a most powerful racket, and he kept it up right along; the
parson he had to stand there, over the coffin, and wait—you
couldn't hear yourself think. ?It was right down awkward, and
nobody didn't seem to know what to do. ?But pretty soon they see
that long-legged undertaker make a sign to the preacher as much
as to say, "Don't you worry—just depend on me." ?Then he
stooped down and begun to glide along the wall, just his
shoulders showing over the people's heads. ?So he glided along,
and the powwow and racket getting more and more outrageous all
the time; and at last, when he had gone around two sides of the
room, he disappears down cellar. ?Then in about two seconds we
heard a whack, and the dog he finished up with a most amazing
howl or two, and then everything was dead still, and the parson
begun his solemn talk where he left off. ?In a minute or two here
comes this undertaker's back and shoulders gliding along the wall
again; and so he glided and glided around three sides of the
room, and then rose up, and shaded his mouth with his hands, and
stretched his neck out towards the preacher, over the people's
heads, and says, in a kind of a coarse whisper, "HE HAD A RAT!"
?Then he drooped down and glided along the wall again to his
place. ?You could see it was a great satisfaction to the people,
because naturally they wanted to know. ?A little thing like that
don't cost nothing, and it's just the little things that makes a
man to be looked up to and liked. ?There warn't no more popular
man in town than what that undertaker was.
Well, the funeral sermon was very good, but pison long and
tiresome; and then the king he shoved in and got off some of his
usual rubbage, and at last the job was through, and the
undertaker begun to sneak up on the coffin with his screw-driver.
?I was in a sweat then, and watched him pretty keen. But he never
meddled at all; just slid the lid along as soft as mush, and
screwed it down tight and fast. ?So there I was! ?I didn't know
whether the money was in there or not. ?So, says I, s'pose
somebody has hogged that bag on the sly?—now how do I know
whether to write to Mary Jane or not? S'pose she dug him up and
didn't find nothing, what would she think of me? Blame it, I
says, I might get hunted up and jailed; I'd better lay low and
keep dark, and not write at all; the thing's awful mixed now;
trying to better it, I've worsened it a hundred times, and I wish
to goodness I'd just let it alone, dad fetch the whole
business!
They buried him, and we come back home, and I went to watching
faces again—I couldn't help it, and I couldn't rest easy.
?But nothing come of it; the faces didn't tell me nothing.
The king he visited around in the evening, and sweetened
everybody up, and made himself ever so friendly; and he give out
the idea that his congregation over in England would be in a
sweat about him, so he must hurry and settle up the estate right
away and leave for home. ?He was very sorry he was so pushed, and
so was everybody; they wished he could stay longer, but they said
they could see it couldn't be done. ?And he said of course him
and William would take the girls home with them; and that pleased
everybody too, because then the girls would be well fixed and
amongst their own relations; and it pleased the girls,
too—tickled them so they clean forgot they ever had a
trouble in the world; and told him to sell out as quick as he
wanted to, they would be ready. ?Them poor things was that glad
and happy it made my heart ache to see
them getting fooled and lied to so, but I didn't see no safe way
for me to chip in and change the general tune.
Well, blamed if the king didn't bill the house and the niggers
and all the property for auction straight off—sale two days
after the funeral; but anybody could buy private beforehand if
they wanted to.
So the next day after the funeral, along about noon-time, the
girls' joy got the first jolt. ?A couple of nigger traders come
along, and the king sold them the niggers reasonable, for
three-day drafts as they called it, and away they went, the two
sons up the river to Memphis, and their mother down the river to
Orleans. ?I thought them poor girls and them niggers would break
their hearts for grief; they cried around each other, and took on
so it most made me down sick to see it. ?The girls said they
hadn't ever dreamed of seeing the family separated or sold away
from the town. ?I can't ever get it out of my memory, the sight
of them poor miserable girls and niggers hanging around each
other's necks and crying; and I reckon I couldn't a stood it all,
but would a had to bust out and tell on our gang if I hadn't
knowed the sale warn't no account and the niggers would be back
home in a week or two.
The thing made a big stir in the town, too, and a good many
come out flatfooted and said it was scandalous to separate the
mother and the children that way. ?It injured the frauds some;
but the old fool he bulled right along, spite of all the duke
could say or do, and I tell you the duke was powerful uneasy.
Next day was auction day. ?About broad day in the morning the
king and the duke come up in the garret and woke me up, and I see
by their look that there was trouble. ?The king says:
"Was you in my room night before last?"
"No, your majesty"—which was the way I always called him
when nobody but our gang warn't around.
"Was you in there yisterday er last night?"
"No, your majesty."
"Honor bright, now—no lies."
"Honor bright, your majesty, I'm telling you the truth. ?I
hain't been a-near your room since Miss Mary Jane took you and
the duke and showed it to you."
The duke says:
"Have you seen anybody else go in there?"
"No, your grace, not as I remember, I believe."
"Stop and think."
I studied awhile and see my chance; then I says:
"Well, I see the niggers go in there several times."
Both of them gave a little jump, and looked like they hadn't
ever expected it, and then like they HAD. ?Then the duke
says:
"What, all of them?"
"No—leastways, not all at once—that is, I don't
think I ever see them all come OUT at once but just one
time."
"Hello! ?When was that?"
"It was the day we had the funeral. ?In the morning. ?It
warn't early, because I overslept. ?I was just starting down the
ladder, and I see them."
"Well, go on, GO on! ?What did they do? ?How'd they act?"
"They didn't do nothing. ?And they didn't act anyway much, as
fur as I see. They tiptoed away; so I seen, easy enough, that
they'd shoved in there to do up your majesty's room, or
something, s'posing you was up; and found you WARN'T up, and so
they was hoping to slide out of the way of trouble without waking
you up, if they hadn't already waked you up."
"Great guns, THIS is a go!" says the king; and both of them
looked pretty sick and tolerable silly. ?They stood there
a-thinking and scratching their heads a minute, and the duke he
bust into a kind of a little raspy chuckle, and says:
"It does beat all how neat the niggers played their hand.
?They let on to be SORRY they was going out of this region! ?And
I believed they WAS sorry, and so did you, and so did everybody.
?Don't ever tell ME any more that a nigger ain't got any
histrionic talent. ?Why, the way they played that thing it would
fool ANYBODY. ?In my opinion, there's a fortune in 'em. ?If I had
capital and a theater, I wouldn't want a better lay-out than
that—and here we've gone and sold 'em for a song. ?Yes, and
ain't privileged to sing the song yet. ?Say, where IS that
song—that draft?"
"In the bank for to be collected. ?Where WOULD it be?"
"Well, THAT'S all right then, thank goodness."
Says I, kind of timid-like:
"Is something gone wrong?"
The king whirls on me and rips out:
"None o' your business! ?You keep your head shet, and mind y'r
own affairs—if you got any. ?Long as you're in this town
don't you forgit THAT—you hear?" ?Then he says to the duke,
"We got to jest swaller it and say noth'n': ?mum's the word for
US."
As they was starting down the ladder the duke he chuckles
again, and says:
"Quick sales AND small profits! ?It's a good
business—yes."
The king snarls around on him and says:
"I was trying to do for the best in sellin' 'em out so quick.
?If the profits has turned out to be none, lackin' considable,
and none to carry, is it my fault any more'n it's yourn?"
"Well, THEY'D be in this house yet and we WOULDN'T if I could
a got my advice listened to."
The king sassed back as much as was safe for him, and then
swapped around and lit into ME again. ?He give me down the banks
for not coming and TELLING him I see the niggers come out of his
room acting that way—said any fool would a KNOWED something
was up. ?And then waltzed in and cussed HIMSELF awhile, and said
it all come of him not laying late and taking his natural rest
that morning, and he'd be blamed if he'd ever do it again. ?So
they went off a-jawing; and I felt dreadful glad I'd worked it
all off on to the niggers, and yet hadn't done the niggers no
harm by it.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
BY and by it was getting-up time. ?So I come down the ladder
and started for down-stairs; but as I come to the girls' room the
door was open, and I see Mary Jane setting by her old hair trunk,
which was open and she'd been packing things in it—getting
ready to go to England. ?But she had stopped now with a folded
gown in her lap, and had her face in her hands, crying. ?I felt
awful bad to see it; of course anybody would. ?I went in there
and says:
"Miss Mary Jane, you can't a-bear to see people in trouble,
and I can't—most always. ?Tell me about it."
So she done it. ?And it was the niggers—I just expected
it. ?She said the beautiful trip to England was most about
spoiled for her; she didn't know HOW she was ever going to be
happy there, knowing the mother and the children warn't ever
going to see each other no more—and then busted out
bitterer than ever, and flung up her hands, and says:
"Oh, dear, dear, to think they ain't EVER going to see each
other any more!"
"But they WILL—and inside of two weeks—and I KNOW
it!" says I.
Laws, it was out before I could think! ?And before I could
budge she throws her arms around my neck and told me to say it
AGAIN, say it AGAIN, say it AGAIN!
I see I had spoke too sudden and said too much, and was in a
close place. I asked her to let me think a minute; and she set
there, very impatient and excited and handsome, but looking kind
of happy and eased-up, like a person that's had a tooth pulled
out. ?So I went to studying it out. ?I says to myself, I reckon a
body that ups and tells the truth when he is in a tight place is
taking considerable many resks, though I ain't had no experience,
and can't say for certain; but it looks so to me, anyway; and yet
here's a case where I'm blest if it don't look to me like the
truth is better and actuly SAFER than a lie. ?I must lay it by in
my mind, and think it over some time or other, it's so kind of
strange and unregular. I never see nothing like it. ?Well, I says
to myself at last, I'm a-going to chance it; I'll up and tell the
truth this time, though it does seem most like setting down on a
kag of powder and touching it off just to see where you'll go to.
Then I says:
"Miss Mary Jane, is there any place out of town a little ways
where you could go and stay three or four days?"
"Yes; Mr. Lothrop's. ?Why?"
"Never mind why yet. ?If I'll tell you how I know the niggers
will see each other again inside of two weeks—here in this
house—and PROVE how I know it—will you go to Mr.
Lothrop's and stay four days?"
"Four days!" she says; "I'll stay a year!"
"All right," I says, "I don't want nothing more out of YOU
than just your word—I druther have it than another man's
kiss-the-Bible." ?She smiled and reddened up very sweet, and I
says, "If you don't mind it, I'll shut the door—and bolt
it."
Then I come back and set down again, and says:
"Don't you holler. ?Just set still and take it like a man. ?I
got to tell the truth, and you want to brace up, Miss Mary,
because it's a bad kind, and going to be hard to take, but there
ain't no help for it. ?These uncles of yourn ain't no uncles at
all; they're a couple of frauds—regular dead-beats.
?There, now we're over the worst of it, you can stand the rest
middling easy."
It jolted her up like everything, of course; but I was over
the shoal water now, so I went right along, her eyes a-blazing
higher and higher all the time, and told her every blame thing,
from where we first struck that young fool going up to the
steamboat, clear through to where she flung herself on to the
king's breast at the front door and he kissed her sixteen or
seventeen times—and then up she jumps, with her face afire
like sunset, and says:
"The brute! ?Come, don't waste a minute—not a
SECOND—we'll have them tarred and feathered, and flung in
the river!"
Says I:
"Cert'nly. ?But do you mean BEFORE you go to Mr. Lothrop's,
or—"
"Oh," she says, "what am I THINKING about!" she says, and set
right down again. ?"Don't mind what I said—please
don't—you WON'T, now, WILL you?" Laying her silky hand on
mine in that kind of a way that I said I would die first. ?"I
never thought, I was so stirred up," she says; "now go on, and I
won't do so any more. ?You tell me what to do, and whatever you
say I'll do it."
"Well," I says, "it's a rough gang, them two frauds, and I'm
fixed so I got to travel with them a while longer, whether I want
to or not—I druther not tell you why; and if you was to
blow on them this town would get me out of their claws, and I'd
be all right; but there'd be another person that you don't know
about who'd be in big trouble. ?Well, we got to save HIM, hain't
we? ?Of course. ?Well, then, we won't blow on them."
Saying them words put a good idea in my head. ?I see how maybe
I could get me and Jim rid of the frauds; get them jailed here,
and then leave. But I didn't want to run the raft in the daytime
without anybody aboard to answer questions but me; so I didn't
want the plan to begin working till pretty late to-night. ?I
says:
"Miss Mary Jane, I'll tell you what we'll do, and you won't
have to stay at Mr. Lothrop's so long, nuther. ?How fur is
it?"
"A little short of four miles—right out in the country,
back here."
"Well, that 'll answer. ?Now you go along out there, and lay
low till nine or half-past to-night, and then get them to fetch
you home again—tell them you've thought of something. ?If
you get here before eleven put a candle in this window, and if I
don't turn up wait TILL eleven, and THEN if I don't turn up it
means I'm gone, and out of the way, and safe. Then you come out
and spread the news around, and get these beats jailed."
"Good," she says, "I'll do it."
"And if it just happens so that I don't get away, but get took
up along with them, you must up and say I told you the whole
thing beforehand, and you must stand by me all you can."
"Stand by you! indeed I will. ?They sha'n't touch a hair of
your head!" she says, and I see her nostrils spread and her eyes
snap when she said it, too.
"If I get away I sha'n't be here," I says, "to prove these
rapscallions ain't your uncles, and I couldn't do it if I WAS
here. ?I could swear they was beats and bummers, that's all,
though that's worth something. Well, there's others can do that
better than what I can, and they're people that ain't going to be
doubted as quick as I'd be. ?I'll tell you how to find them.
?Gimme a pencil and a piece of paper. ?There—'Royal
Nonesuch, Bricksville.' ?Put it away, and don't lose it. ?When
the court wants to find out something about these two, let them
send up to Bricksville and say they've got the men that played
the Royal Nonesuch, and ask for some witnesses—why, you'll
have that entire town down here before you can hardly wink, Miss
Mary. ?And they'll come a-biling, too."
I judged we had got everything fixed about right now. ?So I
says:
"Just let the auction go right along, and don't worry. ?Nobody
don't have to pay for the things they buy till a whole day after
the auction on accounts of the short notice, and they ain't going
out of this till they get that money; and the way we've fixed it
the sale ain't going to count, and they ain't going to get no
money. ?It's just like the way it was with the niggers—it
warn't no sale, and the niggers will be back before long. ?Why,
they can't collect the money for the NIGGERS yet—they're in
the worst kind of a fix, Miss Mary."
"Well," she says, "I'll run down to breakfast now, and then
I'll start straight for Mr. Lothrop's."
"'Deed, THAT ain't the ticket, Miss Mary Jane," I says, "by no
manner of means; go BEFORE breakfast."
"Why?"
"What did you reckon I wanted you to go at all for, Miss
Mary?"
"Well, I never thought—and come to think, I don't know.
?What was it?"
"Why, it's because you ain't one of these leather-face people.
?I don't want no better book than what your face is. ?A body can
set down and read it off like coarse print. ?Do you reckon you
can go and face your uncles when they come to kiss you
good-morning, and never—"
"There, there, don't! ?Yes, I'll go before
breakfast—I'll be glad to. And leave my sisters with
them?"
"Yes; never mind about them. ?They've got to stand it yet a
while. ?They might suspicion something if all of you was to go.
?I don't want you to see them, nor your sisters, nor nobody in
this town; if a neighbor was to ask how is your uncles this
morning your face would tell something. ?No, you go right along,
Miss Mary Jane, and I'll fix it with all of them. I'll tell Miss
Susan to give your love to your uncles and say you've went away
for a few hours for to get a little rest and change, or to see a
friend, and you'll be back to-night or early in the morning."
"Gone to see a friend is all right, but I won't have my love
given to them."
"Well, then, it sha'n't be." ?It was well enough to tell HER
so—no harm in it. ?It was only a little thing to do, and no
trouble; and it's the little things that smooths people's roads
the most, down here below; it would make Mary Jane comfortable,
and it wouldn't cost nothing. ?Then I says: ?"There's one more
thing—that bag of money."
"Well, they've got that; and it makes me feel pretty silly to
think HOW they got it."
"No, you're out, there. ?They hain't got it."
"Why, who's got it?"
"I wish I knowed, but I don't. ?I HAD it, because I stole it
from them; and I stole it to give to you; and I know where I hid
it, but I'm afraid it ain't there no more. ?I'm awful sorry, Miss
Mary Jane, I'm just as sorry as I can be; but I done the best I
could; I did honest. ?I come nigh getting caught, and I had to
shove it into the first place I come to, and run—and it
warn't a good place."
"Oh, stop blaming yourself—it's too bad to do it, and I
won't allow it—you couldn't help it; it wasn't your fault.
?Where did you hide it?"
I didn't want to set her to thinking about her troubles again;
and I couldn't seem to get my mouth to tell her what would make
her see that corpse laying in the coffin with that bag of money
on his stomach. ?So for a minute I didn't say nothing; then I
says:
"I'd ruther not TELL you where I put it, Miss Mary Jane, if
you don't mind letting me off; but I'll write it for you on a
piece of paper, and you can read it along the road to Mr.
Lothrop's, if you want to. ?Do you reckon that 'll do?"
"Oh, yes."
So I wrote: ?"I put it in the coffin. ?It was in there when
you was crying there, away in the night. ?I was behind the door,
and I was mighty sorry for you, Miss Mary Jane."
It made my eyes water a little to remember her crying there
all by herself in the night, and them devils laying there right
under her own roof, shaming her and robbing her; and when I
folded it up and give it to her I see the water come into her
eyes, too; and she shook me by the hand, hard, and says:
"GOOD-bye. ?I'm going to do everything just as you've told me;
and if I don't ever see you again, I sha'n't ever forget you and
I'll think of you a many and a many a time, and I'll PRAY for
you, too!"—and she was gone.
Pray for me! ?I reckoned if she knowed me she'd take a job
that was more nearer her size. ?But I bet she done it, just the
same—she was just that kind. ?She had the grit to pray for
Judus if she took the notion—there warn't no back-down to
her, I judge. ?You may say what you want to, but in my opinion
she had more sand in her than any girl I ever see; in my opinion
she was just full of sand. ?It sounds like flattery, but it ain't
no flattery. ?And when it comes to beauty—and goodness,
too—she lays over them all. ?I hain't ever seen her since
that time that I see her go out of that door; no, I hain't ever
seen her since, but I reckon I've thought of her a many and a
many a million times, and of her saying she would pray for me;
and if ever I'd a thought it would do any good for me to pray for
HER, blamed if I wouldn't a done it or bust.
Well, Mary Jane she lit out the back way, I reckon; because
nobody see her go. ?When I struck Susan and the hare-lip, I
says:
"What's the name of them people over on t'other side of the
river that you all goes to see sometimes?"
They says:
"There's several; but it's the Proctors, mainly."
"That's the name," I says; "I most forgot it. ?Well, Miss Mary
Jane she told me to tell you she's gone over there in a dreadful
hurry—one of them's sick."
"Which one?"
"I don't know; leastways, I kinder forget; but I thinks
it's—"
"Sakes alive, I hope it ain't HANNER?"
"I'm sorry to say it," I says, "but Hanner's the very
one."
"My goodness, and she so well only last week! ?Is she took
bad?"
"It ain't no name for it. ?They set up with her all night,
Miss Mary Jane said, and they don't think she'll last many
hours."
"Only think of that, now! ?What's the matter with her?"
I couldn't think of anything reasonable, right off that way,
so I says:
"Mumps."
"Mumps your granny! ?They don't set up with people that's got
the mumps."
"They don't, don't they? ?You better bet they do with THESE
mumps. ?These mumps is different. ?It's a new kind, Miss Mary
Jane said."
"How's it a new kind?"
"Because it's mixed up with other things."
"What other things?"
"Well, measles, and whooping-cough, and erysiplas, and
consumption, and yaller janders, and brain-fever, and I don't
know what all."
"My land! ?And they call it the MUMPS?"
"That's what Miss Mary Jane said."
"Well, what in the nation do they call it the MUMPS for?"
"Why, because it IS the mumps. ?That's what it starts
with."
"Well, ther' ain't no sense in it. ?A body might stump his
toe, and take pison, and fall down the well, and break his neck,
and bust his brains out, and somebody come along and ask what
killed him, and some numskull up and say, 'Why, he stumped his
TOE.' ?Would ther' be any sense in that? NO. ?And ther' ain't no
sense in THIS, nuther. ?Is it ketching?"
"Is it KETCHING? ?Why, how you talk. ?Is a HARROW
catching—in the dark? If you don't hitch on to one tooth,
you're bound to on another, ain't you? And you can't get away
with that tooth without fetching the whole harrow along, can you?
?Well, these kind of mumps is a kind of a harrow, as you may
say—and it ain't no slouch of a harrow, nuther, you come to
get it hitched on good."
"Well, it's awful, I think," says the hare-lip. ?"I'll go to
Uncle Harvey and—"
"Oh, yes," I says, "I WOULD. ?Of COURSE I would. ?I wouldn't
lose no time."
"Well, why wouldn't you?"
"Just look at it a minute, and maybe you can see. ?Hain't your
uncles obleegd to get along home to England as fast as they can?
?And do you reckon they'd be mean enough to go off and leave you
to go all that journey by yourselves? ?YOU know they'll wait for
you. ?So fur, so good. Your uncle Harvey's a preacher, ain't he?
?Very well, then; is a PREACHER going to deceive a steamboat
clerk? is he going to deceive a SHIP CLERK?—so as to get
them to let Miss Mary Jane go aboard? ?Now YOU know he ain't.
?What WILL he do, then? ?Why, he'll say, 'It's a great pity, but
my church matters has got to get along the best way they can; for
my niece has been exposed to the dreadful pluribus-unum mumps,
and so it's my bounden duty to set down here and wait the three
months it takes to show on her if she's got it.' ?But never mind,
if you think it's best to tell your uncle Harvey—"
"Shucks, and stay fooling around here when we could all be
having good times in England whilst we was waiting to find out
whether Mary Jane's got it or not? ?Why, you talk like a
muggins."
"Well, anyway, maybe you'd better tell some of the
neighbors."
"Listen at that, now. ?You do beat all for natural stupidness.
?Can't you SEE that THEY'D go and tell? ?Ther' ain't no way but
just to not tell anybody at ALL."
"Well, maybe you're right—yes, I judge you ARE
right."
"But I reckon we ought to tell Uncle Harvey she's gone out a
while, anyway, so he won't be uneasy about her?"
"Yes, Miss Mary Jane she wanted you to do that. ?She says,
'Tell them to give Uncle Harvey and William my love and a kiss,
and say I've run over the river to see Mr.'—Mr.—what
IS the name of that rich family your uncle Peter used to think so
much of?—I mean the one that—"
"Why, you must mean the Apthorps, ain't it?"
"Of course; bother them kind of names, a body can't ever seem
to remember them, half the time, somehow. ?Yes, she said, say she
has run over for to ask the Apthorps to be sure and come to the
auction and buy this house, because she allowed her uncle Peter
would ruther they had it than anybody else; and she's going to
stick to them till they say they'll come, and then, if she ain't
too tired, she's coming home; and if she is, she'll be home in
the morning anyway. ?She said, don't say nothing about the
Proctors, but only about the Apthorps—which 'll be
perfectly true, because she is going there to speak about their
buying the house; I know it, because she told me so herself."
"All right," they said, and cleared out to lay for their
uncles, and give them the love and the kisses, and tell them the
message.
Everything was all right now. ?The girls wouldn't say nothing
because they wanted to go to England; and the king and the duke
would ruther Mary Jane was off working for the auction than
around in reach of Doctor Robinson. ?I felt very good; I judged I
had done it pretty neat—I reckoned Tom Sawyer couldn't a
done it no neater himself. ?Of course he would a throwed more
style into it, but I can't do that very handy, not being brung up
to it.
Well, they held the auction in the public square, along
towards the end of the afternoon, and it strung along, and strung
along, and the old man he was on hand and looking his level
pisonest, up there longside of the auctioneer, and chipping in a
little Scripture now and then, or a little goody-goody saying of
some kind, and the duke he was around goo-gooing for sympathy all
he knowed how, and just spreading himself generly.
But by and by the thing dragged through, and everything was
sold—everything but a little old trifling lot in the
graveyard. ?So they'd got to work that off—I never see such
a girafft as the king was for wanting to swallow EVERYTHING.
?Well, whilst they was at it a steamboat landed, and in about two
minutes up comes a crowd a-whooping and yelling and laughing and
carrying on, and singing out:
"HERE'S your opposition line! here's your two sets o' heirs to
old Peter Wilks—and you pays your money and you takes your
choice!"
CHAPTER XXIX.
THEY was fetching a very nice-looking old gentleman along, and
a nice-looking younger one, with his right arm in a sling. ?And,
my souls, how the people yelled and laughed, and kept it up. ?But
I didn't see no joke about it, and I judged it would strain the
duke and the king some to see any. ?I reckoned they'd turn pale.
?But no, nary a pale did THEY turn. The duke he never let on he
suspicioned what was up, but just went a goo-gooing around,
happy and satisfied, like a jug that's googling out buttermilk;
and as for the king, he just gazed and gazed down sorrowful on
them new-comers like it give him the stomach-ache in his very
heart to think there could be such frauds and rascals in the
world. ?Oh, he done it admirable. ?Lots of the principal people
gethered around the king, to let him see they was on his side.
?That old gentleman that had just come looked all puzzled to
death. ?Pretty soon he begun to speak, and I see straight off he
pronounced LIKE an Englishman—not the king's way, though
the king's WAS pretty good for an imitation. ?I can't give the
old gent's words, nor I can't imitate him; but he turned around
to the crowd, and says, about like this:
"This is a surprise to me which I wasn't looking for; and I'll
acknowledge, candid and frank, I ain't very well fixed to meet it
and answer it; for my brother and me has had misfortunes; he's
broke his arm, and our baggage got put off at a town above here
last night in the night by a mistake. ?I am Peter Wilks' brother
Harvey, and this is his brother William, which can't hear nor
speak—and can't even make signs to amount to much, now't
he's only got one hand to work them with. ?We are who we say we
are; and in a day or two, when I get the baggage, I can prove it.
But up till then I won't say nothing more, but go to the hotel
and wait."
So him and the new dummy started off; and the king he laughs,
and blethers out:
"Broke his arm—VERY likely, AIN'T it?—and very
convenient, too, for a fraud that's got to make signs, and ain't
learnt how. ?Lost their baggage! That's MIGHTY good!—and
mighty ingenious—under the CIRCUMSTANCES!"
So he laughed again; and so did everybody else, except three
or four, or maybe half a dozen. ?One of these was that doctor;
another one was a sharp-looking gentleman, with a carpet-bag of
the old-fashioned kind made out of carpet-stuff, that had just
come off of the steamboat and was talking to him in a low voice,
and glancing towards the king now and then and nodding their
heads—it was Levi Bell, the lawyer that was gone up to
Louisville; and another one was a big rough husky that come along
and listened to all the old gentleman said, and was listening to
the king now. And when the king got done this husky up and
says:
"Say, looky here; if you are Harvey Wilks, when'd you come to
this town?"
"The day before the funeral, friend," says the king.
"But what time o' day?"
"In the evenin'—'bout an hour er two before
sundown."
"HOW'D you come?"
"I come down on the Susan Powell from Cincinnati."
"Well, then, how'd you come to be up at the Pint in the
MORNIN'—in a canoe?"
"I warn't up at the Pint in the mornin'."
"It's a lie."
Several of them jumped for him and begged him not to talk that
way to an old man and a preacher.
"Preacher be hanged, he's a fraud and a liar. ?He was up at
the Pint that mornin'. ?I live up there, don't I? ?Well, I was up
there, and he was up there. ?I see him there. ?He come in a
canoe, along with Tim Collins and a boy."
The doctor he up and says:
"Would you know the boy again if you was to see him,
Hines?"
"I reckon I would, but I don't know. ?Why, yonder he is, now.
?I know him perfectly easy."
It was me he pointed at. ?The doctor says:
"Neighbors, I don't know whether the new couple is frauds or
not; but if THESE two ain't frauds, I am an idiot, that's all. ?I
think it's our duty to see that they don't get away from here
till we've looked into this thing. Come along, Hines; come along,
the rest of you. ?We'll take these fellows to the tavern and
affront them with t'other couple, and I reckon we'll find out
SOMETHING before we get through."
It was nuts for the crowd, though maybe not for the king's
friends; so we all started. ?It was about sundown. ?The doctor he
led me along by the hand, and was plenty kind enough, but he
never let go my hand.
We all got in a big room in the hotel, and lit up some
candles, and fetched in the new couple. ?First, the doctor
says:
"I don't wish to be too hard on these two men, but I think
they're frauds, and they may have complices that we don't know
nothing about. ?If they have, won't the complices get away with
that bag of gold Peter Wilks left? ?It ain't unlikely. ?If these
men ain't frauds, they won't object to sending for that money and
letting us keep it till they prove they're all right—ain't
that so?"
Everybody agreed to that. ?So I judged they had our gang in a
pretty tight place right at the outstart. ?But the king he only
looked sorrowful, and says:
"Gentlemen, I wish the money was there, for I ain't got no
disposition to throw anything in the way of a fair, open,
out-and-out investigation o' this misable business; but, alas,
the money ain't there; you k'n send and see, if you want to."
"Where is it, then?"
"Well, when my niece give it to me to keep for her I took and
hid it inside o' the straw tick o' my bed, not wishin' to bank it
for the few days we'd be here, and considerin' the bed a safe
place, we not bein' used to niggers, and suppos'n' 'em honest,
like servants in England. ?The niggers stole it the very next
mornin' after I had went down stairs; and when I sold 'em I
hadn't missed the money yit, so they got clean away with it. ?My
servant here k'n tell you 'bout it, gentlemen."
The doctor and several said "Shucks!" and I see nobody didn't
altogether believe him. ?One man asked me if I see the niggers
steal it. ?I said no, but I see them sneaking out of the room and
hustling away, and I never thought nothing, only I reckoned they
was afraid they had waked up my master and was trying to get away
before he made trouble with them. ?That was all they asked me.
?Then the doctor whirls on me and says:
"Are YOU English, too?"
I says yes; and him and some others laughed, and said,
"Stuff!"
Well, then they sailed in on the general investigation, and
there we had it, up and down, hour in, hour out, and nobody never
said a word about supper, nor ever seemed to think about
it—and so they kept it up, and kept it up; and it WAS the
worst mixed-up thing you ever see. ?They made the king tell his
yarn, and they made the old gentleman tell his'n; and anybody but
a lot of prejudiced chuckleheads would a SEEN that the old
gentleman was spinning truth and t'other one lies. ?And by and by
they had me up to tell what I knowed. ?The king he give me a
left-handed look out of the corner of his eye, and so I knowed
enough to talk on the right side. ?I begun to tell about
Sheffield, and how we lived there, and all about the English
Wilkses, and so on; but I didn't get pretty fur till the doctor
begun to laugh; and Levi Bell, the lawyer, says:
"Set down, my boy; I wouldn't strain myself if I was you. ?I
reckon you ain't used to lying, it don't seem to come handy; what
you want is practice. ?You do it pretty awkward."
I didn't care nothing for the compliment, but I was glad to be
let off, anyway.
The doctor he started to say something, and turns and
says:
"If you'd been in town at first, Levi Bell—" The king
broke in and reached out his hand, and says:
"Why, is this my poor dead brother's old friend that he's
wrote so often about?"
The lawyer and him shook hands, and the lawyer smiled and
looked pleased, and they talked right along awhile, and then got
to one side and talked low; and at last the lawyer speaks up and
says:
"That 'll fix it. ?I'll take the order and send it, along with
your brother's, and then they'll know it's all right."
So they got some paper and a pen, and the king he set down and
twisted his head to one side, and chawed his tongue, and scrawled
off something; and then they give the pen to the duke—and
then for the first time the duke looked sick. ?But he took the
pen and wrote. ?So then the lawyer turns to the new old gentleman
and says:
"You and your brother please write a line or two and sign your
names."
The old gentleman wrote, but nobody couldn't read it. ?The
lawyer looked powerful astonished, and says:
"Well, it beats ME"—and snaked a lot of old letters out
of his pocket, and examined them, and then examined the old man's
writing, and then THEM again; and then says: ?"These old letters
is from Harvey Wilks; and here's THESE two handwritings, and
anybody can see they didn't write them" (the king and the duke
looked sold and foolish, I tell you, to see how the lawyer had
took them in), "and here's THIS old gentleman's hand writing, and
anybody can tell, easy enough, HE didn't write them—fact
is, the scratches he makes ain't properly WRITING at all. ?Now,
here's some letters from—"
The new old gentleman says:
"If you please, let me explain. ?Nobody can read my hand but
my brother there—so he copies for me. ?It's HIS hand you've
got there, not mine."
"WELL!" says the lawyer, "this IS a state of things. ?I've got
some of William's letters, too; so if you'll get him to write a
line or so we can com—"
"He CAN'T write with his left hand," says the old gentleman.
?"If he could use his right hand, you would see that he wrote his
own letters and mine too. ?Look at both, please—they're by
the same hand."
The lawyer done it, and says:
"I believe it's so—and if it ain't so, there's a heap
stronger resemblance than I'd noticed before, anyway. ?Well,
well, well! ?I thought we was right on the track of a slution,
but it's gone to grass, partly. ?But anyway, one thing is
proved—THESE two ain't either of 'em Wilkses"—and he
wagged his head towards the king and the duke.
Well, what do you think? ?That muleheaded old fool wouldn't
give in THEN! Indeed he wouldn't. ?Said it warn't no fair test.
?Said his brother William was the cussedest joker in the world,
and hadn't tried to write—HE see William was going to play
one of his jokes the minute he put the pen to paper. ?And so he
warmed up and went warbling right along till he was actuly
beginning to believe what he was saying HIMSELF; but pretty soon
the new gentleman broke in, and says:
"I've thought of something. ?Is there anybody here that helped
to lay out my br—helped to lay out the late Peter Wilks for
burying?"
"Yes," says somebody, "me and Ab Turner done it. ?We're both
here."
Then the old man turns towards the king, and says:
"Peraps this gentleman can tell me what was tattooed on his
breast?"
Blamed if the king didn't have to brace up mighty quick, or
he'd a squshed down like a bluff bank that the river has cut
under, it took him so sudden; and, mind you, it was a thing that
was calculated to make most ANYBODY sqush to get fetched such a
solid one as that without any notice, because how was HE going to
know what was tattooed on the man? ?He whitened a little; he
couldn't help it; and it was mighty still in there, and everybody
bending a little forwards and gazing at him. ?Says I to myself,
NOW he'll throw up the sponge—there ain't no more use.
?Well, did he? ?A body can't hardly believe it, but he didn't. ?I
reckon he thought he'd keep the thing up till he tired them
people out, so they'd thin out, and him and the duke could break
loose and get away. ?Anyway, he set there, and pretty soon he
begun to smile, and says:
"Mf! ?It's a VERY tough question, AIN'T it! ?YES, sir, I k'n
tell you what's tattooed on his breast. ?It's jest a small, thin,
blue arrow—that's what it is; and if you don't look clost,
you can't see it. ?NOW what do you say—hey?"
Well, I never see anything like that old blister for clean
out-and-out cheek.
The new old gentleman turns brisk towards Ab Turner and his
pard, and his eye lights up like he judged he'd got the king THIS
time, and says:
"There—you've heard what he said! ?Was there any such
mark on Peter Wilks' breast?"
Both of them spoke up and says:
"We didn't see no such mark."
"Good!" says the old gentleman. ?"Now, what you DID see on his
breast was a small dim P, and a B (which is an initial he dropped
when he was young), and a W, with dashes between them, so:
?P—B—W"—and he marked them that way on a piece
of paper. ?"Come, ain't that what you saw?"
Both of them spoke up again, and says:
"No, we DIDN'T. ?We never seen any marks at all."
Well, everybody WAS in a state of mind now, and they sings
out:
"The whole BILIN' of 'm 's frauds! ?Le's duck 'em! le's drown
'em! le's ride 'em on a rail!" and everybody was whooping at
once, and there was a rattling powwow. ?But the lawyer he jumps
on the table and yells, and says:
"Gentlemen—gentleMEN! ?Hear me just a word—just a
SINGLE word—if you PLEASE! ?There's one way yet—let's
go and dig up the corpse and look."
That took them.
"Hooray!" they all shouted, and was starting right off; but
the lawyer and the doctor sung out:
"Hold on, hold on! ?Collar all these four men and the boy, and
fetch THEM along, too!"
"We'll do it!" they all shouted; "and if we don't find them
marks we'll lynch the whole gang!"
I WAS scared, now, I tell you. ?But there warn't no getting
away, you know. They gripped us all, and marched us right along,
straight for the graveyard, which was a mile and a half down the
river, and the whole town at our heels, for we made noise enough,
and it was only nine in the evening.
As we went by our house I wished I hadn't sent Mary Jane out
of town; because now if I could tip her the wink she'd light out
and save me, and blow on our dead-beats.
Well, we swarmed along down the river road, just carrying on
like wildcats; and to make it more scary the sky was darking up,
and the lightning beginning to wink and flitter, and the wind to
shiver amongst the leaves. This was the most awful trouble and
most dangersome I ever was in; and I was kinder stunned;
everything was going so different from what I had allowed for;
stead of being fixed so I could take my own time if I wanted to,
and see all the fun, and have Mary Jane at my back to save me and
set me free when the close-fit come, here was nothing in the
world betwixt me and sudden death but just them tattoo-marks. ?If
they didn't find them—
I couldn't bear to think about it; and yet, somehow, I
couldn't think about nothing else. ?It got darker and darker, and
it was a beautiful time to give the crowd the slip; but that big
husky had me by the wrist—Hines—and a body might as
well try to give Goliar the slip. ?He dragged me right along, he
was so excited, and I had to run to keep up.
When they got there they swarmed into the graveyard and washed
over it like an overflow. ?And when they got to the grave they
found they had about a hundred times as many shovels as they
wanted, but nobody hadn't thought to fetch a lantern. ?But they
sailed into digging anyway by the flicker of the lightning, and
sent a man to the nearest house, a half a mile off, to borrow
one.
So they dug and dug like everything; and it got awful dark,
and the rain started, and the wind swished and swushed along, and
the lightning come brisker and brisker, and the thunder boomed;
but them people never took no notice of it, they was so full of
this business; and one minute you could see everything and every
face in that big crowd, and the shovelfuls of dirt sailing up out
of the grave, and the next second the dark wiped it all out, and
you couldn't see nothing at all.
At last they got out the coffin and begun to unscrew the lid,
and then such another crowding and shouldering and shoving as
there was, to scrouge in and get a sight, you never see; and in
the dark, that way, it was awful. ?Hines he hurt my wrist
dreadful pulling and tugging so, and I reckon he clean forgot I
was in the world, he was so excited and panting.
All of a sudden the lightning let go a perfect sluice of white
glare, and somebody sings out:
"By the living jingo, here's the bag of gold on his
breast!"
Hines let out a whoop, like everybody else, and dropped my
wrist and give a big surge to bust his way in and get a look, and
the way I lit out and shinned for the road in the dark there
ain't nobody can tell.
I had the road all to myself, and I fairly
flew—leastways, I had it all to myself except the solid
dark, and the now-and-then glares, and the buzzing of the rain,
and the thrashing of the wind, and the splitting of the thunder;
and sure as you are born I did clip it along!
When I struck the town I see there warn't nobody out in the
storm, so I never hunted for no back streets, but humped it
straight through the main one; and when I begun to get towards
our house I aimed my eye and set it. No light there; the house
all dark—which made me feel sorry and disappointed, I
didn't know why. ?But at last, just as I was sailing by, FLASH
comes the light in Mary Jane's window! and my heart swelled up
sudden, like to bust; and the same second the house and all was
behind me in the dark, and wasn't ever going to be before me no
more in this world. She WAS the best girl I ever see, and had the
most sand.
The minute I was far enough above the town to see I could make
the towhead, I begun to look sharp for a boat to borrow, and the
first time the lightning showed me one that wasn't chained I
snatched it and shoved. It was a canoe, and warn't fastened with
nothing but a rope. ?The towhead was a rattling big distance off,
away out there in the middle of the river, but I didn't lose no
time; and when I struck the raft at last I was so fagged I would
a just laid down to blow and gasp if I could afforded it. ?But I
didn't. ?As I sprung aboard I sung out:
"Out with you, Jim, and set her loose! ?Glory be to goodness,
we're shut of them!"
Jim lit out, and was a-coming for me with both arms spread, he
was so full of joy; but when I glimpsed him in the lightning my
heart shot up in my mouth and I went overboard backwards; for I
forgot he was old King Lear and a drownded A-rab all in one, and
it most scared the livers and lights out of me. ?But Jim fished
me out, and was going to hug me and bless me, and so on, he was
so glad I was back and we was shut of the king and the duke, but
I says:
"Not now; have it for breakfast, have it for breakfast! ?Cut
loose and let her slide!"
So in two seconds away we went a-sliding down the river, and
it DID seem so good to be free again and all by ourselves on the
big river, and nobody to bother us. ?I had to skip around a bit,
and jump up and crack my heels a few times—I couldn't help
it; but about the third crack I noticed a sound that I knowed
mighty well, and held my breath and listened and waited; and sure
enough, when the next flash busted out over the water, here they
come!—and just a-laying to their oars and making their
skiff hum! ?It was the king and the duke.
So I wilted right down on to the planks then, and give up; and
it was all I could do to keep from crying.
CHAPTER XXX.
WHEN they got aboard the king went for me, and shook me by the
collar, and says:
"Tryin' to give us the slip, was ye, you pup! ?Tired of our
company, hey?"
I says:
"No, your majesty, we warn't—PLEASE don't, your
majesty!"
"Quick, then, and tell us what WAS your idea, or I'll shake
the insides out o' you!"
"Honest, I'll tell you everything just as it happened, your
majesty. ?The man that had a-holt of me was very good to me, and
kept saying he had a boy about as big as me that died last year,
and he was sorry to see a boy in such a dangerous fix; and when
they was all took by surprise by finding the gold, and made a
rush for the coffin, he lets go of me and whispers, 'Heel it now,
or they'll hang ye, sure!' and I lit out. ?It didn't seem no good
for ME to stay—I couldn't do nothing, and I didn't want to
be hung if I could get away. ?So I never stopped running till I
found the canoe; and when I got here I told Jim to hurry, or
they'd catch me and hang me yet, and said I was afeard you and
the duke wasn't alive now, and I was awful sorry, and so was Jim,
and was awful glad when we see you coming; you may ask Jim if I
didn't."
Jim said it was so; and the king told him to shut up, and
said, "Oh, yes, it's MIGHTY likely!" and shook me up again, and
said he reckoned he'd drownd me. ?But the duke says:
"Leggo the boy, you old idiot! ?Would YOU a done any
different? ?Did you inquire around for HIM when you got loose? ?I
don't remember it."
So the king let go of me, and begun to cuss that town and
everybody in it. But the duke says:
"You better a blame' sight give YOURSELF a good cussing, for
you're the one that's entitled to it most. ?You hain't done a
thing from the start that had any sense in it, except coming out
so cool and cheeky with that imaginary blue-arrow mark. ?That WAS
bright—it was right down bully; and it was the thing that
saved us. ?For if it hadn't been for that they'd a jailed us till
them Englishmen's baggage come—and then—the
penitentiary, you bet! But that trick took 'em to the graveyard,
and the gold done us a still bigger kindness; for if the excited
fools hadn't let go all holts and made that rush to get a look
we'd a slept in our cravats to-night—cravats warranted to
WEAR, too—longer than WE'D need 'em."
They was still a minute—thinking; then the king says,
kind of absent-minded like:
"Mf! ?And we reckoned the NIGGERS stole it!"
That made me squirm!
"Yes," says the duke, kinder slow and deliberate and
sarcastic, "WE did."
After about a half a minute the king drawls out:
"Leastways, I did."
The duke says, the same way:
"On the contrary, I did."
The king kind of ruffles up, and says:
"Looky here, Bilgewater, what'r you referrin' to?"
The duke says, pretty brisk:
"When it comes to that, maybe you'll let me ask, what was YOU
referring to?"
"Shucks!" says the king, very sarcastic; "but I don't
know—maybe you was asleep, and didn't know what you was
about."
The duke bristles up now, and says:
"Oh, let UP on this cussed nonsense; do you take me for a
blame' fool? Don't you reckon I know who hid that money in that
coffin?"
"YES, sir! ?I know you DO know, because you done it
yourself!"
"It's a lie!"—and the duke went for him. ?The king sings
out:
"Take y'r hands off!—leggo my throat!—I take it
all back!"
The duke says:
"Well, you just own up, first, that you DID hide that money
there, intending to give me the slip one of these days, and come
back and dig it up, and have it all to yourself."
"Wait jest a minute, duke—answer me this one question,
honest and fair; if you didn't put the money there, say it, and
I'll b'lieve you, and take back everything I said."
"You old scoundrel, I didn't, and you know I didn't. ?There,
now!"
"Well, then, I b'lieve you. ?But answer me only jest this one
more—now DON'T git mad; didn't you have it in your mind to
hook the money and hide it?"
The duke never said nothing for a little bit; then he
says:
"Well, I don't care if I DID, I didn't DO it, anyway. ?But you
not only had it in mind to do it, but you DONE it."
"I wisht I never die if I done it, duke, and that's honest. ?I
won't say I warn't goin' to do it, because I WAS; but you—I
mean somebody—got in ahead o' me."
"It's a lie! ?You done it, and you got to SAY you done it,
or—"
The king began to gurgle, and then he gasps out:
"'Nough!—I OWN UP!"
I was very glad to hear him say that; it made me feel much
more easier than what I was feeling before. ?So the duke took his
hands off and says:
"If you ever deny it again I'll drown you. ?It's WELL for you
to set there and blubber like a baby—it's fitten for you,
after the way you've acted. I never see such an old ostrich for
wanting to gobble everything—and I a-trusting you all the
time, like you was my own father. ?You ought to been ashamed of
yourself to stand by and hear it saddled on to a lot of poor
niggers, and you never say a word for 'em. ?It makes me feel
ridiculous to think I was soft enough to BELIEVE that rubbage.
?Cuss you, I can see now why you was so anxious to make up the
deffisit—you wanted to get what money I'd got out of the
Nonesuch and one thing or another, and scoop it ALL!"
The king says, timid, and still a-snuffling:
"Why, duke, it was you that said make up the deffisit; it
warn't me."
"Dry up! ?I don't want to hear no more out of you!" says the
duke. ?"And NOW you see what you GOT by it. ?They've got all
their own money back, and all of OURN but a shekel or two
BESIDES. ?G'long to bed, and don't you deffersit ME no more
deffersits, long 's YOU live!"
So the king sneaked into the wigwam and took to his bottle for
comfort, and before long the duke tackled HIS bottle; and so in
about a half an hour they was as thick as thieves again, and the
tighter they got the lovinger they got, and went off a-snoring in
each other's arms. ?They both got powerful mellow, but I noticed
the king didn't get mellow enough to forget to remember to not
deny about hiding the money-bag again. ?That made me feel easy
and satisfied. ?Of course when they got to snoring we had a long
gabble, and I told Jim everything.
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