Title: TOM SAWYER, DETECTIVE
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Author: MARK TWAIN
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TOM SAWYER, DETECTIVE
MARK TWAIN
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Table of Contents
TOM SAWYER, DETECTIVE .........................................................................................................................1
MARK TWAIN.......................................................................................................................................1
TOM SAWYER, DETECTIVE
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TOM SAWYER, DETECTIVE
MARK TWAIN
CHAPTER I. AN INVITATION FOR TOM AND HUCK
CHAPTER II. JAKE DUNLAP
CHAPTER III. A DIAMOND ROBBERY
CHAPTER IV. THE THREE SLEEPERS
CHAPTER V. A TRAGEDY IN THE WOODS
CHAPTER VI. PLANS TO SECURE THE DIAMONDS
CHAPTER VII. A NIGHT'S VIGIL
CHAPTER VIII. TALKING WITH THE GHOST
CHAPTER IX. FINDING OF JUBITER DUNLAP
CHAPTER X. THE ARREST OF UNCLE SILAS
CHAPTER XI. TOM SAWYER DISCOVERS THE MURDERERS
CHAPTER I. AN INVITATION FOR TOM AND HUCK
[Footnote: Strange as the incidents of this story are, they are not inventions, but facts even to the public
confession of the accused. I take them from an oldtime Swedish criminal trial, change the actors, and
transfer the scenes to America. I have added some details, but only a couple of them are important ones.
M. T.]
WELL, it was the next spring after me and Tom Sawyer set our old nigger Jim free, the time he was chained
up for a runaway slave down there on Tom's uncle Silas's farm in Arkansaw. The frost was working out of
the ground, and out of the air, too, and it was getting closer and closer onto barefoot time every day; and next
it would be marble time, and next mumbletypeg, and next tops and hoops, and next kites, and then right away
it would be summer and go ing in aswimming. It just makes a boy homesick to look ahead like that and see
how far off summer is. Yes, and it sets him to sighing and saddening around, and there's something the matter
with him, he don't know what. But anyway, he gets out by himself and mopes and thinks; and mostly he
hunts for a lone some place high up on the hill in the edge of the woods, and sets there and looks away off
on the big Mississippi down there areaching miles and miles around the points where the timber looks
smoky and dim it's so far off and still, and everything's so solemn it seems like everybody you've loved is
dead and gone, and you 'most wish you was dead and gone too, and done with it all.
Don't you know what that is? It's spring fever. That is what the name of it is. And when you've got it, you
want oh, you don't quite know what it is you DO want, but it just fairly makes your heart ache, you want it
so! It seems to you that mainly what you want is to get away; get away from the same old tedious things
you're so used to seeing and so tired of, and set something new. That is the idea; you want to go and be a
wanderer; you want to go wandering far away to strange countries where everything is mysterious and
wonderful and romantic. And if you can't do that, you'll put up with considerable less; you'll go any where
you CAN go, just so as to get away, and be thank ful of the chance, too.
Well, me and Tom Sawyer had the spring fever, and had it bad, too; but it warn't any use to think about Tom
trying to get away, because, as he said, his Aunt Polly wouldn't let him quit school and go traipsing off
somers wasting time; so we was pretty blue. We was setting on the front steps one day about sundown talk
ing this way, when out comes his aunt Polly with a letter in her hand and says:
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"Tom, I reckon you've got to pack up and go down to Arkansaw your aunt Sally wants you."
I 'most jumped out of my skin for joy. I reckoned Tom would fly at his aunt and hug her head off; but if you
believe me he set there like a rock, and never said a word. It made me fit to cry to see him act so foolish, with
such a noble chance as this opening up. Why, we might lose it if he didn't speak up and show he was thankful
and grateful. But he set there and studied and studied till I was that distressed I didn't know what to do; then
he says, very ca'm, and I could a shot him for it:
"Well," he says, "I'm right down sorry, Aunt Polly, but I reckon I got to be excused for the present."
His aunt Polly was knocked so stupid and so mad at the cold impudence of it that she couldn't say a word for
as much as a half a minute, and this gave me a chance to nudge Tom and whisper:
"Ain't you got any sense? Sp'iling such a noble chance as this and throwing it away?"
But he warn't disturbed. He mumbled back:
"Huck Finn, do you want me to let her SEE how bad I want to go? Why, she'd begin to doubt, right away, and
imagine a lot of sicknesses and dangers and objections, and first you know she'd take it all back. You lemme
alone; I reckon I know how to work her."
Now I never would 'a' thought of that. But he was right. Tom Sawyer was always right the levelest head I
ever see, and always AT himself and ready for anything you might spring on him. By this time his aunt Polly
was all straight again, and she let fly. She says:
"You'll be excused! YOU will! Well, I never heard the like of it in all my days! The idea of you talking like
that to ME! Now take yourself off and pack your traps; and if I hear another word out of you about what
you'll be excused from and what you won't, I lay I'LL excuse you with a hickory!"
She hit his head a thump with her thimble as we dodged by, and he let on to be whimpering as we struck for
the stairs. Up in his room he hugged me, he was so out of his head for gladness because he was going
traveling. And he says:
"Before we get away she'll wish she hadn't let me go, but she won't know any way to get around it now. After
what she's said, her pride won't let her take it back."
Tom was packed in ten minutes, all except what his aunt and Mary would finish up for him; then we waited
ten more for her to get cooled down and sweet and gentle again; for Tom said it took her ten minutes to
unruffle in times when half of her feathers was up, but twenty when they was all up, and this was one of the
times when they was all up. Then we went down, being in a sweat to know what the letter said.
She was setting there in a brown study, with it laying in her lap. We set down, and she says:
"They're in considerable trouble down there, and they think you and Huck'll be a kind of diversion for them
'comfort,' they say. Much of that they'll get out of you and Huck Finn, I reckon. There's a neigh bor
named Brace Dunlap that's been wanting to marry their Benny for three months, and at last they told him
point blank and once for all, he COULDN'T; so he has soured on them, and they're worried about it. I reckon
he's somebody they think they better be on the good side of, for they've tried to please him by hiring his no
account brother to help on the farm when they can't hardly afford it, and don't want him around anyhow. Who
are the Dunlaps?"
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"They live about a mile from Uncle Silas's place, Aunt Polly all the farmers live about a mile apart down
there and Brace Dunlap is a long sight richer than any of the others, and owns a whole grist of nig gers.
He's a widower, thirtysix years old, without any children, and is proud of his money and overbear ing, and
everybody is a little afraid of him. I judge he thought he could have any girl he wanted, just for the asking,
and it must have set him back a good deal when he found he couldn't get Benny. Why, Benny's only half as
old as he is, and just as sweet and lovely asQ well, you've seen her. Poor old Uncle Silas why, it's pitiful,
him trying to curry favor that way so hard pushed and poor, and yet hiring that useless Jubiter Dunlap to
please his ornery brother."
"What a name Jubiter! Where'd he get it?"
"It's only just a nickname. I reckon they've forgot his real name long before this. He's twentyseven, now,
and has had it ever since the first time he ever went in swimming. The school teacher seen a round brown
mole the size of a dime on his left leg above his knee, and four little bits of moles around it, when he was
naked, and he said it minded him of Jubiter and his moons; and the children thought it was funny, and so they
got to calling him Jubiter, and he's Jubiter yet. He's tall, and lazy, and sly, and sneaky, and ruther cowardly,
too, but kind of goodnatured, and wears long brown hair and no beard, and hasn't got a cent, and Brace
boards him for nothing, and gives him his old clothes to wear, and despises him. Jubiter is a twin."
"What's t'other twin like?"
"Just exactly like Jubiter so they say; used to was, anyway, but he hain't been seen for seven years. He got
to robbing when he was nineteen or twenty, and they jailed him; but he broke jail and got away up North
here, somers. They used to hear about him robbing and burglaring now and then, but that was years ago. He's
dead, now. At least that's what they say. They don't hear about him any more."
"What was his name?"
"Jake."
There wasn't anything more said for a considerable while; the old lady was thinking. At last she says:
"The thing that is mostly worrying your aunt Sally is the tempers that that man Jubiter gets your uncle into."
Tom was astonished, and so was I. Tom says:
"Tempers? Uncle Silas? Land, you must be jok ing! I didn't know he HAD any temper."
"Works him up into perfect rages, your aunt Sally says; says he acts as if he would really hit the man,
sometimes."
"Aunt Polly, it beats anything I ever heard of. Why, he's just as gentle as mush."
"Well, she's worried, anyway. Says your uncle Silas is like a changed man, on account of all this quarreling.
And the neighbors talk about it, and lay all the blame on your uncle, of course, because he's a preacher and
hain't got any business to quarrel. Your aunt Sally says he hates to go into the pulpit he's so ashamed; and the
people have begun to cool toward him, and he ain't as popular now as he used to was."
"Well, ain't it strange? Why, Aunt Polly, he was always so good and kind and moony and absentminded and
chuckleheaded and lovable why, he was just an angel! What CAN be the matter of him, do you reckon?"
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CHAPTER II. JAKE DUNLAP
WE had powerful good luck; because we got a chance in a sternwheeler from away North which was bound
for one of them bayous or onehorse rivers away down Louisiana way, and so we could go all the way down
the Upper Mississippi and all the way down the Lower Mississippi to that farm in Arkansaw with out
having to change steamboats at St. Louis; not so very much short of a thousand miles at one pull.
A pretty lonesome boat; there warn't but few passengers, and all old folks, that set around, wide apart, dozing,
and was very quiet. We was four days getting out of the "upper river," because we got aground so much. But
it warn't dull couldn't be for boys that was traveling, of course.
From the very start me and Tom allowed that there was somebody sick in the stateroom next to ourn, be
cause the meals was always toted in there by the wait ers. By and by we asked about it Tom did and the
waiter said it was a man, but he didn't look sick.
"Well, but AIN'T he sick?"
"I don't know; maybe he is, but 'pears to me he's just letting on."
"What makes you think that?"
"Because if he was sick he would pull his clothes off SOME time or other don't you reckon he would?
Well, this one don't. At least he don't ever pull off his boots, anyway."
"The mischief he don't! Not even when he goes to bed?"
"No."
It was always nuts for Tom Sawyer a mystery was. If you'd lay out a mystery and a pie before me and
him, you wouldn't have to say take your choice; it was a thing that would regulate itself. Because in my
nature I have always run to pie, whilst in his nature he has always run to mystery. People are made different.
And it is the best way. Tom says to the waiter:
"What's the man's name?"
"Phillips."
"Where'd he come aboard?"
"I think he got aboard at Elexandria, up on the Iowa line."
"What do you reckon he's aplaying?"
"I hain't any notion I never thought of it."
I says to myself, here's another one that runs to pie.
"Anything peculiar about him? the way he acts or talks?"
"No nothing, except he seems so scary, and keeps his doors locked night and day both, and when you
knock he won't let you in till he opens the door a crack and sees who it is."
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"By jimminy, it's int'resting! I'd like to get a look at him. Say the next time you're going in there, don't you
reckon you could spread the door and "
"No, indeedy! He's always behind it. He would block that game."
Tom studied over it, and then he says:
"Looky here. You lend me your apern and let me take him his breakfast in the morning. I'll give you a
quarter."
The boy was plenty willing enough, if the head steward wouldn't mind. Tom says that's all right, he reckoned
he could fix it with the head steward; and he done it. He fixed it so as we could both go in with aperns on and
toting vittles.
He didn't sleep much, he was in such a sweat to get in there and find out the mystery about Phillips; and
moreover he done a lot of guessing about it all night, which warn't no use, for if you are going to find out the
facts of a thing, what's the sense in guessing out what ain't the facts and wasting ammunition? I didn't lose no
sleep. I wouldn't give a dern to know what's the matter of Phillips, I says to myself.
Well, in the morning we put on the aperns and got a couple of trays of truck, and Tom he knocked on the
door. The man opened it a crack, and then he let us in and shut it quick. By Jackson, when we got a sight of
him, we 'most dropped the trays! and Tom says:
"Why, Jubiter Dunlap, where'd YOU come from?"
Well, the man was astonished, of course; and first off he looked like he didn't know whether to be scared, or
glad, or both, or which, but finally he settled down to being glad; and then his color come back, though at
first his face had turned pretty white. So we got to talking together while he et his breakfast. And he says:
"But I aint Jubiter Dunlap. I'd just as soon tell you who I am, though, if you'll swear to keep mum, for I ain't
no Phillips, either."
Tom says:
"We'll keep mum, but there ain't any need to tell who you are if you ain't Jubiter Dunlap."
"Why?"
"Because if you ain't him you're t'other twin, Jake. You're the spit'n image of Jubiter."
"Well, I'm Jake. But looky here, how do you come to know us Dunlaps?"
Tom told about the adventures we'd had down there at his uncle Silas's last summer, and when he see that
there warn't anything about his folks or him either, for that matter that we didn't know, he opened out
and talked perfectly free and candid. He never made any bones about his own case; said he'd been a hard lot,
was a hard lot yet, and reckoned he'd be a hard lot plumb to the end. He said of course it was a danger ous
life, and
He give a kind of gasp, and set his head like a person that's listening. We didn't say anything, and so it was
very still for a second or so, and there warn't no sounds but the screaking of the woodwork and the chug
chugging of the machinery down below.
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Then we got him comfortable again, telling him about his people, and how Brace's wife had been dead three
years, and Brace wanted to marry Benny and she shook him, and Jubiter was working for Uncle Silas, and
him and Uncle Silas quarreling all the time and then he let go and laughed.
"Land!" he says, "it's like old times to hear all this tittletattle, and does me good. It's been seven years and
more since I heard any. How do they talk about me these days?"
"Who?"
"The farmers and the family."
"Why, they don't talk about you at all at least only just a mention, once in a long time."
"The nation!" he says, surprised; "why is that?"
"Because they think you are dead long ago."
"No! Are you speaking true? honor bright, now." He jumped up, excited.
"Honor bright. There ain't anybody thinks you are alive."
"Then I'm saved, I'm saved, sure! I'll go home. They'll hide me and save my life. You keep mum. Swear
you'll keep mum swear you'll never, never tell on me. Oh, boys, be good to a poor devil that's being
hunted day and night, and dasn't show his face! I've never done you any harm; I'll never do you any, as God
is in the heavens; swear you'll be good to me and help me save my life."
We'd a swore it if he'd been a dog; and so we done it. Well, he couldn't love us enough for it or be grate ful
enough, poor cuss; it was all he could do to keep from hugging us.
We talked along, and he got out a little handbag and begun to open it, and told us to turn our backs. We
done it, and when he told us to turn again he was perfectly different to what he was before. He had on blue
goggles and the naturalestlooking long brown whiskers and mustashes you ever see. His own mother
wouldn't 'a' knowed him. He asked us if he looked like his brother Jubiter, now.
"No," Tom said; "there ain't anything left that's like him except the long hair."
"All right, I'll get that cropped close to my head be fore I get there; then him and Brace will keep my secret,
and I'll live with them as being a stranger, and the neighbors won't ever guess me out. What do you think?"
Tom he studied awhile, then he says:
"Well, of course me and Huck are going to keep mum there, but if you don't keep mum yourself there's going
to be a little bit of a risk it ain't much, maybe, but it's a little. I mean, if you talk, won't people notice that
your voice is just like Jubiter's; and mightn't it make them think of the twin they reckoned was dead, but
maybe after all was hid all this time under another name?"
"By George," he says, "you're a sharp one! You're perfectly right. I've got to play deef and dumb when there's
a neighbor around. If I'd a struck for home and forgot that little detail However, I wasn't striking for home.
I was breaking for any place where I could get away from these fellows that are after me; then I was going to
put on this disguise and get some different clothes, and "
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He jumped for the outside door and laid his ear against it and listened, pale and kind of panting. Presently he
whispers:
"Sounded like cocking a gun! Lord, what a life to lead!"
Then he sunk down in a chair all limp and sick like, and wiped the sweat off of his face.
CHAPTER III. A DIAMOND ROBBERY
FROM that time out, we was with him 'most all the time, and one or t'other of us slept in his upper berth. He
said he had been so lonesome, and it was such a comfort to him to have company, and somebody to talk to in
his troubles. We was in a sweat to find out what his secret was, but Tom said the best way was not to seem
anxious, then likely he would drop into it himself in one of his talks, but if we got to asking questions he
would get suspicious and shet up his shell. It turned out just so. It warn't no trouble to see that he WANTED
to talk about it, but always along at first he would scare away from it when he got on the very edge of it, and
go to talking about something else. The way it come about was this: He got to asking us, kind of indifferent
like, about the passengers down on deck. We told him about them. But he warn't satis fied; we warn't
particular enough. He told us to de scribe them better. Tom done it. At last, when Tom was describing one
of the roughest and raggedest ones, he gave a shiver and a gasp and says:
"Oh, lordy, that's one of them! They're aboard sure I just knowed it. I sort of hoped I had got away, but I
never believed it. Go on."
Presently when Tom was describing another mangy, rough deck passenger, he give that shiver again and
says:
"That's him! that's the other one. If it would only come a good black stormy night and I could get ashore.
You see, they've got spies on me. They've got a right to come up and buy drinks at the bar yonder forrard, and
they take that chance to bribe somebody to keep watch on me porter or boots or somebody. If I was to slip
ashore without anybody seeing me, they would know it inside of an hour."
So then he got to wandering along, and pretty soon, sure enough, he was telling! He was poking along
through his ups and downs, and when he come to that place he went right along. He says:
"It was a confidence game. We played it on a julery shop in St. Louis. What we was after was a couple of
noble big di'monds as big as hazelnuts, which every body was running to see. We was dressed up fine, and
we played it on them in broad daylight. We ordered the di'monds sent to the hotel for us to see if we wanted
to buy, and when we was examining them we had paste counterfeits all ready, and THEM was the things that
went back to the shop when we said the water wasn't quite fine enough for twelve thousand dollars."
"TwelveQthousandQdollars!" Tom says. "Was they really worth all that money, do you reckon?"
"Every cent of it."
"And you fellows got away with them?"
"As easy as nothing. I don't reckon the julery people know they've been robbed yet. But it wouldn't be good
sense to stay around St. Louis, of course, so we considered where we'd go. One was for going one way, one
another, so we throwed up, heads or tails, and the Upper Mississippi won. We done up the di'monds in a
paper and put our names on it and put it in the keep of the hotel clerk, and told him not to ever let either of us
have it again without the others was on hand to see it done; then we went down town, each by his own self
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because I reckon maybe we all had the same notion. I don't know for certain, but I reckon maybe we had."
"What notion?" Tom says.
"To rob the others."
"What one take everything, after all of you had helped to get it?"
"Cert'nly."
It disgusted Tom Sawyer, and he said it was the orneriest, lowdownest thing he ever heard of. But Jake
Dunlap said it warn't unusual in the profession. Said when a person was in that line of business he'd got to
look out for his own intrust, there warn't no body else going to do it for him. And then he went on. He says:
"You see, the trouble was, you couldn't divide up two di'monds amongst three. If there'd been three But
never mind about that, there warn't three. I loafed along the back streets studying and studying. And I says to
myself, I'll hog them di'monds the first chance I get, and I'll have a disguise all ready, and I'll give the boys
the slip, and when I'm safe away I'll put it on, and then let them find me if they can. So I got the false
whiskers and the goggles and this countrified suit of clothes, and fetched them along back in a hand bag;
and when I was passing a shop where they sell all sorts of things, I got a glimpse of one of my pals through
the window. It was Bud Dixon. I was glad, you bet. I says to myself, I'll see what he buys. So I kept shady,
and watched. Now what do you reckon it was he bought?"
"Whiskers?" said I.
"No."
"Goggles?"
"No."
"Oh, keep still, Huck Finn, can't you, you're only just hendering all you can. What WAS it he bought, Jake?"
"You'd never guess in the world. It was only just a screwdriver just a wee little bit of a screwdriver."
"Well, I declare! What did he want with that?"
"That's what I thought. It was curious. It clean stumped me. I says to myself, what can he want with that
thing? Well, when he come out I stood back out of sight, and then tracked him to a secondhand slop shop
and see him buy a red flannel shirt and some old ragged clothes just the ones he's got on now, as you've
described. Then I went down to the wharf and hid my things aboard the upriver boat that we had picked out,
and then started back and had another streak of luck. I seen our other pal lay in HIS stock of old rusty
secondhanders. We got the di'monds and went aboard the boat.
"But now we was up a stump, for we couldn't go to bed. We had to set up and watch one another. Pity, that
was; pity to put that kind of a strain on us, because there was bad blood between us from a couple of weeks
back, and we was only friends in the way of business. Bad anyway, seeing there was only two di'monds
betwixt three men. First we had supper, and then tramped up and down the deck together smoking till most
midnight; then we went and set down in my stateroom and locked the doors and looked in the piece of paper
to see if the di'monds was all right, then laid it on the lower berth right in full sight; and there we set, and set,
and byandby it got to be dreadful hard to keep awake. At last Bud Dixon he dropped off. As soon as he
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was snoring a good regular gait that was likely to last, and had his chin on his breast and looked permanent,
Hal Clayton nodded towards the di'monds and then towards the outside door, and I understood. I reached and
got the paper, and then we stood up and waited perfectly still; Bud never stirred; I turned the key of the
outside door very soft and slow, then turned the knob the same way, and we went tiptoeing out onto the
guard, and shut the door very soft and gentle.
"There warn't nobody stirring anywhere, and the boat was slipping along, swift and steady, through the big
water in the smoky moonlight. We never said a word, but went straight up onto the hurricanedeck and
plumb back aft, and set down on the end of the sky light. Both of us knowed what that meant, without
having to explain to one another. Bud Dixon would wake up and miss the swag, and would come straight for
us, for he ain't afeard of anything or anybody, that man ain't. He would come, and we would heave him
overboard, or get killed trying. It made me shiver, because I ain't as brave as some people, but if I showed the
white feather well, I knowed better than do that. I kind of hoped the boat would land somers, and we
could skip ashore and not have to run the risk of this row, I was so scared of Bud Dixon, but she was an
upperriver tub and there warn't no real chance of that.
"Well, the time strung along and along, and that fellow never come! Why, it strung along till dawn begun to
break, and still he never come. 'Thunder,' I says, 'what do you make out of this? ain't it sus picious?'
'Land!' Hal says, 'do you reckon he's playing us? open the paper!' I done it, and by gracious there warn't
anything in it but a couple of little pieces of loafsugar! THAT'S the reason he could set there and snooze all
night so comfortable. Smart? Well, I reckon! He had had them two papers all fixed and ready, and he had put
one of them in place of t'other right under our noses.
"We felt pretty cheap. But the thing to do, straight off, was to make a plan; and we done it. We would do up
the paper again, just as it was, and slip in, very elaborate and soft, and lay it on the bunk again, and let on WE
didn't know about any trick, and hadn't any idea he was alaughing at us behind them bogus snores of his'n;
and we would stick by him, and the first night we was ashore we would get him drunk and search him, and
get the di'monds; and DO for him, too, if it warn't too risky. If we got the swag, we'd GOT to do for him, or
he would hunt us down and do for us, sure. But I didn't have no real hope. I knowed we could get him drunk
he was always ready for that but what's the good of it? You might search him a year and never find
"Well, right there I catched my breath and broke off my thought! For an idea went ripping through my head
that tore my brains to rags and land, but I felt gay and good! You see, I had had my boots off, to unswell
my feet, and just then I took up one of them to put it on, and I catched a glimpse of the heel bottom, and it
just took my breath away. You re member about that puzzlesome little screwdriver?"
"You bet I do," says Tom, all excited.
"Well, when I catched that glimpse of that boot heel, the idea that went smashing through my head was, I
know where he's hid the di'monds! You look at this boot heel, now. See, it's bottomed with a steel plate, and
the plate is fastened on with little screws. Now there wasn't a screw about that feller anywhere but in his boot
heels; so, if he needed a screwdriver, I reckoned I knowed why."
"Huck, ain't it bully!" says Tom.
"Well, I got my boots on, and we went down and slipped in and laid the paper of sugar on the berth, and sat
down soft and sheepish and went to listening to Bud Dixon snore. Hal Clayton dropped off pretty soon, but I
didn't; I wasn't ever so wide awake in my life. I was spying out from under the shade of my hat brim,
searching the floor for leather. It took me a long time, and I begun to think maybe my guess was wrong, but
at last I struck it. It laid over by the bulkhead, and was nearly the color of the carpet. It was a little round plug
about as thick as the end of your little finger, and I says to myself there's a di'mond in the nest you've come
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from. Before long I spied out the plug's mate .
"Think of the smartness and coolness of that blatherskite! He put up that scheme on us and reasoned out what
we would do, and we went ahead and done it perfectly exact, like a couple of pudd'n heads. He set there and
took his own time to un screw his heelplates and cut out his plugs and stick in the di'monds and screw on his
plates again . He allowed we would steal the bogus swag and wait all night for him to come up and get
drownded, and by George it's just what we done! I think it was power ful smart."
"You bet your life it was!" says Tom, just full of admiration.
CHAPTER IV. THE THREE SLEEPERS
WELL, all day we went through the humbug of watching one another, and it was pretty sickly business for
two of us and hard to act out, I can tell you. About night we landed at one of them little Missouri towns high
up toward Iowa, and had supper at the tavern, and got a room upstairs with a cot and a double bed in it, but I
dumped my bag under a deal table in the dark hall while we was moving along it to bed, single file, me last,
and the landlord in the lead with a tallow candle. We had up a lot of whisky, and went to playing
highlowjack for dimes, and as soon as the whisky begun to take hold of Bud we stopped drinking, but we
didn't let him stop. We loaded him till he fell out of his chair and laid there snoring.
"We was ready for business now. I said we better pull our boots off, and his'n too, and not make any noise,
then we could pull him and haul him around and ransack him without any trouble. So we done it. I set my
boots and Bud's side by side, where they'd be handy. Then we stripped him and searched his seams and his
pockets and his socks and the inside of his boots, and everything, and searched his bundle. Never found any
di'monds. We found the screwdriver, and Hal says, 'What do you reckon he wanted with that?' I said I didn't
know; but when he wasn't looking I hooked it. At last Hal he looked beat and discour aged, and said we'd
got to give it up. That was what I was waiting for. I says:
"'There's one place we hain't searched.'
"'What place is that?' he says.
"'His stomach.'
"'By gracious, I never thought of that! NOW we're on the homestretch, to a dead moral certainty. How'll we
manage?'
"'Well,' I says, 'just stay by him till I turn out and hunt up a drug store, and I reckon I'll fetch something that'll
make them di'monds tired of the company they're keeping.'
"He said that's the ticket, and with him looking straight at me I slid myself into Bud's boots instead of my
own, and he never noticed. They was just a shade large for me, but that was considerable better than be ing
too small. I got my bag as I went agroping through the hall, and in about a minute I was out the back way
and stretching up the river road at a fivemile gait.
"And not feeling so very bad, neither walking on di'monds don't have no such effect. When I had gone
fifteen minutes I says to myself, there's more'n a mile behind me, and everything quiet. Another five minutes
and I says there's considerable more land behind me now, and there's a man back there that's begun to wonder
what's the trouble. Another five and I says to myself he's getting real uneasy he's walking the floor now.
Another five, and I says to myself, there's two mile and a half behind me, and he's AWFUL uneasy be
ginning to cuss, I reckon. Pretty soon I says to my self, forty minutes gone he KNOWS there's
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something up! Fifty minutes the truth's abusting on him now! he is reckoning I found the di'monds
whilst we was searching, and shoved them in my pocket and never let on yes, and he's starting out to hunt
for me. He'll hunt for new tracks in the dust, and they'll as likely send him down the river as up.
"Just then I see a man coming down on a mule, and before I thought I jumped into the bush. It was stupid!
When he got abreast he stopped and waited a little for me to come out; then he rode on again. But I didn't feel
gay any more. I says to myself I've botched my chances by that; I surely have, if he meets up with Hal
Clayton.
"Well, about three in the morning I fetched Elex andria and see this sternwheeler laying there, and was
very glad, because I felt perfectly safe, now, you know. It was just daybreak. I went aboard and got this
state room and put on these clothes and went up in the pilot house to watch, though I didn't reckon
there was any need of it. I set there and played with my di'monds and waited and waited for the boat to start,
but she didn't. You see, they was mending her machinery, but I didn't know anything about it, not being very
much used to steamboats.
"Well, to cut the tale short, we never left there till plumb noon; and long before that I was hid in this
stateroom; for before breakfast I see a man coming, away off, that had a gait like Hal Clayton's, and it made
me just sick. I says to myself, if he finds out I'm aboard this boat, he's got me like a rat in a trap. All he's got
to do is to have me watched, and wait wait till I slip ashore, thinking he is a thousand miles away, then
slip after me and dog me to a good place and make me give up the di'monds, and then he'll oh, I know
what he'll do! Ain't it awful awful! And now to think the OTHER one's aboard, too! Oh, ain't it hard luck,
boys ain't it hard! But you'll help save me, WON'T you? oh, boys, be good to a poor devil that's being
hunted to death, and save me I'll worship the very ground you walk on!"
We turned in and soothed him down and told him we would plan for him and help him, and he needn't be so
afeard; and so by and by he got to feeling kind of comfortable again, and unscrewed his heelplates and held
up his di'monds this way and that, admiring them and loving them; and when the light struck into them they
WAS beautiful, sure; why, they seemed to kind of bust, and snap fire out all around. But all the same I judged
he was a fool. If I had been him I would a handed the di'monds to them pals and got them to go ashore and
leave me alone. But he was made differ ent. He said it was a whole fortune and he couldn't bear the idea.
Twice we stopped to fix the machinery and laid a good while, once in the night; but it wasn't dark enough,
and he was afeard to skip. But the third time we had to fix it there was a better chance. We laid up at a
country woodyard about forty mile above Uncle Silas's place a little after one at night, and it was thickening
up and going to storm. So Jake he laid for a chance to slide. We begun to take in wood. Pretty soon the rain
come adrenching down, and the wind blowed hard. Of course every boathand fixed a gunny sack and put it
on like a bonnet, the way they do when they are toting wood, and we got one for Jake, and he slipped down
aft with his handbag and come tramping forrard just like the rest, and walked ashore with them, and when
we see him pass out of the light of the torchbasket and get swallowed up in the dark, we got our breath
again and just felt grateful and splendid. But it wasn't for long. Somebody told, I reckon; for in about eight or
ten minutes them two pals come tearing forrard as tight as they could jump and darted ashore and was gone.
We waited plumb till dawn for them to come back, and kept hoping they would, but they never did. We was
awful sorry and lowspirited. All the hope we had was that Jake had got such a start that they couldn't get on
his track, and he would get to his brother's and hide there and be safe.
He was going to take the river road, and told us to find out if Brace and Jubiter was to home and no strangers
there, and then slip out about sundown and tell him. Said he would wait for us in a little bunch of sycamores
right back of Tom's uncle Silas's tobacker field on the river road, a lonesome place.
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We set and talked a long time about his chances, and Tom said he was all right if the pals struck up the river
instead of down, but it wasn't likely, because maybe they knowed where he was from; more likely they would
go right, and dog him all day, him not suspecting, and kill him when it come dark, and take the boots. So we
was pretty sorrowful.
CHAPTER V. A TRAGEDY IN THE WOODS
WE didn't get done tinkering the machinery till away late in the afternoon, and so it was so close to sundown
when we got home that we never stopped on our road, but made a break for the sycamores as tight as we
could go, to tell Jake what the delay was, and have him wait till we could go to Brace's and find out how
things was there. It was getting pretty dim by the time we turned the corner of the woods, sweating and
panting with that long run, and see the sycamores thirty yards ahead of us; and just then we see a couple of
men run into the bunch and heard two or three terrible screams for help. "Poor Jake is killed, sure," we says.
We was scared through and through, and broke for the tobacker field and hid there, trembling so our clothes
would hardly stay on; and just as we skipped in there, a couple of men went tearing by, and into the bunch
they went, and in a second out jumps four men and took out up the road as tight as they could go, two chasing
two.
We laid down, kind of weak and sick, and listened for more sounds, but didn't hear none for a good while but
just our hearts. We was thinking of that awful thing laying yonder in the sycamores, and it seemed like being
that close to a ghost, and it give me the cold shudders. The moon come aswelling up out of the ground, now,
powerful big and round and bright, be hind a comb of trees, like a face looking through prison bars, and the
black shadders and white places begun to creep around, and it was miserable quiet and still and nightbreezy
and graveyardy and scary. All of a sud den Tom whispers:
"Look! what's that?"
"Don't!" I says. "Don't take a person by sur prise that way. I'm 'most ready to die, anyway, with out you
doing that."
"Look, I tell you. It's something coming out of the sycamores."
"Don't, Tom!"
"It's terrible tall!"
"Oh, lordylordy! let's "
"Keep still it's acoming this way."
He was so excited he could hardly get breath enough to whisper. I had to look. I couldn't help it. So now we
was both on our knees with our chins on a fence rail and gazing yes, and gasping too. It was coming down
the road coming in the shadder of the trees, and you couldn't see it good; not till it was pretty close to us;
then it stepped into a bright splotch of moonlight and we sunk right down in our tracks it was Jake
Dunlap's ghost! That was what we said to ourselves.
We couldn't stir for a minute or two; then it was gone We talked about it in low voices. Tom says:
"They're mostly dim and smoky, or like they're made out of fog, but this one wasn't."
"No," I says; "I seen the goggles and the whiskers perfectly plain."
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"Yes, and the very colors in them loud countrified Sunday clothes plaid breeches, green and black "
"Cotton velvet westcot, firered and yaller squares "
"Leather straps to the bottoms of the breeches legs and one of them hanging unbottoned "
"Yes, and that hat "
"What a hat for a ghost to wear!"
You see it was the first season anybody wore that kind a black sitffbrim stovepipe, very high, and not
smooth, with a round top just like a sugarloaf.
"Did you notice if its hair was the same, Huck?"
"No seems to me I did, then again it seems to me I didn't."
"I didn't either; but it had its bag along, I noticed that."
"So did I. How can there be a ghostbag, Tom?"
"Sho! I wouldn't be as ignorant as that if I was you, Huck Finn. Whatever a ghost has, turns to ghost stuff.
They've got to have their things, like anybody else. You see, yourself, that its clothes was turned to
ghoststuff. Well, then, what's to hender its bag from turning, too? Of course it done it."
That was reasonable. I couldn't find no fault with it. Bill Withers and his brother Jack come along by, talking,
and Jack says:
"What do you reckon he was toting?"
"I dunno; but it was pretty heavy."
"Yes, all he could lug. Nigger stealing corn from old Parson Silas, I judged."
"So did I. And so I allowed I wouldn't let on to see him."
"That's me, too."
Then they both laughed, and went on out of hearing. It showed how unpopular old Uncle Silas had got to be
now. They wouldn't 'a' let a nigger steal anybody else's corn and never done anything to him.
We heard some more voices mumbling along towards us and getting louder, and sometimes a cackle of a
laugh. It was Lem Beebe and Jim Lane. Jim Lane says:
"Who? Jubiter Dunlap?"
"Yes."
"Oh, I don't know. I reckon so. I seen him spad ing up some ground along about an hour ago, just be fore
sundown him and the parson. Said he guessed he wouldn't go tonight, but we could have his dog if we
wanted him."
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"Too tired, I reckon."
"Yes works so hard!"
"Oh, you bet!"
They cackled at that, and went on by. Tom said we better jump out and tag along after them, because they
was going our way and it wouldn't be comfortable to run across the ghost all by ourselves. So we done it, and
got home all right.
That night was the second of September a Satur day. I sha'n't ever forget it. You'll see why, pretty soon .
CHAPTER VI. PLANS TO SECURE THE DIAMONDS
WE tramped along behind Jim and Lem till we come to the back stile where old Jim's cabin was that he was
captivated in, the time we set him free, and here come the dogs piling around us to say howdy, and there was
the lights of the house, too; so we warn't afeard any more, and was going to climb over, but Tom says:
"Hold on; set down here a minute. By George!"
"What's the matter?" says I.
"Matter enough!" he says. "Wasn't you expect ing we would be the first to tell the family who it is that's
been killed yonder in the sycamores, and all about them rapscallions that done it, and about the di'monds
they've smouched off of the corpse, and paint it up fine, and have the glory of being the ones that knows a lot
more about it than anybody else?"
"Why, of course. It wouldn't be you, Tom Sawyer, if you was to let such a chance go by. I reckon it ain't
going to suffer none for lack of paint," I says, "when you start in to scollop the facts."
"Well, now," he says, perfectly ca'm, "what would you say if I was to tell you I ain't going to start in at all?"
I was astonished to hear him talk so. I says:
"I'd say it's a lie. You ain't in earnest, Tom Sawyer?"
"You'll soon see. Was the ghost barefooted?"
"No, it wasn't. What of it?"
"You wait I'll show you what. Did it have its boots on?"
"Yes. I seen them plain."
"Swear it?"
"Yes, I swear it."
"So do I. Now do you know what that means?"
"No. What does it mean?"
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"Means that them thieves DIDN'T GET THE DI'MONDS."
"Jimminy! What makes you think that?"
"I don't only think it, I know it. Didn't the breeches and goggles and whiskers and handbag and every
blessed thing turn to ghoststuff? Everything it had on turned, didn't it? It shows that the reason its boots
turned too was because it still had them on after it started to go ha'nting around, and if that ain't proof that
them blatherskites didn't get the boots, I'd like to know what you'd CALL proof."
Think of that now. I never see such a head as that boy had. Why, I had eyes and I could see things, but they
never meant nothing to me. But Tom Sawyer was different. When Tom Sawyer seen a thing it just got up on
its hind legs and TALKED to him told him everything it knowed. I never see such a head.
"Tom Sawyer," I says, "I'll say it again as I've said it a many a time before: I ain't fitten to black your boots.
But that's all right that's neither here nor there. God Almighty made us all, and some He gives eyes that's
blind, and some He gives eyes that can see, and I reckon it ain't none of our lookout what He done it for; it's
all right, or He'd 'a' fixed it some other way. Go on I see plenty plain enough, now, that them thieves didn't
get way with the di'monds. Why didn't they, do you reckon?"
"Because they got chased away by them other two men before they could pull the boots off of the corpse."
"That's so! I see it now. But looky here, Tom, why ain't we to go and tell about it?"
"Oh, shucks, Huck Finn, can't you see? Look at it. What's agoing to happen? There's going to be an inquest
in the morning. Them two men will tell how they heard the yells and rushed there just in time to not save the
stranger. Then the jury'll twaddle and twaddle and twaddle, and finally they'll fetch in a verdict that he got
shot or stuck or busted over the head with something, and come to his death by the in spiration of God. And
after they've buried him they'll auction off his things for to pay the expenses, and then's OUR chance." "How,
Tom?"
"Buy the boots for two dollars!"
Well, it 'most took my breath.
"My land! Why, Tom, WE'LL get the di'monds!"
"You bet. Some day there'll be a big reward offered for them a thousand dollars, sure. That's our money!
Now we'll trot in and see the folks. And mind you we don't know anything about any murder, or any
di'monds, or any thieves don't you forget that."
I had to sigh a little over the way he had got it fixed. I'd 'a' SOLD them di'monds yes, sir for twelve
thousand dollars; but I didn't say anything. It wouldn't done any good. I says:
"But what are we going to tell your aunt Sally has made us so long getting down here from the village,
Tom?"
"Oh, I'll leave that to you," he says. "I reckon you can explain it somehow."
He was always just that strict and delicate. He never would tell a lie himself.
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We struck across the big yard, noticing this, that, and t'other thing that was so familiar, and we so glad to see
it again, and when we got to the roofed big passageway betwixt the double log house and the kitchen part,
there was everything hanging on the wall just as it used to was, even to Uncle Silas's old faded green baize
workinggown with the hood to it, and rag gedy white patch between the shoulders that always looked like
somebody had hit him with a snowball; and then we lifted the latch and walked in. Aunt Sally she was just
aripping and atearing around, and the children was huddled in one corner, and the old man he was huddled
in the other and praying for help in time of need. She jumped for us with joy and tears running down her face
and give us a whacking box on the ear, and then hugged us and kissed us and boxed us again, and just
couldn't seem to get enough of it, she was so glad to see us; and she says:
"Where HAVE you been aloafing to, you goodfor nothing trash! I've been that worried about you I didn't
know what to do. Your traps has been here ever so long, and I've had supper cooked fresh about four times so
as to have it hot and good when you come, till at last my patience is just plumb wore out, and I declare I I
why I could skin you alive! You must be starving, poor things! set down, set down, everybody; don't
lose no more time."
It was good to be there again behind all that noble cornpone and spareribs, and everything that you could
ever want in this world. Old Uncle Silas he peeled off one of his bulliest oldtime blessings, with as many
layers to it as an onion, and whilst the angels was haul ing in the slack of it I was trying to study up what to
say about what kept us so long. When our plates was all loadened and we'd got agoing, she asked me, and I
says:
"Well, you see, er Mizzes "
"Huck Finn! Since when am I Mizzes to you? Have I ever been stingy of cuffs or kisses for you since the day
you stood in this room and I took you for Tom Sawyer and blessed God for sending you to me, though you
told me four thousand lies and I believed every one of them like a simpleton? Call me Aunt Sally like you
always done."
So I done it. And I says:
"Well, me and Tom allowed we would come along afoot and take a smell of the woods, and we run across
Lem Beebe and Jim Lane, and they asked us to go with them blackberrying tonight, and said they could
bor row Jubiter Dunlap's dog, because he had told them just that minute "
"Where did they see him?" says the old man; and when I looked up to see how HE come to take an intrust in
a little thing like that, his eyes was just burning into me, he was that eager. It surprised me so it kind of
throwed me off, but I pulled myself together again and says:
"It was when he was spading up some ground along with you, towards sundown or along there."
He only said, "Um," in a kind of a disappointed way, and didn't take no more intrust. So I went on. I says:
"Well, then, as I was asaying "
"That'll do, you needn't go no furder." It was Aunt Sally. She was boring right into me with her eyes, and
very indignant. "Huck Finn," she says, "how'd them men come to talk about going ablack berrying in
September in THIS region?"
I see I had slipped up, and I couldn't say a word. She waited, still agazing at me, then she says:
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"And how'd they come to strike that idiot idea of going ablackberrying in the night?"
"Well, m'm, they er they told us they had a lantern, and "
"Oh, SHET up do! Looky here; what was they going to do with a dog? hunt blackberries with it?"
"I think, m'm, they "
"Now, Tom Sawyer, what kind of a lie are you fix ing YOUR mouth to contribit to this mess of rubbage?
Speak out and I warn you before you begin, that I don't believe a word of it. You and Huck's been up to
something you no business to I know it perfectly well; I know you, BOTH of you. Now you explain that
dog, and them blackberries, and the lantern, and the rest of that rot and mind you talk as straight as a
string do you hear?"
Tom he looked considerable hurt, and says, very dignified:
"It is a pity if Huck is to be talked to that way, just for making a little bit of a mistake that anybody could
make."
"What mistake has he made?"
"Why, only the mistake of saying blackberries when of course he meant strawberries."
"Tom Sawyer, I lay if you aggravate me a little more, I'll "
"Aunt Sally, without knowing it and of course without intending it you are in the wrong. If you'd 'a'
studied natural history the way you ought, you would know that all over the world except just here in
Arkansaw they ALWAYS hunt strawberries with a dog and a lantern "
But she busted in on him there and just piled into him and snowed him under. She was so mad she couldn't
get the words out fast enough, and she gushed them out in one everlasting freshet. That was what Tom
Sawyer was after. He allowed to work her up and get her started and then leave her alone and let her burn
herself out. Then she would be so aggravated with that subject that she wouldn't say another word about it,
nor let anybody else. Well, it happened just so. When she was tuckered out and had to hold up, he says, quite
ca'm:
"And yet, all the same, Aunt Sally "
"Shet up!" she says, "I don't want to hear another word out of you."
So we was perfectly safe, then, and didn't have no more trouble about that delay. Tom done it elegant.
CHAPTER VII. A NIGHT'S VIGIL
BENNY she was looking pretty sober, and she sighed some, now and then; but pretty soon she got to asking
about Mary, and Sid, and Tom's aunt Polly, and then Aunt Sally's clouds cleared off and she got in a good
humor and joined in on the questions and was her lovingest best self, and so the rest of the supper went along
gay and pleasant. But the old man he didn't take any hand hardly, and was absentminded and restless, and
done a considerable amount of sigh ing; and it was kind of heartbreaking to see him so sad and troubled
and worried.
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By and by, a spell after supper, come a nigger and knocked on the door and put his head in with his old straw
hat in his hand bowing and scraping, and said his Marse Brace was out at the stile and wanted his brother, and
was getting tired waiting supper for him, and would Marse Silas please tell him where he was? I never see
Uncle Silas speak up so sharp and fractious before. He says:
"Am I his brother's keeper?" And then he kind of wilted together, and looked like he wished he hadn't spoken
so, and then he says, very gentle: "But you needn't say that, Billy; I was took sudden and irritable, and I ain't
very well these days, and not hardly respon sible. Tell him he ain't here."
And when the nigger was gone he got up and walked the floor, backwards and forwards, mumbling and
muttering to himself and plowing his hands through his hair. It was real pitiful to see him. Aunt Sally she
whispered to us and told us not to take notice of him, it embarrassed him. She said he was always thinking
and thinking, since these troubles come on, and she allowed he didn't more'n about half know what he was
about when the thinking spells was on him; and she said he walked in his sleep considerable more now than
he used to, and sometimes wandered around over the house and even outdoors in his sleep, and if we catched
him at it we must let him alone and not disturb him. She said she reckoned it didn't do him no harm, and may
be it done him good. She said Benny was the only one that was much help to him these days. Said Benny
appeared to know just when to try to soothe him and when to leave him alone.
So he kept on tramping up and down the floor and muttering, till by and by he begun to look pretty tired; then
Benny she went and snuggled up to his side and put one hand in his and one arm around his waist and walked
with him; and he smiled down on her, and reached down and kissed her; and so, little by little the trouble
went out of his face and she persuaded him off to his room. They had very petting ways together, and it was
uncommon pretty to see.
Aunt Sally she was busy getting the children ready for bed; so by and by it got dull and tedious, and me and
Tom took a turn in the moonlight, and fetched up in the watermelonpatch and et one, and had a good deal of
talk. And Tom said he'd bet the quarreling was all Jubiter's fault, and he was going to be on hand the first
time he got a chance, and see; and if it was so, he was going to do his level best to get Uncle Silas to turn him
off.
And so we talked and smoked and stuffed water melons much as two hours, and then it was pretty late, and
when we got back the house was quiet and dark, and everybody gone to bed.
Tom he always seen everything, and now he see that the old green baize workgown was gone, and said it
wasn't gone when he went out; so he allowed it was curious, and then we went up to bed.
We could hear Benny stirring around in her room, which was next to ourn, and judged she was worried a
good deal about her father and couldn't sleep. We found we couldn't, neither. So we set up a long time, and
smoked and talked in a low voice, and felt pretty dull and downhearted. We talked the murder and the ghost
over and over again, and got so creepy and crawly we couldn't get sleepy nohow and noway.
By and by, when it was away late in the night and all the sounds was late sounds and solemn, Tom nudged
me and whispers to me to look, and I done it, and there we see a man poking around in the yard like he didn't
know just what he wanted to do, but it was pretty dim and we couldn't see him good. Then he started for the
stile, and as he went over it the moon came out strong, and he had a longhandled shovel over his shoulder,
and we see the white patch on the old work gown. So Tom says:
"He's awalking in his sleep. I wish we was allowed to follow him and see where he's going to. There, he's
turned down by the tobackerfield. Out of sight now. It's a dreadful pity he can't rest no better."
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We waited a long time, but he didn't come back any more, or if he did he come around the other way; so at
last we was tuckered out and went to sleep and had nightmares, a million of them. But before dawn we was
awake again, because meantime a storm had come up and been raging, and the thunder and lightning was
awful, and the wind was athrashing the trees around, and the rain was driving down in slanting sheets, and
the gullies was running rivers. Tom says:
"Looky here, Huck, I'll tell you one thing that's mighty curious. Up to the time we went out last night the
family hadn't heard about Jake Dunlap being mur dered. Now the men that chased Hal Clayton and Bud
Dixon away would spread the thing around in a half an hour, and every neighbor that heard it would shin out
and fly around from one farm to t'other and try to be the first to tell the news. Land, they don't have such a big
thing as that to tell twice in thirty year! Huck, it's mighty strange; I don't understand it."
So then he was in a fidget for the rain to let up, so we could turn out and run across some of the people and
see if they would say anything about it to us. And he said if they did we must be horribly surprised and
shocked.
We was out and gone the minute the rain stopped. It was just broad day then. We loafed along up the road,
and now and then met a person and stopped and said howdy, and told them when we come, and how we left
the folks at home, and how long we was going to stay, and all that, but none of them said a word about that
thing; which was just astonishing, and no mistake. Tom said he believed if we went to the sycamores we
would find that body laying there solitary and alone, and not a soul around. Said he believed the men chased
the thieves so far into the woods that the thieves prob'ly seen a good chance and turned on them at last, and
maybe they all killed each other, and so there wasn't anybody left to tell.
First we knowed, gabbling along that away, we was right at the sycamores. The cold chills trickled down my
back and I wouldn't budge another step, for all Tom's persuading. But he couldn't hold in; he'd GOT to see if
the boots was safe on that body yet. So he crope in and the next minute out he come again with his eyes
bulging he was so excited, and says:
"Huck, it's gone!"
I WAS astonished! I says:
"Tom, you don't mean it."
"It's gone, sure. There ain't a sign of it. The ground is trampled some, but if there was any blood it's all
washed away by the storm, for it's all puddles and slush in there."
At last I give in, and went and took a look myself; and it was just as Tom said there wasn't a sign of a
corpse.
"Dern it," I says, "the di'monds is gone. Don't you reckon the thieves slunk back and lugged him off, Tom?"
"Looks like it. It just does. Now where'd they hide him, do you reckon?"
"I don't know," I says, disgusted, "and what's more I don't care. They've got the boots, and that's all I cared
about. He'll lay around these woods a long time before I hunt him up."
Tom didn't feel no more intrust in him neither, only curiosity to know what come of him; but he said we'd lay
low and keep dark and it wouldn't be long till the dogs or somebody rousted him out.
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We went back home to breakfast ever so bothered and put out and disappointed and swindled. I warn't ever so
down on a corpse before.
CHAPTER VIII. TALKING WITH THE GHOST
IT warn't very cheerful at breakfast. Aunt Sally she looked old and tired and let the children snarl and fuss at
one another and didn't seem to notice it was going on, which wasn't her usual style; me and Tom had a plenty
to think about without talking; Benny she looked like she hadn't had much sleep, and whenever she'd lift her
head a little and steal a look towards her father you could see there was tears in her eyes; and as for the old
man, his things stayed on his plate and got cold without him knowing they was there, I reckon, for he was
thinking and thinking all the time, and never said a word and never et a bite.
By and by when it was stillest, that nigger's head was poked in at the door again, and he said his Marse Brace
was getting powerful uneasy about Marse Jubiter, which hadn't come home yet, and would Marse Silas please
He was looking at Uncle Silas, and he stopped there, like the rest of his words was froze; for Uncle Silas he
rose up shaky and steadied himself leaning his fingers on the table, and he was panting, and his eyes was set
on the nigger, and he kept swallowing, and put his other hand up to his throat a couple of times, and at last he
got his words started, and says:
"Does he does he think WHAT does he think! Tell him tell him " Then he sunk down in his
chair limp and weak, and says, so as you could hardly hear him: "Go away go away!"
The nigger looked scared and cleared out, and we all felt well, I don't know how we felt, but it was awful,
with the old man panting there, and his eyes set and looking like a person that was dying. None of us could
budge; but Benny she slid around soft, with her tears running down, and stood by his side, and nestled his old
gray head up against her and begun to stroke it and pet it with her hands, and nodded to us to go away, and
we done it, going out very quiet, like the dead was there.
Me and Tom struck out for the woods mighty solemn, and saying how different it was now to what it was last
summer when we was here and everything was so peaceful and happy and everybody thought so much of
Uncle Silas, and he was so cheerful and simple hearted and pudd'nheaded and good and now look at
him. If he hadn't lost his mind he wasn't muck short of it. That was what we allowed.
It was a most lovely day now, and bright and sun. shiny; and the further and further we went over the hills
towards the prairie the lovelier and lovelier the trees and flowers got to be and the more it seemed strange and
somehow wrong that there had to be trouble in such a world as this. And then all of a sudden I catched my
breath and grabbed Tom's arm, and all my livers and lungs and things fell down into my legs.
"There it is!" I says. We jumped back behind a bush shivering, and Tom says:
"'Sh! don't make a noise."
It was setting on a log right in the edge of a little prairie, thinking. I tried to get Tom to come away, but he
wouldn't, and I dasn't budge by myself. He said we mightn't ever get another chance to see one, and he was
going to look his fill at this one if he died for it. So I looked too, though it give me the fan tods to do it. Tom
he HAD to talk, but he talked low. He says:
"Poor Jakey, it's got all its things on, just as he said he would. NOW you see what we wasn't certain about
its hair. It's not long now the way it was: it's got it cropped close to its head, the way he said he would. Huck,
TOM SAWYER, DETECTIVE
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I never see anything look any more naturaler than what It does."
"Nor I neither," I says; "I'd recognize it any wheres."
"So would I. It looks perfectly solid and genu wyne, just the way it done before it died."
So we kept agazing. Pretty soon Tom says:
"Huck, there's something mighty curious about this one, don't you know? IT oughtn't to be going around in
the daytime."
"That's so, Tom I never heard the like of it before."
"No, sir, they don't ever come out only at night and then not till after twelve. There's something wrong
about this one, now you mark my words. I don't believe it's got any right to be around in the daytime. But
don't it look natural! Jake was going to play deef and dumb here, so the neighbors wouldn't know his voice.
Do you reckon it would do that if we was to holler at it?"
"Lordy, Tom, don't talk so! If you was to holler at it I'd die in my tracks."
"Don't you worry, I ain't going to holler at it. Look, Huck, it's ascratching its head don't you see?"
"Well, what of it?"
"Why, this. What's the sense of it scratching its head? There ain't anything there to itch; its head is made out
of fog or something like that, and can't itch. A fog can't itch; any fool knows that."
"Well, then, if it don't itch and can't itch, what in the nation is it scratching it for? Ain't it just habit, don't you
reckon?"
"No, sir, I don't. I ain't a bit satisfied about the way this one acts. I've a blame good notion it's a bogus one
I have, as sure as I'm asitting here. Because, if it Huck!"
"Well, what's the matter now?"
"YOU CAN'T SEE THE BUSHES THROUGH IT!"
"Why, Tom, it's so, sure! It's as solid as a cow. I sort of begin to think "
"Huck, it's biting off a chaw of tobacker! By George, THEY don't chaw they hain't got anything to chaw
WITH. Huck!"
"I'm alistening."
"It ain't a ghost at all. It's Jake Dunlap his own self!"
"Oh your granny!" I says.
"Huck Finn, did we find any corpse in the syca mores?"
"No."
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"Or any sign of one?"
"No."
"Mighty good reason. Hadn't ever been any corpse there."
"Why, Tom, you know we heard "
"Yes, we didJ heard a howl or two. Does that prove anybody was killed? Course it don't. And we seen four
men run, then this one come walking out and we took it for a ghost. No more ghost than you are. It was Jake
Dunlap his own self, and it's Jake Dunlap now. He's been and got his hair cropped, the way he said he would,
and he's playing himself for a stranger, just the same as he said he would. Ghost? Hum! he's as sound as a
nut."
Then I see it all, and how we had took too much for granted. I was powerful glad he didn't get killed, and so
was Tom, and we wondered which he would like the best for us to never let on to know him, or how?
Tom reckoned the best way would be to go and ask him. So he started; but I kept a little behind, because I
didn't know but it might be a ghost, after all. When Tom got to where he was, he says:
"Me and Huck's mighty glad to see you again, and you needn't be afeared we'll tell. And if you think it'll be
safer for you if we don't let on to know you when we run across you, say the word and you'll see you can
depend on us, and would ruther cut our hands off than get you into the least little bit of danger."
First off he looked surprised to see us, and not very glad, either; but as Tom went on he looked pleasanter,
and when he was done he smiled, and nodded his head several times, and made signs with his hands, and
says:
"Googoo googoo," the way deef and dummies does.
Just then we see some of Steve Nickerson's people coming that lived t'other side of the prairie, so Tom says:
"You do it elegant; I never see anybody do it better. You're right; play it on us, too; play it on us same as the
others; it'll keep you in practice and prevent you making blunders. We'll keep away from you and let on we
don't know you, but any time we can be any help, you just let us know."
Then we loafed along past the Nickersons, and of course they asked if that was the new stranger yonder, and
where'd he come from, and what was his name, and which communion was he, Babtis' or Methodis', and
which politics, Whig or Democrat, and how long is he staying, and all them other questions that humans
always asks when a stranger comes, and animals does, too. But Tom said he warn't able to make anything out
of deef and dumb signs, and the same with goo gooing. Then we watched them go and bullyrag Jake;
because we was pretty uneasy for him. Tom said it would take him days to get so he wouldn't forget he was a
deef and dummy sometimes, and speak out be fore he thought. When we had watched long enough to see
that Jake was getting along all right and working his signs very good, we loafed along again, allowing to
strike the schoolhouse about recess time, which was a threemile tramp.
I was so disappointed not to hear Jake tell about the row in the sycamores, and how near he come to get ting
killed, that I couldn't seem to get over it, and Tom he felt the same, but said if we was in Jake's fix we would
want to go careful and keep still and not take any chances.
The boys and girls was all glad to see us again, and we had a real good time all through recess. Coming to
school the Henderson boys had come across the new deef and dummy and told the rest; so all the scholars
TOM SAWYER, DETECTIVE
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was chuck full of him and couldn't talk about anything else, and was in a sweat to get a sight of him because
they hadn't ever seen a deef and dummy in their lives, and it made a powerful excitement.
Tom said it was tough to have to keep mum now; said we would be heroes if we could come out and tell all
we knowed; but after all, it was still more heroic to keep mum, there warn't two boys in a million could do it.
That was Tom Sawyer's idea about it, and reckoned there warn't anybody could better it.
CHAPTER IX. FINDING OF JUBITER DUNLAP
IN the next two or three days Dummy he got to be powerful popular. He went associating around with the
neighbors, and they made much of him, and was proud to have such a rattling curiosity among them. They
had him to breakfast, they had him to dinner, they had him to supper; they kept him loaded up with hog and
hominy, and warn't ever tired staring at him and wondering over him, and wishing they knowed more about
him, he was so uncommon and romantic. His signs warn't no good; people couldn't under stand them and he
prob'ly couldn't himself, but he done a sight of googooing, and so everybody was sat isfied, and admired to
hear him go it. He toted a piece of slate around, and a pencil; and people wrote questions on it and he wrote
answers; but there warn't anybody could read his writing but Brace Dunlap. Brace said he couldn't read it
very good, but he could manage to dig out the meaning most of the time. He said Dummy said he belonged
away off somers and used to be well off, but got busted by swindlers which he had trusted, and was poor
now, and hadn't any way to make a living.
Everybody praised Brace Dunlap for being so good to that stranger. He let him have a little logcabin all to
himself, and had his niggers take care of it, and fetch him all the vittles he wanted.
Dummy was at our house some, because old Uncle Silas was so afflicted himself, these days, that anybody
else that was afflicted was a comfort to him. Me and Tom didn't let on that we had knowed him before, and
he didn't let on that he had knowed us before. The family talked their troubles out before him the same as if
he wasn't there, but we reckoned it wasn't any harm for him to hear what they said. Generly he didn't seem to
notice, but sometimes he did.
Well, two or three days went along, and everybody got to getting uneasy about Jubiter Dunlap. Every body
was asking everybody if they had any idea what had become of him. No, they hadn't, they said: and they
shook their heads and said there was something powerful strange about it. Another and another day went by;
then there was a report got around that praps he was murdered. You bet it made a big stir! Every body's
tongue was clacking away after that. Saturday two or three gangs turned out and hunted the woods to see if
they could run across his remainders. Me and Tom helped, and it was noble good times and exciting. Tom he
was so brimful of it he couldn't eat nor rest. He said if we could find that corpse we would be celebrated, and
more talked about than if we got drownded.
The others got tired and give it up; but not Tom Sawyer that warn't his style. Saturday night he didn't
sleep any, hardly, trying to think up a plan; and towards daylight in the morning he struck it. He snaked me
out of bed and was all excited, and says:
"Quick, Huck, snatch on your clothes I've got it! Bloodhound!"
In two minutes we was tearing up the river road in the dark towards the village. Old Jeff Hooker had a
bloodhound, and Tom was going to borrow him. I says:
"The trail's too old, Tom and besides, it's rained, you know."
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"It don't make any difference, Huck. If the body's hid in the woods anywhere around the hound will find it. If
he's been murdered and buried, they wouldn't bury him deep, it ain't likely, and if the dog goes over the spot
he'll scent him, sure. Huck, we're going to be celebrated, sure as you're born!"
He was just ablazing; and whenever he got afire he was most likely to get afire all over. That was the way
this time. In two minutes he had got it all ciphered out, and wasn't only just going to find the corpse no, he
was going to get on the track of that murderer and hunt HIM down, too; and not only that, but he was going
to stick to him till
"Well," I says, "you better find the corpse first; I reckon that's aplenty for today. For all we know, there
AIN'T any corpse and nobody hain't been mur dered. That cuss could 'a' gone off somers and not been killed
at all."
That graveled him, and he says:
"Huck Finn, I never see such a person as you to want to spoil everything. As long as YOU can't see anything
hopeful in a thing, you won't let anybody else. What good can it do you to throw cold water on that corpse
and get up that selfish theory that there ain't been any murder? None in the world. I don't see how you can act
so. I wouldn't treat you like that, and you know it. Here we've got a noble good opportunity to make a
ruputation, and "
"Oh, go ahead," I says. "I'm sorry, and I take it all back. I didn't mean nothing. Fix it any way you want it. HE
ain't any consequence to me. If he's killed, I'm as glad of it as you are; and if he "
"I never said anything about being glad; I only "
"Well, then, I'm as SORRY as you are. Any way you druther have it, that is the way I druther have it. He "
"There ain't any druthers ABOUT it, Huck Finn; no body said anything about druthers. And as for "
He forgot he was talking, and went tramping along, studying. He begun to get excited again, and pretty soon
he says:
"Huck, it'll be the bulliest thing that ever happened if we find the body after everybody else has quit look
ing, and then go ahead and hunt up the murderer. It won't only be an honor to us, but it'll be an honor to
Uncle Silas because it was us that done it. It'll set him up again, you see if it don't."
But Old Jeff Hooker he throwed cold water on the whole business when we got to his blacksmith shop and
told him what we come for.
"You can take the dog," he says, "but you ain't agoing to find any corpse, because there ain't any corpse to
find. Everybody's quit looking, and they're right. Soon as they come to think, they knowed there warn't no
corpse. And I'll tell you for why. What does a person kill another person for, Tom Sawyer? answer me
that."
"Why, he er "
"Answer up! You ain't no fool. What does he kill him FOR?"
"Well, sometimes it's for revenge, and "
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Page No 27
"Wait. One thing at a time. Revenge, says you; and right you are. Now who ever had anything agin that poor
trifling noaccount? Who do you reckon would want to kill HIM? that rabbit!"
Tom was stuck. I reckon he hadn't thought of a person having to have a REASON for killing a person be
fore, and now he sees it warn't likely anybody would have that much of a grudge against a lamb like Jubiter
Dunlap. The blacksmith says, by and by:
"The revenge idea won't work, you see. Well, then, what's next? Robbery? B'gosh, that must 'a' been it, Tom!
Yes, sirree, I reckon we've struck it this time. Some feller wanted his gallusbuckles, and so he "
But it was so funny he busted out laughing, and just went on laughing and laughing and laughing till he was
'most dead, and Tom looked so put out and cheap that I knowed he was ashamed he had come, and he wished
he hadn't. But old Hooker never let up on him. He raked up everything a person ever could want to kill
another person about, and any fool could see they didn't any of them fit this case, and he just made no end of
fun of the whole business and of the people that had been hunting the body; and he said:
"If they'd had any sense they'd 'a' knowed the lazy cuss slid out because he wanted a loafing spell after all this
work. He'll come pottering back in a couple of weeks, and then how'll you fellers feel? But, laws bless you,
take the dog, and go and hunt his re mainders. Do, Tom."
Then he busted out, and had another of them forty rod laughs of hisn. Tom couldn't back down after all this,
so he said, "All right, unchain him;" and the blacksmith done it, and we started home and left that old man
laughing yet.
It was a lovely dog. There ain't any dog that's got a lovelier disposition than a bloodhound, and this one
knowed us and liked us. He capered and raced around ever so friendly, and powerful glad to be free and have
a holiday; but Tom was so cut up he couldn't take any intrust in him, and said he wished he'd stopped and
thought a minute before he ever started on such a fool errand. He said old Jeff Hooker would tell every
body, and we'd never hear the last of it.
So we loafed along home down the back lanes, feel ing pretty glum and not talking. When we was pass ing
the far corner of our tobacker field we heard the dog set up a long howl in there, and we went to the place and
he was scratching the ground with all his might, and every now and then canting up his head sideways and
fetching another howl.
It was a long square, the shape of a grave; the rain had made it sink down and show the shape. The minute we
come and stood there we looked at one another and never said a word. When the dog had dug down only a
few inches he grabbed something and pulled it up, and it was an arm and a sleeve. Tom kind of gasped out,
and says:
"Come away, Huck it's found."
I just felt awful. We struck for the road and fetched the first men that come along. They got a spade at the crib
and dug out the body, and you never see such an excitement. You couldn't make anything out of the face, but
you didn't need to. Everybody said:
"Poor Jubiter; it's his clothes, to the last rag!"
Some rushed off to spread the news and tell the justice of the peace and have an inquest, and me and Tom lit
out for the house. Tom was all afire and 'most out of breath when we come tearing in where Uncle Silas and
Aunt Sally and Benny was. Tom sung out:
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"Me and Huck's found Jubiter Dunlap's corpse all by ourselves with a bloodhound, after everybody else had
quit hunting and given it up; and if it hadn't a been for us it never WOULD 'a' been found; and he WAS
murdered too they done it with a club or something like that; and I'm going to start in and find the mur
derer, next, and I bet I'll do it!"
Aunt Sally and Benny sprung up pale and astonished, but Uncle Silas fell right forward out of his chair on to
the floor and groans out:
"Oh, my God, you've found him NOW!"
CHAPTER X. THE ARREST OF UNCLE SILAS
THEM awful words froze us solid. We couldn't move hand or foot for as much as half a minute. Then we
kind of come to, and lifted the old man up and got him into his chair, and Benny petted him and kissed him
and tried to comfort him, and poor old Aunt Sally she done the same; but, poor things, they was so broke up
and scared and knocked out of their right minds that they didn't hardly know what they was about. With Tom
it was awful; it 'most petrified him to think maybe he had got his uncle into a thousand times more trouble
than ever, and maybe it wouldn't ever happened if he hadn't been so ambitious to get celebrated, and let the
corpse alone the way the others done. But pretty soon he sort of come to himself again and says:
"Uncle Silas, don't you say another word like that. It's dangerous, and there ain't a shadder of truth in it."
Aunt Sally and Benny was thankful to hear him say that, and they said the same; but the old man he wagged
his head sorrowful and hopeless, and the tears run down his face, and he says;
"No I done it; poor Jubiter, I done it!"
It was dreadful to hear him say it. Then he went on and told about it, and said it happened the day me and
Tom come along about sundown. He said Jubiter pestered him and aggravated him till he was so mad he
just sort of lost his mind and grabbed up a stick and hit him over the head with all his might, and Jubiter
dropped in his tracks. Then he was scared and sorry, and got down on his knees and lifted his head up, and
begged him to speak and say he wasn't dead; and before long he come to, and when he see who it was
holding his head, he jumped like he was 'most scared to death, and cleared the fence and tore into the woods,
and was gone. So he hoped he wasn't hurt bad.
"But laws," he says, "it was only just fear that gave him that last little spurt of strength, and of course it soon
played out and he laid down in the bush, and there wasn't anybody to help him, and he died."
Then the old man cried and grieved, and said he was a murderer and the mark of Cain was on him, and he had
disgraced his family and was going to be found out and hung. But Tom said:
"No, you ain't going to be found out. You DIDN'T kill him. ONE lick wouldn't kill him. Somebody else done
it."
"Oh, yes," he says, "I done it nobody else. Who else had anything against him? Who else COULD have
anything against him?"
He looked up kind of like he hoped some of us could mention somebody that could have a grudge against that
harmless noaccount, but of course it warn't no use he HAD us; we couldn't say a word. He noticed that,
and he saddened down again, and I never see a face so miserable and so pitiful to see. Tom had a sudden idea,
and says:
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"But hold on! somebody BURIED him. Now who "
He shut off sudden. I knowed the reason. It give me the cold shudders when he said them words, because
right away I remembered about us seeing Uncle Silas prowling around with a longhandled shovel away in
the night that night. And I knowed Benny seen him, too, because she was talking about it one day. The
minute Tom shut off he changed the subject and went to begging Uncle Silas to keep mum, and the rest of us
done the same, and said he MUST, and said it wasn't his business to tell on himself, and if he kept mum
nobody would ever know; but if it was found out and any harm come to him it would break the family's
hearts and kill them, and yet never do anybody any good. So at last he promised. We was all of us more
com fortable, then, and went to work to cheer up the old man. We told him all he'd got to do was to keep
still, and it wouldn't be long till the whole thing would blow over and be forgot. We all said there wouldn't
any body ever suspect Uncle Silas, nor ever dream of such a thing, he being so good and kind, and having
such a good character; and Tom says, cordial and hearty, he says:
"Why, just look at it a minute; just consider. Here is Uncle Silas, all these years a preacher at his own
expense; all these years doing good with all his might and every way he can think of at his own ex
pense, all the time; always been loved by everybody, and respected; always been peaceable and minding his
own business, the very last man in this whole deestrict to touch a person, and everybody knows it. Suspect
HIM? Why, it ain't any more possible than "
"By authority of the State of Arkansaw, I arrest you for the murder of Jubiter Dunlap!" shouts the sheriff at
the door.
It was awful. Aunt Sally and Benny flung themselves at Uncle Silas, screaming and crying, and hugged him
and hung to him, and Aunt Sally said go away, she wouldn't ever give him up, they shouldn't have him, and
the niggers they come crowding and crying to the door and well, I couldn't stand it; it was enough to break
a person's heart; so I got out.
They took him up to the little onehorse jail in the village, and we all went along to tell him goodbye; and
Tom was feeling elegant, and says to me, "We'll have a most noble good time and heaps of danger some dark
night getting him out of there, Huck, and it'll be talked about everywheres and we will be celebrated;" but the
old man busted that scheme up the minute he whispered to him about it. He said no, it was his duty to stand
whatever the law done to him, and he would stick to the jail plumb through to the end, even if there warn't no
door to it. It disappointed Tom and graveled him a good deal, but he had to put up with it.
But he felt responsible and bound to get his uncle Silas free; and he told Aunt Sally, the last thing, not to
worry, because he was going to turn in and work night and day and beat this game and fetch Uncle Silas out
innocent; and she was very loving to him and thanked him and said she knowed he would do his very best.
And she told us to help Benny take care of the house and the children, and then we had a goodbye cry all
around and went back to the farm, and left her there to live with the jailer's wife a month till the trial in
October.
CHAPTER XI. TOM SAWYER DISCOVERS THE MURDERERS
WELL, that was a hard month on us all. Poor Benny, she kept up the best she could, and me and Tom tried to
keep things cheerful there at the house, but it kind of went for nothing, as you may say. It was the same up at
the jail. We went up every day to see the old people, but it was awful dreary, because the old man warn't
sleeping much, and was walking in his sleep considerable and so he got to looking fagged and miserable, and
his mind got shaky, and we all got afraid his troubles would break him down and kill him. And whenever we
tried to persuade him to feel cheer fuler, he only shook his head and said if we only knowed what it was to
carry around a murderer's load in your heart we wouldn't talk that way. Tom and all of us kept telling him it
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WASN'T murder, but just acci dental killing! but it never made any difference it was murder, and he
wouldn't have it any other way. He actu'ly begun to come out plain and square towards trial time and
acknowledge that he TRIED to kill the man. Why, that was awful, you know. It made things seem fifty times
as dreadful, and there warn't no more com fort for Aunt Sally and Benny. But he promised he wouldn't say a
word about his murder when others was around, and we was glad of that.
Tom Sawyer racked the head off of himself all that month trying to plan some way out for Uncle Silas, and
many's the night he kept me up 'most all night with this kind of tiresome work, but he couldn't seem to get on
the right track no way. As for me, I reckoned a body might as well give it up, it all looked so blue and I was
so downhearted; but he wouldn't. He stuck to the business right along, and went on planning and thinking and
ransacking his head.
So at last the trial come on, towards the middle of October, and we was all in the court. The place was
jammed, of course. Poor old Uncle Silas, he looked more like a dead person than a live one, his eyes was so
hollow and he looked so thin and so mournful. Benny she set on one side of him and Aunt Sally on the other,
and they had veils on, and was full of trouble. But Tom he set by our lawyer, and had his finger in every
wheres, of course. The lawyer let him, and the judge let him. He 'most took the business out of the law yer's
hands sometimes; which was well enough, be cause that was only a mudturtle of a backsettlement lawyer
and didn't know enough to come in when it rains, as the saying is.
They swore in the jury, and then the lawyer for the prostitution got up and begun. He made a terrible speech
against the old man, that made him moan and groan, and made Benny and Aunt Sally cry. The way HE told
about the murder kind of knocked us all stupid it was so different from the old man's tale. He said he was
going to prove that Uncle Silas was SEEN to kill Jubiter Dunlap by two good witnesses, and done it
deliberate, and SAID he was going to kill him the very minute he hit him with the club; and they seen him
hide Jubiter in the bushes, and they seen that Jubiter was stonedead. And said Uncle Silas come later and
lugged Jubiter down into the tobacker field, and two men seen him do it. And said Uncle Silas turned out,
away in the night, and buried Jubiter, and a man seen him at it.
I says to myself, poor old Uncle Silas has been lying about it because he reckoned nobody seen him and he
couldn't bear to break Aunt Sally's heart and Benny's; and right he was: as for me, I would 'a' lied the same
way, and so would anybody that had any feeling, to save them such misery and sorrow which THEY warn't
no ways responsible for. Well, it made our lawyer look pretty sick; and it knocked Tom silly, too, for a little
spell, but then he braced up and let on that he warn't worried but I knowed he WAS, all the same. And the
people my, but it made a stir amongst them!
And when that lawyer was done telling the jury what he was going to prove, he set down and begun to work
his witnesses.
First, he called a lot of them to show that there was bad blood betwixt Uncle Silas and the diseased; and they
told how they had heard Uncle Silas threaten the diseased, at one time and another, and how it got worse and
worse and everybody was talking about it, and how diseased got afraid of his life, and told two or three of
them he was certain Uncle Silas would up and kill him some time or another.
Tom and our lawyer asked them some questions; but it warn't no use, they stuck to what they said.
Next, they called up Lem Beebe, and he took the stand. It come into my mind, then, how Lem and Jim Lane
had come along talking, that time, about borrow ing a dog or something from Jubiter Dunlap; and that
brought up the blackberries and the lantern; and that brought up Bill and Jack Withers, and how they passed
by, talking about a nigger stealing Uncle Silas's corn; and that fetched up our old ghost that come along about
the same time and scared us so and here HE was too, and a privileged character, on accounts of his being
TOM SAWYER, DETECTIVE
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deef and dumb and a stranger, and they had fixed him a chair inside the railing, where he could cross his legs
and be comfortable, whilst the other people was all in a jam so they couldn't hardly breathe. So it all come
back to me just the way it was that day; and it made me mournful to think how pleasant it was up to then, and
how miserable ever since.
LEM BEEBE, sworn, said "I was acoming along,
that day, second of September, and Jim Lane was with
me, and it was towards sundown, and we heard loud
talk, like quarrelling, and we was very close, only
the hazel bushes between (that's along the fence);
and we heard a voice say, 'I've told you more'n once
I'd kill you,' and knowed it was this prisoner's
voice; and then we see a club come up above the
bushes and down out of sight again. and heard a
smashing thump and then a groan or two: and then we
crope soft to where we could see, and there laid
Jupiter Dunlap dead, and this prisoner standing over
him with the club; and the next he hauled the dead
man into a clump of bushes and hid him, and then we
stooped low, to be cut of sight, and got away."
Well, it was awful. It kind of froze everybody's blood to hear it, and the house was 'most as still whilst he was
telling it as if there warn't nobody in it. And when he was done, you could hear them gasp and sigh, all over
the house, and look at one another the same as to say, "Ain't it perfectly terrible ain't it awful!"
Now happened a thing that astonished me. All the time the first witnesses was proving the bad blood and the
threats and all that, Tom Sawyer was alive and lay ing for them; and the minute they was through, he went
for them, and done his level best to catch them in lies and spile their testimony. But now, how different.
When Lem first begun to talk, and never said anything about speaking to Jubiter or trying to borrow a dog off
of him, he was all alive and laying for Lem, and you could see he was getting ready to crossquestion him to
death pretty soon, and then I judged him and me would go on the stand by and by and tell what we heard him
and Jim Lane say. But the next time I looked at Tom I got the cold shivers. Why, he was in the brownest
study you ever see miles and miles away. He warn't hearing a word Lem Beebe was saying; and when he
got through he was still in that brownstudy, just the same. Our lawyer joggled him, and then he looked up
startled, and says, "Take the witness if you want him. Lemme alone I want to think."
Well, that beat me. I couldn't understand it. And Benny and her mother oh, they looked sick, they was so
troubled. They shoved their veils to one side and tried to get his eye, but it warn't any use, and I couldn't get
his eye either. So the mudturtle he tackled the witness, but it didn't amount to nothing; and he made a mess
of it.
Then they called up Jim Lane, and he told the very same story over again, exact. Tom never listened to this
one at all, but set there thinking and thinking, miles and miles away. So the mudturtle went in alone again
and come out just as flat as he done before. The lawyer for the prostitution looked very comfortable, but the
judge looked disgusted. You see, Tom was just the same as a regular lawyer, nearly, because it was
Arkansaw law for a prisoner to choose anybody he wanted to help his lawyer, and Tom had had Uncle Silas
shove him into the case, and now he was botching it and you could see the judge didn't like it much. All that
the mudturtle got out of Lem and Jim was this: he asked them:
"Why didn't you go and tell what you saw?"
"We was afraid we would get mixed up in it our selves. And we was just starting down the river ahunting
for all the week besides; but as soon as we come back we found out they'd been searching for the body, so
then we went and told Brace Dunlap all about it."
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"When was that?"
"Saturday night, September 9th."
The judge he spoke up and says:
"Mr. Sheriff, arrest these two witnesses on suspicions of being accessionary after the fact to the murder."
The lawyer for the prostitution jumps up all excited, and says:
"Your honor! I protest against this extraordi "
"Set down!" says the judge, pulling his bowie and laying it on his pulpit. "I beg you to respect the Court."
So he done it. Then he called Bill Withers.
BILL WITHERS, sworn, said: "I was coming along
about sundown, Saturday, September 2d, by the
prisoner's field, and my brother Jack was with me
and we seen a man toting off something heavy on
his back and allowed it was a nigger stealing
corn; we couldn't see distinct; next we made out
that it was one man carrying another; and the way
it hung, so kind of limp, we judged it was
somebody that was drunk; and by the man's walk we
said it was Parson Silas, and we judged he had
found Sam Cooper drunk in the road, which he was
always trying to reform him, and was toting him
out of danger."
It made the people shiver to think of poor old Uncle Silas toting off the diseased down to the place in his
tobacker field where the dog dug up the body, but there warn't much sympathy around amongst the faces, and
I heard one cuss say "'Tis the coldest blooded work I ever struck, lugging a murdered man around like that,
and going to bury him like a animal, and him a preacher at that."
Tom he went on thinking, and never took no notice; so our lawyer took the witness and done the best he
could, and it was plenty poor enough.
Then Jack Withers he come on the stand and told the same tale, just like Bill done.
And after him comes Brace Dunlap, and he was look ing very mournful, and most crying; and there was a
rustle and a stir all around, and everybody got ready to listen, and lost of the women folks said, "Poor cretur,
poor cretur," and you could see a many of them wip ing their eyes.
BRACE DUNLAP, sworn, said: "I was in considerable
trouble a long time about my poor brother, but I
reckoned things warn't near so bad as he made out,
and I couldn't make myself believe anybody would
have the heart to hurt a poor harmless cretur like
that" [by jings, I was sure I seen Tom give a
kind of a faint little start, and then look
disappointed again] "and you know I COULDN'T
think a preacher would hurt him it warn't natural
to think such an onlikely thing so I never paid
much attention, and now I sha'n't ever, ever
TOM SAWYER, DETECTIVE
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forgive myself; for if I had a done different, my
poor brother would be with me this day, and not
laying yonder murdered, and him so harmless." He
kind of broke down there and choked up, and waited
to get his voice; and people all around said the
most pitiful things, and women cried; and it was
very still in there, and solemn, and old Uncle Silas,
poor thing, he give a groan right out so everybody
heard him. Then Brace he went on, "Saturday,
September 2d, he didn't come home to supper.
Byandby I got a little uneasy, and one of my
niggers went over to this prisoner's place, but come
back and said he warn't there. So I got uneasier
and uneasier, and couldn't rest. I went to bed, but
I couldn't sleep; and turned out, away late in the
night, and went wandering over to this prisoner's
place and all around about there a good while, hoping
I would run across my poor brother, and never
knowing he was out of his troubles and gone to a
better shore " So he broke down and choked up again,
and most all the women was crying now. Pretty soon
he got another start and says: "But it warn't no use;
so at last I went home and tried to get some sleep,
but couldn't. Well, in a day or two everybody was
uneasy, and they got to talking about this prisoner's
threats, and took to the idea, which I didn't take
no stock in, that my brother was murdered so they
hunted around and tried to find his body, but
couldn't and give it up. And so I reckoned he was
gone off somers to have a little peace, and would
come back to us when his troubles was kind of healed.
But late Saturday night, the 9th, Lem Beebe and
Jim Lane come to my house and told me all told me
the whole awful 'sassination, and my heart was
broke. And THEN I remembered something that hadn't
took no hold of me at the time, because reports said
this prisoner had took to walking in his sleep and
doing all kind of things of no consequence, not
knowing what he was about. I will tell you what that
thing was that come back into my memory. Away late
that awful Saturday night when I was wandering
around about this prisoner's place, grieving and
troubled, I was down by the corner of the tobacker
field and I heard a sound like digging in a gritty
soil; and I crope nearer and peeped through the
vines that hung on the rail fence and seen this
prisoner SHOVELING shoveling with a longhandled
shovel heaving earth into a big hole that was
most filled up; his back was to me, but it was
bright moonlight and I knowed him by his old green
baize workgown with a splattery white patch in
the middle of the back like somebody had hit him
with a snowball. HE WAS BURYING THE MAN HE'D MURDERED!"
And he slumped down in his chair crying and sob bing, and 'most everybody in the house busted out
wailing, and crying, and saying, "Oh, it's awful awful horrible! and there was a most tremendous ex
citement, and you couldn't hear yourself think; and right in the midst of it up jumps old Uncle Silas, white as
a sheet, and sings out:
"IT'S TRUE, EVERY WORD I MURDERED HIM IN COLD BLOOD!"
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By Jackson, it petrified them! People rose up wild all over the house, straining and staring for a better look at
him, and the judge was hammering with his mallet and the sheriff yelling "Order order in the court
order!"
And all the while the old man stood there aquaking and his eyes aburning, and not looking at his wife and
daughter, which was clinging to him and begging him to keep still, but pawing them off with his hands and
saying he WOULD clear his black soul from crime, he WOULD heave off this load that was more than he
could bear, and he WOULDN'T bear it another hour! And then he raged right along with his awful tale,
every body astaring and gasping, judge, jury, lawyers, and everybody, and Benny and Aunt Sally crying
their hearts out. And by George, Tom Sawyer never looked at him once! Never once just set there gazing
with all his eyes at something else, I couldn't tell what. And so the old man raged right along, pouring his
words out like a stream of fire:
"I killed him! I am guilty! But I never had the notion in my life to hurt him or harm him, spite of all them lies
about my threatening him, till the very minute I raised the club then my heart went cold! then the pity
all went out of it, and I struck to kill! In that one moment all my wrongs come into my mind; all the insults
that that man and the scoundrel his brother, there, had put upon me, and how they laid in together to ruin me
with the people, and take away my good name, and DRIVE me to some deed that would destroy me and my
family that hadn't ever done THEM no harm, so help me God! And they done it in a mean revenge for
why? Because my innocent pure girl here at my side wouldn't marry that rich, insolent, ignorant coward,
Brace Dunlap, who's been sniveling here over a brother he never cared a brass farthing for "[I see Tom
give a jump and look glad THIS time, to a dead certainty]" and in that moment I've told you about, I
forgot my God and remembered only my heart's bitterness, God forgive me, and I struck to kill. In one
second I was miserably sorry oh, filled with remorse; but I thought of my poor family, and I MUST hide
what I'd done for their sakes; and I did hide that corpse in the bushes; and presently I carried it to the tobacker
field; and in the deep night I went with my shovel and buried it where "
Up jumps Tom and shouts:
"NOW, I've got it!" and waves his hand, oh, ever so fine and starchy, towards the old man, and says:
"Set down! A murder WAS done, but you never had no hand in it!"
Well, sir, you could a heard a pin drop. And the old man he sunk down kind of bewildered in his seat and
Aunt Sally and Benny didn't know it, because they was so astonished and staring at Tom with their mouths
open and not knowing what they was about. And the whole house the same. I never seen people look so
helpless and tangled up, and I hain't ever seen eyes bug out and gaze without a blink the way theirn did. Tom
says, perfectly ca'm:
"Your honor, may I speak?"
"For God's sake, yes go on!" says the judge, so astonished and mixed up he didn't know what he was
about hardly.
Then Tom he stood there and waited a second or two that was for to work up an "effect," as he calls it
then he started in just as ca'm as ever, and says:
"For about two weeks now there's been a little bill sticking on the front of this courthouse offering two
thousand dollars reward for a couple of big di'monds stole at St. Louis. Them di'monds is worth twelve
thousand dollars. But never mind about that till I get to it. Now about this murder. I will tell you all about it
how it happened who done it every DEtail."
TOM SAWYER, DETECTIVE
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You could see everybody nestle now, and begin to listen for all they was worth.
"This man here, Brace Dunlap, that's been sniveling so about his dead brother that YOU know he never cared
a straw for, wanted to marry that young girl there, and she wouldn't have him. So he told Uncle Silas he
would make him sorry. Uncle Silas knowed how powerful he was, and how little chance he had against such
a man, and he was scared and worried, and done everything he could think of to smooth him over and get him
to be good to him: he even took his no account brother Jubiter on the farm and give him wages and stinted
his own family to pay them; and Jubiter done everything his brother could contrive to insult Uncle Silas, and
fret and worry him, and try to drive Uncle Silas into doing him a hurt, so as to injure Uncle Silas with the
people. And it done it. Everybody turned against him and said the meanest kind of things about him, and it
graduly broke his heart yes, and he was so worried and distressed that often he warn't hardly in his right
mind.
"Well, on that Saturday that we've had so much trouble about, two of these witnesses here, Lem Beebe and
Jim Lane, come along by where Uncle Silas and Jubiter Dunlap was at work and that much of what
they've said is true, the rest is lies. They didn't hear Uncle Silas say he would kill Jubiter; they didn't hear no
blow struck; they didn't see no dead man, and they didn't see Uncle Silas hide anything in the bushes. Look at
them now how they set there, wishing they hadn't been so handy with their tongues; anyway, they'll wish
it before I get done.
"That same Saturday evening Bill and Jack Withers DID see one man lugging off another one. That much of
what they said is true, and the rest is lies. First off they thought it was a nigger stealing Uncle Silas's corn
you notice it makes them look silly, now, to find out somebody overheard them say that. That's because they
found out by and by who it was that was doing the lugging, and THEY know best why they swore here that
they took it for Uncle Silas by the gait which it WASN'T, and they knowed it when they swore to that lie.
"A man out in the moonlight DID see a murdered person put under ground in the tobacker field but it
wasn't Uncle Silas that done the burying. He was in his bed at that very time.
"Now, then, before I go on, I want to ask you if you've ever noticed this: that people, when they're thinking
deep, or when they're worried, are most always doing something with their hands, and they don't know it, and
don't notice what it is their hands are doing. some stroke their chins; some stroke their noses; some stroke up
UNDER their chin with their hand; some twirl a chain, some fumble a button, then there's some that draws a
figure or a letter with their finger on their cheek, or under their chin or on their under lip. That's MY way.
When I'm restless, or worried, or thinking hard, I draw capital V's on my cheek or on my under lip or under
my chin, and never anything BUT capital V's and half the time I don't notice it and don't know I'm doing
it."
That was odd. That is just what I do; only I make an O. And I could see people nodding to one another, same
as they do when they mean "THAT's so."
"Now, then, I'll go on. That same Saturday no, it was the night before there was a steamboat laying at
Flagler's Landing, forty miles above here, and it was raining and storming like the nation. And there was a
thief aboard, and he had them two big di'monds that's advertised out here on this courthouse door; and he
slipped ashore with his handbag and struck out into the dark and the storm, and he was ahoping he could
get to this town all right and be safe. But he had two pals aboard the boat, hiding, and he knowed they was
going to kill him the first chance they got and take the di'monds; because all three stole them, and then this
fellow he got hold of them and skipped.
"Well, he hadn't been gone more'n ten minutes be fore his pals found it out, and they jumped ashore and lit
out after him. Prob'ly they burnt matches and found his tracks. Anyway, they dogged along after him all day
TOM SAWYER, DETECTIVE
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Saturday and kept out of his sight; and towards sundown he come to the bunch of sycamores down by Uncle
Silas's field, and he went in there to get a disguise out of his handbag and put it on before he showed himself
here in the town and mind you he done that just a little after the time that Uncle Silas was hitting Jubiter
Dunlap over the head with a club for he DID hit him.
"But the minute the pals see that thief slide into the bunch of sycamores, they jumped out of the bushes and
slid in after him.
"They fell on him and clubbed him to death.
"Yes, for all he screamed and howled so, they never had no mercy on him, but clubbed him to death. And two
men that was running along the road heard him yelling that way, and they made a rush into the syca i more
bunch which was where they was bound for, anyway and when the pals saw them they lit out and the
two new men after them achasing them as tight as they could go. But only a minute or two then these
two new men slipped back very quiet into the syca mores.
"THEN what did they do? I will tell you what they done. They found where the thief had got his disguise out
of his carpetsack to put on; so one of them strips and puts on that disguise."
Tom waited a little here, for some more "effect" then he says, very deliberate:
"The man that put on that dead man's disguise was JUBITER DUNLAP!"
"Great Scott!" everybody shouted, all over the house, and old Uncle Silas he looked perfectly astonished.
"Yes, it was Jubiter Dunlap. Not dead, you see. Then they pulled off the dead man's boots and put Jubiter
Dunlap's old ragged shoes on the corpse and put the corpse's boots on Jubiter Dunlap. Then Jubiter Dunlap
stayed where he was, and the other man lugged the dead body off in the twilight; and after midnight he went
to Uncle Silas's house, and took his old green workrobe off of the peg where it always hangs in the passage
betwixt the house and the kitchen and put it on, and stole the longhandled shovel and went off down into the
tobacker field and buried the murdered man."
He stopped, and stood half a minute. Then
"And who do you reckon the murdered man WAS? It was JAKE Dunlap, the longlost burglar!"
"Great Scott!"
"And the man that buried him was BRACE Dunlap, his brother!"
"Great Scott!"
"And who do you reckon is this mowing idiot here that's letting on all these weeks to be a deef and dumb
stranger? It's JUBITER Dunlap!"
My land, they all busted out in a howl, and you never see the like of that excitement since the day you was
born. And Tom he made a jump for Jubiter and snaked off his goggles and his false whiskers, and there was
the murdered man, sure enough, just as alive as anybody! And Aunt Sally and Benny they went to hugging
and crying and kissing and smothering old Uncle Silas to that degree he was more muddled and confused and
mushed up in his mind than he ever was before, and that is saying considerable. And next, people begun to
yell:
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Page No 37
"Tom Sawyer! Tom Sawyer! Shut up every body, and let him go on! Go on, Tom Sawyer!"
Which made him feel uncommon bully, for it was nuts for Tom Sawyer to be a public character that away,
and a hero, as he calls it. So when it was all quiet, he says:
"There ain't much left, only this. When that man there, Bruce Dunlap, had most worried the life and sense out
of Uncle Silas till at last he plumb lost his mind and hit this other blatherskite, his brother, with a club, I
reckon he seen his chance. Jubiter broke for the woods to hide, and I reckon the game was for him to slide
out, in the night, and leave the country. Then Brace would make everybody believe Uncle Silas killed him
and hid his body somers; and that would ruin Uncle Silas and drive HIM out of the country hang him,
maybe; I dunno. But when they found their dead brother in the sycamores without knowing him, because he
was so battered up, they see they had a better thing; disguise BOTH and bury Jake and dig him up presently
all dressed up in Jubiter's clothes, and hire Jim Lane and Bill Withers and the others to swear to some handy
lies which they done. And there they set, now, and I told them they would be looking sick before I got
done, and that is the way they're looking now.
"Well, me and Huck Finn here, we come down on the boat with the thieves, and the dead one told us all about
the di'monds, and said the others would murder him if they got the chance; and we was going to help him all
we could. We was bound for the sycamores when we heard them killing him in there; but we was in there in
the early morning after the storm and allowed nobody hadn't been killed, after all. And when we see Jubiter
Dunlap here spreading around in the very same disguise Jake told us HE was going to wear, we thought it
was Jake his own self and he was googooing deef and dumb, and THAT was according to agreement.
"Well, me and Huck went on hunting for the corpse after the others quit, and we found it. And was proud,
too; but Uncle Silas he knocked us crazy by telling us HE killed the man. So we was mighty sorry we found
the body, and was bound to save Uncle Silas's neck if we could; and it was going to be tough work, too,
because he wouldn't let us break him out of prison the way we done with our old nigger Jim.
"I done everything I could the whole month to think up some way to save Uncle Silas, but I couldn't strike a
thing. So when we come into court today I come empty, and couldn't see no chance anywheres. But by and
by I had a glimpse of something that set me thinking just a little wee glimpse only that, and not enough
to make sure; but it set me thinking hard and WATCHING, when I was only letting on to think; and by
and by, sure enough, when Uncle Silas was pil ing out that stuff about HIM killing Jubiter Dunlap, I catched
that glimpse again, and this time I jumped up and shut down the proceedings, because I KNOWED Jubiter
Dunlap was asetting here before me. I knowed him by a thing which I seen him do and I remem bered
it. I'd seen him do it when I was here a year ago."
He stopped then, and studied a minute laying for an "effect" I knowed it perfectly well. Then he turned
off like he was going to leave the platform, and says, kind of lazy and indifferent:
"Well, I believe that is all."
Why, you never heard such a howl! and it come from the whole house:
"What WAS it you seen him do? Stay where you are, you little devil! You think you are going to work a
body up till his mouth's awatering and stop there? What WAS it he done?"
That was it, you see he just done it to get an "effect "; you couldn't 'a' pulled him off of that plat form
with a yoke of oxen.
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"Oh, it wasn't anything much," he says. "I seen him looking a little excited when he found Uncle Silas was
actuly fixing to hang himself for a murder that warn't ever done; and he got more and more nervous and
worried, I awatching him sharp but not seeming to look at him and all of a sudden his hands begun to
work and fidget, and pretty soon his left crept up and HIS FINGER DRAWED A CROSS ON HIS CHEEK,
and then I HAD him!"
Well, then they ripped and howled and stomped and clapped their hands till Tom Sawyer was that proud and
happy he didn't know what to do with him self.
And then the judge he looked down over his pulpit and says:
"My boy, did you SEE all the various details of this strange conspiracy and tragedy that you've been de
scribing?"
"No, your honor, I didn't see any of them."
"Didn't see any of them! Why, you've told the whole history straight through, just the same as if you'd seen it
with your eyes. How did you manage that?"
Tom says, kind of easy and comfortable:
"Oh, just noticing the evidence and piecing this and that together, your honor; just an ordinary little bit of
detective work; anybody could 'a' done it."
"Nothing of the kind! Not two in a million could 'a' done it. You are a very remarkable boy."
Then they let go and give Tom another smashing round, and he well, he wouldn't 'a' sold out for a silver
mine. Then the judge says:
"But are you certain you've got this curious history straight?"
"Perfectly, your honor. Here is Brace Dunlap let him deny his share of it if he wants to take the chance;
I'll engage to make him wish he hadn't said anything...... Well, you see HE'S pretty quiet. And his brother's
pretty quiet, and them four witnesses that lied so and got paid for it, they're pretty quiet. And as for Uncle
Silas, it ain't any use for him to put in his oar, I wouldn't believe him under oath!"
Well, sir, that fairly made them shout; and even the judge he let go and laughed. Tom he was just feeling like
a rainbow. When they was done laughing he looks up at the judge and says:
"Your honor, there's a thief in this house."
"A thief?"
"Yes, sir. And he's got them twelvethousand dollar di'monds on him."
By gracious, but it made a stir! Everybody went shouting:
"Which is him? which is him? p'int him out!"
And the judge says:
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"Point him out, my lad. Sheriff, you will arrest him. Which one is it?"
Tom says:
"This late dead man here Jubiter Dunlap."
Then there was another thundering letgo of astonish ment and excitement; but Jubiter, which was
astonished enough before, was just fairly putrified with astonish ment this time. And he spoke up, about half
crying, and says:
"Now THAT'S a lie. Your honor, it ain't fair; I'm plenty bad enough without that. I done the other things
Brace he put me up to it, and persuaded me, and promised he'd make me rich, some day, and I done it, and
I'm sorry I done it, and I wisht I hadn't; but I hain't stole no di'monds, and I hain't GOT no di'monds; I wisht I
may never stir if it ain't so. The sheriff can search me and see."
Tom says:
"Your honor, it wasn't right to call him a thief, and I'll let up on that a little. He did steal the di'monds, but he
didn't know it. He stole them from his brother Jake when he was laying dead, after Jake had stole them from
the other thieves; but Jubiter didn't know he was stealing them; and he's been swelling around here with them
a month; yes, sir, twelve thousand dollars' worth of di'monds on him all that riches, and going around here
every day just like a poor man. Yes, your honor, he's got them on him now."
The judge spoke up and says:
"Search him, sheriff."
Well, sir, the sheriff he ransacked him high and low, and everywhere: searched his hat, socks, seams, boots,
everything and Tom he stood there quiet, laying for another of them effects of hisn. Finally the sheriff he
give it up, and everybody looked disappointed, and Jubiter says:
"There, now! what'd I tell you?"
And the judge says:
"It appears you were mistaken this time, my boy."
Then Tom took an attitude and let on to be studying with all his might, and scratching his head. Then all of a
sudden he glanced up chipper, and says:
"Oh, now I've got it ! I'd forgot."
Which was a lie, and I knowed it. Then he says:
"Will somebody be good enough to lend me a little small screwdriver? There was one in your brother's
handbag that you smouched, Jubiter. but I reckon you didn't fetch it with you."
"No, I didn't. I didn't want it, and I give it away."
"That's because you didn't know what it was for."
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Jubiter had his boots on again, by now, and when the thing Tom wanted was passed over the people's heads
till it got to him, he says to Jubiter:
"Put up your foot on this chair." And he kneeled down and begun to unscrew the heelplate, everybody
watching; and when he got that big di'mond out of that bootheel and held it up and let it flash and blaze and
squirt sunlight everwhichaway, it just took every body's breath; and Jubiter he looked so sick and sorry you
never see the like of it. And when Tom held up the other di'mond he looked sorrier than ever. Land! he was
thinking how he would 'a' skipped out and been rich and independent in a foreign land if he'd only had the
luck to guess what the screwdriver was in the carpetbag for.
Well, it was a most exciting time, take it all around, and Tom got cords of glory. The judge took the
di'monds, and stood up in his pulpit, and cleared his throat, and shoved his spectacles back on his head, and
says:
"I'll keep them and notify the owners; and when they send for them it will be a real pleasure to me to hand
you the two thousand dollars, for you've earned the money yes, and you've earned the deepest and most
sincerest thanks of this community besides, for lifting a wronged and innocent family out of ruin and shame,
and saving a good and honorable man from a felon's death, and for exposing to infamy and the pun ishment
of the law a cruel and odious scoundrel and his miserable creatures!"
Well, sir, if there'd been a brass band to bust out some music, then, it would 'a' been just the perfectest thing I
ever see, and Tom Sawyer he said the same.
Then the sheriff he nabbed Brace Dunlap and his crowd, and by and by next month the judge had them up for
trial and jailed the whole lot. And everybody crowded back to Uncle Silas's little old church, and was ever so
loving and kind to him and the family and couldn't do enough for them; and Uncle Silas he preached them the
blamedest jumbledest idiotic sermons you ever struck, and would tangle you up so you couldn't find your
way home in daylight; but the peo ple never let on but what they thought it was the clear est and brightest
and elegantest sermons that ever was; and they would set there and cry, for love and pity; but, by George,
they give me the jimjams and the fan tods and caked up what brains I had, and turned them solid; but by
and by they loved the old man's intellects back into him again, and he was as sound in his skull as ever he
was, which ain't no flattery, I reckon. And so the whole family was as happy as birds, and nobody could be
gratefuler and lovinger than what they was to Tom Sawyer; and the same to me, though I hadn't done
nothing. And when the two thousand dollars come, Tom give half of it to me, and never told any body so,
which didn't surprise me, because I knowed him.
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TOM SAWYER, DETECTIVE 38
Bookmarks
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