Huckleberry finn by Mark Twain

nothing about it. He's GOT to have a rope ladder; they all do."
"What in the nation can he DO with it?"
"DO with it? He can hide it in his bed, can't he? That's what they all

do; and HE'S got to, too. Huck, you don't ever seem to want to do

anything that's regular; you want to be starting something fresh all the

time. S'pose he DON'T do nothing with it? ain't it there in his bed, for

a clew, after he's gone? and don't you reckon they'll want clews? Of

course they will. And you wouldn't leave them any? That would be a

PRETTY howdy-do, WOULDN'T it! I never heard of such a thing."
"Well," I says, "if it's in the regulations, and he's got to have it, all

right, let him have it; because I don't wish to go back on no

regulations; but there's one thing, Tom Sawyer--if we go to tearing up

our sheets to make Jim a rope ladder, we're going to get into trouble

with Aunt Sally, just as sure as you're born. Now, the way I look at it,

a hickry-bark ladder don't cost nothing, and don't waste nothing, and is

just as good to load up a pie with, and hide in a straw tick, as any rag

ladder you can start; and as for Jim, he ain't had no experience, and so

he don't care what kind of a--"
"Oh, shucks, Huck Finn, if I was as ignorant as you I'd keep still

--that's what I'D do. Who ever heard of a state prisoner escaping by a

hickry-bark ladder? Why, it's perfectly ridiculous."
"Well, all right, Tom, fix it your own way; but if you'll take my advice,

you'll let me borrow a sheet off of the clothesline."

make him a pen out of an old pewter spoon or a piece of an old iron

barrel-hoop?"
"Why, Tom, we can pull a feather out of a goose and make him a better

one; and quicker, too."

out of, you muggins. They ALWAYS make their pens out of the hardest,

toughest, troublesomest piece of old brass candlestick or something like

that they can get their hands on; and it takes them weeks and weeks and

months and months to file it out, too, because they've got to do it by

rubbing it on the wall. THEY wouldn't use a goose-quill if they had it.

It ain't regular."
"Well, then, what'll we make him the ink out of?"
"Many makes it out of iron-rust and tears; but that's the common sort and

women; the best authorities uses their own blood. Jim can do that; and

when he wants to send any little common ordinary mysterious message to

let the world know where he's captivated, he can write it on the bottom

of a tin plate with a fork and throw it out of the window. The Iron Mask

always done that, and it's a blame' good way, too."

to write on the plate and throw it out. You don't HAVE to be able to

read it. Why, half the time you can't read anything a prisoner writes on

a tin plate, or anywhere else."

cleared out for the house.

clothes-line; and I found an old sack and put them in it, and we went

down and got the fox-fire, and put that in too. I called it borrowing,

because that was what pap always called it; but Tom said it warn't

borrowing, it was stealing. He said we was representing prisoners; and

prisoners don't care how they get a thing so they get it, and nobody

don't blame them for it, either. It ain't no crime in a prisoner to

steal the thing he needs to get away with, Tom said; it's his right; and

so, as long as we was representing a prisoner, we had a perfect right to

steal anything on this place we had the least use for to get ourselves

out of prison with. He said if we warn't prisoners it would be a very

different thing, and nobody but a mean, ornery person would steal when he

warn't a prisoner. So we allowed we would steal everything there was

that come handy. And yet he made a mighty fuss, one day, after that,

when I stole a watermelon out of the nigger-patch and eat it; and he made

me go and give the niggers a dime without telling them what it was for.

Tom said that what he meant was, we could steal anything we NEEDED. Well,

I says, I needed the watermelon. But he said I didn't need it to get out

of prison with; there's where the difference was. He said if I'd a

wanted it to hide a knife in, and smuggle it to Jim to kill the seneskal

with, it would a been all right. So I let it go at that, though I

couldn't see no advantage in my representing a prisoner if I got to set

down and chaw over a lot of gold-leaf distinctions like that every time I

see a chance to hog a watermelon.

down to business, and nobody in sight around the yard; then Tom he

carried the sack into the lean-to whilst I stood off a piece to keep

watch. By and by he come out, and we went and set down on the woodpile

to talk. He says:
"Everything's all right now except tools; and that's easy fixed."
"Tools?" I says.
"Yes."
"Tools for what?"
"Why, to dig with. We ain't a-going to GNAW him out, are we?"
"Ain't them old crippled picks and things in there good enough to dig a

nigger out with?" I says.

all the modern conveniences in his wardrobe to dig himself out with? Now

I want to ask you--if you got any reasonableness in you at all--what kind

of a show would THAT give him to be a hero? Why, they might as well lend

him the key and done with it. Picks and shovels--why, they wouldn't

furnish 'em to a king."

want?"
"A couple of case-knives."

it's the regular way. And there ain't no OTHER way, that ever I heard

of, and I've read all the books that gives any information about these

things. They always dig out with a case-knife--and not through dirt, mind

you; generly it's through solid rock. And it takes them weeks and weeks

and weeks, and for ever and ever. Why, look at one of them prisoners in

the bottom dungeon of the Castle Deef, in the harbor of Marseilles, that

dug himself out that way; how long was HE at it, you reckon?"

the bottom of THIS fortress was solid rock."

you're always a-wandering off on a side issue. Why can't you stick to

the main point?"
"All right--I don't care where he comes out, so he COMES out; and Jim

don't, either, I reckon. But there's one thing, anyway--Jim's too old to

be dug out with a case-knife. He won't last."
"Yes he will LAST, too. You don't reckon it's going to take thirty-seven

years to dig out through a DIRT foundation, do you?"

very long for Uncle Silas to hear from down there by New Orleans. He'll

hear Jim ain't from there. Then his next move will be to advertise Jim,

or something like that. So we can't resk being as long digging him out

as we ought to. By rights I reckon we ought to be a couple of years; but

we can't. Things being so uncertain, what I recommend is this: that we

really dig right in, as quick as we can; and after that, we can LET ON,

to ourselves, that we was at it thirty-seven years. Then we can snatch

him out and rush him away the first time there's an alarm. Yes, I reckon

that 'll be the best way."

letting on ain't no trouble; and if it's any object, I don't mind letting

on we was at it a hundred and fifty year. It wouldn't strain me none,

after I got my hand in. So I'll mosey along now, and smouch a couple of

case-knives."
"Smouch three," he says; "we want one to make a saw out of."
"Tom, if it ain't unregular and irreligious to sejest it," I says,

"there's an old rusty saw-blade around yonder sticking under the

weather-boarding behind the smoke-house."
He looked kind of weary and discouraged-like, and says:
"It ain't no use to try to learn you nothing, Huck. Run along and smouch

the knives--three of them." So I done it.

CHAPTER XXXVI.
AS soon as we reckoned everybody was asleep that night we went down the

lightning-rod, and shut ourselves up in the lean-to, and got out our pile

of fox-fire, and went to work. We cleared everything out of the way,

about four or five foot along the middle of the bottom log. Tom said we

was right behind Jim's bed now, and we'd dig in under it, and when we got

through there couldn't nobody in the cabin ever know there was any hole

there, because Jim's counter-pin hung down most to the ground, and you'd

have to raise it up and look under to see the hole. So we dug and dug

with the case-knives till most midnight; and then we was dog-tired, and

our hands was blistered, and yet you couldn't see we'd done anything

hardly. At last I says:
"This ain't no thirty-seven year job; this is a thirty-eight year job,

Tom Sawyer."

digging, and then for a good little while I knowed that he was thinking.

Then he says:
"It ain't no use, Huck, it ain't a-going to work. If we was prisoners it

would, because then we'd have as many years as we wanted, and no hurry;

and we wouldn't get but a few minutes to dig, every day, while they was

changing watches, and so our hands wouldn't get blistered, and we could

keep it up right along, year in and year out, and do it right, and the

way it ought to be done. But WE can't fool along; we got to rush; we

ain't got no time to spare. If we was to put in another night this way

we'd have to knock off for a week to let our hands get well--couldn't

touch a case-knife with them sooner."
"Well, then, what we going to do, Tom?"
"I'll tell you. It ain't right, and it ain't moral, and I wouldn't like

it to get out; but there ain't only just the one way: we got to dig him

out with the picks, and LET ON it's case-knives."
"NOW you're TALKING!" I says; "your head gets leveler and leveler all

the time, Tom Sawyer," I says. "Picks is the thing, moral or no moral;

and as for me, I don't care shucks for the morality of it, nohow. When I

start in to steal a nigger, or a watermelon, or a Sunday-school book, I

ain't no ways particular how it's done so it's done. What I want is my

nigger; or what I want is my watermelon; or what I want is my

Sunday-school book; and if a pick's the handiest thing, that's the thing

I'm a-going to dig that nigger or that watermelon or that Sunday-school

book out with; and I don't give a dead rat what the authorities thinks

about it nuther."

this; if it warn't so, I wouldn't approve of it, nor I wouldn't stand by

and see the rules broke--because right is right, and wrong is wrong, and

a body ain't got no business doing wrong when he ain't ignorant and knows

better. It might answer for YOU to dig Jim out with a pick, WITHOUT any

letting on, because you don't know no better; but it wouldn't for me,

because I do know better. Gimme a case-knife."
He had his own by him, but I handed him mine. He flung it down, and

says:
"Gimme a CASE-KNIFE."

amongst the old tools, and got a pickaxe and give it to him, and he took

it and went to work, and never said a word.
He was always just that particular. Full of principle.
So then I got a shovel, and then we picked and shoveled, turn about, and

made the fur fly. We stuck to it about a half an hour, which was as long

as we could stand up; but we had a good deal of a hole to show for it.

When I got up stairs I looked out at the window and see Tom doing his

level best with the lightning-rod, but he couldn't come it, his hands was

so sore. At last he says:

you think of no way?"

let on it's a lightning-rod."

for to make some pens for Jim out of, and six tallow candles; and I hung

around the nigger cabins and laid for a chance, and stole three tin

plates. Tom says it wasn't enough; but I said nobody wouldn't ever see

the plates that Jim throwed out, because they'd fall in the dog-fennel

and jimpson weeds under the window-hole--then we could tote them back and

he could use them over again. So Tom was satisfied. Then he says:
"Now, the thing to study out is, how to get the things to Jim."
"Take them in through the hole," I says, "when we get it done."
He only just looked scornful, and said something about nobody ever heard

of such an idiotic idea, and then he went to studying. By and by he said

he had ciphered out two or three ways, but there warn't no need to decide

on any of them yet. Said we'd got to post Jim first.

one of the candles along, and listened under the window-hole, and heard

Jim snoring; so we pitched it in, and it didn't wake him. Then we

whirled in with the pick and shovel, and in about two hours and a half

the job was done. We crept in under Jim's bed and into the cabin, and

pawed around and found the candle and lit it, and stood over Jim awhile,

and found him looking hearty and healthy, and then we woke him up gentle

and gradual. He was so glad to see us he most cried; and called us

honey, and all the pet names he could think of; and was for having us

hunt up a cold-chisel to cut the chain off of his leg with right away,

and clearing out without losing any time. But Tom he showed him how

unregular it would be, and set down and told him all about our plans, and

how we could alter them in a minute any time there was an alarm; and not

to be the least afraid, because we would see he got away, SURE. So Jim

he said it was all right, and we set there and talked over old times

awhile, and then Tom asked a lot of questions, and when Jim told him

Uncle Silas come in every day or two to pray with him, and Aunt Sally

come in to see if he was comfortable and had plenty to eat, and both of

them was kind as they could be, Tom says:
"NOW I know how to fix it. We'll send you some things by them."
I said, "Don't do nothing of the kind; it's one of the most jackass ideas

I ever struck;" but he never paid no attention to me; went right on. It

was his way when he'd got his plans set.
So he told Jim how we'd have to smuggle in the rope-ladder pie and other

large things by Nat, the nigger that fed him, and he must be on the

lookout, and not be surprised, and not let Nat see him open them; and we

would put small things in uncle's coat-pockets and he must steal them

out; and we would tie things to aunt's apron-strings or put them in her

apron-pocket, if we got a chance; and told him what they would be and

what they was for. And told him how to keep a journal on the shirt with

his blood, and all that. He told him everything. Jim he couldn't see no

sense in the most of it, but he allowed we was white folks and knowed

better than him; so he was satisfied, and said he would do it all just as

Tom said.
Jim had plenty corn-cob pipes and tobacco; so we had a right down good

sociable time; then we crawled out through the hole, and so home to bed,

with hands that looked like they'd been chawed. Tom was in high spirits.

He said it was the best fun he ever had in his life, and the most

intellectural; and said if he only could see his way to it we would keep

it up all the rest of our lives and leave Jim to our children to get out;

for he believed Jim would come to like it better and better the more he

got used to it. He said that in that way it could be strung out to as

much as eighty year, and would be the best time on record. And he said

it would make us all celebrated that had a hand in it.

candlestick into handy sizes, and Tom put them and the pewter spoon in

his pocket. Then we went to the nigger cabins, and while I got Nat's

notice off, Tom shoved a piece of candlestick into the middle of a

corn-pone that was in Jim's pan, and we went along with Nat to see how it

would work, and it just worked noble; when Jim bit into it it most mashed

all his teeth out; and there warn't ever anything could a worked better.

Tom said so himself. Jim he never let on but what it was only just a

piece of rock or something like that that's always getting into bread,

you know; but after that he never bit into nothing but what he jabbed his

fork into it in three or four places first.
And whilst we was a-standing there in the dimmish light, here comes a

couple of the hounds bulging in from under Jim's bed; and they kept on

piling in till there was eleven of them, and there warn't hardly room in

there to get your breath. By jings, we forgot to fasten that lean-to

door! The nigger Nat he only just hollered "Witches" once, and keeled

over on to the floor amongst the dogs, and begun to groan like he was

dying. Tom jerked the door open and flung out a slab of Jim's meat, and

the dogs went for it, and in two seconds he was out himself and back

again and shut the door, and I knowed he'd fixed the other door too.

Then he went to work on the nigger, coaxing him and petting him, and

asking him if he'd been imagining he saw something again. He raised up,

and blinked his eyes around, and says:

million dogs, er devils, er some'n, I wisht I may die right heah in dese

tracks. I did, mos' sholy. Mars Sid, I FELT um--I FELT um, sah; dey was

all over me. Dad fetch it, I jis' wisht I could git my han's on one er

dem witches jis' wunst--on'y jis' wunst--it's all I'd ast. But mos'ly I

wisht dey'd lemme 'lone, I does."

runaway nigger's breakfast-time? It's because they're hungry; that's the

reason. You make them a witch pie; that's the thing for YOU to do."
"But my lan', Mars Sid, how's I gwyne to make 'm a witch pie? I doan'

know how to make it. I hain't ever hearn er sich a thing b'fo'."

I will!"
"All right, I'll do it, seeing it's you, and you've been good to us and

showed us the runaway nigger. But you got to be mighty careful. When we

come around, you turn your back; and then whatever we've put in the pan,

don't you let on you see it at all. And don't you look when Jim unloads

the pan--something might happen, I don't know what. And above all, don't

you HANDLE the witch-things."
"HANNEL 'm, Mars Sid? What IS you a-talkin' 'bout? I wouldn' lay de

weight er my finger on um, not f'r ten hund'd thous'n billion dollars, I

wouldn't."

CHAPTER XXXVII.

the back yard, where they keep the old boots, and rags, and pieces of

bottles, and wore-out tin things, and all such truck, and scratched

around and found an old tin washpan, and stopped up the holes as well as

we could, to bake the pie in, and took it down cellar and stole it full

of flour and started for breakfast, and found a couple of shingle-nails

that Tom said would be handy for a prisoner to scrabble his name and

sorrows on the dungeon walls with, and dropped one of them in Aunt

Sally's apron-pocket which was hanging on a chair, and t'other we stuck

in the band of Uncle Silas's hat, which was on the bureau, because we

heard the children say their pa and ma was going to the runaway nigger's

house this morning, and then went to breakfast, and Tom dropped the

pewter spoon in Uncle Silas's coat-pocket, and Aunt Sally wasn't come

yet, so we had to wait a little while.

for the blessing; and then she went to sluicing out coffee with one hand

and cracking the handiest child's head with her thimble with the other,

and says:

become of your other shirt."

piece of corn-crust started down my throat after it and got met on the

road with a cough, and was shot across the table, and took one of the

children in the eye and curled him up like a fishing-worm, and let a cry

out of him the size of a warwhoop, and Tom he turned kinder blue around

the gills, and it all amounted to a considerable state of things for

about a quarter of a minute or as much as that, and I would a sold out

for half price if there was a bidder. But after that we was all right

again--it was the sudden surprise of it that knocked us so kind of cold.

Uncle Silas he says:

well I took it OFF, because--"