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shoved him out o' the way. I says to the people, why ain't this nigger

put up at auction and sold?--that's what I want to know. And what do you

reckon they said? Why, they said he couldn't be sold till he'd been in

the State six months, and he hadn't been there that long yet. There,

now--that's a specimen. They call that a govment that can't sell a free

nigger till he's been in the State six months. Here's a govment that

calls itself a govment, and lets on to be a govment, and thinks it is a

govment, and yet's got to set stock-still for six whole months before it

can take a hold of a prowling, thieving, infernal, white-shirted free

nigger, and--"

Pap was agoing on so he never noticed where his old limber legs was

taking him to, so he went head over heels over the tub of salt pork and

barked both shins, and the rest of his speech was all the hottest kind of

language--mostly hove at the nigger and the govment, though he give the

tub some, too, all along, here and there. He hopped around the cabin

considerable, first on one leg and then on the other, holding first one

shin and then the other one, and at last he let out with his left foot

all of a sudden and fetched the tub a rattling kick. But it warn't good

judgment, because that was the boot that had a couple of his toes leaking

out of the front end of it; so now he raised a howl that fairly made a

body's hair raise, and down he went in the dirt, and rolled there, and

held his toes; and the cussing he done then laid over anything he had

ever done previous. He said so his own self afterwards. He had heard

old Sowberry Hagan in his best days, and he said it laid over him, too;

but I reckon that was sort of piling it on, maybe.

After supper pap took the jug, and said he had enough whisky there for

two drunks and one delirium tremens. That was always his word. I judged

he would be blind drunk in about an hour, and then I would steal the key,

or saw myself out, one or t'other. He drank and drank, and tumbled down

on his blankets by and by; but luck didn't run my way. He didn't go

sound asleep, but was uneasy. He groaned and moaned and thrashed around

this way and that for a long time. At last I got so sleepy I couldn't

keep my eyes open all I could do, and so before I knowed what I was about

I was sound asleep, and the candle burning.

I don't know how long I was asleep, but all of a sudden there was an

awful scream and I was up. There was pap looking wild, and skipping

around every which way and yelling about snakes. He said they was

crawling up his legs; and then he would give a jump and scream, and say

one had bit him on the cheek--but I couldn't see no snakes. He started

and run round and round the cabin, hollering "Take him off! take him off!

he's biting me on the neck!" I never see a man look so wild in the eyes.

Pretty soon he was all fagged out, and fell down panting; then he rolled

over and over wonderful fast, kicking things every which way, and

striking and grabbing at the air with his hands, and screaming and saying

there was devils a-hold of him. He wore out by and by, and laid still a

while, moaning. Then he laid stiller, and didn't make a sound. I could

hear the owls and the wolves away off in the woods, and it seemed

terrible still. He was laying over by the corner. By and by he raised up

part way and listened, with his head to one side. He says, very low:

"Tramp--tramp--tramp; that's the dead; tramp--tramp--tramp; they're

coming after me; but I won't go. Oh, they're here! don't touch me

--don't! hands off--they're cold; let go. Oh, let a poor devil alone!"

Then he went down on all fours and crawled off, begging them to let him

alone, and he rolled himself up in his blanket and wallowed in under the

old pine table, still a-begging; and then he went to crying. I could

hear him through the blanket.

By and by he rolled out and jumped up on his feet looking wild, and he

see me and went for me. He chased me round and round the place with a

clasp-knife, calling me the Angel of Death, and saying he would kill me,

and then I couldn't come for him no more. I begged, and told him I was

only Huck; but he laughed SUCH a screechy laugh, and roared and cussed,

and kept on chasing me up. Once when I turned short and dodged under his

arm he made a grab and got me by the jacket between my shoulders, and I

thought I was gone; but I slid out of the jacket quick as lightning, and

saved myself. Pretty soon he was all tired out, and dropped down with his

back against the door, and said he would rest a minute and then kill me.

He put his knife under him, and said he would sleep and get strong, and

then he would see who was who.

So he dozed off pretty soon. By and by I got the old split-bottom chair

and clumb up as easy as I could, not to make any noise, and got down the

gun. I slipped the ramrod down it to make sure it was loaded, then I

laid it across the turnip barrel, pointing towards pap, and set down

behind it to wait for him to stir. And how slow and still the time did

drag along.

CHAPTER VII.

"GIT up! What you 'bout?"

I opened my eyes and looked around, trying to make out where I was. It

was after sun-up, and I had been sound asleep. Pap was standing over me

looking sour and sick, too. He says:

"What you doin' with this gun?"

I judged he didn't know nothing about what he had been doing, so I says:

"Somebody tried to get in, so I was laying for him."

"Why didn't you roust me out?"

"Well, I tried to, but I couldn't; I couldn't budge you."

"Well, all right. Don't stand there palavering all day, but out with you

and see if there's a fish on the lines for breakfast. I'll be along in a

minute."

He unlocked the door, and I cleared out up the river-bank. I noticed

some pieces of limbs and such things floating down, and a sprinkling of

bark; so I knowed the river had begun to rise. I reckoned I would have

great times now if I was over at the town. The June rise used to be

always luck for me; because as soon as that rise begins here comes

cordwood floating down, and pieces of log rafts--sometimes a dozen logs

together; so all you have to do is to catch them and sell them to the

wood-yards and the sawmill.

I went along up the bank with one eye out for pap and t'other one out for

what the rise might fetch along. Well, all at once here comes a canoe;

just a beauty, too, about thirteen or fourteen foot long, riding high

like a duck. I shot head-first off of the bank like a frog, clothes and

all on, and struck out for the canoe. I just expected there'd be

somebody laying down in it, because people often done that to fool folks,

and when a chap had pulled a skiff out most to it they'd raise up and

laugh at him. But it warn't so this time. It was a drift-canoe sure

enough, and I clumb in and paddled her ashore. Thinks I, the old man

will be glad when he sees this--she's worth ten dollars. But when I

got to shore pap wasn't in sight yet, and as I was running her into a

little creek like a gully, all hung over with vines and willows, I struck

another idea: I judged I'd hide her good, and then, 'stead of taking to

the woods when I run off, I'd go down the river about fifty mile and camp

in one place for good, and not have such a rough time tramping on foot.

It was pretty close to the shanty, and I thought I heard the old man

coming all the time; but I got her hid; and then I out and looked around

a bunch of willows, and there was the old man down the path a piece just

drawing a bead on a bird with his gun. So he hadn't seen anything.

When he got along I was hard at it taking up a "trot" line. He abused me

a little for being so slow; but I told him I fell in the river, and that

was what made me so long. I knowed he would see I was wet, and then he

would be asking questions. We got five catfish off the lines and went

home.

While we laid off after breakfast to sleep up, both of us being about

wore out, I got to thinking that if I could fix up some way to keep pap

and the widow from trying to follow me, it would be a certainer thing

than trusting to luck to get far enough off before they missed me; you

see, all kinds of things might happen. Well, I didn't see no way for a

while, but by and by pap raised up a minute to drink another barrel of

water, and he says:

"Another time a man comes a-prowling round here you roust me out, you

hear? That man warn't here for no good. I'd a shot him. Next time you

roust me out, you hear?"

Then he dropped down and went to sleep again; but what he had been saying

give me the very idea I wanted. I says to myself, I can fix it now so

nobody won't think of following me.

About twelve o'clock we turned out and went along up the bank. The river

was coming up pretty fast, and lots of driftwood going by on the rise.

By and by along comes part of a log raft--nine logs fast together. We

went out with the skiff and towed it ashore. Then we had dinner.

Anybody but pap would a waited and seen the day through, so as to catch

more stuff; but that warn't pap's style. Nine logs was enough for one

time; he must shove right over to town and sell. So he locked me in and

took the skiff, and started off towing the raft about half-past three. I

judged he wouldn't come back that night. I waited till I reckoned he had

got a good start; then I out with my saw, and went to work on that log

again. Before he was t'other side of the river I was out of the hole;

him and his raft was just a speck on the water away off yonder.

I took the sack of corn meal and took it to where the canoe was hid, and

shoved the vines and branches apart and put it in; then I done the same

with the side of bacon; then the whisky-jug. I took all the coffee and

sugar there was, and all the ammunition; I took the wadding; I took the

bucket and gourd; I took a dipper and a tin cup, and my old saw and two

blankets, and the skillet and the coffee-pot. I took fish-lines and

matches and other things--everything that was worth a cent. I cleaned

out the place. I wanted an axe, but there wasn't any, only the one out

at the woodpile, and I knowed why I was going to leave that. I fetched

out the gun, and now I was done.

I had wore the ground a good deal crawling out of the hole and dragging

out so many things. So I fixed that as good as I could from the outside

by scattering dust on the place, which covered up the smoothness and the

sawdust. Then I fixed the piece of log back into its place, and put two

rocks under it and one against it to hold it there, for it was bent up at

that place and didn't quite touch ground. If you stood four or five foot

away and didn't know it was sawed, you wouldn't never notice it; and

besides, this was the back of the cabin, and it warn't likely anybody

would go fooling around there.

It was all grass clear to the canoe, so I hadn't left a track. I

followed around to see. I stood on the bank and looked out over the

river. All safe. So I took the gun and went up a piece into the woods,

and was hunting around for some birds when I see a wild pig; hogs soon

went wild in them bottoms after they had got away from the prairie farms.

I shot this fellow and took him into camp.

I took the axe and smashed in the door. I beat it and hacked it

considerable a-doing it. I fetched the pig in, and took him back nearly

to the table and hacked into his throat with the axe, and laid him down

on the ground to bleed; I say ground because it was ground--hard packed,

and no boards. Well, next I took an old sack and put a lot of big rocks

in it--all I could drag--and I started it from the pig, and dragged it

to the door and through the woods down to the river and dumped it in, and

down it sunk, out of sight. You could easy see that something had been

dragged over the ground. I did wish Tom Sawyer was there; I knowed he

would take an interest in this kind of business, and throw in the fancy

touches. Nobody could spread himself like Tom Sawyer in such a thing as

that.

Well, last I pulled out some of my hair, and blooded the axe good, and

stuck it on the back side, and slung the axe in the corner. Then I took

up the pig and held him to my breast with my jacket (so he couldn't drip)

till I got a good piece below the house and then dumped him into the

river. Now I thought of something else. So I went and got the bag of

meal and my old saw out of the canoe, and fetched them to the house. I

took the bag to where it used to stand, and ripped a hole in the bottom

of it with the saw, for there warn't no knives and forks on the place

--pap done everything with his clasp-knife about the cooking. Then I

carried the sack about a hundred yards across the grass and through the

willows east of the house, to a shallow lake that was five mile wide and

full of rushes--and ducks too, you might say, in the season. There was a

slough or a creek leading out of it on the other side that went miles

away, I don't know where, but it didn't go to the river. The meal sifted

out and made a little track all the way to the lake. I dropped pap's

whetstone there too, so as to look like it had been done by accident.

Then I tied up the rip in the meal sack with a string, so it wouldn't

leak no more, and took it and my saw to the canoe again.

It was about dark now; so I dropped the canoe down the river under some

willows that hung over the bank, and waited for the moon to rise. I made

fast to a willow; then I took a bite to eat, and by and by laid down in

the canoe to smoke a pipe and lay out a plan. I says to myself, they'll

follow the track of that sackful of rocks to the shore and then drag the

river for me. And they'll follow that meal track to the lake and go