So I started for town in the wagon, and when I was half-way I see another wagon coming, and sure enough it was Tom Sawyer, and I stopped and waited until he come along. I says "Hold on!" and it stopped beside me, and his mouth opened up like a suitcase, and stayed so; and he worked his mouth like a person that’s got a dry throat, with no words coming out until he says: "I ain’t ever hurt you. You know that. So, then, what you want to come back and follow me for?"
I says: "I ain’t come back -- I ain’t been gone."
When he heard my voice it righted him up some, but he weren’t quite sure yet. He says: "Don’t you play nothing on me, because I wouldn’t on you. Honest Indian, you ain’t a ghost?"
"Honest Indian, I ain’t," I says.
"Well, I -- that should be good enough; but I can’t seem to understand it no way. Look here, weren’t you ever killed at all?"
"No. I weren’t ever killed at all -- I played it on them. You come in here and feel of me if you don’t believe me."
So he done it; and it was enough for him; he was that glad to see me again he didn’t know what to do. He wanted to know all about it right off, because it was a great adventure, and so it hit him right where he lived. But I said, leave it alone until by and by; and I told his driver to wait, and we pulled off a little piece, and I told him the kind of trouble I was in, and what did he think we should do? He said, let him alone a minute, and don’t say nothing. So he thought and thought, and pretty soon he says: "It’s all right; I’ve got it. Take my suitcase in your wagon, and let on it’s yours, Turn back and go along very slowly, so as to get to the house about the time you should; and I’ll go toward town a piece, and take a new start, and get there fifteen minutes after you; and you needn’t let on to know me at first."
I says: "All right; but wait a minute. There’s one more thing -- one that nobody knows but me. There’s a slave here that I’m a-trying to free, and his name is Jim -- old Miss Watson’s Jim."
He says: "What! Why, Jim is -- "
He stopped and went to studying. I says: "I know what you’ll say. You’ll say it’s dirty, low-down business; but what if it is? I’m low down; and I’m a-going to rob him free, and I want you to keep quiet and not let on. Will you?"
His eyes opened wide, and he says: "I’ll help you free him!"
Well, I let go all holds then, like I was dying. It was the most surprising thing I ever heard -- and I must say Tom Sawyer dropped a lot in my thinking about him. I couldn’t believe it. Tom Sawyer a slave-robber!
"No way!" I says. "You’re joking."
"I ain’t joking, either."
"Well, then," I says, "joking or no joking, if you hear anything said about a runaway slave, remember that you don’t know nothing about him, and I don’t know nothing either."
Then we took the suitcase and put it in my wagon, and he went riding off his way and I went mine. But I didn’t remember about driving slow because of being glad and full of thinking; so I got home way too early. The old man was at the door, and he says: "This is wonderful! Who would a thought it was in that horse to do it? I wish we’d a timed her. And she ain’t even breathing heavy. It’s wonderful. Why, I wouldn’t take a hundred dollars for that horse now -- honest; and yet I would a sold her for fifteen before, and thought it was all she was worth."
That’s all he said. He was the most trusting old soul I ever seen. But it weren’t surprising; because he weren’t only just a farmer, he was a preacher, too, and had a little one-horse log church down back of the farm, which he built himself with his own money, for a church and a school. He never asked nothing for his preaching, and it was worth it, too.
In about half an hour Tom’s wagon come up to the front fence, and Aunt Sally she seen it through the window, because it was only about fifty yards, and says: "Why, there’s some- body come! Who could it be? Why, I do believe it’s a stranger. Jimmy," (That’s one of the children.) "run and tell Lize to put on another plate for dinner."
Everybody ran to the front door, because a stranger don’t come every year, and so he brings more interest than the smallpox when he does come. Tom was over the fence and starting for the house; the wagon was driving back up the road to the village, and we was all crowded in the front door. Tom had his good clothes on, and a crowd to talk to -- and that was always good as nuts for Tom Sawyer. With us all watching, it was easy for him to give it his special touch.
He weren’t a boy to walk shyly up the yard like a sheep; no, he come relaxed and important, and when he got in front of us he lifts his hat ever so nicely, like it was the top of a box that had butterflies asleep in it and he didn’t want to wake them, and says: "Mr. Archibald Nichols, is that right?"
"No, my boy," says the old man, "Nichols’s place is down the road three miles more. Come in, come in."
Tom he took a look back over his shoulder, and says, "Too late -- can’t even see him."
"Yes, he’s gone, son. You must come in and eat your dinner with us; and then we’ll take you down to Nichols’s."
"Oh, I can’t make you so much trouble; I couldn’t think of it. I’ll walk -- it’s no problem."
"But we won’t let you walk -- it wouldn’t be right to do that. Come on in."
"Oh, do," says Aunt Sally; "it ain’t no trouble to us, no trouble at all. You must stay. It’s a long, dirty three mile, and we can’t let you walk. And, besides, I’ve already told ‘em to put on another plate when I seen you coming; so you mustn’t let us down. Come right in and make yourself at home."
So Tom he thanked them very warmly and beautifully, and let himself be talked into coming in; and when he was in he said he was a stranger from Hicksville, Ohio, and his name was William Thompson -- and he made another bow.
Well, he run on, and on, and on, making up things about Hicksville and everybody in it he could make up, and I was getting a little worried, and thinking how was this going to help me out of my troubles; and at last, still talking along, he reached over and kissed Aunt Sally right on the mouth, and then sat back again in his chair comfortable, and was going on talking; but she jumped up and rubbed it off with the back of her hand, and says: "You dirty dog!"
He looked kind of hurt, and says: "I’m surprised at you, ma’am."
"You’re surpri -- Why, what do you think I am? I should take and -- Say, what do you mean by kissing me?"
He looked kind of humble, and says: "I didn’t mean nothing, ma’am. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I -- I -- thought you’d like it."
"Was you born crazy!" She took up a stick from the spinning-wheel, and it looked like it was all she could do to keep from giving him a hit with it. "What made you think I’d like it?"
"Well, I don’t know. Only, they -- they -- told me you would."
"They told you I would? Whoever told you is another crazy person. I never heard anything like it. Who’s they?"
"Why, everybody. They all said so, ma’am."
It was all she could do to hold in. Her eyes showed anger, and her fingers worked like she wanted to scratch him; and she says: "Who’s ‘everybody’? Out with their names, or there’ll be one less crazy person when I finish with you."
He got up and looked worried, and played with his hat, and says: "I’m sorry, I weren’t thinking you would take it that way. They all said, kiss her; and said she’d like it -- every one of them. But I’m sorry, ma’am, and I won’t do it no more -- honest."
"You won’t, won’t you? Well, I should think you won’t!"
"No ma’am, I’m honest about it; I won’t ever do it again -- until you ask me."
"Until I ask! Well, I never seen anything like it in all my days!"
"Well," he says, "it does surprise me so. I can’t make it out. They said you would, and I thought you would. But -- " He stopped and looked around slow, like he wished he could find a friendly eye somewhere, and finished up on the old man’s, and says, "Didn’t you think she’d like me to kiss her, sir?"
"Why, no; I -- I -- well, no, I believe I didn’t."
Then he looks on around the same way to me, and says: "Tom, didn’t you think Aunt Sally would open out her arms and say, ‘Sid Sawyer, my boy -- ‘"
"My land!" she says, breaking in and jumping for him, "you little devil, to trick a body so." She was going to hug him, but he pushed her back, and says: "Not until you’ve asked me first."
So she didn’t lose no time, but asked him; and hugged him and kissed him over and over again, and then turned him over to the old man, and he took what was left. And after they got a little quiet again she says: "What can I say? I never seen such a surprise. We weren’t looking for you at all, but only Tom. Polly never wrote to me about anybody coming but him."
"It’s because it weren’t planned for any of us to come but Tom," he says; "but I begged and begged, and at the last minute she let me come, too; so, coming down the river, me and Tom thought it would be a good surprise for him to come here to the house first, and for me to by and by come along and drop in, and let on to be a stranger. But it was wrong, Aunt Sally. This ain’t no healthy place for a stranger to come."
"No -- not bad little boys, Sid. You should of had your mouth hit; I ain’t been so put out since I don’t know when. But I don’t care -- I’d be willing to stand a thousand such jokes to have you here. Well, to think of that act! I have to say, I was almost turned to stone with surprise when you give me that kiss."
We had dinner out in that wide open walk way between the house and the kitchen; and there was things enough on that table for seven families -- and all hot, too; none of your rubber meat that’s laid on a shelf in a wet room under the house all night and tastes like a piece of an old cold body in the morning. Uncle Silas he asked a pretty long blessing over it, but it was worth it; and it didn’t cool it at all, either, the way I’ve seen them kind of prayers do lots of times.
There was a lot of talk all the afternoon, and me and Tom was watching all the time; but it weren’t no use, they didn’t happen to say nothing about any runaway slave, and we was afraid to try to work up to it. But at the table, that night, one of the little boys says: "Pa, can Tom and Sid and me go to the show?"
"No," says the old man, "There ain’t going to be any; and you couldn’t go if there was. That runaway slave told Burton and me all about the show, and Burton said he'd tell the others. They've probably run those snakes out of town by now."
So there it was! -- but I couldn’t help it. Tom and me was to sleep in the same room and bed; so, being tired, we said good-night and went up to bed right after eating, and climbed out of the window and down the lightning-rod, and headed for the town; for I didn’t believe anyone was going to tell the king and the duke what was up, and so if I didn’t hurry up and tell them they’d get into big trouble for sure.
On the road Tom told me all about how it was believed I was killed, and how pap was gone pretty soon after, and didn’t come back, and what talk there was when Jim run away; and I told Tom all about our Kings Foolishness devils, and as much of the raft trip as I had time to; and as we come into the town and up through the street -- here come an angry crowd of people with torches, and an awful noise of shouting and banging tin pans and blowing horns; and we jumped to one side to let them go by; and as they went by I see they had the king and the duke sitting on a log -- that is, I knowed it was the king and the duke, but they was all over tar and feathers, and didn’t look like nothing in the world that was a living person -- just looked like two giant feathers. Well, it made me sick to see it; and I was sorry for them poor devils, it seemed like I couldn’t ever feel anything bad against them any more in the world. It was an awful thing to see. People can be awful cruel to one another.
We seen we was too late -- couldn’t do no good. We asked some people about it, and they said everybody went to the show looking like nothing was wrong; and stayed that way until the poor old king was in the middle of his foolishness on the stage; then someone give a sign, and the house jumped up and went for them.
So we went slowly back home, and I weren’t feeling so good as I was before, but kind of bad, and humble, and to blame. I knew that I hadn’t done nothing, but that’s always the way; it don’t make no difference if you do right or wrong, a person’s conscience ain’t got no reason, and just goes for him any way it can. If I had a yellow dog that didn’t know no more than a person’s conscience does I would poison him. It takes up more room than all the rest of a person’s insides, and yet ain’t no good, at all. Tom Sawyer he says the same.