Всего за 279 руб. Купить полную версию
Tom hailed the romantic outcast:
Hello, Huckleberry!
Hello yourself, and see how you like it.
Whats that you got?
Dead cat.
Lemme see him, Huck. My, hes pretty stiff. Whered you get him?
Bought him offn a boy.
What did you give?
I give a blue ticket and a bladder that I got at the slaughter-house.
Whered you get the blue ticket?
Bought it offn Ben Rogers two weeks ago for a hoop-stick.
Say-what is dead cats good for, Huck?
Good for? Cure warts with.
No! Is that so? I know something thats better.
I bet you dont. What is it?
Why, spunk-water.
Spunk-water! I wouldnt give a dern for spunk-water.
You wouldnt, wouldnt you? Dyou ever try it?
No, I haint. But Bob Tanner did.
Who told you so!
Why, he told Jeff Thatcher, and Jeff told Johnny Baker, and Johnny told Jim Hollis, and Jim told Ben Rogers, and Ben told a nigger, and the nigger told me. There now!
Well, what of it? Theyll all lie. Leastways all but the nigger. I dont know him. But I never see a nigger that wouldnt lie. Shucks! Now you tell me how Bob Tanner done it, Huck.
Why, he took and dipped his hand in a rotten stump where the rain-water was.
In the daytime?
Certainly.
With his face to the stump?
Yes. Least I reckon so.
Did he say anything?
I dont reckon he did. I dont know.
Aha! Talk about trying to cure warts with spunk-water such a blame fool way as that! Why, that aint a-going to do any good. You got to go all by yourself, to the middle of the woods, where you know theres a spunk-water stump, and just as its midnight you back up against the stump and jam your hand in and say:
Barley-corn, barley-corn, injun-meal shorts,
Spunk-water, spunk-water, swaller these warts,
and then walk away quick, eleven steps, with your eyes shut, and then turn around three times and walk home without speaking to anybody. Because if you speak the charms busted.
Well, that sounds like a good way; but that aint the way Bob Tanner done.
No, sir, you can bet he didnt, becuz hes the wartiest boy in this town; and he wouldnt have a wart on him if hed knowed how to work spunk-water. Ive took off thousands of warts off of my hands that way, Huck. I play with frogs so much that Ive always got considerable many warts. Sometimes I take em off with a bean.
Yes, beans good. Ive done that.
Have you? Whats your way?
You take and split the bean, and cut the wart so as to get some blood, and then you put the blood on one piece of the bean and take and dig a hole and bury it bout midnight at the crossroads in the dark of the moon, and then you burn up the rest of the bean. You see that piece thats got the blood on it will keep drawing and drawing, trying to fetch the other piece to it, and so that helps the blood to draw the wart, and pretty soon off she comes.
Yes, thats it, Huck-thats it; though when youre burying it if you say Down bean; off wart; come no more to bother me! its better. Thats the way Joe Harper does, and hes been nearly to Coonville and most everywheres. But say-how do you cure em with dead cats?
Why, you take your cat and go and get in the grave-yard long about midnight when somebody that was wicked has been buried; and when its midnight a devil will come, or maybe two or three, but you cant see em, you can only hear something like the wind, or maybe hear em talk; and when theyre taking that feller away, you heave your cat after em and say, Devil follow corpse, cat follow devil, warts follow cat, Im done with ye! Thatll fetch any wart.
Sounds right. Dyou ever try it, Huck?
No, but old Mother Hopkins told me.
Well, I reckon its so, then. Becuz they say shes a witch.
Say! Why, Tom, I know she is. She witched pap. Pap says so his own self. He come along one day, and he see she was a-witching him, so he took up a rock, and if she hadnt dodged, hed a got her. Well, that very night he rolled offn a shed wher he was a layin drunk, and broke his arm.
Why, thats awful. How did he know she was a-witching him?
Lord, pap can tell, easy. Pap says when they keep looking at you right stiddy, theyre a-witching you. Specially if they mumble. Becuz when they mumble theyre saying the Lords Prayer backards.
Say, Hucky, when you going to try the cat?
To-night. I reckon theyll come after old Hoss Williams to-night.
But they buried him Saturday. Didnt they get him Saturday night?
Why, how you talk! How could their charms work till midnight? and then its Sunday. Devils dont slosh around much of a Sunday, I dont reckon.
I never thought of that. Thats so. Lemme go with you?
Of course-if you aint afeard.
Afeard! Taint likely. Will you meow?
Yes-and you meow back, if you get a chance. Last time, you kep me a-meowing around till old Hays went to throwing rocks at me and says Dern that cat! and so I hove a brick through his window-but dont you tell.
I wont. I couldnt meow that night, becuz auntie was watching me, but Ill meow this time. Say-whats that?
Nothing but a tick.
Whered you get him?
Out in the woods.
Whatll you take for him?
I dont know. I dont want to sell him.
All right. Its a mighty small tick, anyway.
Oh, anybody can run a tick down that dont belong to them. Im satisfied with it. Its a good enough tick for me.
Sho, theres ticks a plenty. I could have a thousand of em if I wanted to.
Well, why dont you? Becuz you know mighty well you cant. This is a pretty early tick, I reckon. Its the first one Ive seen this year.
Say, Huck-Ill give you my tooth for him.
Less see it.
Tom got out a bit of paper and carefully unrolled it. Huckleberry viewed it wistfully. The temptation was very strong. At last he said:
Is it genuwyne?
Tom lifted his lip and showed the vacancy.
Well, all right, said Huckleberry, its a trade.
Tom enclosed the tick in the percussion-cap box that had lately been the pinchbugs prison, and the boys separated, each feeling wealthier than before.
When Tom reached the little isolated frame school-house, he strode in briskly, with the manner of one who had come with all honest speed. He hung his hat on a peg and flung himself into his seat with business-like alacrity. The master, throned on high in his great splint-bottom arm-chair, was dozing, lulled by the drowsy hum of study. The interruption roused him.
Thomas Sawyer!
Tom knew that when his name was pronounced in full, it meant trouble.
Sir!
Come up here. Now, sir, why are you late again, as usual?
Tom was about to take refuge in a lie, when he saw two long tails of yellow hair hanging down a back that he recognized by the electric sympathy of love; and by that form was the only vacant place on the girls side of the school-house. He instantly said:
I stopped to talk with Huckleberry Finn!
The masters pulse stood still, and he stared helplessly. The buzz of study ceased. The pupils wondered if this foolhardy boy had lost his mind. The master said:
You-you did what?
Stopped to talk with Huckleberry Finn.
There was no mistaking the words.
Thomas Sawyer, this is the most astounding confession I have ever listened to. No mere ferule will answer for this offence. Take off your jacket.
The masters arm performed until it was tired and the stock of switches notably diminished. Then the order followed:
Now, sir, go and sit with the girls! And let this be a warning to you.
The titter that rippled around the room appeared to abash the boy, but in reality that result was caused rather more by his worshipful awe of his unknown idol and the dread pleasure that lay in his high good fortune. He sat down upon the end of the pine bench and the girl hitched herself away from him with a toss of her head. Nudges and winks and whispers traversed the room, but Tom sat still, with his arms upon the long, low desk before him, and seemed to study his book.
By and by attention ceased from him, and the accustomed school murmur rose upon the dull air once more. Presently the boy began to steal furtive glances at the girl. She observed it, made a mouth at him and gave him the back of her head for the space of a minute. When she cautiously faced around again, a peach lay before her. She thrust it away. Tom gently put it back. She thrust it away again, but with less animosity. Tom patiently returned it to its place. Then she let it remain. Tom scrawled on his slate, Please take it-I got more. The girl glanced at the words, but made no sign. Now the boy began to draw something on the slate, hiding his work with his left hand. For a time the girl refused to notice; but her human curiosity presently began to manifest itself by hardly perceptible signs. The boy worked on, apparently unconscious. The girl made a sort of non-committal attempt to see, but the boy did not betray that he was aware of it. At last she gave in and hesitatingly whispered: