I WANTED to go and look at a
place right about the middle
of the island that I'd found
when I was exploring; so we started
and soon got to it, because the
island was only three miles long
and a quarter of a
mile wide.
This place was a tolerable
long, steep hill or ridge about
forty foot high. We had a rough
time getting to the top, the
sides was so steep and the bushes
so thick. We tramped and clumb
around all over it, and by and
by found a good big cavern in
the rock, most up to the top
on the side towards Illinois.
The cavern was as big as two
or three rooms bunched together,
and Jim could stand up straight
in it. It was cool in there.
Jim was for putting our traps
in there right away, but I said
we didn't want to be climbing
up and down there all the time.
Jim said if we had the canoe
hid in a good place, and had
all the traps in the cavern,
we could rush there if anybody
was to come to the island, and
they would never find us without
dogs. And, besides, he said them
little birds had said it was
going to rain, and did I want
the things to get wet?
So we went back and got the
canoe, and paddled up abreast
the cavern, and lugged all the
traps up there. Then we hunted
up a place close by to hide the
canoe in, amongst the thick willows.
We took some fish off of the
lines and set them again, and
begun to get ready for dinner.
The door of the cavern was
big enough to roll a hogshead
in, and on one side of the door
the floor stuck out a little
bit, and was flat and a good
place to build a fire on. So
we built it there and cooked
dinner.
We spread the blankets inside
for a carpet, and eat our dinner
in there. We put all the other
things handy at the back of the
cavern. Pretty soon it darkened
up, and begun to thunder and
lighten; so the birds was right
about it. Directly it begun to
rain, and it rained like all
fury, too, and I never see the
wind blow so. It was one of these
regular summer storms. It would
get so dark that it looked all
blue-black outside, and lovely;
and the rain would thrash along
by so thick that the trees off
a little ways looked dim and
spiderwebby; and here would come
a blast of wind that would bend
the trees down and turn up the
pale underside of the leaves;
and then a perfect ripper of
a gust would follow along and
set the branches to tossing their
arms as if they was just wild;
and next, when it was just about
the bluest and blackest -- FST!
it was as bright as glory, and
you'd have a little glimpse of
treetops a-plunging about away
off yonder in the storm, hundreds
of yards further than you could
see before; dark as sin again
in a second, and now you'd hear
the thunder let go with an awful
crash, and then go rumbling,
grumbling, tumbling, down the
sky towards the under side of
the world, like rolling empty
barrels down stairs -- where
it's long stairs and they bounce
a good deal, you know.
"Jim, this is nice," I says. "I
wouldn't want to be nowhere else
but here. Pass me along another
hunk of fish and some hot corn-bread."
"Well, you
wouldn't a ben here 'f it hadn't
a ben for Jim. You'd
a ben down dah in de woods widout
any dinner, en gittn' mos' drownded,
too; dat you would, honey. Chickens
knows when it's gwyne to rain,
en so do de birds, chile."
The river went on raising and
raising for ten or twelve days,
till at last it was over the
banks. The water was three or
four foot deep on the island
in the low places and on the
Illinois bottom. On that side
it was a good many miles wide,
but on the Missouri side it was
the same old distance across
-- a half a mile -- because the
Missouri shore was just a wall
of high bluffs.
Daytimes we paddled all over
the island in the canoe, It was
mighty cool and shady in the
deep woods, even if the sun was
blazing outside. We went winding
in and out amongst the trees,
and sometimes the vines hung
so thick we had to back away
and go some other way. Well,
on every old broken-down tree
you could see rabbits and snakes
and such things; and when the
island had been overflowed a
day or two they got so tame,
on account of being hungry, that
you could paddle right up and
put your hand on them if you
wanted to; but not the snakes
and turtles -- they would slide
off in the water. The ridge our
cavern was in was full of them.
We could a had pets enough if
we'd wanted them.
One night we catched a little
section of a lumber raft -- nice
pine planks. It was twelve foot
wide and about fifteen or sixteen
foot long, and the top stood
above water six or seven inches
-- a solid, level floor. We could
see saw-logs go by in the daylight
sometimes, but we let them go;
we didn't show ourselves in daylight.
Another night when we was up
at the head of the island, just
before daylight, here comes a
frame-house down, on the west
side. She was a two-story, and
tilted over considerable. We
paddled out and got aboard --
clumb in at an upstairs window.
But it was too dark to see yet,
so we made the canoe fast and
set in her to wait for daylight.
The light begun to come before
we got to the foot of the island.
Then we looked in at the window.
We could make out a bed, and
a table, and two old chairs,
and lots of things around about
on the floor, and there was clothes
hanging against the wall. There
was something laying on the floor
in the far corner that looked
like a man. So Jim says:
"Hello, you!"
But it didn't budge. So I hollered
again, and then Jim says:
"De man ain't
asleep -- he's dead. You hold
still -- I'll
go en see."
He went, and bent down and
looked, and says:
"It's a dead
man. Yes, indeedy; naked, too.
He's ben shot in
de back. I reck'n he's ben dead
two er three days. Come in, Huck,
but doan' look at his face --
it's too gashly."
I didn't look at him at all.
Jim throwed some old rags over
him, but he needn't done it;
I didn't want to see him. There
was heaps of old greasy cards
scattered around over the floor,
and old whisky bottles, and a
couple of masks made out of black
cloth; and all over the walls
was the ignorantest kind of words
and pictures made with charcoal.
There was two old dirty calico
dresses, and a sun-bonnet, and
some women's underclothes hanging
against the wall, and some men's
clothing, too. We put the lot
into the canoe -- it might come
good. There was a boy's old speckled
straw hat on the floor; I took
that, too. And there was a bottle
that had had milk in it, and
it had a rag stopper for a baby
to suck. We would a took the
bottle, but it was broke. There
was a seedy old chest, and an
old hair trunk with the hinges
broke. They stood open, but there
warn't nothing left in them that
was any account. The way things
was scattered about we reckoned
the people left in a hurry, and
warn't fixed so as to carry off
most of their stuff.
We got an old tin lantern,
and a butcher-knife without any
handle, and a bran-new Barlow
knife worth two bits in any store,
and a lot of tallow candles,
and a tin candlestick, and a
gourd, and a tin cup, and a ratty
old bedquilt off the bed, and
a reticule with needles and pins
and beeswax and buttons and thread
and all such truck in it, and
a hatchet and some nails, and
a fishline as thick as my little
finger with some monstrous hooks
on it, and a roll of buckskin,
and a leather dog-collar, and
a horseshoe, and some vials of
medicine that didn't have no
label on them; and just as we
was leaving I found a tolerable
good curry-comb, and Jim he found
a ratty old fiddle-bow, and a
wooden leg. The straps was broke
off of it, but, barring that,
it was a good enough leg, though
it was too long for me and not
long enough for Jim, and we couldn't
find the other one, though we
hunted all around.
And so, take it all around,
we made a good haul. When we
was ready to shove off we was
a quarter of a mile below the
island, and it was pretty broad
day; so I made Jim lay down in
the canoe and cover up with the
quilt, because if he set up people
could tell he was a nigger a
good ways off. I paddled over
to the Illinois shore, and drifted
down most a half a mile doing
it. I crept up the dead water
under the bank, and hadn't no
accidents and didn't see nobody.
We got home all safe. |