THE ADVENTURES OF TOM SAWYER 3 страница

when he saw this small new-comer his soul was all ablaze with bliss in

a moment. The next moment he was " showing off" with all his might

--cuffing boys, pulling hair, making faces--in a word, using every art

that seemed likely to fascinate a girl and win her applause. His

exaltation had but one alloy--the memory of his humiliation in this

angel's garden--and that record in sand was fast washing out, under

the waves of happiness that were sweeping over it now.

The visitors were given the highest seat of honor, and as soon as Mr.

Walters' speech was finished, he introduced them to the school. The

middle-aged man turned out to be a prodigious personage--no less a one

than the county judge--altogether the most august creation these

children had ever looked upon--and they wondered what kind of material

he was made of--and they half wanted to hear him roar, and were half

afraid he might, too. He was from Constantinople, twelve miles away--so

he had travelled, and seen the world--these very eyes had looked upon

the county court-house--which was said to have a tin roof. The awe

which these reflections inspired was attested by the impressive silence

and the ranks of staring eyes. This was the great Judge Thatcher,

brother of their own lawyer. Jeff Thatcher immediately went forward, to

be familiar with the great man and be envied by the school. It would

have been music to his soul to hear the whisperings:

" Look at him, Jim! He's a going up there. Say--look! he's a going to

shake hands with him--he IS shaking hands with him! By jings, don't you

wish you was Jeff? "

Mr. Walters fell to " showing off, " with all sorts of official

bustlings and activities, giving orders, delivering judgments,

discharging directions here, there, everywhere that he could find a

target. The librarian " showed off" --running hither and thither with his

arms full of books and making a deal of the splutter and fuss that

insect authority delights in. The young lady teachers " showed off"

--bending sweetly over pupils that were lately being boxed, lifting

pretty warning fingers at bad little boys and patting good ones

lovingly. The young gentlemen teachers " showed off" with small

scoldings and other little displays of authority and fine attention to

discipline--and most of the teachers, of both sexes, found business up

at the library, by the pulpit; and it was business that frequently had

to be done over again two or three times (with much seeming vexation).

The little girls " showed off" in various ways, and the little boys

" showed off" with such diligence that the air was thick with paper wads

and the murmur of scufflings. And above it all the great man sat and

beamed a majestic judicial smile upon all the house, and warmed himself

in the sun of his own grandeur--for he was " showing off, " too.

There was only one thing wanting to make Mr. Walters' ecstasy

complete, and that was a chance to deliver a Bible-prize and exhibit a

prodigy. Several pupils had a few yellow tickets, but none had enough

--he had been around among the star pupils inquiring. He would have given

worlds, now, to have that German lad back again with a sound mind.

And now at this moment, when hope was dead, Tom Sawyer came forward

with nine yellow tickets, nine red tickets, and ten blue ones, and

demanded a Bible. This was a thunderbolt out of a clear sky. Walters

was not expecting an application from this source for the next ten

years. But there was no getting around it--here were the certified

checks, and they were good for their face. Tom was therefore elevated

to a place with the Judge and the other elect, and the great news was

announced from headquarters. It was the most stunning surprise of the

decade, and so profound was the sensation that it lifted the new hero

up to the judicial one's altitude, and the school had two marvels to

gaze upon in place of one. The boys were all eaten up with envy--but

those that suffered the bitterest pangs were those who perceived too

late that they themselves had contributed to this hated splendor by

trading tickets to Tom for the wealth he had amassed in selling

whitewashing privileges. These despised themselves, as being the dupes

of a wily fraud, a guileful snake in the grass.

The prize was delivered to Tom with as much effusion as the

superintendent could pump up under the circumstances; but it lacked

somewhat of the true gush, for the poor fellow's instinct taught him

that there was a mystery here that could not well bear the light,

perhaps; it was simply preposterous that this boy had warehoused two

thousand sheaves of Scriptural wisdom on his premises--a dozen would

strain his capacity, without a doubt.

Amy Lawrence was proud and glad, and she tried to make Tom see it in

her face--but he wouldn't look. She wondered; then she was just a grain

troubled; next a dim suspicion came and went--came again; she watched;

a furtive glance told her worlds--and then her heart broke, and she was

jealous, and angry, and the tears came and she hated everybody. Tom

most of all (she thought).

Tom was introduced to the Judge; but his tongue was tied, his breath

would hardly come, his heart quaked--partly because of the awful

greatness of the man, but mainly because he was her parent. He would

have liked to fall down and worship him, if it were in the dark. The

Judge put his hand on Tom's head and called him a fine little man, and

asked him what his name was. The boy stammered, gasped, and got it out:

" Tom. "

" Oh, no, not Tom--it is--"

" Thomas. "

" Ah, that's it. I thought there was more to it, maybe. That's very

well. But you've another one I daresay, and you'll tell it to me, won't

you? "

" Tell the gentleman your other name, Thomas, " said Walters, " and say

sir. You mustn't forget your manners. "

" Thomas Sawyer--sir. "

" That's it! That's a good boy. Fine boy. Fine, manly little fellow.

Two thousand verses is a great many--very, very great many. And you

never can be sorry for the trouble you took to learn them; for

knowledge is worth more than anything there is in the world; it's what

makes great men and good men; you'll be a great man and a good man

yourself, some day, Thomas, and then you'll look back and say, It's all

owing to the precious Sunday-school privileges of my boyhood--it's all

owing to my dear teachers that taught me to learn--it's all owing to

the good superintendent, who encouraged me, and watched over me, and

gave me a beautiful Bible--a splendid elegant Bible--to keep and have

it all for my own, always--it's all owing to right bringing up! That is

what you will say, Thomas--and you wouldn't take any money for those

two thousand verses--no indeed you wouldn't. And now you wouldn't mind

telling me and this lady some of the things you've learned--no, I know

you wouldn't--for we are proud of little boys that learn. Now, no

doubt you know the names of all the twelve disciples. Won't you tell us

the names of the first two that were appointed? "

Tom was tugging at a button-hole and looking sheepish. He blushed,

now, and his eyes fell. Mr. Walters' heart sank within him. He said to

himself, it is not possible that the boy can answer the simplest

question--why DID the Judge ask him? Yet he felt obliged to speak up

and say:

" Answer the gentleman, Thomas--don't be afraid. "

Tom still hung fire.

" Now I know you'll tell me, " said the lady. " The names of the first

two disciples were--"

" DAVID AND GOLIAH! "

Let us draw the curtain of charity over the rest of the scene.

CHAPTER V

ABOUT half-past ten the cracked bell of the small church began to

ring, and presently the people began to gather for the morning sermon.

The Sunday-school children distributed themselves about the house and

occupied pews with their parents, so as to be under supervision. Aunt

Polly came, and Tom and Sid and Mary sat with her--Tom being placed

next the aisle, in order that he might be as far away from the open

window and the seductive outside summer scenes as possible. The crowd

filed up the aisles: the aged and needy postmaster, who had seen better

days; the mayor and his wife--for they had a mayor there, among other

unnecessaries; the justice of the peace; the widow Douglass, fair,

smart, and forty, a generous, good-hearted soul and well-to-do, her

hill mansion the only palace in the town, and the most hospitable and

much the most lavish in the matter of festivities that St. Petersburg

could boast; the bent and venerable Major and Mrs. Ward; lawyer

Riverson, the new notable from a distance; next the belle of the

village, followed by a troop of lawn-clad and ribbon-decked young

heart-breakers; then all the young clerks in town in a body--for they

had stood in the vestibule sucking their cane-heads, a circling wall of

oiled and simpering admirers, till the last girl had run their gantlet;

and last of all came the Model Boy, Willie Mufferson, taking as heedful

care of his mother as if she were cut glass. He always brought his

mother to church, and was the pride of all the matrons. The boys all

hated him, he was so good. And besides, he had been " thrown up to them"

so much. His white handkerchief was hanging out of his pocket behind, as

usual on Sundays--accidentally. Tom had no handkerchief, and he looked

upon boys who had as snobs.

The congregation being fully assembled, now, the bell rang once more,

to warn laggards and stragglers, and then a solemn hush fell upon the

church which was only broken by the tittering and whispering of the

choir in the gallery. The choir always tittered and whispered all

through service. There was once a church choir that was not ill-bred,

but I have forgotten where it was, now. It was a great many years ago,

and I can scarcely remember anything about it, but I think it was in

some foreign country.

The minister gave out the hymn, and read it through with a relish, in

a peculiar style which was much admired in that part of the country.

His voice began on a medium key and climbed steadily up till it reached

a certain point, where it bore with strong emphasis upon the topmost

word and then plunged down as if from a spring-board:

Shall I be car-ri-ed toe the skies, on flow'ry BEDS of ease,

Whilst others fight to win the prize, and sail thro' BLOODY seas?

He was regarded as a wonderful reader. At church " sociables" he was

always called upon to read poetry; and when he was through, the ladies

would lift up their hands and let them fall helplessly in their laps,

and " wall" their eyes, and shake their heads, as much as to say, " Words

cannot express it; it is too beautiful, TOO beautiful for this mortal

earth. "

After the hymn had been sung, the Rev. Mr. Sprague turned himself into

a bulletin-board, and read off " notices" of meetings and societies and

things till it seemed that the list would stretch out to the crack of

doom--a queer custom which is still kept up in America, even in cities,

away here in this age of abundant newspapers. Often, the less there is

to justify a traditional custom, the harder it is to get rid of it.

And now the minister prayed. A good, generous prayer it was, and went

into details: it pleaded for the church, and the little children of the

church; for the other churches of the village; for the village itself;

for the county; for the State; for the State officers; for the United

States; for the churches of the United States; for Congress; for the

President; for the officers of the Government; for poor sailors, tossed

by stormy seas; for the oppressed millions groaning under the heel of

European monarchies and Oriental despotisms; for such as have the light

and the good tidings, and yet have not eyes to see nor ears to hear

withal; for the heathen in the far islands of the sea; and closed with

a supplication that the words he was about to speak might find grace

and favor, and be as seed sown in fertile ground, yielding in time a

grateful harvest of good. Amen.

There was a rustling of dresses, and the standing congregation sat

down. The boy whose history this book relates did not enjoy the prayer,

he only endured it--if he even did that much. He was restive all

through it; he kept tally of the details of the prayer, unconsciously

--for he was not listening, but he knew the ground of old, and the

clergyman's regular route over it--and when a little trifle of new

matter was interlarded, his ear detected it and his whole nature

resented it; he considered additions unfair, and scoundrelly. In the

midst of the prayer a fly had lit on the back of the pew in front of

him and tortured his spirit by calmly rubbing its hands together,

embracing its head with its arms, and polishing it so vigorously that

it seemed to almost part company with the body, and the slender thread

of a neck was exposed to view; scraping its wings with its hind legs

and smoothing them to its body as if they had been coat-tails; going

through its whole toilet as tranquilly as if it knew it was perfectly

safe. As indeed it was; for as sorely as Tom's hands itched to grab for

it they did not dare--he believed his soul would be instantly destroyed

if he did such a thing while the prayer was going on. But with the

closing sentence his hand began to curve and steal forward; and the

instant the " Amen" was out the fly was a prisoner of war. His aunt

detected the act and made him let it go.

The minister gave out his text and droned along monotonously through

an argument that was so prosy that many a head by and by began to nod

--and yet it was an argument that dealt in limitless fire and brimstone

and thinned the predestined elect down to a company so small as to be

hardly worth the saving. Tom counted the pages of the sermon; after

church he always knew how many pages there had been, but he seldom knew

anything else about the discourse. However, this time he was really

interested for a little while. The minister made a grand and moving

picture of the assembling together of the world's hosts at the

millennium when the lion and the lamb should lie down together and a

little child should lead them. But the pathos, the lesson, the moral of

the great spectacle were lost upon the boy; he only thought of the

conspicuousness of the principal character before the on-looking

nations; his face lit with the thought, and he said to himself that he

wished he could be that child, if it was a tame lion.

Now he lapsed into suffering again, as the dry argument was resumed.

Presently he bethought him of a treasure he had and got it out. It was

a large black beetle with formidable jaws--a " pinchbug, " he called it.

It was in a percussion-cap box. The first thing the beetle did was to

take him by the finger. A natural fillip followed, the beetle went

floundering into the aisle and lit on its back, and the hurt finger

went into the boy's mouth. The beetle lay there working its helpless

legs, unable to turn over. Tom eyed it, and longed for it; but it was

safe out of his reach. Other people uninterested in the sermon found

relief in the beetle, and they eyed it too. Presently a vagrant poodle

dog came idling along, sad at heart, lazy with the summer softness and

the quiet, weary of captivity, sighing for change. He spied the beetle;

the drooping tail lifted and wagged. He surveyed the prize; walked

around it; smelt at it from a safe distance; walked around it again;

grew bolder, and took a closer smell; then lifted his lip and made a

gingerly snatch at it, just missing it; made another, and another;

began to enjoy the diversion; subsided to his stomach with the beetle

between his paws, and continued his experiments; grew weary at last,

and then indifferent and absent-minded. His head nodded, and little by

little his chin descended and touched the enemy, who seized it. There

was a sharp yelp, a flirt of the poodle's head, and the beetle fell a

couple of yards away, and lit on its back once more. The neighboring

spectators shook with a gentle inward joy, several faces went behind

fans and handkerchiefs, and Tom was entirely happy. The dog looked

foolish, and probably felt so; but there was resentment in his heart,

too, and a craving for revenge. So he went to the beetle and began a

wary attack on it again; jumping at it from every point of a circle,

lighting with his fore-paws within an inch of the creature, making even

closer snatches at it with his teeth, and jerking his head till his

ears flapped again. But he grew tired once more, after a while; tried

to amuse himself with a fly but found no relief; followed an ant

around, with his nose close to the floor, and quickly wearied of that;

yawned, sighed, forgot the beetle entirely, and sat down on it. Then

there was a wild yelp of agony and the poodle went sailing up the

aisle; the yelps continued, and so did the dog; he crossed the house in

front of the altar; he flew down the other aisle; he crossed before the

doors; he clamored up the home-stretch; his anguish grew with his

progress, till presently he was but a woolly comet moving in its orbit

with the gleam and the speed of light. At last the frantic sufferer

sheered from its course, and sprang into its master's lap; he flung it

out of the window, and the voice of distress quickly thinned away and

died in the distance.

By this time the whole church was red-faced and suffocating with

suppressed laughter, and the sermon had come to a dead standstill. The

discourse was resumed presently, but it went lame and halting, all

possibility of impressiveness being at an end; for even the gravest

sentiments were constantly being received with a smothered burst of

unholy mirth, under cover of some remote pew-back, as if the poor

parson had said a rarely facetious thing. It was a genuine relief to

the whole congregation when the ordeal was over and the benediction

pronounced.

Tom Sawyer went home quite cheerful, thinking to himself that there

was some satisfaction about divine service when there was a bit of

variety in it. He had but one marring thought; he was willing that the

dog should play with his pinchbug, but he did not think it was upright

in him to carry it off.

CHAPTER VI

MONDAY morning found Tom Sawyer miserable. Monday morning always found

him so--because it began another week's slow suffering in school. He

generally began that day with wishing he had had no intervening

holiday, it made the going into captivity and fetters again so much

more odious.

Tom lay thinking. Presently it occurred to him that he wished he was

sick; then he could stay home from school. Here was a vague

possibility. He canvassed his system. No ailment was found, and he

investigated again. This time he thought he could detect colicky

symptoms, and he began to encourage them with considerable hope. But

they soon grew feeble, and presently died wholly away. He reflected

further. Suddenly he discovered something. One of his upper front teeth

was loose. This was lucky; he was about to begin to groan, as a

" starter, " as he called it, when it occurred to him that if he came

into court with that argument, his aunt would pull it out, and that

would hurt. So he thought he would hold the tooth in reserve for the

present, and seek further. Nothing offered for some little time, and

then he remembered hearing the doctor tell about a certain thing that

laid up a patient for two or three weeks and threatened to make him

lose a finger. So the boy eagerly drew his sore toe from under the

sheet and held it up for inspection. But now he did not know the

necessary symptoms. However, it seemed well worth while to chance it,

so he fell to groaning with considerable spirit.

But Sid slept on unconscious.

Tom groaned louder, and fancied that he began to feel pain in the toe.

No result from Sid.

Tom was panting with his exertions by this time. He took a rest and

then swelled himself up and fetched a succession of admirable groans.

Sid snored on.

Tom was aggravated. He said, " Sid, Sid! " and shook him. This course

worked well, and Tom began to groan again. Sid yawned, stretched, then

brought himself up on his elbow with a snort, and began to stare at

Tom. Tom went on groaning. Sid said:

" Tom! Say, Tom! " [No response. ] " Here, Tom! TOM! What is the matter,

Tom? " And he shook him and looked in his face anxiously.

Tom moaned out:

" Oh, don't, Sid. Don't joggle me. "

" Why, what's the matter, Tom? I must call auntie. "

" No--never mind. It'll be over by and by, maybe. Don't call anybody. "

" But I must! DON'T groan so, Tom, it's awful. How long you been this

way? "

" Hours. Ouch! Oh, don't stir so, Sid, you'll kill me. "

" Tom, why didn't you wake me sooner? Oh, Tom, DON'T! It makes my

flesh crawl to hear you. Tom, what is the matter? "

" I forgive you everything, Sid. [Groan. ] Everything you've ever done

to me. When I'm gone--"

" Oh, Tom, you ain't dying, are you? Don't, Tom--oh, don't. Maybe--"

" I forgive everybody, Sid. [Groan. ] Tell 'em so, Sid. And Sid, you

give my window-sash and my cat with one eye to that new girl that's

come to town, and tell her--"

But Sid had snatched his clothes and gone. Tom was suffering in

reality, now, so handsomely was his imagination working, and so his

groans had gathered quite a genuine tone.

Sid flew down-stairs and said:

" Oh, Aunt Polly, come! Tom's dying! "

" Dying! "

" Yes'm. Don't wait--come quick! "

" Rubbage! I don't believe it! "

But she fled up-stairs, nevertheless, with Sid and Mary at her heels.

And her face grew white, too, and her lip trembled. When she reached

the bedside she gasped out:

" You, Tom! Tom, what's the matter with you? "

" Oh, auntie, I'm--"

" What's the matter with you--what is the matter with you, child? "

" Oh, auntie, my sore toe's mortified! "

The old lady sank down into a chair and laughed a little, then cried a

little, then did both together. This restored her and she said:

" Tom, what a turn you did give me. Now you shut up that nonsense and

climb out of this. "

The groans ceased and the pain vanished from the toe. The boy felt a

little foolish, and he said:

" Aunt Polly, it SEEMED mortified, and it hurt so I never minded my

tooth at all. "

" Your tooth, indeed! What's the matter with your tooth? "

" One of them's loose, and it aches perfectly awful. "

" There, there, now, don't begin that groaning again. Open your mouth.

Well--your tooth IS loose, but you're not going to die about that.

Mary, get me a silk thread, and a chunk of fire out of the kitchen. "

Tom said:

" Oh, please, auntie, don't pull it out. It don't hurt any more. I wish

I may never stir if it does. Please don't, auntie. I don't want to stay

home from school. "

" Oh, you don't, don't you? So all this row was because you thought

you'd get to stay home from school and go a-fishing? Tom, Tom, I love

you so, and you seem to try every way you can to break my old heart

with your outrageousness. " By this time the dental instruments were

ready. The old lady made one end of the silk thread fast to Tom's tooth

with a loop and tied the other to the bedpost. Then she seized the

chunk of fire and suddenly thrust it almost into the boy's face. The

tooth hung dangling by the bedpost, now.

But all trials bring their compensations. As Tom wended to school

after breakfast, he was the envy of every boy he met because the gap in

his upper row of teeth enabled him to expectorate in a new and

admirable way. He gathered quite a following of lads interested in the

exhibition; and one that had cut his finger and had been a centre of

fascination and homage up to this time, now found himself suddenly

without an adherent, and shorn of his glory. His heart was heavy, and

he said with a disdain which he did not feel that it wasn't anything to

spit like Tom Sawyer; but another boy said, " Sour grapes! " and he

wandered away a dismantled hero.

Shortly Tom came upon the juvenile pariah of the village, Huckleberry

Finn, son of the town drunkard. Huckleberry was cordially hated and

dreaded by all the mothers of the town, because he was idle and lawless

and vulgar and bad--and because all their children admired him so, and

delighted in his forbidden society, and wished they dared to be like

him. Tom was like the rest of the respectable boys, in that he envied

Huckleberry his gaudy outcast condition, and was under strict orders

not to play with him. So he played with him every time he got a chance.

Huckleberry was always dressed in the cast-off clothes of full-grown

men, and they were in perennial bloom and fluttering with rags. His hat

was a vast ruin with a wide crescent lopped out of its brim; his coat,

when he wore one, hung nearly to his heels and had the rearward buttons

far down the back; but one suspender supported his trousers; the seat

of the trousers bagged low and contained nothing, the fringed legs

dragged in the dirt when not rolled up.

Huckleberry came and went, at his own free will. He slept on doorsteps

in fine weather and in empty hogsheads in wet; he did not have to go to

school or to church, or call any being master or obey anybody; he could

go fishing or swimming when and where he chose, and stay as long as it

suited him; nobody forbade him to fight; he could sit up as late as he

pleased; he was always the first boy that went barefoot in the spring