MINERVA

hat letters?” “_Them_ letters. I be bound, if I have to take aholt of you I’ll—” “They’re in the trunk. There, now. And they’re just the same as they was when I got them out of the office. I hain’t looked into them, I hain’t touched them. But I knowed they’d make trouble, and I thought if you warn’t in no hurry, I’d—” “Well, you _do_ need skinning, there ain’t no mistake about it. And I wrote another one to tell you I was coming; and I s’pose he—” “No, it come yesterday; I hain’t read it yet, but _it’s_ all right, I’ve got that one.” I wanted to offer to bet two dollars she hadn’t, but I reckoned maybe it was just as safe to not to. So I never said nothing. CHAPTER THE LAST The first time I catched Tom private I asked him what was his idea, time of the evasion?—what it was he’d planned to do if the evasion worked all right and he managed to set a nigger free that was already free before? And he said, what he had planned in his head from the start, if we got Jim out all safe, was for us to run him down the river on the raft, and have adventures plumb to the mouth of the river, and then tell him about his being free, and take him back up home on a steamboat, in style, and pay him for his lost time, and write word ahead and get out all the niggers around, and have them waltz him into town with a torchlight procession and a brass-band, and then he would be a hero, and so would we. But I reckoned it was about as well the way it was. We had Jim out of the chains in no time, and when Aunt Polly and Uncle Silas and Aunt Sally found out how good he helped the doctor nurse Tom, they made a heap of fuss over him, and fixed him up prime, and give him all he wanted to eat, and a good time, and nothing to do. And we had him up to the sick-room, and had a high talk; and Tom give Jim forty dollars for being prisoner for us so patient, and doing it up so good, and Jim was pleased most to death, and busted out, and says: “_Dah_, now, Huck, what I tell you?—what I tell you up dah on Jackson islan’? I _tole_ you I got a hairy breas’, en what’s de sign un it; en I _tole_ you I ben rich wunst, en gwineter to be rich _agin;_ en it’s come true; en heah she _is! Dah_, now! doan’ talk to _me_—signs is _signs_, mine I tell you; en I knowed jis’ ’s well ’at I ’uz gwineter be rich agin as I’s a-stannin’ heah dis minute!” And then Tom he talked along and talked along, and says, le’s all three slide out of here one of these nights and get an outfit, and go for howling adventures amongst the Injuns, over in the Territory, for a couple of weeks or two; and I says, all right, that suits me, but I ain’t got no money for to buy the outfit, and I reckon I couldn’t get none from home, because it’s likely pap’s been back before now, and got it all away from Judge Thatcher and drunk it up. “No, he hain’t,” Tom says; “it’s all there yet—six thousand dollars and more; and your pap hain’t ever been back since. Hadn’t when I come away, anyhow.” Jim says, kind of solemn: “He ain’t a-comin’ back no mo’, Huck.” I says: “Why, Jim?” “Nemmine why, Huck—but he ain’t comin’ back no mo.” But I kept at him; so at last he says: “Doan’ you ’member de house dat was float’n down de river, en dey wuz a man in dah, kivered up, en I went in en unkivered him and didn’ let you come in? Well, den, you kin git yo’ money when you wants it, kase dat wuz him.” Tom’s most well now, and got his bullet a