by Mark Twain
The duke says:
"Leave me alone to cipher out a way so we can run in the daytime if we want to. I'll think the thing over-I'll invent a plan that'll fix it. We'll let it alone for to-day, because of course we don't want to go by that town yonder in daylight-it mightn't be healthy."
Towards night it begun to darken up and look like rain; the heat lightning was squirting around low down in the sky, and the leaves was beginning to shiver-it was going to be pretty ugly, it was easy to see that. So the duke and the king went to overhauling our wigwam, to see what the beds was like. My bed was a straw tick better than Jim's, which was a corn-shuck tick; there's always cobs around about in a shuck tick, and they poke into you and hurt; and when you roll over the dry shucks sound like you was rolling over in a pile of dead leaves; it makes such a rustling that you wake up. Well, the duke allowed he would take my bed; but the king allowed he wouldn't. He says:
"I should a reckoned the difference in rank would a sejested to you that a corn-shuck bed warn't just fitten for me to sleep on. Your Grace'll take the shuck bed yourself."
Jim and me was in a sweat again for a minute, being afraid there was going to be some more trouble amongst them; so we was pretty glad when the duke says:
"'Tis my fate to be always ground into the mire under the iron heel of oppression. Misfortune has broken my once haughty spirit; I yield, I submit; ‘tis my fate. I am alone in the world-let me suffer; can bear it."
I was still dreamin’ up a scheme to rid ourselves of these jokers, but so-far I haidn't come up with nothin’ much. An’ Jim was keepin’ pretty mum.
The king comes over an’ says, “I knows yer a runnin’ zomby ‘cause I seen the sign at the print shop. Y'ain't foolin’ me, Jim. I knows precisely what's goin’ on here, an’ I also knows there be a reward fo’ yo’ capture, too. You jest keep thet in mind. You jest rememba’ it's not you two what calls the shots on dis river."
An’ I thought about lettin’ out a string o’ cuss-words, just then, but Jim pat me on th’ shoulder as to say to let it pass.
Them royals seemed to be holdin’ all the face cards.
We got away as soon as it was good and dark. The king told us to stand well out towards the middle of the river, and not show a light till we got a long ways below the town. We come in sight of the little bunch of lights by and by-that was the town, you know-and slid by, about a half a mile out, all right. When we was three-quarters of a mile below we hoisted up our signal lantern; and about ten o'clock it come on to rain and blow and thunder and lighten like everything; so the king told us to both stay on watch till the weather got better; then him and the duke crawled into the wigwam and turned in for the night. It was my watch below till twelve, but I wouldn't a turned in anyway if I'd had a bed, because a body don't see such a storm as that every day in the week, not by a long sight. My souls, how the wind did scream along! And every second or two there'd come a glare that lit up the white-caps for a half a mile around, and you'd see the islands looking dusty through the rain, and the trees thrashing around in the wind; then comes a h-whack!-bum! bum! bumble-umble-um-bum-bum-bum-bum-and the thunder would go rumbling and grumbling away, and quit-and then rip comes another flash and another sockdolager. The waves most washed me off the raft sometimes, but I hadn't any clothes on, and didn't mind. We didn't have no trouble about snags; the lightning was glaring and flittering around so constant that we could see them plenty soon enough to throw her head this way or that and miss them.
I had the middle watch, you know, but I was pretty sleepy by that time, so Jim he said he would stand the first half of it for me; he was always mighty good that way, Jim was. He come out an’ his lips looked to be dark and wet, but I couldn’ tell for sure in the night. So I crawled into the wigwam and beheld a right dreadful sight.
The king and the duke was deader ‘n hell.
The one fella's eyes was all bugged out an’ starin’ into eternity, and the other was a terr'ble bloody mess. Lookt to me like Jim'd strangled one fella with one hand and mebby gouged the’ other to death with a pick. There wasn't much about that one to identify him, ‘cept I could see the wide-eyed fella was the king so this one had to be the duke, by my deduction.
I come out an’ tells Jim to explain himself and tell about what happened. Jim says:
"They was bad men, Huck. You says so yo'self."
I says, “So you din’ hafta kill ‘em for it."
"But I jes’ wanted to hab me a li'l taste. I don’ wan’ do wrong, Huck. I's lookin’ out fo’ you. An’ fo’ me. An’ I knowed those two was gonna mess it all up fo’ us. I jus’ had to take a li'l taste an’ satisfy my innerds."
"You had to go an’ eat that fella's face? You couldn't stop yourself?"
"Wall, I reckon I coulda, but I d'cided not to."
'Bout then the dark sky opened up an’ the rain come down. I laid down on the deck an’ just let it wash over me, an’ it was peaceful.
I didn't mind the rain, because it was warm, and the waves warn't running so high now. About two they come up again, though, and Jim was going to roust me; but he changed his mind, because he reckoned they warn't high enough yet to do any harm; but he was mistaken about that, for pretty soon all of a sudden along comes a regular ripper and washed me overboard. It most re-killed Jim a-laughing. He was the easiest bagger to laugh that ever was, anyway.
An’ when we got me back on the raft, Jim decides it's time to get rid of the royalty, and so we dumps the king and the duke over the side an’ waves goodbye to ‘em. I din’ feel too bad about it. I reckoned I shoulda felt worse, but I didn't. Mebby somethin’ was hard'ning inside me. Or soft'ning, too.
I took the watch, and Jim he laid down and snored away; and by and by the storm let up for good and all; and the first cabin-light that showed I rousted him out, and we slid the raft into hiding quarters for the day. Me an’ Jim ate breakfast, an’ Jim looked mighty pleased of himself. I says:
"You sure did chew that fella good."
An’ Jim boasted, “I coulda et lots more, too, but I din’ wan’ seem a glutton. I jus’ wanted to fix the sitchyashun, is all. You did say they ‘uz bad men, an’ I knowed they was fixin’ to harm us."
"Yah, you did good."
"Thanky, Huck."
There was a little one-horse town about three mile down the bend, and we was out of coffee, so Jim said I better go along in the canoe and get some.
When I got there there warn't nobody stirring; streets empty, and perfectly dead and still, like Sunday. I found a sick negro sunning himself in a back yard. He was all fancy an’ free an’ livin’ like a white man, ‘xcept he was dyin'; and he said everybody that warn't too young or too sick or too old was gone to camp-meeting, about two mile back in the woods. An’ that wasn't too many people either, on account o’ most folks were boilin’ up with pox, shut into their homes.
The negro said, “So many dyin', dey won't be no one left to bag us."
I had some smoke and then lit out for the camp-meeting.
I got there in about a half an hour fairly dripping, for it was a most awful hot day. There was as much as a thousand people there, far more than the dyin’ negro figured, but also most of ‘em come from twenty mile around. The woods was full of teams and wagons, hitched everywheres, feeding out of the wagon-troughs and stomping to keep off the flies. There was sheds made out of poles and roofed over with branches, where they had lemonade and gingerbread to sell, and piles of watermelons and green corn and such-like truck.
The preaching was going on under the same kinds of sheds, only they was bigger and held crowds of people. The benches was made out of outside slabs of logs, with holes bored in the round side to drive sticks into for legs. They didn't have no backs. The preachers had high platforms to stand on at one end of the sheds. The women had on sun-bonnets; and some had linsey-woolsey frocks, some gingham ones, and a few of the young ones had on calico. Some of the young men was barefooted, and some of the children didn't have on any clothes but just a tow-linen
shirt. Some of the old women was knitting, and some of the young folks was courting on the sly. A few folks brought their baggers along, and these just stood out at the perimeter, stupidly, and stunk all th’ way to Heaven.
The first shed I came to the preacher was lining out a hymn. He lined out two lines, everybody sung it, and it was kind of grand to hear it, there was so many of them and they done it in such a rousing way; then he lined out two more for them to sing-and so on. The people woke up more and more, and sung louder and louder; and towards the end some begun to groan, and some begun to shout, and even some of the baggers at the back began to sway, like they wasn't afraid of Hell no more. Then the preacher begun to preach, and begun in earnest, too; and went weaving first to one side of the platform and then the other, and then a-leaning down over the front of it, with his arms and his body going all the time, and shouting his words out with all his might; and every now and then he would hold up his Bible and spread it open, and kind of pass it around this way and that, shouting, “It's the brazen serpent in the wilderness! Look upon it and live!” And people would shout out, “Glory!-a-a-men!” And so he went on, and the people groaning and crying and saying amen:
"Oh, come to the mourners’ bench! come, black with sin! (amen!) come, sick and sore! (amen!) come, lame and halt and blind! (amen!) come, pore and needy, sunk in shame! (a-a-men!) come, all that's worn and soiled and suffering!-come with a broken spirit! come with a contrite heart! come in your rags and sin and dirt! the waters that cleanse is free, the door of heaven stands open-oh, enter in and be at rest!” (a-a-men! glory, glory hallelujah!)
And then he talked about the fissythis that was takin’ more folks ‘n ever before, an’ how ever'one had to pray harder to right the situation; an’ if you lost someone an’ they come back, you was s'posed to keep prayin’ for them so the devil would let go of their tortured souls.
Then came more singin'.
And so on. You couldn't make out what the preacher said any more, on account of the shouting and crying. Folks got up everywheres in the crowd, and worked their way just by main strength to the mourners’ bench, with the tears running down their faces; and when all the mourners had got up there to the front benches in a crowd, they sung and shouted and flung themselves down on the straw, just crazy and wild.
Well, somethin’ got a-hold of me, and I raised my little voice up so you could hear me over everybody; and next I went a-charging up on to the platform, and the preacher he begged me to speak to the people, and I done it.
I told them the same story I told the royals, but with a few alt'rations that I added as I went along, which is how most storytellin’ goes, anyway. I talked about livin’ in Pike County, an’ how ever'one died but me an’ pap an’ a brother named Ike. I talked about poorness and debt and pap's drinkin’ and gamblin'; an’ how I was orphaned and kidnapped; an’ how I excaped; and how me an my Uncle Ben was on a raft, headed for a new life in the South; an’ how a steamboat run over the forrard corner of the raft last night, and we both went overboard and dove under the wheel; and how I almost drowned comin’ ashore ‘cause I barely knowed how to swim.
And then I busted into tears, and so did everybody. Then somebody sings out, “Take up a collection for him, take up a collection!” Well, a half a dozen made a jump to do it, but somebody sings out, “Let him pass the hat around!” Then everybody said it, the preacher too.
So I went all through the crowd with my hat swabbing my eyes, and blessing the people and praising them and thanking them for being so good to the poor orphans of the world; and every little while the prettiest kind of girls, with the tears running down their cheeks, would up and ask me would I let them kiss me for to remember me by; and I always done it, even though it made me want to squirm outta my own skin-and I was invited to stay a week; and everybody wanted me to live in their houses, and said they'd think it was an honor; but I said I was headin’ overland to try to make contact with an older sister that was my sole livin’ relative an’ I hadn't time to waste.
I had to duck away and lose myself under the crowd ‘fore I could get away from there.
When I got back to the raft and I come to count up, I found I had collected eighty-seven dollars and seventy-five cents. And then I had fetched away a bag o’ coffee and a three-gallon jug of whisky that I found on the back of a wagon, too, for Jim. I told him about the poster I saw at the post office:
"There was a picture of a runaway bagger with flies buzzin’ around his head, and a two-hundred-dollar reward under it. The reading was all about you, and just described you to a dot. It said you run away from St. Jacques’ plantation, forty mile below New Orleans, last winter, and likely went north, and whoever would catch you and send him back he could have the reward and expenses."
Jim said, “Sho’ ‘nuff, dat's what de royals was fixin’ to do. It warn't no bluff, was it, Huck? Folks is a-huntin’ fo’ me now."
"Seems mebby, Jim."
We laid low and kept still, and never shoved out till nearly ten o'clock; then we slid by, pretty wide away from the town, and didn't hoist our lantern till we was clear out of sight of it.
When Jim called me to take the watch at four in the morning, he says:
"Huck, does you reck'n we gwyne to run acrost any mo’ kings on dis trip?"
"No,” I says, “I reckon not."
"Well,” says he, “dat's all right, den. I reckon I doan’ like kings."
I found Jim saying some mumbo-jumbo which he said was some voodoo, just in case the ghosts of the royals be followin’ after us. I agreed that was probably a sound idea.
CHAPTER XXI
It was after sun-up now, an’ we tied up at a sheltered spot under a tall forest. Jim went in the water to scrub off some of the rot, but he didn't go very deep. He said he didn't feel very float-worthy, nowadays. Said he gave up on breathin’ a long time ago and maybe there weren't no air left in him. After breakfast I took a seat on the corner of the raft, and rolled up my britches, and let my legs dangle in the water, so as to be comfortable, and I lit a smoke, and went to enjoying the day. An’ it wasn't minutes before another someone come traipsing along to get into our affairs.
This fella introduced hisself as Bert Hock, but Jim heard it as Birdock and that's what we ended up callin’ him ever after.
Birdock said he was just freshly dead, a brand-new bagger, and would we mind if he rode along with us so's he could sell himself on the market yonder. Jim said:
"I neva heard o’ no bagger sellin’ himself. You is dead now. The only one who kin sell you is some'un other than you'self."
"Jus’ ‘cause somethin’ ain't been done before,” Birdock said, “it don't mean it can't be done at all. An’ why cain't a bunderlug sell his own self? I knows of wimmen who sells themselves all time."
That din’ sit right with ol’ Jim.
Myself, I couln’ see a thing about Bert Hock thet would make me believe he was back from Hell. He didn't look the least bit dead, except for a patch of bumps on ‘is face, but those was beet red an’ full of fresh blood. He had no black parts or blue parts or yellow parts and, aside from being dirty, he shore din’ look ill t'me.
He said he was an actor, back when he was alive.
Jim said, “Mebby you be actin’ now."
"No sir,” says Birdock. “I'm as dead as they come. Pinch me-"
I reached out an’ gave the flesh of his arm a good twist and he shrieked like a fancy school girl. This, he said, was due to instinct more ‘n anything, and he hadn't actually felt a damn thing. Wall, not even Jim believed that.
Birdock made himself a longsword out of oak laths and called himself Richard III.; and the way he pranced around the raft was grand to see. Bagger Jim said Birdock was crazy like a turd-house squirrel. But by and by he tripped and fell overboard, and after that he took a rest, and talked about all kinds of adventures he'd had in other times along the river, back when he was an actor, and alive.
After dinner he says:
"Well, friends, I do a
first-class show, you know, not all just dancin’ and swordplay, so I guess I kin add a little more to it. I can do Hamlet's soliloquy like the back o’ my hand."
"Hamlet's which?"
"Hamlet's soliloquy, you know; the most celebrated thing in Shakespeare. Ah, it's sublime, sublime! I know it as surely as I know the Lord's prayer."
So he went to marching up and down, thinking, and frowning horrible every now and then; then he would hoist up his eyebrows; next he would squeeze his hand on his forehead and stagger back and kind of moan; next he would sigh, and next he'd let on to drop a tear. It was beautiful to see him. By and by he got it. He told us to give attention. Then he strikes a most noble attitude, with one leg shoved forwards, and his arms stretched away up, and his head tilted back, looking up at the sky; and then he begins to rip and rave and grit his teeth; and after that, all through his speech, he howled, and spread around, and swelled up his chest, and just knocked the spots out of any acting ever I see before. This is the speech-I learned it, easy enough, while he was learning it to Jim:
To be, or not to be; that is the bare bodkin That makes calamity of so long life; For who would fardels bear, till Birnam Wood do come to Dunsinane, But that the fear of something after death Murders the innocent sleep, Great nature's second course, And makes us rather sling the arrows of outrageous fortune Than fly to others that we know not of. There's the respect must give us pause: Wake Duncan with thy knocking! I would thou couldst; For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, The law's delay, and the quietus which his pangs might take, In the dead waste and middle of the night, when churchyards yawn In customary suits of solemn black, But that the undiscovered country from whose bourne no traveler returns, Breathes forth contagion on the world, And thus the native hue of resolution, like the poor cat i’ the adage, Is sicklied o'er with care, And all the clouds that lowered o'er our housetops, With this regard their currents turn awry, And lose the name of action. ‘Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished. But soft you, the fair Ophelia: Ope not thy ponderous and marble jaws, But get thee to a nunnery-go!