University of Virginia Library

Chapter XXVIII

By -and-by it was getting-up time; so I
come down the ladder and started
for down stairs, but as I come to the
girls' room, the door was open, and I
see Mary Jane setting by her old hair
trunk, which was open and she'd
been packing things in it—getting
ready to go to England. But she
had stopped now, with a folded
gown in her lap, and had her face in
her hands, crying. I felt awful bad
to see it; of course anybody would.
I went in there, and says:

"Miss Mary Jane, you can't
abear to see people in trouble, and I
can't—most always. Tell me about
it."

[ILLUSTRATION]

in trouble.

So she done it. And it was the
niggers—I just expected it. She said the beautiful trip to England was most
about spoiled for her; she didn't know how she was ever going to be happy there,
knowing the mother and the children warn't ever going to see each other no
more—and then busted out bitterer than ever, and flung up her hands, and
says

"Oh, dear, dear, to think they ain't ever going to see each other any more!"

"But they will—and inside of two weeks—and I know it!" says I.

Laws it was out before I could think!—and before I could budge, she throws
her arms around my neck, and told me to say it again, say it again, say it again!

I see I had spoke too sudden, and said too much, and was in a close place. I
asked her to let me think a minute; and she set there, very impatient
and excited, and handsome, but looking kind of happy and eased-up, like
a person that's had a tooth pulled out. So I went to studying it out.
I says to myself, I reckon a body that ups and tells the truth when he
is in a tight place, is taking considerable many resks, though I ain't had no
experience, and can't say for certain; but it looks so to me, anyway; and yet
here's a case where I'm blest if it don't look to me like the truth is better,
and actuly safer, than a lie. I must lay it by in my mind, and think it over
some time or other, it's so kind of strange and unregular. I never see nothing
like it. Well, I says to myself at last, I'm agoing to chance it; I'll up and tell
the truth this time, though it does seem most like setting down on a kag of
powder and touching it off just to see where you'll go to. Then I says:

"Miss Mary Jane, is there any place out of town a little ways, where you
could go and stay three or four days?"

"Yes—Mr. Lothrop's. Why?"

"Never mind why, yet. If I'll tell you how I know the niggers will see each
other again—inside of two weeks—here in this house—and prove how I know it
—will you go to Mr. Lothrop's and stay four days?"

"Four days!" she says; "I'll stay a year!"

"All right," I says, "I don't want nothing more out of you than just your
word—I druther have it than another man's kiss-the-Bible." She smiled, and
reddened up very sweet, and I says, "If you don't mind it, I'll shut the door—
and bolt it."

Then I come back and set down again, and says:

"Don't you holler. Just set still, and take it like a man. I got to tell the
truth, and you want to brace up, Miss Mary, because it's a bad kind, and going to
be hard to take, but there ain't no help for it. These uncles of yourn ain't no

uncles at all—they're a couples of frauds—regular dead-beats. There, now we're
over the worst of it—you can stand the rest middling easy."

It jolted her up like everything, of course; but I was over the shoal water
now, so I went right along, her eyes a blazing higher and higher all the time,
and told her every blame thing, from where we first struck that young fool going
up to the steamboat, clear through to where she flung herself onto the king's
breast at the front door and he kissed her sixteen or seventeen times—and then
up she jumps, with her face afire like sunset, and says:

"The brute! Come—don't waste a minute—
not a second—we'll have them tarred and
feathered, and flung in the river!"

Says I:

"Cert'nly. But do you mean, before you go
to Mr. Lothrop's, or——"

[ILLUSTRATION]

indignation.

"Oh," she says, "what am I thinking about!"
she says, and set right down again. "Don't mind
what I said—please don't—you won't, now, will
you?" Laying her silky hand on mind in that
kind of a way that I said I would die first. "I
never thought, I was so stirred up," she says;
"now go on, and I won't do so any more. You tell
me what to do, and whatever you say, I'll do it."

"Well," I says, "it's a rough gang, them two
frauds, and I'm fixed so I got to travel with them
a while longer, whether I want to or not—I
druther not tell you why—and if you was to blow
on them this town would get me out of their claws, and I'd be all right, but
there'd be another person that you don't know about who'd be in big trouble. Well,
we got to save him, hain't we? Of course. Well, then, we won't blow on them."

Saying them words put a good idea in my head. I see how maybe I could
get me and Jim rid of the frauds; get them jailed here, and then leave. But
I didn't want to run the raft in day-time, without anybody aboard to answer

questions but me; so I didn't want the plan to begin working till pretty late
to-night. I says:

"Miss Mary Jane, I'll tell you what we'll do—and you won't have to stay
at Mr. Lothrop's so long, nuther. How fur is it?"

"A little short of four miles—right out in the country, back here."

"Well, that'll answer. Now you go along out there, and lay low till nine or
half-past, to-night, and then get them to fetch you home again—tell them you've
thought of something. If you get here before eleven, put a candle in this window,
and if I don't turn up, wait till eleven, and then if I don't turn up it means I'm
gone, and out of the way, and safe. Then you come out and spread the news
around, and get these beats jailed."

"Good," she says, "I'll do it."

"And if it just happens so that I don't get away, but get took up along with
them, you must up and say I told you the whole thing beforehand, and you must
stand by me all you can."

"Stand by you, indeed I will. They sha'n't touch a hair of your head!" she
says, and I see her nostrils spread and her eyes snap when she said it, too.

[ILLUSTRATION]

how to find them.

"If I get away, I sha'n't be here," I says, "to prove these rapscallions ain't
your uncles, and I couldn't do it if I
was here. I could swear they was beats
and bummers, that's all; though that's
worth something. Well, there's others
can do that better than what I can—
and they're people that ain't going to be
doubted as quick as I'd be. I'll tell you
how to find them. Gimme a pencil and
a piece of paper. There—'Royal Nonesuch,
Bricksville.' Put it away, and
don't lose it. When the court wants to
find out something about these two, let
them send up to Bricksville and say
they've got the men that played the Royal Nonesuch, and ask for some witnesses

—why, you'll have that entire town down here before you can hardly wink, Miss
Mary. And they'll come a-biling, too."

I judged we had got everything fixed about right, now. So I says:

"Just let the auction go right along, and don't worry. Nobody don't have
to pay for the things they buy till a whole day after the auction, on accounts of
the short notice, and they ain't going out of this till they get that money—and
the way we've fixed it the sale ain't going to count, and they ain't going to get no
money. It's just like the way it was with the niggers—it warn't no sale, and the
niggers will be back before long. Why, they can't collect the money for the
niggers, yet—they're in the worst kind of a fix, Miss Mary."

"Well," she says, "I'll run down to breakfast now, and then I'll start
straight for Mr. Lothrop's."

"'Deed, that ain't the ticket, Miss Mary Jane," I says, "by no manner of
means; go before breakfast."

"Why?"

"What did you reckon I wanted you to go at all for, Miss Mary?"

"Well, I never thought—and come to think, I don't know. What was it?"

"Why, it's because you ain't one of these leather-face people. I don't want
no better book that what your face is. A body can set down and read it off like
coarse print. Do you reckon you can go and face your uncles, when they come
to kiss you good-morning, and never——"

"There, there, don't! Yes, I'li go before breakfast—I'll be glad to. And
leave my sisters with them?"

"Yes—never mind about them. They've got to stand it yet a while. They
might suspicion something if all of you was to go. I don't want you to see them,
nor your sisters, nor nobody in this town—if a neighbor was to ask how is your
uncles this morning, your face would tell something. No, you go right along, Miss
Mary Jane, and I'll fix it with all of them. I'll tell Miss Susan to give your love
to your uncles and say you've went away for a few hours for to get a little rest and
change, or to see a friend, and you'll be back to-night or early in the morning."

"Gone to see a friend is all right, but I won't have my love given to them."

"Well, then, it sha'n't be." It was well enough to tell her so—no harm in it.

It was only a little thing to do, and no trouble; and it's the little things that
smoothers people's roads the most, down here below; it would make Mary Jane
comfortable, and it wouldn't cost nothing. Then I says: "There's one more
thing—that bag of money."

"Well, they've got that; and it makes me feel pretty silly to think how they
got it."

"No, you're out, there. They hain't got it."

"Why, who's got it?"

"I wish I knowed, but I don't. I had it, because I stole it from them: and
I stole it to give to you; and I know where I hid it, but I'm afraid it ain't
there no more. I'm awful sorry, Miss Mary Jane, I'm just as sorry as I can be;
but I done the best I could; I did, honest. I come nigh getting caught, and I
had to shove it into the first place I come to, and run—and it warn't a good
place."

"Oh, stop blaming yourself—it's too bad to do it, and I won't allow it—you
couldn't help it; it wasn't you fault. Where did you hide it?"

I didn't want to set her to thinking about her troubles again; and I couldn't
seem to get my mouth to tell her what would make her see that corpse laying in
the coffin with that bag of money on his stomach. So for a minute I didn't say
nothing—then I says:

[ILLUSTRATION]

he wrote.

"I'd ruther not tell you where I put it, Miss Mary Jane, if you don't mind
letting me off; but I'll write it for you on a piece of paper, and you can read it
along the road to Mr. Lothrop's, if you want to. Do you reckon that'll do?"

"Oh, yes."

So I wrote: "I put it in the coffin. It was in there when you was crying
there, away in the night. I was behind the door, and I was mighty sorry for
you, Miss Mary Jane."

It made my eyes water a little, to remember her crying there all by herself
in the night, and them devils laying there right under her own roof, shaming
her and robbing her; and when I folded it up and give it to her, I see the water
come into her eyes, too; and she shook me by the hand, hard, and says:

"Good-bye—I'm going to do everything just as you've told me; and if I
don't ever see you again, I sha'n't ever forget you, and I'll think of you a many
and a many a time, and I'll pray for you, too!"—and she was gone.

Pray for me! I reckoned if she knowed me she'd take a job that was more
nearer her size. But I bet she done it, just the same—she was just that kind.
She had the grit to pray for Judus if she took the notion—there warn't no backdown
to her, I judge. You may say what you want to, but in my opinion she
had more sand in her than any girl I ever see; in my opinion she was just full of
sand. It sounds like flattery, but it ain't no flattery. And when it comes to
beauty—and goodness too—she lays over them all. I hain't ever seen her since
that time that I see her go out of that door; no, I hain't ever seen her since,
but I reckon I've thought of her a many and a many a million times, and of her
saying she would pray for me; and if ever I'd a thought it would do any good
for me to pray for her, blamed if I wouldn't a done it or bust.

Well, Mary Jane she lit out the back way, I reckon; because nobody see
her go. When I struck Susan and the hare-lip, I says:

"What's the name of them people over on t'other side of the river that you,
all goes to see sometimes?"

They says:

"There's several; but it's the Proctors, mainly."

"That's the name," I says; "I most forgot it. Well, Miss Mary Jane she
told me to tell you she's gone over there in a dreadful hurry—one of them's
sick."

"Which one?"

"I don't know; leastways I kinder forget; but I think it's——"

"Sakes alive, I hope it ain't Hanner?"

"I'm sorry to say it," I says, "but Hanner's the very one."

"My goodness—and she so well only last week! Is she took bad?"

"It ain't no name for it. They set up with her all night, Miss Mary Jane
said, and they don't think she'll last many hours."

"Only think of that, now! What's the matter with her!"

I couldn't think of anything reasonable, right off that way, so I says:

"Mumps."

"Mumps your granny! They don't set up
with people that's got the mumps."

"They don't, don't they? You better
bet they do with these mumps. These mumps
is different. It's a new kind, Miss Mary Jane
said."

[ILLUSTRATION]

hanner with the mumps.

"How's it a new kind?"

"Because it's mixed up with other things."

"What other things?"

"Well, measles, and whooping-cough, and
erysiplas, and consumption, and yaller janders,
and brain fever, and I don't know what all."

"My land! And they call it the mumps?"

"That's what Miss Mary Jane said."

"Well, what in the nation do they call it the
mumps for?"

"Why, because it is the mumps. That's
what it starts with."

"Well, ther' ain't no sense in it. A body might stump his toe, and take pison,
and fall down the well, and break his neck, and bust his brains out, and somebody
come along and ask what killed him, and some numskull up and say, 'Why,
he stumped his toe.' Would ther' be any sense in that? No. And ther' ain't
no sense in this, nuther. Is it ketching?"

"Is it ketching? Why, how you talk. Is a harrow catching?—in the dark?

If you don't hitch onto one tooth, you're bound to on another, ain't you? And
you can't get away with that tooth without fetching the whole harrow along,
can you? Well, these kind of mumps is a kind of a harrow, as you may say—
and it ain't no slouch of a harrow, nuther, you come to get it hitched on
good."

"Well, it's awful, I think," says the hare-lip. "I'll go to Uncle Harvey
and——"

"Oh, yes," I says, "I would. Of course I would. I wouldn't lose no time."

"Well, why wouldn't you?"

"Just look at it a minute, and maybe you can see. Hain't your uncles
obleeged to get along home to England as fast as they can? And do you reckon
they'd be mean enough to go off and leave you to go all that journey by yourselves?
You know they'll wait for you. So fur, so good. Your uncle Harvey's a
preacher, ain't he? Very well, then; is a preacher going to deceive a steamboat
clerk? is he going to deceive a ship clerk?—so as to get them to let Miss Mary
Jane go aboard? Now you know he ain't. What will he do, then? Why, he'll
say, 'It's a great pity, but my church matters has got to get along the best way they
can; for my niece has been exposed to the dreadful pluribus-unum mumps, and
so it's my bounden duty to set down here and wait the three months it takes to
show on her if she's got it.' But never mind, if you think it's best to tell your
uncle Harvey——"

"Shucks, and stay fooling around here when we could all be having good
times in England whilst we was waiting to find out whether Mary Jane's got it or
not? Why, you talk like a muggins."

"Well, anyway, maybe you better tell some of the neighbors."

"Listen at that, now. You do beat all, for natural stupidness. Can't you
see that they'd go and tell? Ther' ain't no way but just to not tell anybody at all."

"Well, maybe you're right—yes, I judge you are right."

"But I reckon we ought to tell Uncle Harvey she's gone out a while, anyway,
so he wont be uneasy about her?"

"Yes, Miss Mary Jane she wanted you to do that. She says, 'Tell them to
give Uncle Harvey and William my love and a kiss, and say I've run over the river

to see Mr.—Mr.—what is the name of that rich family your uncle Peter used
to think so much of?—I mean the one that——"

"Why, you must mean the Apthorps, ain't it?"

"Of course; bother them
kind of names, a body can't
ever seem to remember them,
half the time, somehow.
Yes, she said, say she has run
over for to ask the Apthorps
to be sure and come to the
auction and buy this house,
because she allowed her uncle
Peter would ruther they
had it than anybody else;
and she's going to stick to
them till they say they'll
come, and then, if she ain't
too tired, she's coming
home; and if she is, she'll
be home in the morning anyway.
She said, don't say
nothing about the Proctors,
but only about the Apthorps
—which'll be perfectly true,
because she is going there to speak about their buying the house; I know it,
because she told me so, herself."

[ILLUSTRATION]

the auction.

"All right," they said, and cleared out to lay for their uncles, and give them
the love and the kisses, and tell them the message.

Everything was all right now. The girls wouldn't say nothing because they
wanted to go to England; and the king and the duke would ruther Mary Jane
was off working for the auction than around in reach of Doctor Robinson. I felt
very good; I judged I had done it pretty neat—I reckoned Tom Sawyer couldn't

a done it no neater himself. Of course he would a throwed more style into it,
but I can't do that very handy, not being brung up to it.

Well, they held the auction in the public square, along towards the end of the
afternoon, and it strung along, and strung along, and the old man he was on
hand and looking his level pisonest, up there longside of the auctioneer, and
chipping in a little Scripture, now and then, or a little goody-goody saying, of
some kind, and the duke he was around goo-gooing for sympathy all he knowed
how, and just spreading himself generly.

But by-and-by the thing dragged through, and everything was sold. Everything
but a little old trifling lot in the graveyard. So they'd got to work that
off—I never see such a girafft as the king was for wanting to swallow everything.
Well, whilst they was at it, a steamboat landed, and in about two minutes up
comes a crowd a whooping and yelling and laughing and carrying on, and singing
out:

"Here's your opposition line! here's your two sets o' heirs to old Peter Wilks
—and you pays your money and you takes your choice!"