Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

  CHAPTER XV.

  WE judged that three nights more would fetch us to Cairo, at the bottomof Illinois, where the Ohio River comes in, and that was what we wasafter. ?We would sell the raft and get on a steamboat and go way up theOhio amongst the free States, and then be out of trouble.

  Well, the second night a fog begun to come on, and we made for a towheadto tie to, for it wouldn't do to try to run in a fog; but when I paddledahead in the canoe, with the line to make fast, there warn't anythingbut little saplings to tie to. ?I passed the line around one of themright on the edge of the cut bank, but there was a stiff current, andthe raft come booming down so lively she tore it out by the roots andaway she went. ?I see the fog closing down, and it made me so sick andscared I couldn't budge for most a half a minute it seemed to me--andthen there warn't no raft in sight; you couldn't see twenty yards. ?Ijumped into the canoe and run back to the stern, and grabbed the paddleand set her back a stroke. ?But she didn't come. ?I was in such a hurryI hadn't untied her. ?I got up and tried to untie her, but I was soexcited my hands shook so I couldn't hardly do anything with them.

  As soon as I got started I took out after the raft, hot and heavy, rightdown the towhead. ?That was all right as far as it went, but the towheadwarn't sixty yards long, and the minute I flew by the foot of it I shotout into the solid white fog, and hadn't no more idea which way I wasgoing than a dead man.

  Thinks I, it won't do to paddle; first I know I'll run into the bankor a towhead or something; I got to set still and float, and yet it'smighty fidgety business to have to hold your hands still at such a time.?I whooped and listened. ?Away down there somewheres I hears a smallwhoop, and up comes my spirits. ?I went tearing after it, listeningsharp to hear it again. ?The next time it come I see I warn't headingfor it, but heading away to the right of it. ?And the next time I washeading away to the left of it--and not gaining on it much either, forI was flying around, this way and that and t'other, but it was goingstraight ahead all the time.

  I did wish the fool would think to beat a tin pan, and beat it all thetime, but he never did, and it was the still places between the whoopsthat was making the trouble for me. ?Well, I fought along, and directlyI hears the whoop _behind_ me. ?I was tangled good now. ?That wassomebody else's whoop, or else I was turned around.

  I throwed the paddle down. ?I heard the whoop again; it was behind meyet, but in a different place; it kept coming, and kept changing itsplace, and I kept answering, till by and by it was in front of me again,and I knowed the current had swung the canoe's head down-stream, and Iwas all right if that was Jim and not some other raftsman hollering.?I couldn't tell nothing about voices in a fog, for nothing don't looknatural nor sound natural in a fog.

  The whooping went on, and in about a minute I come a-booming down on acut bank with smoky ghosts of big trees on it, and the current throwedme off to the left and shot by, amongst a lot of snags that fairlyroared, the currrent was tearing by them so swift.

  In another second or two it was solid white and still again. ?I setperfectly still then, listening to my heart thump, and I reckon I didn'tdraw a breath while it thumped a hundred.

  I just give up then. ?I knowed what the matter was. ?That cut bankwas an island, and Jim had gone down t'other side of it. ?It warn't notowhead that you could float by in ten minutes. ?It had the big timberof a regular island; it might be five or six miles long and more thanhalf a mile wide.

  I kept quiet, with my ears cocked, about fifteen minutes, I reckon. ?Iwas floating along, of course, four or five miles an hour; but you don'tever think of that. ?No, you _feel_ like you are laying dead still onthe water; and if a little glimpse of a snag slips by you don't think toyourself how fast _you're_ going, but you catch your breath and think,my! how that snag's tearing along. ?If you think it ain't dismal andlonesome out in a fog that way by yourself in the night, you try itonce--you'll see.

  Next, for about a half an hour, I whoops now and then; at last I hearsthe answer a long ways off, and tries to follow it, but I couldn't doit, and directly I judged I'd got into a nest of towheads, for I hadlittle dim glimpses of them on both sides of me--sometimes just a narrowchannel between, and some that I couldn't see I knowed was there becauseI'd hear the wash of the current against the old dead brush and trashthat hung over the banks. ?Well, I warn't long loosing the whoops downamongst the towheads; and I only tried to chase them a little while,anyway, because it was worse than chasing a Jack-o'-lantern. ?You neverknowed a sound dodge around so, and swap places so quick and so much.

  I had to claw away from the bank pretty lively four or five times, tokeep from knocking the islands out of the river; and so I judged theraft must be butting into the bank every now and then, or else it wouldget further ahead and clear out of hearing--it was floating a littlefaster than what I was.

  Well, I seemed to be in the open river again by and by, but I couldn'thear no sign of a whoop nowheres. ?I reckoned Jim had fetched up on asnag, maybe, and it was all up with him. ?I was good and tired, so Ilaid down in the canoe and said I wouldn't bother no more. ?I didn'twant to go to sleep, of course; but I was so sleepy I couldn't help it;so I thought I would take jest one little cat-nap.

  But I reckon it was more than a cat-nap, for when I waked up the starswas shining bright, the fog was all gone, and I was spinning down abig bend stern first. ?First I didn't know where I was; I thought I wasdreaming; and when things began to come back to me they seemed to comeup dim out of last week.

  It was a monstrous big river here, with the tallest and the thickestkind of timber on both banks; just a solid wall, as well as I could seeby the stars. ?I looked away down-stream, and seen a black speck on thewater. I took after it; but when I got to it it warn't nothing but acouple of sawlogs made fast together. ?Then I see another speck, andchased that; then another, and this time I was right. ?It was the raft.

  When I got to it Jim was setting there with his head down between hisknees, asleep, with his right arm hanging over the steering-oar. ?Theother oar was smashed off, and the raft was littered up with leaves andbranches and dirt. ?So she'd had a rough time.

  I made fast and laid down under Jim's nose on the raft, and began togap, and stretch my fists out against Jim, and says:

  "Hello, Jim, have I been asleep? ?Why didn't you stir me up?"

  "Goodness gracious, is dat you, Huck? ?En you ain' dead--you ain'drownded--you's back agin? ?It's too good for true, honey, it's too goodfor true. Lemme look at you chile, lemme feel o' you. ?No, you ain'dead! you's back agin, 'live en soun', jis de same ole Huck--de same oleHuck, thanks to goodness!"

  "What's the matter with you, Jim? ?You been a-drinking?"

  "Drinkin'? ?Has I ben a-drinkin'? ?Has I had a chance to be a-drinkin'?"

  "Well, then, what makes you talk so wild?"

  "How does I talk wild?"

  "_How_? ?Why, hain't you been talking about my coming back, and all thatstuff, as if I'd been gone away?"

  "Huck--Huck Finn, you look me in de eye; look me in de eye. ?_Hain't_ youben gone away?"

  "Gone away? ?Why, what in the nation do you mean? ?I hain't been goneanywheres. ?Where would I go to?"

  "Well, looky here, boss, dey's sumf'n wrong, dey is. ?Is I _me_, or who_is_ I? Is I heah, or whah _is_ I? ?Now dat's what I wants to know."

  "Well, I think you're here, plain enough, but I think you're atangle-headed old fool, Jim."

  "I is, is I? ?Well, you answer me dis: ?Didn't you tote out de line inde canoe fer to make fas' to de tow-head?"

  "No, I didn't. ?What tow-head? ?I hain't see no tow-head."

  "You hain't seen no towhead? ?Looky here, didn't de line pull loose ende raf' go a-hummin' down de river, en leave you en de canoe behine inde fog?"

  "What fog?"

  "Why, de fog!--de fog dat's been aroun' all night. ?En didn't you whoop,en didn't I whoop, tell we got mix' up in de islands en one un us gotlos' en t'other one was jis' as good as los', 'kase he didn' know whahhe wuz? En didn't I bust up agin a lot er dem islands en have a tu
rribletime en mos' git drownded? ?Now ain' dat so, boss--ain't it so? ?Youanswer me dat."

  "Well, this is too many for me, Jim. ?I hain't seen no fog, nor noislands, nor no troubles, nor nothing. ?I been setting here talking withyou all night till you went to sleep about ten minutes ago, and I reckonI done the same. ?You couldn't a got drunk in that time, so of courseyou've been dreaming."

  "Dad fetch it, how is I gwyne to dream all dat in ten minutes?"

  "Well, hang it all, you did dream it, because there didn't any of ithappen."

  "But, Huck, it's all jis' as plain to me as--"

  "It don't make no difference how plain it is; there ain't nothing in it.I know, because I've been here all the time."

  Jim didn't say nothing for about five minutes, but set there studyingover it. ?Then he says:

  "Well, den, I reck'n I did dream it, Huck; but dog my cats ef it ain'tde powerfullest dream I ever see. ?En I hain't ever had no dream b'fo'dat's tired me like dis one."

  "Oh, well, that's all right, because a dream does tire a body likeeverything sometimes. ?But this one was a staving dream; tell me allabout it, Jim."

  So Jim went to work and told me the whole thing right through, just asit happened, only he painted it up considerable. ?Then he said he muststart in and "'terpret" it, because it was sent for a warning. ?He saidthe first towhead stood for a man that would try to do us some good, butthe current was another man that would get us away from him. ?The whoopswas warnings that would come to us every now and then, and if we didn'ttry hard to make out to understand them they'd just take us into badluck, 'stead of keeping us out of it. ?The lot of towheads was troubleswe was going to get into with quarrelsome people and all kinds of meanfolks, but if we minded our business and didn't talk back and aggravatethem, we would pull through and get out of the fog and into the bigclear river, which was the free States, and wouldn't have no moretrouble.

  It had clouded up pretty dark just after I got on to the raft, but itwas clearing up again now.

  "Oh, well, that's all interpreted well enough as far as it goes, Jim," Isays; "but what does _these_ things stand for?"

  It was the leaves and rubbish on the raft and the smashed oar. ?Youcould see them first-rate now.

  Jim looked at the trash, and then looked at me, and back at the trashagain. ?He had got the dream fixed so strong in his head that hecouldn't seem to shake it loose and get the facts back into its placeagain right away. ?But when he did get the thing straightened around helooked at me steady without ever smiling, and says:

  "What do dey stan' for? ?I'se gwyne to tell you. ?When I got all woreout wid work, en wid de callin' for you, en went to sleep, my heart wuzmos' broke bekase you wuz los', en I didn' k'yer no' mo' what becomeer me en de raf'. ?En when I wake up en fine you back agin, all safeen soun', de tears come, en I could a got down on my knees en kiss yo'foot, I's so thankful. En all you wuz thinkin' 'bout wuz how you couldmake a fool uv ole Jim wid a lie. ?Dat truck dah is _trash_; en trashis what people is dat puts dirt on de head er dey fren's en makes 'emashamed."

  Then he got up slow and walked to the wigwam, and went in there withoutsaying anything but that. ?But that was enough. ?It made me feel so meanI could almost kissed _his_ foot to get him to take it back.

  It was fifteen minutes before I could work myself up to go and humblemyself to a nigger; but I done it, and I warn't ever sorry for itafterwards, neither. ?I didn't do him no more mean tricks, and Iwouldn't done that one if I'd a knowed it would make him feel that way.