Join Host Bree Carlile as she reads the thirteenth chapter of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.

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Today we'll be continuing The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain.

Chapter 13 Tom's mind was made up now.

He was gloomy and desperate.

He was a forsaken, friendless boy.

He said nobody loved him.

When they found out what they had driven him to, perhaps they would be sorry.

He had tried to do right and get along, but they would not let him, since nothing would do them but to be rid of him.

Let it be so, and let them blame him for the consequences.

Why shouldn't they?

What right had the friendless to complain?

Yes, they had forced him to it.

At last he would lead a life of crime.

There was no choice.

By this time he was far down Meadow Lane and the bell for school to take up.

tinkled faintly upon his ear he sobbed now to think he should never, never hear that old familiar sound anymore.

It was very hard, but it was forced on him, since he was driven out into the cold world.

He must submit, but he forgave them.

Then the sobs came, thick and fast.

Just at this point he met his soul sworn comrade, Joe Harper, hard eyed and with evidently a great and dismal purpose in his heart.

Plainly, here were two souls with but a single thought.

Tom, wiping his eyes with his sleeve, began to blubber out.

Something about a resolution to escape from hard usage and lack of sympathy at home by roaming abroad into the great world, never to return, and ended by hoping that Joe would not forget him.

But it transpired that this was a request which Joe had just been going to make of Tom and had come to hunt him up for that purpose.

His mother had whipped him for drinking some cream which he had never tasted and knew nothing about.

It was plain that she was tired of him and wished him to go.

If she felt that way, there was nothing for him to do but succumb, he hoped, she would be happy and never regret having driven her poor boy out into the unfeeling world to suffer and die.

As the two boys walked sorrowing along, they made a new compact to stand by each other and be brothers and never separate till death relieved them of their troubles and they began to lay their plans.

Joe was for being a hermit and living on crusts in a remote cave and dying some time of cold and want and grief.

But after listening to Tom, he conceded that there were some conspicuous advantages about a life of crime, and so he consented to be a pirate.

3 miles below St.

Petersburg, at a point where the Mississippi River was a trifle over a mile wide, there was a long, narrow, wooded island with a shallow bar at the head of it, and this offered well as a rendezvous.

It was not inhabited.

It lay far over toward the further shore, abreast a dense and almost wholly unpeopled forest.

So Jackson's Island was chosen.

Who were to be the subjects of their piracies was a matter that did not occur to them.

Then they hunted up Huckleberry Finn, and he joined them promptly, for all careers were won to him.

He was indifferent.

They presently separated to meet at a lonely spot on the riverbank 2 miles above the village.

At the favorite hour, which was midnight, there was a small log raft there which they meant to capture.

Each would bring hooks and lines and such provision as he could steal in the most dark and mysterious way as became outlaws.

And before the afternoon was done, they had all managed to enjoy the sweet glory of spreading the fact that pretty soon the town would hear something.

All who got this vague hint were cautioned to be mum and wait.

About midnight, Tom arrived with a boiled ham and a few trifles and stopped in a dense undergrowth on a small bluff overlooking the meeting place.

It was starlight and very still.

The mighty river lay like an ocean at rest.

Tom listened for a moment, but no sound disturbed the quiet.

Then he gave a low, distinct whistle.

It was answered from under the bluff.

Tom whistled twice more.

These signals were answered in the same way.

Then a guarded voice said, who goes there?

Tom Sawyer, the Black Avenger of the Spanish Main.

Name your names.

Hooks in the red handed.

And Joe Harper, the terror of the Seas.

Tom had furnished these titles from his favorite literature, dis.

Well, give the countersign.

Two Horse Whispers delivered the same awful word simultaneously to the brooding Knight Blood.

Then Tom tumbled his ham over the bluff and let himself down after it tearing both skin and clothes to some extent in the effort.

There was an easy, comfortable path along the shore under the bluff but it lacked the advantages of difficulty and danger so valued by a pirate.

The Terror of the Seas had brought a side of bacon and had about worn himself out with getting it there.

Finn the Red Handed had stolen a skillet and a quantity of half cured leaf tobacco and had also brought a few corn cobs to make pipes with.

But none of the pirates smoked or chewed but himself.

The Black Avenger of the Spanish Maine said it would never do to start without some fire.

That was a wise thought.

Matches were hardly known there in that day.

I saw a fire smoldering upon a great raft a hundred yards above, and they went stealthily thither and helped themselves to a chunk.

They made an imposing adventure of it, saying hissed every now and then and suddenly halting with finger on lip, moving with hands on imaginary dagger hilts and giving orders and dismal whispers that if the foe stirred, to let him have it to the hilt because dead men tell no tales.

They knew well enough that the raftsmen were all down at the village laying in stores and having a spree.

But still that was no excuse for their conducting this thing in an unpartical way.

They shoved off presently, Tom in command, huck at the after, or and Joe at the forward.

Tom stood amid ships gloomy browed and with folded arms and gave his orders in a low, stern whisper.

Loughen, bring her to the wind.

Aye, sir.

Steady.

Steady.

Steady it is, sir.

Let her go off a point.

Point it is, sir.

As the boy steadily and monotonously drove the raft toward midstream it was no doubt understood that these orders were given only for style and were not intended to mean anything in particular.

What sails she carrying?

Courses, top sales and flying jib, sir.

Sin royals up.

Lay out aloft there.

Half a dozen of ye.

Four top mastons lively now.

Aye, sir.

Shake out that main to logins sheets and braces.

Now.

My, hardees.

Aye, sir.

Ella Mali.

Hard a port.

Stand by to meet her when she comes.

Port.

Port Nowman with a will.

Steady.

Steady it is, sir.

The raft drew beyond the middle of the river.

The boys pointed her head right and then lay on their oars.

The river was not high, so there was not more than a two or three mile current.

Hardly a word was said during the next three quarters of an hour.

Now the raft was passing before the distant town.

Two or three glimmering lights showed where it lay peacefully sleeping beyond the vague, vast sweep of starjammed water, unconscious of the tremendous event that was happening.

The Black Avenger stood still with folded arms, looking his last upon the scene of his former joys and his later sufferings, and wishing she could see him now abroad on the wild sea, facing peril and death, with dauntless heart going to his doom with a grim smile on his lips.

It was but a small strain on his imagination to remove Jackson's Island beyond eyeshot of the village, and so he looked his last with a broken and satisfied heart.

The other pirates were looking their last too, and they all looked so long that they came near, letting the current drift them out of the range of the island.

But they discovered the danger in time and made shifts to avert it.

About 02:00 in the morning, the raft grounded on the bar 200 yards above the head of the island, and they waited back and forth until they had landed their freight.

Part of the little raft's belongings consisted of an old sail, and this they spread over a nook in the bushes for a tent to shelter their provisions.

But they themselves would sleep in the open air in good weather, as became outlaws.

They built a fire against the side of a great log 20 or 30 steps within the somber depths of the forest, and then cooked some bacon in the frying pan for supper and used up half of the corn pone stock they had brought.

It seemed glorious sport to be feasting in that wild freeway in the virgin forest of an unexplored and uninhabited island, far from the haunts of men, and they said they never would return to civilization.

The climbing fire lit up their faces and threw its ruddy glare upon the pillared tree trunks of their forest temple and upon the varnished foliage and festooning vines.

When the last crisp slice of bacon was gone and the last allowance of cornpone devoured, the boys stretched themselves out on the grass filled with contentment.

They could have found a cooler place, but they would not deny themselves such a romantic feature as the roasting campfire.

Ain't it gay?

Said Joe.

It's nuts, said Tom.

What would the boys say if they could see us?

Say, well, they just die to be here, hey, Hucky?

I reckon so, said Huckleberry.

Anyways, I'm suited.

I don't want nothing better than this.

I don't ever get enough to eat generally.

And here they can't come and pick at a feller and bully rag him.

So it's just the life for me, said Tom.

You don't have to get up mornings, and you don't have to go to school and wash and all that blame foolishness.

You see, a pirate don't have to do anything, Joe, when he's ashore.

But a hermit, he has to be praying considerable and then he don't have any fun anyway, all by himself that way.

Oh, yes, that's so, said Joe, but I hadn't thought much about it.

You know, I'd a good deal rather be a pirate, now that I've tried it.

You see, said Tom, people don't go much on hermits nowadays like they used to in old times.

But a pirate's always respected, and a hermit's got to sleep on the hardest place he can find and put sackcloth and ashes on his head and stand out in the rain.

And what does he put sackcloth and ashes on his head for?

Inquired Huck.

I don't know, but they've got to do it.

Hermits always do.

You'd have to do that if you was a hermit?

Darned if I would said huck.

Well, what would you do?

I don't know, but I wouldn't do that.

Why, Huck, you'd have to.

How'd you get around it?

Why, I just wouldn't stand it.

I'd run away.

Run away?

Well, you would be a nice old slouch of a hermit.

You'd be a disgrace.

The Red handed made no response.

Being better employed, he had finished gouging out a cob, and now he fitted a weed stem to it, loaded it with tobacco, and was pressing a coal to the charge and blowing a cloud of fragrant smoke.

He was in full bloom of luxurious contentment.

The other pirates envied him this majestic vice and secretly resolved to acquire it shortly.

Presently, Huck said, what does pirates have to do?

Tom said, oh, they have just a bully time.

Take ships and burn them and get the money and bury it in awful places in their island, where there's ghosts and things to watch it, and kill everybody in the ships.

Make them walk a plank and they carry the women to the island, said Joe.

They don't kill the women.

No, assented Tom, they don't kill the women.

They're too noble.

And the women's always beautiful, too.

And don't they wear the bulliest clothes?

Oh, no, all gold and silver and diamonds, said Joe with enthusiasm.

Who?

Said Huck.

Why, the pirates.

Huck scanned his own clothing.

Forlornly I reckon I ain't dressed fittin for a pirate, said he with a regretful pathos in his voice, but I ain't got none but these.

But the other boys told him the fine clothes would come fast enough after they should have begun their adventures.

They made him understand that his poor rags would do to begin with, though it was customary for wealthy pirates to start with a proper wardrobe, gradually their talk died out, and Drowsiness began to steal upon the eyelids of the little waves.

The pipe dropped from the fingers of the red handed, and he slept the sleep of the conscience free, and the weary, the terror of the seas.

And the Black Avenger of the Spanish Maine had more difficulty in getting to sleep.

They said their prayers inwardly and lying down, since there was nobody there with authority to make them kneel and recite aloud.

In truth, they had a mind not to say them at all, but they were afraid to proceed to such lengths as that, lest they might call down a sudden and special thunderbolt from heaven.

Then at once they reached and hovered upon the imminent verge of sleep.

But an intruder came now that would not down.

It was conscience.

They began to feel a vague fear that they had been doing wrong to run away.

And next they thought of the stolen meat.

And then the real torture came.

They tried to argue it away by reminding conscience that they had perloined sweet meats and apples scores of times.

But conscience was not to be appeased by such thin plausibilities.

It seemed to them in the end that there was no getting around the stubborn fact that taking sweet meats was only hooking, while taking bacon and hams and such valuables was plain, simple stealing.

And there was a command against that in the Bible.

So they inwardly resolved that so long as they remained in the business, their piracy should not again be solelied with the crime of stealing.

Then conscience granted a truce, and these curiously inconsistent pirates fell peacefully to sleep.

Thank you for joining Bite at a Time books today while we read a bite of one of your favorite classics.

Again, my name is Brie Carlyle, and I hope you come back tomorrow for the next bite of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.

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