Join Host Bree Carlile as she reads the thirty-fourth chapter of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

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Today we'll be continuing Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain.

Chapter 34 we Stopped Talking and Got to Thinking by and by, tom says, looky here, Huck, what fools we are to not think of it before.

I bet I know where Jim is.

No.

Where?

In that hut down by the ash hopper.

Why?

Looky here.

When we was at dinner, didn't you see a servant man go in there with some vittles?

Yes.

What did you think the viddles was for?

For a dog.

So did I.

Well, it wasn't for a dog.

Why?

Because part of it was watermelon.

So it was.

I noticed it.

Well, it does beat all that.

I never thought about a dog not eating watermelon.

It shows how a body can see and don't see at the same time.

Well, the servant unlocked the padlock when he went in and he locked it again when he came out.

He fetched uncle a key about the time we got it from table.

Same key, I bet.

Watermelon shows man locke shows prisoner.

And it ain't likely there's two prisoners on such a little plantation.

And where the people's all so kind and good.

Jim's the prisoner, all right.

I'm glad we found it out.

Detective Fashion, I wouldn't give shucks for any other way.

Now you work your mind and study out a plan to steal.

Jim and I'll study out one, too, and we'll take the one we like the best.

What a head for just a boy to have?

If I had Tom Sawyer's head, I wouldn't trade it off to be a duke nor made of a steamboat nor a clown in a circus nor nothing I can think of.

I went to thinking out a plan, but only just to be doing something.

I knowed very well where the right plan was going to come from.

Pretty soon, Tom says.

Ready?

Yes, I says.

All right, bring it out.

My plan is this, I says.

We can easy find out if it's Jim in there.

Then get up my canoe tomorrow night and fetch my raft over from the island.

Then the first dark night that comes, steal the key out of the old man's britches after he goes to bed and shove off down the river on the raft with Jim hiding daytimes and running nights the way me and Jim used to do before.

Wouldn't that plan work?

Work?

Why, certainly.

It would work like rats of fighting.

But it's too blame simple.

There ain't nothing to it.

What's the good of a plan that ain't no more trouble than that?

It's as mild as goose milk.

Why, Huck, it wouldn't make no more talk than breaking into a soap factory.

I never said nothing because I weren't expecting nothing different.

But I knowed mighty well that whenever he got his plan ready it wouldn't have none of them objections to it, and it didn't.

He told me what it was, and I see in a minute it was worth 15 of mine for style and would make Jim just as free a man as mine would and maybe get us all killed besides.

So I was satisfied and said we would waltz in on it.

I neededn't tell what it was here because I knowed it wouldn't stay the way it was.

I knowed he would be changing it around every which way as we went along and heaving in new bulliness wherever he got a chance, and that is what he'd done.

Well, one thing was dead sure, and that was that Tom Sawyer was in earnest and was actually going to help steal that servant out of slavery.

That was the thing that was too many for me.

Here was a boy that was respectable and well brong up and had a character to lose and folks at home that had characters.

And he was bright and not leatherheaded and knowing and not ignorant and not mean, but kind.

And yet here he was without any more pride or rightness or feeling than to stoop to this business and make himself a shame and his family ashamed before everybody.

I couldn't understand it, no way at all.

It was outrageous.

And I knowed I ought to just up and tell him so and so be his true friend and let him quit the thing right where he was and save himself and I did start to tell him, but he shut me up and says, don't you reckon I know what I'm about?

Don't I generally know what I'm about?

Yes.

Didn't I say I was going to help steal the servant?

Yes.

Well, then?

That's all he said and that's all I said.

It weren't no use to say anymore, because when he said he'd do a thing, he always done it.

But I couldn't make out how he was willing to go into this thing, so I just let it go and never bothered no more about it if he was bound to have it.

So I couldn't help it.

When we got home, the house was all dark and still.

So we went on down to the hut by the ashhopper for to examine it.

We went through the yard so as to see what the hounds would do.

They noted us and didn't make no more noise than Country Dogs is always doing when anything comes by in the night.

When we got to the cabin, we took a look at the front and the two sides, and on the side I weren't acquainted with, which was the north side.

We found a square window hole up tolerable high with just one stout board nailed across it.

I says, here's the ticket.

This hole's big enough for Jim to get through if we wrench off the board.

Tom says it's as simple as tit tattoo three in a row and as easy as playing hooky.

I should hope we can find a way that's a little more complicated than that Huck Finn.

Well, then, I says, how will it do to saw him out the way I'd done before I was murdered that time?

That's more like he says.

It's real mysterious and troublesome and good, he says.

But I bet we can find a way that's twice as long.

There ain't no hurry.

Let's keep on looking around.

Betwix the HUD and the fence on the backside was a lean to that joined the hut at the eaves and was made out of plank.

It was as long as the hut, but narrow, only about six foot wide.

The door to it was at the south end and was padlocked.

Tom, he went to the soap kettle and searched around and fetched back the iron thing they lift the lid with.

So he took it and prized out one of the staples.

The chain fell down, and we opened the door and went in and shut it and struck a match.

And see, the shed was only built against a cabin and hadn't no connection with it.

And there weren't no floor to the shed, nor nothing in it but some old rusty, played out hose and spades and picks and crippled plow.

The match went out and so did we and shoved in the staple again, and the door was locked as good as ever.

Tom was joyful.

He says, now we're all right.

We'll dig him out.

It'll take about a week.

Then we started for the house and I went in the back door.

You only have to pull a buckskin latch string.

They don't fasten the doors.

But that weren't romantical enough for Tom Sawyer.

No way would do him, but he must climb up the lightning rod.

But after he got up halfway about three times and missed fire and fell every time.

And the last time most busted his brains out.

He thought he'd got to give it up.

But after he was rested, he allowed he would give her one more turn for luck.

And this time he made the trip.

In the morning we was up at break of day and down to the servant cabins to pet the dogs and make friends with the servant that fed Jim.

If it was Jim that was being fed.

The servants was just getting through breakfast and starting for the fields and Jim's servant was piling up a tin pan with bread and meat and things.

And whilst the others were leaving, the key come from the house.

This servant had a good natured chuckleheaded face and his wool was all tied up in little bunches with thread.

This was to keep witches off, he said.

The witches was pestering him awful these nights and making him see all kinds of strange things and hear all kinds of strange words and noises.

And he didn't believe he was ever witched so long before in his life.

He got so worked up and got to running on so about his troubles he forgot all about what he'd been going to do.

So Tom says, what's the vittles for going to feed the dogs?

The servant kind of smiled around gradually over his face like when you heave a brick brat in a mud puddle.

And he says, yes, Marzida dog.

Curse dog too.

Does he want to go in and look at him?

Yes.

I hunched Tom, and whispers are you going right here in the daybreak?

That weren't the plan.

No, it weren't, but it's the plan now.

So drat him.

We went along, but I didn't like it much.

When we got in, we couldn't hardly see anything, it was so dark.

But Jim was there sure enough and could see us.

And he sings out why, huck in good land, ain't that Mr.

Tom?

I just knowed how it would be.

I just expected it.

I didn't know nothing to do.

And if I had, I couldn't have done it because that servant busted in and says, why, to gracious sakes, do we know you gentlemen?

We could see pretty well now, Tom.

He looked at the servant steady and kind of wondering and says does who know us?

Why, does he?

A runaway servant?

I don't reckon he does.

But what put that into your head?

We'll put it there.

Didn't he just dismiss it?

Sing out like he knows you?

Tom says in a puzzled up kind of way.

Well that's mighty curious.

Who sung out?

When did he sing out?

What did he sing out?

And turns to me perfectly calm and says did you hear anybody sing out?

Of course there weren't nothing to be said but the one thing.

So I says no, I ain't heard nobody sing nothing.

Then he turns to Jim and looks him over like he'd never seen him before and says did you sing out?

No sir, says Jim, I ain't say nothing sir.

Not a word?

No sir.

Hadn't said a word.

Did you ever see us before?

No sir, not as I knows on.

So Tom turns to the servant, which was looking wild and distressed, and says kind of severe.

What do you reckon is the matter with you anyway?

What made you think somebody sung out?

Oh, is the dad blame witches, sir.

And I wish I was dead.

I do days always at it, sir.

And day to most kill me.

Day scares me so please don't tell nobody about it, sir.

Old Mars Silas, he'll scold me because he said they ain't no witches.

I just wished a goodness he was here now.

Then what we say?

I just bet he couldn't find no way to get it round in this time.

But it's always just so.

People that sought, save sought, they won't look into nothing, find it for themselves.

And when you find out it's to tell him about it.

They don't believe you.

Tom give him a dime and said we wouldn't tell nobody and told him to buy some more thread to tie up his wool with.

And then looks at Jim and says I wonder if Uncle Silas is going to hang this servant.

If I was to catch a servant that was ungrateful enough to run away, I wouldn't give him up, I'd hang him.

And whilst the servant stepped to the door to look at the dime and bite it to see if it was good, he whispers to Jim and says don't ever let on to know us.

And if you hear any digging going on nights, it's us.

We're going to set you free.

Jim only had time to grab us by the hand and squeeze it.

Then the servant come back and we said we'd come again sometime if the servant wanted us to.

And he said he would more particular if it was dark because the witches went for him mostly in the dark and it was good to have folks around then.

Thank you for joining Bite at a.

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

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