Multimedia Mania/abacus-multimedia-mania.iso/dp/0134/01346.txt

Text File | 1993-07-27 | 7KB | 173 lines

$Unique_ID{bob01346}
$Pretitle{}
$Title{Adventures Of Huckleberry Finn, The
The Gold Saves The Thieves}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Twain, Mark}
$Affiliation{}
$Subject{duke
says
king
didn't
done
now
money
it's
jim
never}
$Date{}
$Log{}
Title:       Adventures Of Huckleberry Finn, The
Author:      Twain, Mark

The Gold Saves The Thieves

     When they got aboard the king went for me, and shook me by the collar,
and says:

     "Tryin' to give us the slip, was ye, you pup!  Tired of our company,
hey?"

     I says:

     "No, your majesty, we warn't - please don't, your majesty!"

     "Quick, then, and tell us what was your idea, or I'll shake the insides
out o' you!"

     "Honest, I'll tell you everything just as it happened, your majesty.
The man that had a-holt of me was very good to me, and kept saying he had a
boy about as big as me that died last year, and he was sorry to see a boy in
such a dangerous fix; and when they was all took by surprise by finding the
gold, and made a rush for the coffin, he lets go of me and whispers, 'Heel it
now, or they'll hang ye, sure!' and I lit out.  It didn't seem no good for me
to stay - I couldn't do nothing, and I didn't want to be hung if I could get
away.  So I never stopped running till I found the canoe; and when I got here
I told Jim to hurry, or they'd catch me and hang me yet, and said I was
afeard you and the duke wasn't alive now, and I was awful sorry, and so was
Jim, and was awful glad when we see you coming; you may ask Jim if I didn't."

     Jim said it was so; and the king told him to shut up, and said, "Oh,
yes, it's mighty likely!" and shook me up again, and said he reckoned he'd
drowned me.  But the duke says:

     "Leggo the boy, you old idiot!  Would you 'a' done any different?  Did
you inquire around for him when you got loose?  I don't remember it."

     So the king let go of me, and begun to cuss that town and everybody in
it.  But the duke says:

     "You better a blame' sight give yourself a good cussing, for you're the
one that's entitled to it most.  You hain't done a thing from the start that
had any sense in it, except coming out so cool and cheeky with that imaginary
blue-arrow mark.  That was bright - it was right down bully; and it was the
thing that saved us.  For if it hadn't been for that they'd 'a' jailed us
till them Englishmen's baggage come - and then - the penitentiary, you bet!
But that trick took 'em to the graveyard, and the gold done us a still bigger
kindness; for if the excited fools hadn't let go all holts and made that rush
to get a look we'd 'a' slept in our cravats to-night - cravats warranted to
wear, too - longer than we'd need 'em."

     They was still a minute - thinking; then the king says, kind of
absent-minded like:

     "Mf!  And we reckoned the niggers stole it!"

     That made me squirm!

     "Yes," says the duke, kinder slow and deliberate and sarcastic, "we
did."

     After about a half a minute the king drawls out:

     "Leastways, I did."

     The duke says, the same way:

     "On the contrary, I did."

     The king kind of ruffles up, and says:

     "Looky here, Bilgewater, what'r you referrin' to?"  The duke says,
pretty brisk:

     "When it comes to that, maybe you'll let me ask what was you referring
to?"

     "Shucks!" says the king, very sarcastic; "but I don't know - maybe you
was asleep, and didn't know what you was about."

     The duke bristles up now, and says:

     "Oh, let up on this cussed nonsense; do you take me for a blame' fool?
Don't you reckon I know who hid that money in that coffin?"

     "Yes, sir!  I know you do know, because you done it yourself!"

     "It's a lie!" - and the duke went for him.  The king sings out:

     "Take y'r hands off! - leggo my throat! - I take it all back!"

     The duke says:

     "Well, you just own up, first, that you did hide that money there,
intending to give me the slip one of these days, and come back and dig it up,
and have it all to yourself."

     "Wait jest a minute, duke - answer me this one question, honest and
fair; if you didn't put the money there, say it, and I'll believe you, and
take back everything I said."

     "You old scoundrel, I didn't, and you know I didn't.  There, now!"

     "Well, then, I b'lieve you.  But answer me only jest this one more - now
don't git mad; didn't you have it in your mind to hook the money and hide
it?"

     The duke never said nothing for a little bit; then he says:

     "Well, I don't care if I did, I didn't do it, anyway.  But you not only
had it in mind to do it, but you done it."

     "I wish I never die if I done it, duke, and that's honest.  I won't say
I warn't goin' to do it, because I was; but you - I mean somebody - got in
ahead o' me."

     "It's a lie!  You done it, and you got to say you done it, or -"

     The king began to gurgle, and then he gasps out:

     "'Nough! - I own up!"

     I was very glad to hear him say that; it made me feel much more easier
than what I was feeling before.  So the duke took his hands off and says:

     "If you ever deny it again I'll drown you.  It's well for you to set
there and blubber like a baby - it's fitten for you, after the way you've
acted.  I never see such an old ostrich for wanting to gobble everything -
and I a-trusting you all the time, like you was my own father.  You ought to
been ashamed of yourself to stand by and hear it saddled on to a lot of poor
niggers, and you never say a word for 'em.  It makes me feel ridiculous to
think I was soft enough to believe that rubbage.  Cuss you, I can see now why
you was so anxious to make up the deffisit - you wanted to get what money I'd
got out of the 'None-such' and one thing or another, and scoop it all!"

     The king says, timid, and still a-snuffling:

     "Why, duke, it was you that said make up the deffersit; it warn't me."

     "Dry up!  I don't want to hear no more out of you!" says the duke.  "And
now you see what you got by it.  They've got all their own money back, and
all of ourn but a shekel or two besides.  G'long to bed, and don't you
deffersit me no more deffersits, long's you live!"

     So the king sneaked into the wigwam and took to his bottle for comfort,
and before long the duke tackled his bottle; and so in about a half an hour
they was as thick as thieves again, and the tighter they got the lovinger
they got, and went off a-snoring in each other's arms.  They both got
powerful mellow, but I noticed the king didn't get mellow enough to forget to
remember to not deny about hiding the money-bag again.  That made me feel
easy and satisfied.  Of course when they got to snoring we had a long gabble,
and I told Jim everything.