CHAPTER XXXV.
IT would be most an hour yet till breakfast, so we left and struck downinto the woods; because Tom said we got to have SOME light to see how todig by, and a lantern makes too much, and might get us into trouble; whatwe must have was a lot of them rotten chunks that's called fox-fire, andjust makes a soft kind of a glow when you lay them in a dark place. Wefetched an armful and hid it in the weeds, and set down to rest, and Tomsays, kind of dissatisfied:
"Blame it, this whole thing is just as easy and awkward as it can be.And so it makes it so rotten difficult to get up a difficult plan. Thereain't no watchman to be drugged--now there OUGHT to be a watchman. Thereain't even a dog to give a sleeping-mixture to. And there's Jim chainedby one leg, with a ten-foot chain, to the leg of his bed: why, all yougot to do is to lift up the bedstead and slip off the chain. And UncleSilas he trusts everybody; sends the key to the punkin-headed nigger, anddon't send nobody to watch the nigger. Jim could a got out of thatwindow-hole before this, only there wouldn't be no use trying to travelwith a ten-foot chain on his leg. Why, drat it, Huck, it's the stupidestarrangement I ever see. You got to invent ALL the difficulties. Well, wecan't help it; we got to do the best we can with the materials we've got.Anyhow, there's one thing--there's more honor in getting him outthrough a lot of difficulties and dangers, where there warn't one of themfurnished to you by the people who it was their duty to furnish them, andyou had to contrive them all out of your own head. Now look at just thatone thing of the lantern. When you come down to the cold facts, wesimply got to LET ON that a lantern's resky. Why, we could work with atorchlight procession if we wanted to, I believe. Now, whilst I think ofit, we got to hunt up something to make a saw out of the first chance weget."
"What do we want of a saw?"
"What do we WANT of a saw? Hain't we got to saw the leg of Jim's bedoff, so as to get the chain loose?"
"Why, you just said a body could lift up the bedstead and slip the chainoff."
"Well, if that ain't just like you, Huck Finn. You CAN get up theinfant-schooliest ways of going at a thing. Why, hain't you ever readany books at all?--Baron Trenck, nor Casanova, nor Benvenuto Chelleeny,nor Henri IV., nor none of them heroes? Who ever heard of getting aprisoner loose in such an old-maidy way as that? No; the way all thebest authorities does is to saw the bed-leg in two, and leave it just so,and swallow the sawdust, so it can't be found, and put some dirt andgrease around the sawed place so the very keenest seneskal can't see nosign of it's being sawed, and thinks the bed-leg is perfectly sound.Then, the night you're ready, fetch the leg a kick, down she goes; slipoff your chain, and there you are. Nothing to do but hitch your ropeladder to the battlements, shin down it, break your leg in the moat--because a rope ladder is nineteen foot too short, you know--and there'syour horses and your trusty vassles, and they scoop you up and fling youacross a saddle, and away you go to your native Langudoc, or Navarre, orwherever it is. It's gaudy, Huck. I wish there was a moat to this cabin.If we get time, the night of the escape, we'll dig one."
I says:
"What do we want of a moat when we're going to snake him out from underthe cabin?"
But he never heard me. He had forgot me and everything else. He had hischin in his hand, thinking. Pretty soon he sighs and shakes his head;then sighs again, and says:
"No, it wouldn't do--there ain't necessity enough for it."
"For what?" I says.
"Why, to saw Jim's leg off," he says.
"Good land!" I says; "why, there ain't NO necessity for it. And whatwould you want to saw his leg off for, anyway?"
"Well, some of the best authorities has done it. They couldn't get thechain off, so they just cut their hand off and shoved. And a leg wouldbe better still. But we got to let that go. There ain't necessityenough in this case; and, besides, Jim's a nigger, and wouldn'tunderstand the reasons for it, and how it's the custom in Europe; sowe'll let it go. But there's one thing--he can have a rope ladder; wecan tear up our sheets and make him a rope ladder easy enough. And wecan send it to him in a pie; it's mostly done that way. And I've etworse pies."
"Why, Tom Sawyer, how you talk," I says; "Jim ain't got no use for a ropeladder."
"He HAS got use for it. How YOU talk, you better say; you don't knownothing about it. He's GOT to have a rope ladder; they all do."
"What in the nation can he DO with it?"
"DO with it? He can hide it in his bed, can't he?" That's what they alldo; and HE'S got to, too. Huck, you don't ever seem to want to doanything that's regular; you want to be starting something fresh all thetime. S'pose he DON'T do nothing with it? ain't it there in his bed, fora clew, after he's gone? and don't you reckon they'll want clews? Ofcourse they will. And you wouldn't leave them any? That would be aPRETTY howdy-do, WOULDN'T it! I never heard of such a thing."
"Well," I says, "if it's in the regulations, and he's got to have it, allright, let him have it; because I don't wish to go back on noregulations; but there's one thing, Tom Sawyer--if we go to tearing upour sheets to make Jim a rope ladder, we're going to get into troublewith Aunt Sally, just as sure as you're born. Now, the way I look at it,a hickry-bark ladder don't cost nothing, and don't waste nothing, and isjust as good to load up a pie with, and hide in a straw tick, as any ragladder you can start; and as for Jim, he ain't had no experience, and sohe don't care what kind of a--"
"Oh, shucks, Huck Finn, if I was as ignorant as you I'd keep still--that's what I'D do. Who ever heard of a state prisoner escaping by ahickry-bark ladder? Why, it's perfectly ridiculous."
"Well, all right, Tom, fix it your own way; but if you'll take my advice,you'll let me borrow a sheet off of the clothesline."
He said that would do. And that gave him another idea, and he says:
"Borrow a shirt, too."
"What do we want of a shirt, Tom?"
"Want it for Jim to keep a journal on."
"Journal your granny--JIM can't write."
"S'pose he CAN'T write--he can make marks on the shirt, can't he, if wemake him a pen out of an old pewter spoon or a piece of an old ironbarrel-hoop?"
"Why, Tom, we can pull a feather out of a goose and make him a betterone; and quicker, too."
"PRISONERS don't have geese running around the donjon-keep to pull pensout of, you muggins. They ALWAYS make their pens out of the hardest,toughest, troublesomest piece of old brass candlestick or something likethat they can get their hands on; and it takes them weeks and weeks andmonths and months to file it out, too, because they've got to do it byrubbing it on the wall. THEY wouldn't use a goose-quill if they had it.It ain't regular."
"Well, then, what'll we make him the ink out of?"
"Many makes it out of iron-rust and tears; but that's the common sort andwomen; the best authorities uses their own blood. Jim can do that; andwhen he wants to send any little common ordinary mysterious message tolet the world know where he's captivated, he can write it on the bottomof a tin plate with a fork and throw it out of the window. The Iron Maskalways done that, and it's a blame' good way, too."
"Jim ain't got no tin plates. They feed him in a pan."
"That ain't nothing; we can get him some."
"Can't nobody READ his plates."
"That ain't got anything to DO with it, Huck Finn. All HE'S got to do isto write on the plate and throw it out. You don't HAVE to be able toread it. Why, half the time you can't read anything a prisoner writes ona tin plate, or anywhere else."
"Well, then, what's the sense in wasting the plates?"
"Why, blame it all, it ain't the PRISONER'S plates."
"But it's SOMEBODY'S plates, ain't it?"
"Well, spos'n it is? What does the PRISONER care whose--"
He broke off there, because we heard the breakfast-horn blowing. So wecleared out for the house.
Along during the morning I borrowed a sheet and a white shirt off of theclothes-line; and I found an old sack and put them in it, and we wentdown and got the fox
-fire, and put that in too. I called it borrowing,because that was what pap always called it; but Tom said it warn'tborrowing, it was stealing. He said we was representing prisoners; andprisoners don't care how they get a thing so they get it, and nobodydon't blame them for it, either. It ain't no crime in a prisoner tosteal the thing he needs to get away with, Tom said; it's his right; andso, as long as we was representing a prisoner, we had a perfect right tosteal anything on this place we had the least use for to get ourselvesout of prison with. He said if we warn't prisoners it would be a verydifferent thing, and nobody but a mean, ornery person would steal when hewarn't a prisoner. So we allowed we would steal everything there wasthat come handy. And yet he made a mighty fuss, one day, after that,when I stole a watermelon out of the nigger-patch and eat it; and he mademe go and give the niggers a dime without telling them what it was for.Tom said that what he meant was, we could steal anything we NEEDED. Well,I says, I needed the watermelon. But he said I didn't need it to get outof prison with; there's where the difference was. He said if I'd awanted it to hide a knife in, and smuggle it to Jim to kill the seneskalwith, it would a been all right. So I let it go at that, though Icouldn't see no advantage in my representing a prisoner if I got to setdown and chaw over a lot of gold-leaf distinctions like that every time Isee a chance to hog a watermelon.
Well, as I was saying, we waited that morning till everybody was settleddown to business, and nobody in sight around the yard; then Tom hecarried the sack into the lean-to whilst I stood off a piece to keepwatch. By and by he come out, and we went and set down on the woodpileto talk. He says:
"Everything's all right now except tools; and that's easy fixed."
"Tools?" I says.
"Yes."
"Tools for what?"
"Why, to dig with. We ain't a-going to GNAW him out, are we?"
"Ain't them old crippled picks and things in there good enough to dig anigger out with?" I says.
He turns on me, looking pitying enough to make a body cry, and says:
"Huck Finn, did you EVER hear of a prisoner having picks and shovels, andall the modern conveniences in his wardrobe to dig himself out with? NowI want to ask you--if you got any reasonableness in you at all--what kindof a show would THAT give him to be a hero? Why, they might as well lendhim the key and done with it. Picks and shovels--why, they wouldn'tfurnish 'em to a king."
"Well, then," I says, "if we don't want the picks and shovels, what do wewant?"
"A couple of case-knives."
"To dig the foundations out from under that cabin with?"
"Yes."
"Confound it, it's foolish, Tom."
"It don't make no difference how foolish it is, it's the RIGHT way--andit's the regular way. And there ain't no OTHER way, that ever I heardof, and I've read all the books that gives any information about thesethings. They always dig out with a case-knife--and not through dirt, mindyou; generly it's through solid rock. And it takes them weeks and weeksand weeks, and for ever and ever. Why, look at one of them prisoners inthe bottom dungeon of the Castle Deef, in the harbor of Marseilles, thatdug himself out that way; how long was HE at it, you reckon?"
"I don't know."
"Well, guess."
"I don't know. A month and a half."
"THIRTY-SEVEN YEAR--and he come out in China. THAT'S the kind. I wishthe bottom of THIS fortress was solid rock."
"JIM don't know nobody in China."
"What's THAT got to do with it? Neither did that other fellow. Butyou're always a-wandering off on a side issue. Why can't you stick tothe main point?"
"All right--I don't care where he comes out, so he COMES out; and Jimdon't, either, I reckon. But there's one thing, anyway--Jim's too old tobe dug out with a case-knife. He won't last."
"Yes he will LAST, too. You don't reckon it's going to take thirty-sevenyears to dig out through a DIRT foundation, do you?"
"How long will it take, Tom?"
"Well, we can't resk being as long as we ought to, because it mayn't takevery long for Uncle Silas to hear from down there by New Orleans. He'llhear Jim ain't from there. Then his next move will be to advertise Jim,or something like that. So we can't resk being as long digging him outas we ought to. By rights I reckon we ought to be a couple of years; butwe can't. Things being so uncertain, what I recommend is this: that wereally dig right in, as quick as we can; and after that, we can LET ON,to ourselves, that we was at it thirty-seven years. Then we can snatchhim out and rush him away the first time there's an alarm. Yes, I reckonthat 'll be the best way."
"Now, there's SENSE in that," I says. "Letting on don't cost nothing;letting on ain't no trouble; and if it's any object, I don't mind lettingon we was at it a hundred and fifty year. It wouldn't strain me none,after I got my hand in. So I'll mosey along now, and smouch a couple ofcase-knives."
"Smouch three," he says; "we want one to make a saw out of."
"Tom, if it ain't unregular and irreligious to sejest it," I says,"there's an old rusty saw-blade around yonder sticking under theweather-boarding behind the smoke-house."
He looked kind of weary and discouraged-like, and says:
"It ain't no use to try to learn you nothing, Huck. Run along and smouchthe knives--three of them." So I done it.
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