Halfway to town I saw a wagon coming, and sure enough, it was Tom Sawyer. When he saw me, his mouth fell open, and he swallowed two or three times.
“I never did you any harm. You know that. So why do you come back and haunt me?”
“I haven’t come back. I haven’t been gone.”
“Honestly, you aren’t a ghost?”
“Honestly, I’m not. I was never murdered at all. I played a trick on them. Come and touch me if you don’t believe me.”
So he did, and he was so glad to see me that he didn’t know what to do. I told him the trouble I was in. He thought for a while, and then he said:
“I’ve got it. Put my trunk in your wagon and say it’s yours. Drive back slowly. I’ll come to the house half an hour after you, and pretend you don’t know me.”
“All right. But there’s one more thing. There’s a slave here that I’m going to steal out of slavery, and it’s Jim, old Miss Watson’s Jim.”
“What! Why, Jim is—” He stopped and started thinking.
“I know what you’ll say. You’ll say it’s a low, dirty business. But I’m low, and I’m going to steal him, and I want you to keep quiet about it. Will you?”
His eyes lit up. “I’ll help you steal him!”
I was so shocked that I almost fell over. Tom Sawyer, a slave stealer! I have to say I thought a lot less of him after that. “You’re joking,” I said.
“I’m not joking.”
I took his trunk and drove home, but I was so happy that I forgot to drive slowly, and Uncle Silas was amazed at how fast his horse was. He was the most innocent, kindest old man I ever saw. He was a farmer and a preacher too, and he never took any money for his preaching.
Half an hour later Tom arrived in his good clothes. He had an audience, and Tom always loved an audience. He lifted his hat very politely and asked for a Mr. Archibald Nichols. Uncle Silas said Mr. Nichols lived three miles farther, and the boy had to stay for dinner first. Tom said he was William Thompson from Hicksville, Ohio, and talked and talked about Hicksville. And in the middle of it, he leaned over and kissed Aunt Sally right on the mouth.
She jumped up and wiped her mouth. “You rude boy! What do you mean by kissing me?”
He looked hurt. “I’m sorry, ma’am. They told me you would like it.”
“Who told you?”
“Everybody. But I won’t do it again—until you ask me.”
“Until I ask you! I never heard anything like it!”
Then he looked at me. “Tom, didn’t you think Aunt Sally would open her arms and say, ‘Sid Sawyer—’”
“My goodness!” she cried, and jumped up to hug him. But he held her off.
“No, not until you’ve asked me.”
So she asked him, and hugged and kissed him again and again. He said that Aunt Polly had let him come at the last minute, and the two of us had planned this surprise on the boat.
At supper one of the little boys asked if we could go to the show in town.
“No,” said Uncle Silas. “The runaway slave told a neighbor and me all about that awful show, and the neighbor said he would tell everybody. I think they have driven those men out of town by now.”
So the king and the duke were in danger. As soon as we went up to bed, Tom and I climbed out of the window and down the lightning rod and ran to town to warn them. On the way Tom told me that Pap had disappeared soon after my “murder” and never came back.
In town a crowd came rushing toward us with torches, shouting and yelling and banging on pans. We jumped to one side, and as they went by, I saw the king and the duke sitting on a rail that men carried on their shoulders. I knew it was them, though they were all covered in tar and feathers and didn’t look human at all. It made me sick to see it. I was sorry for those poor men, and I felt I could never be angry with them again. It was a terrible thing to see. Human beings can be terribly cruel to one another.
We were too late. We walked back home slowly, and I felt low and somehow to blame, though I hadn’t done anything. But that’s always the way. It doesn’t matter if you do right or wrong. A person’s conscience has no sense and makes him feel bad anyway. If I had a yellow dog that knew no more than a person’s conscience, I would poison him. It takes up more room than everything else inside a person, and it is no good at all. Tom Sawyer says the same.