We stopped talking and started thinking. After a while Tom said:
“Huck, what fools we are! I bet I know where Jim is. In that hut by the ash hopper. At dinner, didn’t you see a man take some food in there? Part of it was watermelon, and dogs don’t eat watermelon. And he unlocked the door when he went in and locked it again when he came out. The watermelon means there’s a man in there, and the lock means he’s a prisoner. Jim’s the prisoner. Now you think up a plan to steal him, and I’ll think up one too, and we’ll take the one we like best.”
What a head for a boy to have! I started thinking of a plan too, but I knew where the right plan was going to come from.
“My plan is this,” I said. “We find out if it’s really Jim in there. Then we bring the raft over from the island. On the first dark night we steal the key out of the old man’s pants while he sleeps, and we float down the river with Jim, hiding by day and traveling by night, the way Jim and I did before.”
“Of course it would work. But it’s too simple. There’s nothing to it. What’s the good of a plan that’s no more trouble than that?”
Then he told me his plan, and I saw right away that it was worth fifteen of mine for style. It would make Jim just as free as mine would, and maybe get us all killed too. So I was satisfied.
But one thing I couldn’t understand. Tom was a respectable boy, well brought up, with a good name to lose, and he was really going to help steal a slave and bring shame on himself and his family in front of everybody. I knew I ought to tell him so, like a true friend. I started to, but he stopped me.
“Don’t you think I know what I’m doing? Didn’t I say I was going to help steal him?”
“Yes.”
“Well, then.”
That was all he said, and that was all I said.
When we got home, the house was dark, so we went down to look at the hut. On one side there was a window hole with one board nailed across it. I said Jim could get through it if we pulled off the board, but Tom said that was as easy as a children’s game, and he hoped we could find something a little more difficult. Behind the hut there was a narrow shed made of boards, with a lock on the door. Tom got the lock open, and we went in and lit a match. It had a dirt floor, and there was nothing inside except some old rusty tools. Tom was full of joy.
“Now we’re all right. We’ll dig him out! It’ll take about a week!”
Early the next morning we went down to the slaves’ cabins to make friends with the man who fed Jim. His hair was tied up in little bunches with thread to keep the witches away. He said the witches were giving him an awful time lately.
“What’s the food for?” Tom asked. “The dogs?”
The man smiled slowly. “Yes, Master Sid, a dog. A strange dog, too. Do you want to go and see him?”
So we went in with him. It was very dark inside, but Jim could see us, and he called out:
“Why, Huck! And goodness! Isn’t that Master Tom?”
“Why, does he know you gentlemen?” the man asked.
Tom looked at him, surprised. “Does who know us? Did you hear anybody call out, Huck?”
“No,” I said. “I didn’t hear anybody say anything.”
Tom turned to Jim and looked at him as if he had never seen him before. “Did you call out?”
“No, sir,” said Jim. “I didn’t say anything, sir.”
“Did you ever see us before?”
“No, sir, not that I know of.”
The man looked wild and unhappy. “Oh, it’s those witches again. I wish I was dead. Please don’t tell anybody, sir, or old Master Silas will scold me, because he says there aren’t any witches.”
Tom gave him a dime and promised not to tell. While the man went to the door to bite the dime and see if it was good, Tom whispered to Jim:
“Don’t ever show that you know us. If you hear digging at night, it’s us. We’re going to set you free.”
Jim only had time to grab our hands and squeeze them before the man came back.