湯姆歷險記Chapter 14“海盜們”野外樂逍遙

  Chapter 14
      
      
        
            
      
   
    WHEN Tom awoke in the morning, he wondered where he was. He sat up and rubbed his
    eyes and looked around. Then he comprehended. It was the cool gray dawn, and there was a
    delicious sense of repose and peace in the deep pervading calm and silence of the woods.
    Not a leaf stirred; not a sound obtruded upon great Nature's meditation. Beaded dewdrops
    stood upon the leaves and grasses. A white layer of ashes covered the fire, and a thin
    blue breath of smoke rose straight into the air. Joe and Huck still slept.

    Now, far away in the woods a bird called; another answered; presently the hammering of
    a woodpecker was heard. Gradually the cool dim gray of the morning whitened, and as
    gradually sounds multiplied and life manifested itself. The marvel of Nature shaking off
    sleep and going to work unfolded itself to the musing boy. A little green worm came
    crawling over a dewy leaf, lifting two-thirds of his body into the air from time to time
    and "sniffing around," then proceeding again -- for he was measuring, Tom said;
    and when the worm approached him, of its own accord, he sat as still as a stone, with his
    hopes rising and falling, by turns, as the creature still came toward him or seemed
    inclined to go elsewhere; and when at last it considered a painful moment with its curved
    body in the air and then came decisively down upon Tom's leg and began a journey over him,
    his whole heart was glad -- for that meant that he was going to have a new suit of clothes
    -- without the shadow of a doubt a gaudy piratical uniform. Now a procession of ants
    appeared, from nowhere in particular, and went about their labors; one struggled manfully
    by with a dead spider five times as big as itself in its arms, and lugged it straight up a
    tree-trunk. A brown spotted lady-bug climbed the dizzy height of a grass blade, and Tom
    bent down close to it and said:

    "Lady-bug, lady-bug, fly away home, your house is on fire, your children's
    alone,"

    and she took wing and went off to see about it -- which did not surprise the boy, for
    he knew of old that this insect was credulous about conflagrations, and he had practised
    upon its simplicity more than once. A tumblebug came next, heaving sturdily at its ball,
    and Tom touched the creature, to see it shut its legs against its body and pretend to be
    dead. The birds were fairly rioting by this time. A catbird, the Northern mocker, lit in a
    tree over Tom's head, and trilled out her imitations of her neighbors in a rapture of
    enjoyment; then a shrill jay swept down, a flash of blue flame, and stopped on a twig
    almost within the boy's reach, cocked his head to one side and eyed the strangers with a
    consuming curiosity; a gray squirrel and a big fellow of the "fox" kind came
    skurrying along, sitting up at intervals to inspect and chatter at the boys, for the wild
    things had probably never seen a human being before and scarcely knew whether to be afraid
    or not. All Nature was wide awake and stirring, now; long lances of sunlight pierced down
    through the dense foliage far and near, and a few butterflies came fluttering upon the
    scene.

    Tom stirred up the other pirates and they all clattered away with a shout, and in a
    minute or two were stripped and chasing after and tumbling over each other in the shallow
    limpid water of the white sandbar. They felt no longing for the little village sleeping in
    the distance beyond the majestic waste of water. A vagrant current or a slight rise in the
    river had carried off their raft, but this only gratified them, since its going was
    something like burning the bridge between them and civilization.

    They came back to camp wonderfully refreshed, glad-hearted, and ravenous; and they soon
    had the camp-fire blazing up again. Huck found a spring of clear cold water close by, and
    the boys made cups of broad oak or hickory leaves, and felt that water, sweetened with
    such a wildwood charm as that, would be a good enough substitute for coffee. While Joe was
    slicing bacon for breakfast, Tom and Huck asked him to hold on a minute; they stepped to a
    promising nook in the river-bank and threw in their lines; almost immediately they had
    reward. Joe had not had time to get impatient before they were back again with some
    handsome bass, a couple of sun-perch and a small catfish -- provisions enough for quite a
    family. They fried the fish with the bacon, and were astonished; for no fish had ever
    seemed so delicious before. They did not know that the quicker a fresh-water fish is on
    the fire after he is caught the better he is; and they reflected little upon what a sauce
    open-air sleeping, open-air exercise, bathing, and a large ingredient of hunger make, too.

    They lay around in the shade, after breakfast, while Huck had a smoke, and then went
    off through the woods on an exploring expedition. They tramped gayly along, over decaying
    logs, through tangled underbrush, among solemn monarchs of the forest, hung from their
    crowns to the ground with a drooping regalia of grape-vines. Now and then they came upon
    snug nooks carpeted with grass and jeweled with flowers.

    They found plenty of things to be delighted with, but nothing to be astonished at. They
    discovered that the island was about three miles long and a quarter of a mile wide, and
    that the shore it lay closest to was only separated from it by a narrow channel hardly two
    hundred yards wide. They took a swim about every hour, so it was close upon the middle of
    the afternoon when they got back to camp. They were too hungry to stop to fish, but they
    fared sumptuously upon cold ham, and then threw themselves down in the shade to talk. But
    the talk soon began to drag, and then died. The stillness, the solemnity that brooded in
    the woods, and the sense of loneliness, began to tell upon the spirits of the boys. They
    fell to thinking. A sort of undefined longing crept upon them. This took dim shape,
    presently -- it was budding homesickness. Even Finn the Red-Handed was dreaming of his
    doorsteps and empty hogsheads. But they were all ashamed of their weakness, and none was
    brave enough to speak his thought.

    For some time, now, the boys had been dully conscious of a peculiar sound in the
    distance, just as one sometimes is of the ticking of a clock which he takes no distinct
    note of. But now this mysterious sound became more pronounced, and forced a recognition.
    The boys started, glanced at each other, and then each assumed a listening attitude. There
    was a long silence, profound and unbroken; then a deep, sullen boom came floating down out
    of the distance.

    "What is it!" exclaimed Joe, under his breath.

    "I wonder," said Tom in a whisper.

    "'Tain't thunder," said Huckleberry, in an awed tone, "becuz thunder
    --"

    "Hark!" said Tom. "Listen -- don't talk."

    They waited a time that seemed an age, and then the same muffled boom troubled the
    solemn hush.

    "Let's go and see."

    They sprang to their feet and hurried to the shore toward the town. They parted the
    bushes on the bank and peered out over the water. The little steam ferryboat was about a
    mile below the village, drifting with the current. Her broad deck seemed crowded with
    people. There were a great many skiffs rowing about or floating with the stream in the
    neighborhood of the ferryboat, but the boys could not determine what the men in them were
    doing. Presently a great jet of white smoke burst from the ferryboat's side, and as it
    expanded and rose in a lazy cloud, that same dull throb of sound was borne to the
    listeners again.

    "I know now!" exclaimed Tom; "somebody's drownded!"

    "That's it!" said Huck; "they done that last summer, when Bill Turner
    got drownded; they shoot a cannon over the water, and that makes him come up to the top.
    Yes, and they take loaves of bread and put quicksilver in 'em and set 'em afloat, and
    wherever there's anybody that's drownded, they'll float right there and stop."

    "Yes, I've heard about that," said Joe. "I wonder what makes the bread
    do that."

    "Oh, it ain't the bread, so much," said Tom; "I reckon it's mostly what
    they SAY over it before they start it out."

    "But they don't say anything over it," said Huck. "I've seen 'em and
    they don't."

    "Well, that's funny," said Tom. "But maybe they say it to themselves. Of
    course they do. Anybody might know that."

    The other boys agreed that there was reason in what Tom said, because an ignorant lump
    of bread, uninstructed by an incantation, could not be expected to act very intelligently
    when set upon an errand of such gravity.

    "By jings, I wish I was over there, now," said Joe.

    "I do too" said Huck "I'd give heaps to know who it is."

    The boys still listened and watched. Presently a revealing thought flashed through
    Tom's mind, and he exclaimed:

    "Boys, I know who's drownded -- it's us!"

    They felt like heroes in an instant. Here was a gorgeous triumph; they were missed;
    they were mourned; hearts were breaking on their account; tears were being shed; accusing
    memories of unkindness to these poor lost lads were rising up, and unavailing regrets and
    remorse were being indulged; and best of all, the departed were the talk of the whole
    town, and the envy of all the boys, as far as this dazzling notoriety was concerned. This
    was fine. It was worth while to be a pirate, after all.

    As twilight drew on, the ferryboat went back to her accustomed business and the skiffs
    disappeared. The pirates returned to camp. They were jubilant with vanity over their new
    grandeur and the illustrious trouble they were making. They caught fish, cooked supper and
    ate it, and then fell to guessing at what the village was thinking and saying about them;
    and the pictures they drew of the public distress on their account were gratifying to look
    upon -- from their point of view. But when the shadows of night closed them in, they
    gradually ceased to talk, and sat gazing into the fire, with their minds evidently
    wandering elsewhere. The excitement was gone, now, and Tom and Joe could not keep back
    thoughts of certain persons at home who were not enjoying this fine frolic as much as they
    were. Misgivings came; they grew troubled and unhappy; a sigh or two escaped, unawares. By
    and by Joe timidly ventured upon a roundabout "feeler" as to how the others
    might look upon a return to civilization -- not right now, but --

    Tom withered him with derision! Huck, being uncommitted as yet, joined in with Tom, and
    the waverer quickly "explained," and was glad to get out of the scrape with as
    little taint of chicken-hearted homesickness clinging to his garments as he could. Mutiny
    was effectually laid to rest for the moment.

    As the night deepened, Huck began to nod, and presently to snore. Joe followed next.
    Tom lay upon his elbow motionless, for some time, watching the two intently. At last he
    got up cautiously, on his knees, and went searching among the grass and the flickering
    reflections flung by the camp-fire. He picked up and inspected several large
    semi-cylinders of the thin white bark of a sycamore, and finally chose two which seemed to
    suit him. Then he knelt by the fire and painfully wrote something upon each of these with
    his "red keel"; one he rolled up and put in his jacket pocket, and the other he
    put in Joe's hat and removed it to a little distance from the owner. And he also put into
    the hat certain schoolboy treasures of almost inestimable value -- among them a lump of
    chalk, an India-rubber ball, three fishhooks, and one of that kind of marbles known as a
    "sure 'nough crystal." Then he tiptoed his way cautiously among the trees till
    he felt that he was out of hearing, and straightway broke into a keen run in the direction
    of the sandbar.