The Adventures of Tom Sawyer: Chapter 07-08

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain, Chapter seven,
Tick Running and a heart Break. The harder Tom tried
to fasten his mind on his book, the more his
ideas wandered. So at last, with a sigh and a yawn,
he gave it up. It seemed to him that the
noon recess would never come. The air was utterly dead.

(00:24):
There was not a breath stirring. It was the sleepiest
of sleepy days. The drowsing murmur of the five and
twenty studying scholars soothed the soul, like the spell that
is in the murmur of bees away off in the
flaming sunshine, cart of hill lifted its soft green sides
through a shimmering veil of heat tinted with the purple

(00:46):
of distance. A few birds floated on lazy wing high
in the air. No other living thing was visible but
some cows, and they were asleep. Tom's heart ached to
be free, or else to have something of interest to
do to pass the dreary time. His hand wandered into
his pocket, and his face lit up with a glow

(01:08):
of gratitude That was prayer, though he did not know it.
Then furtively the percussion cat box came out, He released
the tick and put him on the long flat desk.
The creature probably glowed with a gratitude that amounted to
prayer too at this moment, but it was premature, for
when he started thankfully to travel off, Tom turned him

(01:29):
aside with a pin and made him take a new direction.
Tom's bosom friend sat next him, suffering just as Tom
had been, and now he was deeply and gratefully interested
in this entertainment in an instant. This bosom friend was
Joe Harper. The two boys were sworn friends all the
week and embattled enemies on Saturdays. Joe took a pin

(01:50):
out of his lapel and began to assist in exercising
the prisoner. The sport grew in interest momently. Soon Tom
said that they were interfering with each other and neither
getting the fullest benefit of the tick. So he put
Joe's slate on the desk and drew a line down
the middle of it from top to bottom. Now, said he,
as long as he is on your side, you can

(02:10):
stir him up and I'll let him alone. But if
you let him get away and get on my side,
you're to leave him alone. As long as I can
keep him from crossing over all right, go ahead, start
him up. The tick escaped from Tom presently and crossed
the equator. Joe harassed him awhile, and then he got
away and crossed back again. This change of bass occurred often.

(02:32):
While one boy was worrying the tick with absorbing interest,
the other would look on with interest as strong. The
two heads bowed together over the slate, and the two
souls dead to all things else. At last, luck seemed
to settle and abide with Joe. The tick tried this, that,
and the other course, and got as excited and as
anxious as the boys themselves. But time and again, just

(02:53):
as he would have victory in his very grasp, so
to speak, and Tom's fingers would be twitching to begin,
Joe's pin would deftly head him off and keep possession.
At last, Tom could stand it no longer. The temptation
was too strong, so he reached out and leant a
hand with his pin. Joe was angry in a moment,
said he Tom, you let him alone. I only just

(03:14):
want to stir him up a little. Joe, No, sir,
it ain't fair you just let him alone. Blame it?
I ain't goin to stir him much. Let him alone,
I tell you, well, I won't, you shall. He's on
my side of the line. Look here, Joe Harper, Who's
is that tick? I don't care whose tick he is.
He's on my side of the line, and you shan't
touch him. Well, I'll just bet I will though he's

(03:37):
my tick, and I'll do what I blame. Please with
him or die. A tremendous whack came down on Tom's shoulders,
and it's duplicate on Joe's, and for the space of
two minutes, the dust continued to fly from the two jackets,
and the whole school to enjoy it. The boys had
been too absorbed to notice the hush that had stolen
upon the school a while before. When the Master came
tiptoeing down the room and stood over them, he had

(04:00):
contemplated a good part of the performance before he contributed
his bit of variety to it. When school broke up
at noon, Tom flew to Becky Thatcher and whispered in
her ear, put on your bonnet and let on your
going home. And when you get to the corner, give
the rest of them the slip and turn down through
the lane and come back. I'll go the other way
and commit over them the same way. So the one

(04:23):
went off with one group of scholars and the other
with another. In a little while, the two met at
the bottom of the lane, and when they reached the
school they had it all to themselves. Then they sat
together with a slate before them, and Tom gave Becky
the pencil and held her hand in his guiding it,
and so created another surprising house. When the interest in

(04:43):
art began to wane, the two fell to talking. Tom
was swimming in bliss. He said, do you love rats? No?
I hate them. Well I do too, live ones, but
I mean dead ones to swing round your head with
a string. No, I don't care for much anyway. What
I like is chewing gum. Oh, I should say, so,

(05:05):
I wish I had some, Now do you? I've got some.
I'll let you chew it awhile, but you must give
it back to me. That was agreeable, So they chewed it,
turn about and dangled their legs against the bench in
excess of contentment. Was you ever at a circus? Said Tom? Yes,
And my PAW's going to take me again sometime if

(05:25):
I'm good. I've been to the circus three or four times,
lots of times. Church ain't shucks to a circus. There's
things going on at circus all the time. I'm going
to be a clown in a circus when I grow up.
Oh are you? That will be nice. They're so lovely,
all spotted up. Yes, that's so. And they get slathers
of money, most a dollar a day. Ben Rogers says, say, Becky,

(05:49):
was you ever engaged? What's that? Why? Engaged to be married? No?
Would you like to? I reckon? So? I don't know
what is it like like? Why it ain't like anything?
You only just tell a boy you won't ever have
anybody but him, ever, ever, ever? And then you kiss,
and that's all anybody can do it? Kiss? What do

(06:12):
you kiss for? Why? That? You know? Is too well?
They always do that, everybody? Why, yes, everybody that's in
love with each other? Do you remember what I wrote
on the slate? Yes? What was it? I shan't tell you?
Shall I tell you? Yes? But some other time? No? Now? No,

(06:37):
not now tomorrow? Oh no, now, please, Becky, I'll whisper it.
I'll whisper it ever so easy, Becky, hesitating, Tom took
silence for consent, and passed his arm about her waist
and whispered the tail ever so softly, with his mouth
close to her ear. And then he added, now you
whisper it to me just the same. She resists, did

(07:00):
for a while, and then said, you turn your face
away so you can't see, and then I will. But
you mustn't ever tell anybody, will you, Tom? Now you won't,
will you? No? Indeed, indeed I won't. Now, Becky, He
turned his face away, and she bent timidly around till
her breath stirred his curls, and whispered, I love you.

(07:22):
Then she sprang away and ran around and around the
desks and benches, with Tom after her, and took refuge
in a corner. At last, with her little white apron
into her face, Tom clasped her about her neck and pleaded, now, Becky,
it's all done, all over, but the kiss. Don't you
be afraid of that? It ain't anything at all, please Becky,
And he tugged at her apron in the hands, by

(07:44):
and by she gave up and let her hands drop,
Her face all glowing with a struggle, came up and submitted.
Tom kissed the red lips and said, now it's all done, Becky,
and always after this. You know you ain't ever to
love anybody but me, and you ain't ever to marry
anybody but me, never, never and forever will you. No,
I'll never love anybody but you, Tom, And I'll never

(08:07):
marry anybody but you. And you ain't to ever marry
anybody but me either, certainly, of course, that's part of it.
And always coming to school or when we're going home,
you're to walk with me when there ain't anybody looking,
and you choose me, and I choose you at parties
because that's the way you do when you're engaged. It's

(08:28):
so nice. I never heard of it before. Oh it's
ever so gay? Why me and Amy? Lawrence the big
eyes told Tom his blunder and he stopped confused. Oh, Tom,
then I ain't the first you've ever been engaged to.
The child began to cry, and Tom said, oh, don't cry, Becky.
I don't care for her any more. Yes you do, Tom,

(08:49):
you know you do. Tom tried to put his arm
about her neck, but she pushed him away and turned
her face to the wall and went on crying. Tom
tried again with soothing words in his mouth, and was
repulse again. Then his pride was up, and he strode
away and went outside. He stood about, restless and uneasy
for a while, glancing at the door every now and then,
hoping she would repent and come to find him. But

(09:12):
she did not. Then he began to feel badly and
fear that he was in the wrong. It was a
hard struggle with him to make new advances now, but
he nerved himself to it and entered. She was still
standing back there in the corner, sobbing, with her face
to the wall. Tom's heart smote him. He went to
her and stood a moment, not knowing exactly how to proceed.

(09:33):
Then he said, hesitatingly, Becky, I I don't care for anybody,
but you no reply, but sobs Becky. Pleadingly, Becky, won't
you say something more? Sobs? Tom got out his chiefest jewel,
a brass knob from the top of an andiron, and

(09:54):
passed it around her so that she could see it,
and said, please, Becky, won't you take it? She struck
it to the floor. Then Tom marched out of the
house and over the hills and far away to return
to school. No more that day. Presently, Becky began to suspect.
She ran to the door, he was not in sight.
She flew around the playyard, he was not there. Then

(10:16):
she called Tom, come back. Tom. She listened intently, but
there was no answer. She had no companions but silence
and loneliness. So she sat down to cry again and
upbraid herself. And by this time the scholars began to
gather again, and she had to hide her griefs and
still her broken heart, and take up the cross of

(10:36):
a long, dreary, aching afternoon, with none among the strangers
about her to exchange sorrows with. End of chapter seven,
Chapter eight, a pirate bold to be Tom dodged hither
and thither through lanes until he was well out of
the track of returning scholars, and then fell into a

(10:57):
moody jog. He crossed a small branch two or three
times because of a prevailing juvenile superstition that to cross
water baffleds pursuit. Half an hour later he was disappearing
behind the Douglas mansion on the summit of Cardiff Hill,
and the schoolhouse was hardly distinguishable away off in the
valley behind him. He entered a dense wood, picked his

(11:19):
pathless way to the center of it, and sat down
on a mossy spot under a spreading oak. There was
not even a zephyr stirring the dead noonday heat had
even stilled the songs of the birds. Nature lay in
a trance that was broken by no sound but the
occasional far off hammering of a woodpecker, and this seemed
to render the pervading silence and sense of loneliness the

(11:41):
more profound. The boy's soul was steeped and melancholy. His
feelings were in happy accord with his surroundings. He sat
long with his elbows on his knees and his chin
in his hands, meditating. It seemed to him that life
was but a trouble at best, and he more than
half envy Jimmy Hodges so lately released. It must be

(12:03):
very peaceful, he thought, to lie and slumber and dream
forever and ever, with the wind whispering through the trees
and caressing the grass and the flowers over the grave,
and nothing to bother and grieve about ever any more.
If he only had a clean Sunday school record, he
could be willing to go and be done with it
all Now, As to this girl, what had he done? Nothing?

(12:27):
He had meant the best in the world, and been
treated like a dog, like a very dog. She would
be sorry some day, maybe when it was too late. Ah,
if he could only die temporarily. But the elastic heart
of youth cannot be compressed into one constrained shape long
at any time. Tom presently began to drift insensibly back

(12:48):
into the concerns of this life again. What if he
turned his back now and disappeared mysteriously? What if he
went away ever so far away, into unknown countries, beyond
the seas, and never came back any more? How would
she feel? Then? The idea of being a clown recurred
to him now, only to fill him with disgust, for

(13:10):
frivolity and jokes and spotted tights were an offense when
they intruded themselves upon a spirit that was exalted into
the vague, august realm of the romantic. No, he would
be a soldier and return after long years, all war
worn and illustrious. No better still, he would join the
Indians and hunt buffaloes, and go on the war path

(13:33):
in the mountain ranges and the trackless great plains of
the far west, and away in the future, come back
a great chief, bristling with feathers, hideous with paint, and
prance into Sunday school some drowsy summer morning, with a
blood curling war whoop, and sear the eyeballs of all
his companions with unappeaceable envy. But no, there was something

(13:56):
gaudier even than this. He would be airates, that was it.
Now his future lay plain before him and glowing with
unimaginable splendor. How his name would fill the world and
make people shudder. How gloriously he would go plowing the
dancing seas in his long, low, black hulled racer, the

(14:18):
spirit of the storm, with his grisly flag flying at
the fore and at the zenith of his fame. How
he would suddenly appear at the old village and stalk
into church, brown and weather beaten, in his black velvet
doublet and trunks, his great jack boots, his crimson sash,
his belt bristling with horse pistols, his crime rusted cutlass

(14:40):
at his side, his slouch hat with waving plumes, his
black flag unfurled with the skull and crossbones on it.
And here with swelling ecstasy. The whisperings, it's Tom Sawyer,
the pirate, the black avenger of the Spanish main. Yes,
it was settled. His career was determined. He would run

(15:00):
away from home and enter upon it. He would start
the very next morning. Therefore, he must now begin to
get ready. He would collect his resources together. He went
to a rotten log near at hand, and began to
dig under one end of it with his barlow knife.
He soon struck wood that sounded hollow. He put his
hand there and uttered this incantation impressively, What hasn't come here? Come?

(15:25):
What's here? Stay here? Then he scraped away the dirt
and exposed a pine shingle. He took it up and
disclosed a shapely little treasure house, whose bottom and sides
were of shingles. In it lay a marble. Tom's astonishment
was boundless. He scratched his head with perplexed air, and said, well,

(15:46):
that beats anything. Then he tossed the marble away pettishly
and stood cogitating. The truth was that a superstition of
his had failed here, which he and all his comrades
had always looked upon as infallible. If you buried a
marble with certain necessary incantations, and left it alone a fortnight,
and then opened the place with the incantation he had

(16:07):
just used. You would find that all the marbles you
had ever lost had gathered themselves together there meantime, no
matter how widely they had been separated. But now this
thing had actually and unquestionably failed. Tom's whole structure of
faith was shaken to its foundations. He had many a
time heard of this thing succeeding, but never of its

(16:29):
failing before. It did not occur to him that he
had tried it several times before himself, but could never
find the hiding places. Afterward, he puzzled over the matter
some time, and finally decided that some witch had interfered
and broken the charm. He thought he would satisfy himself
on that point, so he searched around till he found
a small sandy spot with a little funnel shaped depression

(16:50):
in it. He laid himself down and put his mouth
close to this depression, and called, doodle bug, doodle bug,
tell me what I want to know. Doodle bug, doodle bug,
tell me what I want to know. The sand began
to work, and presently a small black bug appeared for
a second and then darted under again in a fright.
He doesn't tell, so it was a witch that had

(17:12):
done it, I just noted it. He well knew the
futility of trying to contend against witches, so he gave up, discouraged.
But it occurred to him that he might as well
have the marble he had just thrown away, And therefore
he went and made a patient search for it. But
he could not find it. Now he went back to
his treasure house and carefully placed himself just as he

(17:33):
had been standing when he tossed the marble away. Then
he took another marble from his pocket and tossed it
in the same way, saying, brother, go find your brother.
He watched where it stopped, and went there and looked.
But it must have fallen short or gone too far,
so he tried twice more. The last repetition was successful.
The two marbles lay within a foot of each other.

(17:55):
Just here, the blast of a toy tin trumpet came
faintly down the green aisles of the forest. Tom flung
off his jacket and trousers, turned a suspender into a belt,
raked away some brush behind the rotten log, disclosing a
rude bow and arrow, a lath sword, and a tin trumpet,
and in a moment had seized these things and bounded away,
bare legged with fluttering shirt. He presently halted under a

(18:18):
great elm blew an answering blast, and then began to
tiptoe and look wearily out this way and that. He
said cautiously to an imaginary company, Hold my merry men,
keep hid till I blow. Now appeared Joe Harper, as
airily clad and elaborately armed as Tom Tom called, hold
who comes into sherwood forest without my pass? Guy of

(18:41):
Geeseborne wants no man's pass? Who art thou that that
dares to hold such language? Said Tom, prompting, for they
talked by the book from memory. Who art thou that
darest to hold such language? Ay? Indeed I am Robin Hood,
as thy caate of Carcass soon shall know. Then are
thou indeed that famous outlaw? Right? Gladly will I dispute

(19:03):
with thee the passes of the merry wood have at thee.
They took their lath swords, dumped their other traps on
the ground, and struck a fencing attitude foot to foot
and began a grave, careful combat, two up and two down.
Presently Tom said, now, if you've got the hang, go
it lively. So they went it lively, panting and perspiring

(19:24):
with the work. By and by Tom shouted, fall fall.
Why don't you fall? I sha'n't. Why don't you fall yourself?
You're getting the worst of it. Why that ain't anything?
I can't fall? That ain't the way it is in
the book. The book says. Then with one black handed
stroke he slew, poor guy of Gisbourne. You're to turn

(19:45):
round and let me hit you on the back. There
was no getting around the authorities. So Joe turned, received
the whack and fell. Now said Joe, getting up, you
got to let me kill you. That's fair. Why I
can't do that? It ain't in the book. Well it's
blamed mean, that's all. Well, say Joe. You can be
Friar Tuck or or much the miller's son and lam

(20:07):
me with a quarter staff. Or I'll be the Sheriff
of Nottingham and you be Robin Hood a little while
and kill me. This was satisfactory, and so these adventures
were carried out. Then Tom became Robin Hood again, and
was allowed by the treacherous nun to bleed his strength
away through his neglected wound. And at last Joe, representing
a whole tribe of weeping outlaws, dragged him sadly forth,

(20:30):
gave his bow into his feeble hands, and Tom said,
where this arrow falls, there very poor robin Hood under
the greenwood tree. Then he shot the arrow and fell
back and would have died, but he lit on a
nettle and sprang up too gaily for a corpse. The
boys dressed themselves, hid their accouterments, and went off, grieving

(20:52):
that there were no outlaws any more, and wondering what
modern civilization could claim to have done to compensate for
their loss. They said they would rather be outlaws a
year in Sherwood Forest than president of the United States forever.
End of Chapter eight