There was another long, horrible wait; then there
was a flash, and I see Tom’s head sink down outside
the boat and disappear. He was on the rope-ladder
that dangled down in the air from the gunnel. The
professor let off a shout and jumped for him, and
straight off it was pitch-dark again, and Jim groaned
out, “Po’ Mars Tom, he’s a goner!” and made a
jump for the professor, but the professor warn’t there.
Then we heard a couple of terrible screams, and then
another not so loud, and then another that was ‘way
below, and you could only JUST hear it; and I heard
Jim say, “Po’ Mars Tom!”
Then it was awful still, and I reckon a person could
‘a’ counted four thousand before the next flash come.
When it come I see Jim on his knees, with his arms
on the locker and his face buried in them, and he was
crying. Before I could look over the edge it was all
dark again, and I was glad, because I didn’t want to
see. But when the next flash come, I was watching,
and down there I see somebody a-swinging in the wind
on the ladder, and it was Tom!
“Come up!” I shouts; “come up, Tom!”
His voice was so weak, and the wind roared so, I
couldn’t make out what he said, but I thought he asked
was the professor up there. I shouts:
“No, he’s down in the ocean! Come up! Can
we help you?”
Of course, all this in the dark.
“Huck, who is you hollerin’ at?”
“I’m hollerin’ at Tom.”
“Oh, Huck, how kin you act so, when you know
po’ Mars Tom –” Then he let off an awful scream,
and flung his head and his arms back and let off another
one, because there was a white glare just then, and he
had raised up his face just in time to see Tom’s, as
white as snow, rise above the gunnel and look him right
in the eye. He thought it was Tom’s ghost, you
see.
Tom clumb aboard, and when Jim found it WAS him,
and not his ghost, he hugged him, and called him all
sorts of loving names, and carried on like he was gone
crazy, he was so glad. Says I:
“What did you wait for, Tom? Why didn’t you
come up at first?”
“I dasn’t, Huck. I knowed somebody plunged
down past me, but I didn’t know who it was in the
dark. It could ‘a’ been you, it could ‘a’ been Jim.”
That was the way with Tom Sawyer — always sound.
He warn’t coming up till he knowed where the pro-
fessor was.
The storm let go about this time with all its might;
and it was dreadful the way the thunder boomed and
tore, and the lightning glared out, and the wind sung
and screamed in the rigging, and the rain come down.
One second you couldn’t see your hand before you,
and the next you could count the threads in your coat-
sleeve, and see a whole wide desert of waves pitching
and tossing through a kind of veil of rain. A storm
like that is the loveliest thing there is, but it ain’t at its
best when you are up in the sky and lost, and it’s wet
and lonesome, and there’s just been a death in the
family.
We set there huddled up in the bow, and talked low
about the poor professor; and everybody was sorry
for him, and sorry the world had made fun of him and
treated him so harsh, when he was doing the best he
could, and hadn’t a friend nor nobody to encourage
him and keep him from brooding his mind away and
going deranged. There was plenty of clothes and
blankets and everything at the other end, but we
thought we’d ruther take the rain than go meddling
back there.
CHAPTER V.
LAND
WE tried to make some plans, but we couldn’t come
to no agreement. Me and Jim was for turning
around and going back home, but Tom allowed that
by the time daylight come, so we could see our way,