“Huck, chile … I been lookin’ all over.…”
I turned and it’s Jim, with his clothes all scorched and his hair and eyebrows frizzled by fire.
“Jim.… You ain’t hurt are you?”
“Naw, jest baked some. Das some kinder fire.”
“Did you see Pap?”
“He never come out, Huck,” he says. “I seen de start. It happen right in de hotel down de hall, yo’ Pap’s room I reckon. Soon’s I smell de smoke I open de door an’ de ender de hall ain’t nothin’ but fire. I never coulder got to him, Huck. I jest grab de money we got hid under de flo’ an’ run down de stairs to git away. Dat fire de hungries’ I ever seen, jest leapin’ from one place to de nex’ while I’se lookin’. I reckon a heaper folks been burned.”
There ain’t no way I can ever be sure, but I bet Pap stuffed his pipe with the tobacco I give him and lit it then flopped on the bed drunk and fell asleep with it in his hand, so his bed would of been the first thing to catch alight and him too drunk to know. Now I’m an orphan all over again only this time it’s true, but I ain’t got no tears to shed, not any more.
Me and Jim went away from the fire and rested up in someone’s yard till dawn. There’s still smoke in the air but when we went back to the fire it ain’t nothing but charred bricks and embers with smoke curling out of it, real ugly looking.
“Jim,” says I, “you and me are going to pay a visit on Miles Wyeth.”
“Wait on, Huck. Now de time to do what we was fixin’ to do when we got lef’ on de Ant’lope. Dey goin’ to figure we burned up in de fire. We kin jest skedaddle an’ de Corneycopey gang ain’t goin’ to give us trouble no mo’.”
“We ain’t running another step, Jim. I got a plan hatched in my head that’ll fix things fine.”
He’s doubtful till I told him the plan, then says maybe it’ll work and maybe it won’t, but it’s worth the risk anyway, and we went directly to the St. James Hotel. I seen Manuel in his bellboy uniform in the lobby and he come hurrying over.
“Why are you here?” he whispers, real anxious.
“To put a ring through the bulldog’s nose.”
“But he does not stay here.”
“I know, but Wyeth does.”
“Why do you come to him? He is your enemy also, no?”
“Manuel,” says I, “sometimes you got to get friendly with spiders to catch flies.”
We went up and I knocked on the door. Portiss opened it and says:
“What brings you here, squirt?”
“I know who done the betraying.”
He let us in and went in another room, then come back and showed us through. Miles is in a fancy robe and sat at the same little table where Grace fed me. He’s halfway through breakfast and mopping his chin with a napkin, and he come straight to the point.
“Who is it?”
“I ain’t telling you till you make a deal with me.”
“What kind of deal might that be?”
“The kind that gets Bulldog Barrett off my back once and for all.”
“You’re talking gibberish, Finn. Tell me the name.”
“I ain’t going to till you make the deal.”
“What does this deal have to do with Barrett?”
“The man that sold you out is the one that done the judge’s murder.”
He poured himself coffee but never offered us none.
“I’m still listening,” he says, sipping dainty. I just don’t know how Grace could of stayed with him all that time.
“If I give you the name you got to promise me the bulldog can arrest him for murder and take him for trial and clear my name, and you got to bring in a reporter from the biggest newspaper in town for a witness. I ain’t taking no chances.”
“Don’t talk like a fool. I can’t have reporters knowing my business.”
“I ain’t going to talk about the Corneycopey Company or ship robbing.”
“Why should I do this for you, Finn? I don’t give a damn if you murdered the judge or not.”
“You do what I want and I’ll tell you where Grace is.”
“I could have Portiss beat the facts from you.”
“I reckon you could and would, but if you help Bulldog catch him that’s nameless you’ll get your name in the papers for being a real solid citizen, and that’s something I figure you’d like a whole lot.”
He picks up a piece of toast cut three sided and nibbles awhile like a rabbit, then turns to Portiss and says:
“Get Chauncey Barrett and a reporter from the Bulletin here. Tell them it’s to do with the arrest of Judge … what was his name?”
“Thatcher,” says I.
“Judge Thatcher’s murderer. I want them here in one hour.”
It never took that long. They come like bees to honey, and I listened at a keyhole from another room while Miles got them sat down and offered biscuits and coffee, but they ain’t interested.
“What is this about, Mr. Wyeth?” says Bulldog. “I hope you don’t intend presenting me with yet another sighting of Finn. I receive around twenty a day, placing him anywhere from a hotel around the corner from my own to the North Pole.”
“He’s in neither of those places, Mr. Barrett, in fact he’s in the next room. Come in will you, Huckleberry.”
I come through the door with a swagger and the bulldog and the reporter both jumped up like they sat on porcupines, and guess who the reporter is; Orville Treece that we met on Miles’s ferry.
“You …” he says, but the bulldog elbowed him out of the way.
“Huckleberry Finn, I arrest you for the murder of Judge Caleb Thatcher in Missouri!” he hollers.
“The Bulletin will pay you a handsome sum for an interview, Mr. Finn!” gabbles Treece.
“Sit yourselfs back down again, gents,” says I, holding up my hands for hush. “I aim to tell you a long story, but while I’m doing it, Mr. Wyeth, sir, I reckon it’s a good idea if you send Mr. Portiss to find the whereabouts of a whore called Hattie the Trout.”
36
Close to the Rug—The Truth Will Out—The Wages of Sin—Vindication!—Goodbye, America
I got to skip a whole heap of talk and planning here, but two nights later I’m in a room in a waterfront whorehouse called Mae’s. Hattie the Trout is sat in a chair but I can’t see too much of her on account of I’m on the floor under the bed, and there’s a pistol in my hand. Comes a knock on the door and Hattie got up to answer it. In come a pair of muddy boots and Morg’s voice says:
“What’s all this about a message you got for me?”
“Shut the door,” she says. “Better lock it too.”
He done it and says:
“Well, what’s the message, or maybe you just never wanted to wait for me to come around at the regular time, is that it?”
“There’s a message,” she says, “but first take a seat.”
He done it and she says:
“Are you armed, Morg? You know Mae won’t allow guns in the house.”
“No, I ain’t. Should I be? Wyeth’s men ain’t onto me are they?” he says, sounding alarmful.
“It’s nothing to do with them,” she says. “The message is something bigger than you could find in this town, so big it could scarce be contained in all the wide world.”
“What the hell are you yapping about? You ain’t yourself, Hattie.”
“No I’m not,” she says. “I am a changed woman, changed forever.”
“You don’t look no different to me,” he says.
“The change is within me, and can be within you too if only you will listen to the message, Morg.”
“Aawww hell, Hattie, you ain’t gone and got religion have you?”
“Verily I have,” says she, sounding real holy, “and from this day forth I shall live a life of purity and obedience to the wishes of the Lord.”
“I ain’t hearing straight … I can’t be.… You ain’t truly seen the holy light have you, Hattie? I come here expecting … well, the regular
. You ain’t about to close them pretty legs permanent I hope.”
“Alas, you poor sinner, the fleshly appetites still have you in their foul grip. I shall pray for you this instant, for murderers and fornicators must have need of prayer if they are to reach the kingdom of heaven.”
“Murderers?… Who says I’m a murderer!”
“Deny it not, Morg, for your very soul is at stake.”
Hattie told me she always wanted to be an actress but turned to whoring because the wages is better, and I can see she’s got a real talent for the stage. Now she’s on her knees praying, and Morg says:
“I ain’t no murderer! Who told you I’m a murderer! I’ll kill him!”
“The truth came to me in a vision,” says Hattie, her voice all high and drifting. “I saw you and another man in a room at night, searching for something. A distinguished gentleman found you there and you … cut his throat. Oh, Morg, you must repent and be saved!”
“I ain’t repentin’ nothin’,” he says. “Who told you about the judge?”
“Is that what he was, a judge? How could you do such a wicked deed?”
“I never done nothin’,” he mumbles, then he stands up. “And I ain’t about to believe in no visions neither! Who told you about it? You better tell me quick or by jingo I’ll whale the truth out of you! I mean it, Hattie! Quit that danged praying and tell me who told you!”
“I done it!” says I, rolling out from under the bed and pointing the pistol at him. Hattie give a moan and acted a faint, and Morg just stood there with his mouth hung open.
“You …” he says.
“No one else,” says I.
“How’d you find me?…”
“I done some sniffing around for the biggest rat in town and you’re it.”
He looks down at Hattie, all crumpled in a heap and says:
“She turned me in.…”
“No she ain’t, Morg, just gone off her head with religion.”
“It don’t make no sense.… How come you’re here, you little runt! Did she know you was under that bed?”
“Yes and no. I told her I’m an angel that’s come down to make sure she don’t do no more sinning and she believed it. Like I say, she’s Bible-crazed.”
“But … how come she knows about the murder?”
“What murder’s that, Morg?”
“You know what I’m talkin’ about, runt. You told her.”
“Only so she had a chance to save your soul, Morg. I would of let her save mine but you and me know I ain’t done nothing wrong.”
“Hand over that gun,” he says.
“I can’t do it, Morg. You got to come with me to the governor and confess what you done so I can quit running.”
“You ain’t serious,” he says, smiling.
“I surely am, and don’t you make no move to get away or I’ll shoot.”
“Then you’ll be wanted for two murders,” he says, smiling wider.
“They can’t hang me but once,” says I.
“You kill me and they’ll surely do it, boy. I’m the only one that knows. I heard the Ophir burned down so I reckon ol’ Finn’s dead. There ain’t no one can clear you now except for me. Ain’t that right?”
“I reckon so, and if you got any decency you’ll do it.”
“Well, I ain’t,” he says, “and I dare you to pull that trigger. You ain’t got the gumption for it.”
He took a step toward me and I backed off a little.
“Don’t come no closer, Morg.…”
“I ain’t lettin’ you off no hook, boy,” he says, still coming. “The whole country figures you killed the judge and that suits me fine. I ain’t confessin’ to no governor.”
“Well, then,” says I, sounding afraid, “why don’t you confess to me?”
“Why should I do such a damnfool thing? You already know I done it, but it ain’t going to do you a peck of good, not even if you shout it from the rooftops.”
“That will not be necessary,” says Bulldog, stepping out from the wardrobe with his pistol aimed. “I arrest you for the murder of Judge Caleb Thatcher in Missouri.”
Orville Treece come out of the wardrobe too and was just about to offer Morg some handsome money for his life story when Morg swung around and flung himself through the window in a shower of glass. Bulldog fired a shot and Hattie screamed and Orville fell over her, then Bulldog’s out the window too and firing down the alley at Morg, who’s only fading footsteps now. Me and Orville got jammed trying to get through the window together, then we’re both outside in the mud and garbage and running along after the bulldog. He turned a corner and we followed around into another alley and seen him down the far end next to a body on the ground, so he must of hit Morg after all.
When we catched him up Bulldog is stood over the body and the legs is still kicking, but Morg ain’t fell prey to no pistol; his throat is cut ear to ear and pumping out buckets of blood while we watched. Then he’s dead. I reckon Miles must of put his men around Mae’s place to get Morg so’s he don’t do no babbling on the witness stand about the Corneycopey Company. Most likely it’s a warning to me too, and I aim to take it. My lips is sealed. Later on Miles wants to know where Grace is like I promised for the deal, so I told him honest and sincere how her and Randolph was in a hotel just down the street from the Ophir on the night of the big blaze and both of them got burned to cinders. I reckon he disbelieved me, but never called me a liar outright and we never come face to face again.
All that happened awhile back now. The story got put in the Bulletin and the presses run twenty-four hours a day for three days so all of California knows HUCK FINN IS INNOCENT! Governor Burnett himself invited me and Jim to stay in his home and says he wants a full and entire account of what happened, which is why this book got writ. Mae that runs the whorehouse got two thousand dollars for letting the bulldog set up a trap there and Hattie the Trout got one thousand, all paid by Miles, who’s running for Congress nowadays and likely to get there too. Ships is leaving San Francisco regular now with rich forty-niners as passengers and poor forty-niners as deckhands, and they say Bulldog Barrett has took to drink while he waits for a berth on one. He ain’t been the same man since he found I’m truly innocent and was obliged to give me an apology in front of the whole world. Proud men like him ain’t partial to the taste of humble pie, but for me the look on his face when he done the apology was sweet revenge, as the saying goes. Auberon Clitheroe that done Finn the Red Handed has writ another play that tells a heap more truth. It’s called Finn the Fearless or Unjustly Accused, but it’s still full of stuff that never happened, which is another reason I done the book. I ain’t stretched nothing, just told the facts the way I seen them. I was there all along so I know, and I want it all set down so’s folks can learn what happened, specially Tom Sawyer. He’ll be green when he sees all the adventures I had, bigger than anything he ever done.
Living in the governor’s house is quiet and peaceful after all we been through and him and his wife treats us both decent, even Jim, but Mrs. Burnett has got me in clothes that fit tight around the neck and boots that pinch my feet considerable, and we’re both getting a power of restlessness inside of us. Jim says he wants to go to Africa and see for himself if it’s true there’s nigger kings there, and I got a yearning for them South Sea islands and howling adventures among the cannibals. When the whalers start coming into San Francisco regular me and him has got a notion to sign on as sailors. Jim reckons he’ll be a harpooner and see if them fish is big enough to swaller a man like the Bible says about Jonah.
But while we wait to slide out, I got a heap of time to spend in remindfulness of people and places I knowed. Sometimes I think about Grace, and sometimes about the lovebirds or Frank’n’ Obadiah, but mainly it’s Thaddeus I got memories of. I hope he found somewhere in the mountains to live the way he wants, and carved Jim’s name and mine on one of them giant trees like he promised. Maybe right now he’s sat outside a log cabin way out in the lonesome yonder,
smoking his pipe and spitting and recollecting me.
Most days we ride out and look at the ocean, which is big and wide and stretches away forever. We aim to be gone by July thirty-second, Huck’n’Jim Day, which ain’t far off now, so
Goodbye,
yours truly,
Huck Finn
About the Author
Greg Matthews is the author of eleven books, including The Further Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, heralded by the Christian Science Monitor as “the true sequel to Twain’s masterpiece,” and two acclaimed sagas of the Old West, Heart of the Country and Power in the Blood. He has published three books—Callisto, The Dolphin People, and The Secret Book of Sacred Things—under the nom de plume Torsten Krol. The author describes himself as “a guy in a room, writing, writing.”
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1983 by Greg Matthews
Cover design by Andy Ross
ISBN: 978-1-5040-3487-6
This edition published in 2016 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.