The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Part 5.
by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)

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Title: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Part 5.

Author: Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)

Release Date: June 30, 2004 [EBook #7197]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TOM SAWYER ***

Produced by David Widger

THE ADVENTURES OF TOM SAWYER
BY
MARK TWAIN
(Samuel Langhorne Clemens)

Part 5

CHAPTER XVIII

THAT was Tom's great secret--the scheme to return home with his
brother pirates and attend their own funerals. They had paddled over to
the Missouri shore on a log, at dusk on Saturday, landing five or six
miles below the village; they had slept in the woods at the edge of the
town till nearly daylight, and had then crept through back lanes and
alleys and finished their sleep in the gallery of the church among a
chaos of invalided benches.

At breakfast, Monday morning, Aunt Polly and Mary were very loving to
Tom, and very attentive to his wants. There was an unusual amount of
talk. In the course of it Aunt Polly said:

"Well, I don't say it wasn't a fine joke, Tom, to keep everybody
suffering 'most a week so you boys had a good time, but it is a pity
you could be so hard-hearted as to let me suffer so. If you could come
over on a log to go to your funeral, you could have come over and give
me a hint some way that you warn't dead, but only run off."

"Yes, you could have done that, Tom," said Mary; "and I believe you
would if you had thought of it."

"Would you, Tom?" said Aunt Polly, her face lighting wistfully. "Say,
now, would you, if you'd thought of it?"

"I--well, I don't know. 'Twould 'a' spoiled everything."

"Tom, I hoped you loved me that much," said Aunt Polly, with a grieved
tone that discomforted the boy. "It would have been something if you'd
cared enough to THINK of it, even if you didn't DO it."

"Now, auntie, that ain't any harm," pleaded Mary; "it's only Tom's
giddy way--he is always in such a rush that he never thinks of
anything."

"